Making the connection? Attitudes about women in politics and voting for women candidates

Abstract

Research on women candidates in the USA often considers the role that attitudes toward women in politics can play in shaping the electoral success of these candidates. However, besides anecdotal information about reactions to individual candidates, we lack systematic data that allow us to examine whether there is a link between the attitudes voters have about women in politics and their vote choice decisions when they are faced with a woman candidate. Relying on data from a two-wave panel survey of 3150 US adults in 2010, we test whether the political attitudes people hold are related to their voting decisions in mixed- sex (woman vs. man) races for the House of Representatives. We consider the role of attitudes alongside traditional political forces such as political party and incumbency and examine whether the party of the woman candidate is relevant. In all, we find that some attitudes about women in politics are related to voting for women candidates, but the relationships are not a central influence