I'm a bit late getting to this one, but it's a report of an interesting study (abstract here) that finds:

Low-income youth are more apt to vote if they are involved in political activism, according to a new study that also notes the influence of friends and family.

This is a fairly understudied population -- hard to reach, hard to get to participate, and often with less political power (thus, less interest in those who pay for surveys and other forms of research).  

Civic Knowledge

I'd blogged earlier about this, but here's another recent story about the problems of college kids not knowing much of anything about civics or government.  The theme is how to do you teach basic political science and government when students are so ill prepared?

I kinda love this line:

That many children don’t know how government works is one of the many things wrong with the American educational system, “But it’s not my main priority,” she (Anna Law) said. “I know it sounds strange coming from a political science professor.”

And you can see her point.   She's got so much else to work on, such as a decline in writing and critical thinking skills, that the nuts-and-bolts of government seem almost too mundane to deal with.

You can download the entire report about how young people are doing when it comes to civic engagement and knowledge.  It's here.

Political and Non-Political Civic Engagement

When we speak about civic engagement, we're usually talking political civic engagement.  But not so fast, argues this paper.  What about non-political civic engagement?  They are conceptually distinct, the authors argue. 

Okay, before you give a huge duh, let's consider this for a moment.  According to the abstract:

Both TV news and newspaper use contribute to an increase in political and nonpolitical engagement, but fail to affect trust building in politics and among people in general.

Unfortunately I can't call up the entire article, at least not easily, but they rely on American National Elections Study data, a source I often use as well, so I'm assuming the quote above includes the traditional newspaper and television news exposure items.  It's hardly surprising that media consumption is associated with, or contributes to, increases in both political and non-political engagement. 

But you may be surprised that these media exposure items are unrelated to trust.  It's not surprising.  Greater media use tends to be found among those with greater motivation to keep up with, or be involved in, public affairs.  These folks are often quoted, or know others who are quoted, by the news.  Or they're deeply involved in topics that the news media cover, so they see all the nuances and therefore see how the news, especially TV news, often tosses out nuance in order to explain what's happening to a general audience.  The result?  Less trust, or enough so that an expected positive association becomes no association between consumption of the news and trust.

Comfort with Technology

Playing with technological toys to learn stuff apparently helps people become more engaged in public life, according to a new study, but one's comfort with technology makes all the difference.  Or as the report states:

Notably, individuals who report higher levels of comfort with mobile telephony and use it for information exchange tend to be more civically and politically engaged than those who report less comfort with the technology. 

Never mind the creative spelling of "civically" above (I can't think of another way to spell it, so I'd do what I always do when challenged like this -- write around the problem).  The point is, competence matters.  As the Journal of Communication research article uses a multiple regression to control for factors often associated with civic engagement.  The ultimate point?  Mobile media matter, but those mostly for those comfortable with the technology, which raises the question of a competence-based digital divide.


abstract | full study

Personality and Political Behavior

If you remember your psychology, you know all about the Big Five personality traits.  These are those five broad organizing traits under which all other psychological predispositions and actions are thought to emerge from.  What are the Big Five?

• Openness to Experience
• Conscientiousness
• Extraversion
• Agreeableness
• Emotional Stability

We don't see a lot of studies that touch on media or political communication that make use of these big traits.  Instead, we often focus on smaller, more distinct, traits (need for cognition, as an example).  And yet, some folks take on the challenge, like this study.

The only reason I mention it is that, on Table 3, political knowledge gets tossed into the mix.  This is basically an examination of civic engagement (participation) as a function of the big personality traits.  Table 3, for example, looks at openness to experience and various political activities.  Political knowledge and internal efficacy (the belief of one's own competence in understanding politics) do a better job, it seems to me, than openness to experience when it comes to predicting participation.  The study is much broader than this, far more complex, but I'm keeping just to the bit that touches on knowledge.

Civic Engagement and Ideology

Everyone agrees civic engagement is important, and that young people need to be encouraged to participate.  After that, it gets kinda political.

Here's an Inside Higher Ed article that outlines the basic idea here, that colleges need to do more.  The lede:

There is strong support among students and faculty members for the idea that colleges have a role to play in encouraging civic engagement and promoting good citizenship. But there are real doubts about whether colleges are actually carrying out that role.

No argument here, and the article pumps a lot of tables at you to make the point.  A similar article can be found here at the Chronicle of Higher Education.   The lede:

Colleges are not promoting civic engagement nearly as strongly as their students, faculty members, and administrators believe they should be, says a report released today by the Association of American Colleges and Universities, a group that promotes liberal education.

To be journalistically picky, the "who said" should never be as long as the "what said" in a lede.  But that's the journalism prof in me rearing my ugly head.

Again, no big deal.  But you do get organizations with a somewhat political/partisan/ideological bent in this debate.  Go here and scroll down, you'll find a link to their guide to what colleges don't tell you.  Some of this is the old preserve western civilization argument (one I'm supportive of, but one that is nonetheless ripe with ideological overtones). 

Click on a state, see how the universities score.  My school -- UGA -- got a B.  UF only got a C, meaning we finally beat 'em at something.  Rice, a great school in Texas, got an F.  That alone makes you wonder about the scoring system.

So sometimes what people know, or what is taught, is full of political undertones.

Civic Health in Hard Times

A new report is out, called Civic Health in Hard Times.  From the summary:

The survey’s results reflect the hard choices Americans have made during the downturn, with 72 percent of respondents saying they have cut back on time engaged in civic participation, which includes time spent volunteering, participating in groups or performing other civic activities in their communities. Public perception supports this finding, as 66 percent of Americans say they feel other people are responding to the current economic downturn by looking out for themselves, with only 19 percent saying people around them are responding to the recession by helping each other more.

Translation: When the economy goes bad people spend less -- both in money, and in their time.

Non-profits have already watched this decline at a time their own funds have disappeared into risky investments.  And now people are giving less, of their time.  People under stress find it difficult to do the things they used to do, at a time when it's probably even more important that they do it.  Human nature in action.

Any loss in engagement will also influence something like knowledge.  The two are often intertwined (but not always, as my post the other day elaborated on when talking about political content from Facebook).

I'd love a more detailed breakdown of the folks who reported helping more because of the recession versus those who pulled back.  Are there some consistencies?  This gets fun because it turns out conservatives tend to give more than liberals, at least in money, to non-profits and the like.  This is mostly fueled by church giving, but it probably goes deeper than that, so I'd love to see a more detailed breakdown.

A non-pdf of the report here, a full pdf of the report here.

Civic Engagement Online:Song Remains the Same

A new Pew Center report finds that online civic engagement is largely the product of the same people engaged in offline ways -- those who with higher incomes and greater education.  In other words, online or offline, the song remains the same.  The graph to the right, hotlinked from the Pew site, says it all.

The largely parallel lines suggest it may be time to stop separating offline and online participation and just fold them into a single measure of political or civic participation.

It's both a theoretical and methodological question, one worth pursuing.

The Politics of "Civic Knowledge"

Everyone agrees "civic knowledge" is important. People need to understand how government works and the historical nature of our system and other systems, how they compare, the basics of structure and how just a bill on capitol hill can become law. But I can't help think there's a lot of politics involved in these calls for "civic knowledge."

Here's one from a day or so ago. According to the pullout quote:

Coalition Calls for a Renewed Focus on Western Civilization and Ethics Coursework in Texas Colleges and Universities Asks lawmakers to study the value of fostering greater civic knowledge

The Coalition for American Traditions and Ethics? Obviously I'm big on political and civic knowledge. Hell, I blog about it constantly, plus I do research in this area, but I gotta think there's just a hint of politics and "culture war" stuff going on here.

Of Partisanship and Participation

A fascinating piece in The American Prospect analyzes the civic decline debate and asks whether political parties and partisanship should be written off as important factors in increasing political participation. At its heart, author Henry Farrell argues theorists failed to understand the power of technology, particularly the Internet, to foster participation.

Political blogs don't fit well with deliberation theory. They are rough, raucous, and vigorously partisan.

In many ways this is a defense of blogs and blogging. Hell, I can hardly blog an attack on a defense of blogging, plus there is a navel-gazing aspect to doing so that irritates the senses. Not going there. Finally:

That said, however, there remains a tremendous inequality in participation and political knowledge. While millions of Americans are engaged as never before as volunteers and debaters, millions more lack the time, the passion, or the patience for such intense engagement. We may be moving toward two economies of political information, one in which voters are intensely involved and informed, and the other in which they are not and are perhaps turned off by the strong opinions and intimidating voices of the well-informed.

I buy into the argument above. The red state/blue state dichotomy is becoming less geographic and more an individual difference. Huge chunks of the country will care less and less, or be less and less involved. But, and this is key, that leaves them open to all kinds of nasty little persuasion tricks. A Republican who looks at the Obama campaign and, if well read in Elaboration Likelihood Model of persuasion, sees the success as a case study in low involvement persuasion can work. Peripheral cues and emotion play well in low-involvement, low-knowledge audiences. The GOP has used this as well. We're going to see a helluva lot more by the next election.

Civic Engagement

Getting young people engaged in the political process has long been a focus of scholars, advocates, and of course politicians and political parties who desperately seek their precious votes.

But do celebrities help in getting people involved?

One study suggests yes, they do. Celebrity endorsements of political engagement can make a difference, though one that is probably short-lived, by attracting young people who often identify with those celebrities. These endorsements led to higher self-efficacy and lower complacency among young respondents as part of a study in the 2004 campaign. The end result was more engagement.

That's the good news, though it being short-lived is probably the bad news. The theory is that once we get people used to participating or voting, they'll do it again and again. Addiction theory at its best, but the data suggest otherwise.

And again I say it -- damn those data. I need a bumper sticker with that line, or maybe a t-shirt.

It'll be interesting to see the 2008 version of this study, what with Barack Obama's attraction to younger voters. I suspect in 2008 celebrity endorsements of engagement were almost redundant to Obama's candidacy and had no real effect. Again, we'll have to let the data tell us the tale.

Youth, Knowledge, and Turnout

Voter turnout among young people has increased dramatically this campaign season, no doubt in part to Obama's candidacy and his theme of change. He appeal skews younger, more upper class, than does Clinton. That'll be the stuff of future political science journal articles, but here I'm more interested in the relationship between turnout and knowledge.

Younger people tend to score less well on tests of public affairs knowledge. The Pew Center documents this fully. Scroll down and you'll see only 15% of those ages 18-29 are categorized as "high" in knowledge. Ages 50-64 do a helluva lot better, scoring at 47%.

A doctoral student at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill says: so what?

In a column published April 18 in the News & Observer, Justin Martin argues that the kind of knowledge tapped in these questions. Rather, he says "Young Americans are actually quite informed about issues that matter to them."

The Pew questions focus on who is president of Russia and whether Chief Justice John Roberts is conservative and a host of other points. As Martin argues:

Knowing who is the president of Russia or which party controls the House isn't a prerequisite of political participation. Many young people aren't interested in Russia, or in the bipolar nature of our two-party system.

....

Do not despair. Waves of youthful ignorance aren't going to wash down the democratic lighthouse. Quite the opposite. As young people choose what issues are important to them in the information age, we're seeing democracy become more precise, for citizens can easily acquire knowledge of issues they care about and specify the reasons they want to be part of democracy.

I kinda agree and sympathize with is position. He quotes Doris Graber, who along with V.O. Key are political scientists who argue that the people are not the dolts some make them out to be. But you'd hope that young people could at least do better than older respondents on at least some of the questions that do not involve American Idol, like how many troops are in Iraq, how many have died, or what's the difference between Sunni and Shia. This is not textbook civics, this is real world stuff. And it matters.

Back to my opening, about youth turnout. Most of that is powered by 18-29 year olds with a college degree or in college. Indeed, 79% of Super Tuesday young people attended or are attending college. No doubt the Obama effect again, but also hopes that a younger electorate might also be a better informed electorate.

We can only hope.

The Role of Parents

A new study suggests parents play a pivotal role in what kids know. While that's kinda obvious, it is important nonetheless to establish this through systematic research and not gut feeling.

What boosts political knowledge for kids? Here are a few:

• Participation in youth activities
• Discussing politics with parents
• Grades in school (higher grades = more knowledge)
• Education level of parents
• Civics courses (this makes such good sense)
• Being a boy versus a girl (see an earlier blog on sex differences)
• Internal political efficacy (basically, the feeling you are capable of keeping up with politics)

I drew these from the multiple regression table in the study in which various factors statistically control for one another. Most make perfectly good sense. Smart parents who talk about politics, that's likely to rub off on kids, especially if they're also smart. Civics classes ... a word, please. My kids have had disappointing civics classes, an N of 2, but I think they are vital and yet the No Child Left Untested has hurt such classes in an attempt to boost math and other scores. That's too bad, but you can hardly blame schools for attacking a class this way.

The ultimate finding here? Parents matter. Talk about politics in front of your kids. Answer their questions. Explain the basics so they understand the context of your discussion. Engage them.

It also helps if parents know what the hell they're talking about. Read the news!

Tufts Study: Young People ARE Knowledgeable

That's right, those wacky young people are not the disconnected, self-absorbed, knowledge-deprived, pop culture-driven types we always imagined, at least not according to a study reportedly conducted by a Tufts University class. The formal pdf version of the report is here.

I'm not exactly sure why the authors found it interesting to compare college and non-college youth. Sure, it controls for age, but 18-to-24 year olds who did and did not attend college? I would expect them to differ. A lot. And they do. Except when they don't.

Huh?

Well, college-attending young people do better on questions about public affairs (somewhat better, but not a hell of a lot better) but they score about the same on those all-important questions on who won American Idol or Dancing with the Stars. For example, while 65 percent of college youth could name at least one of their U.S. senators, only 51 percent of non-college youth could manage this. About 13 percent of college youth knew the name of the winner of American Idol. About 15 percent of non-college youth did. The numbers on pop culture questions are basically the same given the margin of error involved. The best we can say is that college youth are a bit more engaged and knowledgeable but they are about the same on keeping up with pop culture.

The study raises some interesting questions, more than it answers, but is definitely worth a read if you're interested in what people know or political knowledge.