Faculty Publications

Does Microtargeting Matter? Campaign Contact Strategies and Young Voters

Document Type

Article

Journal/Book/Conference Title

Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties

Volume

28

Issue

1

First Page

1

Last Page

18

Abstract

In recent elections, campaigns have based their contact decisions on individual microtargeted propensity scores generated using “Big Data” rather than the more traditional geographic-based contacting. Shifts in campaign strategy have implications for who is contacted and ultimately who participates in elections. As campaigns focus more of their outreach towards individuals who the data indicate are more likely to turn out and more likely to vote for their candidate, some groups may be systematically excluded from contact. We investigate this using voter files and survey data from the 2012 US elections to compare who the Republicans identified for campaign contact using microtargeted propensity scores and who would have been identified for contact if they used a strictly geographic-based approach. Our findings suggest that young people are much less likely to be designated for contact when campaigns rely on microtargeted data than older individuals, the latter of whom are more likely to be contacted under both geographic and microtargeting strategies.

Department

Department of Political Science

Original Publication Date

1-2-2018

DOI of published version

10.1080/17457289.2017.1378222

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