The Effects of Published Polls on Voting Intensions: A New Approach

I argue that the inconsistent evidence in current research regarding the influence of published polls on voting behavior might be attributed to the solely focus on direct effects and a lacking understanding of the underlying cognitive processes. Using rolling-cross-section survey data for the 2013 federal elections in Germany, I conducted a multilevel-path analysis to examine the cognitive processing of opinion polls and its effect on a voter’s attitudes and voting intentions. Results demonstrate the existence of bandwagon-effects driven by published polls on voting intentions for the Left and the Green Party that are mediated by polls’ effects on the short-term evaluations of parties and candidates while expectations about the outcome of the election remain largely unaffected.