American Voters’ Issue Voting Behaviour Revisited - A Case Study of the 2008 American Presidential Election

Scholars in American politics have often examined the role of issues in voters’ voting choice. In these analyses, however, there were controversial voices. Some studies supported the idea that the general public lacked sophisticated political knowledge and skills needed for issue voting, thus concluding that issue voting behavior was limited within American electorate. Other scholars made an optimistic assessment and concluded that issues played a great role in voting behavior and different issue attitudes may lead to different candidate choice. In this regard, this paper attempts to revisit the American voters’ issue voting by using data from the 2008 American presidential election. We mainly focus on four questions: (1) How do issues influence voters’ voting choice? (2) Does issue voting exist or not in the American electorate? (3) What are characteristics of American voters’ issue voting behavior? (4) Compared with demographic variables, how important issues are for one’s voting choice?