Media Predictions and Voter Turnout in the United States, Election Day 1980

The purpose of this study was to ascertain whether election night reporting of presidential election results affected voter turnout in the 1980 United States election. The study gathered information on what time of day respondents voted, whether they had heard early reports of election results, and when they heard such reports. The dataset also includes variables used to assess likelihood of voting, including education, region, partisan strength, and feelings of citizen duty, as well as vote validation variables indicating the respondent's registration status and whether he or she voted. This study used part of the sample from the AMERICAN NATIONAL ELECTION STUDY, 1980 (ICPSR 7763). A brief telephone interview was conducted in January 1981 with individuals who participated in that study's Minor Panel (C1-C4) and Traditional Time Series samples (C3-C3po), and who agreed to be reinterviewed and could be reached by telephone. Vote validation variables and variables used to assess the likelihood of voting were drawn from the Integrated File of ICPSR 7763. This dataset can be merged with the entire Integrated File to permit analysis using the full data gathered for these respondents. Merging instructions are included in the machine-readable documentation for this study. Demographic information collected on respondents includes age, educational attainment, and political party affiliation.