And they’re off!!! The political parties have started what is going to be an intense election race full of hazards. But how will voters decide which horse to back?
Decision making research suggests that many people choose on the basis of habit and that this is so ingrained that political campaigns have little influence on them. But what about those that have not developed consistent political ‘habits’ such as floating and new voters – how will they decide? Contemporary research suggests that they approach the choice in very different ways.
A relatively small group of people will conduct a detailed analysis of the party manifestos – often referred to as rational or ‘head’ thinking. They will analyse the positions taken by each party in detail, weigh the information up and come to a reasoned choice.
However, the vast majority will use another approach, often referred to as ‘gut’ or ‘intuitive’ thinking. This approach is used because our capacity for thinking is limited. We rely on simple short cuts or rules of thumb that reduce the demand on our thinking by focusing on a very small amount of the available information, often processing this information in a simple or superficial way.
But which forms of intuitive thinking will be used during the election and what lessons can communicators learn from recent campaigns?
This depends in part on how people ‘frame’ their decision – that is how they make sense of the situation. Framing a decision in a particular way makes particular forms of intuitive thinking more or less likely to occur.
For example, there is evidence suggesting that the Labour Party campaign in 1997 tried to get the electorate to frame the choice in terms of the individual qualities of the party leaders, building a campaign that highlighted the ‘presidential’ credentials of Tony Blair. This increased the relevance of a form of thinking called ‘representativeness’ where people match information about people and events to knowledge they already have.
So, if people are persuaded to choose a ‘president’ rather than a party, then they choose the person who best matches their existing understanding of the key characteristics of a president. A successful political campaign encourages people to frame the political choice on the basis of which leader is more presidential. Similarly, campaigners should present information that demonstrates typical presidential characteristics.
While the current election campaign has only just started, we can already see differences between the major political parties in terms of how they are trying to frame the electorate’s choice.
The Conservative Party has focused squarely on Cameron as an individual as if they wish the choice to be conceptualised as Brown vs. Cameron. On the other hand, the Labour Party kicked off the campaign by including the whole Cabinet as if they wish the choice to be conceptualised as one team versus the other. The Liberal Democrats, however, seemed to opt for a middle ground, launching the campaign with leader Nick Clegg and its highest profile spokesperson Vince Cable.
It will be interesting to see whether this is a deliberate strategy and which, if any, becomes the predominant way that the electorate frames their voting decision. Regardless, the political campaigns need to appeal to both gut and head to ensure they’re first past the post.
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