Choosers or Followers?

Assessing Historic Vaccination Behavior to Study Partisan Attachment

Nicolai Berk

Public Policy Group | Immigration Policy Lab | ETH Zürich

2024-03-26

Motivation

Motivation (cont.)


Debate on Extent on Partisan Motivation

Research Questions


When a party position conflicts with voters’ beliefs,

  1. …to what extent do voters change their beliefs based on past party support?
  2. …to what extent do voters change their party support based on past behavior?

Setting


Covid Vaccinations in Germany

  • Covid vaccination campaign represents observable, costly behavior
  • Pre-Covid vaccination behavior: indicator of pre-treatment preferences

Data

Daily Covid Vaccinations


  • “Digital Vaccine Monitoring” from Germany’s Robert Koch Institute (RKI)
  • Daily Vaccination Data per County
  • Collected from vaccinating doctors directly via web-app
  • Available on GitHub

Polio Vaccination Rate


  • Data from “VacMap” of RKI
  • Polio Vaccination Rate per County per Year for Yearly Cohorts
  • Collection Similar to Covid Data, but only Annual Availability
  • Also available on GitHub

Party Support 2017 & 2021 per Voting District

  • Data from Federal Voting Commission on Voting District Level (different from county)
  • For now matched by weighting based on voting-age population (no spatial weighting)

Relevant Party Endorsements


  • Hubert “Hubsi” Aiwanger (FW): “Hunt on unvaccinated”
  • Greens: Historically alt-med & anti-vax community but opposing stance during Covid

Beliefs \(\rightarrow\) Party Support

Free Voters

Free Voters

Greens

Greens

Party Support \(\rightarrow\) Beliefs

Hubert “Hubsi” Aiwanger


  • 1.7.21: Bavarian PM Söder asks Aiwanger to explain why he won’t get vaccinated in public press conference
  • 11.11.21: Vaccination - claims of strategic catering to anti-vax base before BTW
  • Focus: “Hubsi-Town” Landshut (25% FW Votes in 2018 BY election)

Landshut vs. Similar Control

Hubsi-Town vs. Similar Place Outside BY

Next Steps

Open Questions

Beliefs \(\rightarrow\) Party Support

  • Longer Time Frame and Continuous DiD?
  • How to get at precise Mechanism - Additional Panel Data?

Party Support \(\rightarrow\) Beliefs

  • Synthetic Control for Landshut?
  • DiD with matching?
  • Other relevant variation?

Open Questions


Other Issues

  • SUTVA Violations?
  • Ecological Fallacies?

Thank you!

Resources

Bisgaard, Martin. 2019. “How Getting the Facts Right Can Fuel Partisan‐Motivated Reasoning.” American Journal of Political Science 63 (4): 824–39. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12432.
Bullock, John G. 2011. “Elite Influence on Public Opinion in an Informed Electorate.” American Political Science Review 105 (3): 496–515. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003055411000165.
———. 2020. “Party Cues.” In The Oxford Handbook of Electoral Persuasion, edited by Elizabeth Suhay, Bernard Grofman, and Alexander H. Trechsel, 128–50. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190860806.013.2.
Lehmann, Pola, and Lisa Zehnter. 2022. “The Self-Proclaimed Defender of Freedom: The AfD and the Pandemic.” Government and Opposition, March, 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1017/gov.2022.5.
Prior, Markus, Gaurav Sood, and Kabir Khanna. 2015. “You Cannot Be Serious: The Impact of Accuracy Incentives on Partisan Bias in Reports of Economic Perceptions.” Quarterly Journal of Political Science 10 (4): 489–518. https://doi.org/10.1561/100.00014127.
Slothuus, Rune, Rasmus Skytte, and Martin Bisgaard. 2022. “Party Cues Change How Citizens Understand Policy.”

Appendix

FW National Support