Abstract
Two studies were conducted during the Italian General Elections of 2006 (N = 179) and 2008 (N = 607), to investigate the relationships among implicit and explicit attitudes, voting intention and voting behaviour. Several structural equation models that included direct and indirect effect of implicit and explicit attitudes toward political objects (coalitions and leaders) on voting intention and behaviour were executed to test a prediction model of political preferences and voting behaviour. Notwithstanding some differences, the results of the two studies showed that (i) the implicit evaluations of political objects are more differentiated than the explicit ones; (ii) that implicit attitudes contribute in a specific and additive way to determine the voting intention and behaviour, and (iii) that the effect of the implicit attitude is also mediated by the explicit attitudes. Findings are discussed in the frame of dual cognition models and in the light of the peculiar political scenarios of the considered electoral process.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Gawronski, B., Bodehausen, G.V.: Associative and propositional processes in evaluation: an integrative review of implicit and explicit change. Psychol. Bull. 132, 692–731 (2006)
Smith, E.R., DeCoster, J.: Dual process models in social and cognitive psychology: conceptual integration and links to underlying memory systems. Pers. Soc. Psychol. Rev. 4, 108–131 (2000)
Strack, F., Deutsch, R.: Reflective and impulsive determinants of social behavior. Pers. Soc. Psychol. Rev. 8, 220–247 (2004)
Morris, J.P., Squires, N.K., Taber, C.S., Lodge, M.: Activation of political attitudes: A psychophysiological examination of the hot cognition hypothesis. Polit. Psychol. 24, 727–745 (2003)
Gawronski, B., Galdi, S., Arcuri, L.: What can political psychology learn from implicit measures? Empirical evidence and new directions. Polit. Psychol. 36(1), 1–17 (2015)
Burdein, I., Lodge, M., Taber, C.: Experiments on the automaticity of political belief and attitudes. Polit. Psychol. 27, 359–371 (2006)
Friese, M., Bluemke, M., Wänke, M.: Predicting voting behavior with implicit attitude measures: the 2002 German parliamentary election. Exp. Psychol. 54, 247–255 (2007)
Arcuri, L., Castelli, L., Galdi, S., Zogmaister, C., Amadori, A.: Predicting the vote: implicit attitudes as predictors of the future behaviour of decided and undecided voters. Polit. Psychol. 29(3), 369–387 (2008)
Roccato, M., Zogmaister, C.: Predicting the vote through implicit and explicit attitudes: a field research. Polit. Psychol. 31(2), 249–274 (2010)
Di Conza, A., Gnisci, A., Perugini, M., Senese, V.P.: L’influenza dell’atteggiamento implicito ed esplicito verso leader e partito sul voto delle elezioni europee del 2004 in Italia e delle elezioni politiche del 2005 in Inghilterra. Psicologia Sociale, 2, pp. 301–329 (2010)
Gnisci, A., Di Conza, A., Senese, V.P., Perugini, M.: Negativismo politico, voto e atteggiamento. uno studio su un campione di studenti universitari alla vigilia delle elezioni europee del 12–13 giugno 2004. Rassegna di Psicologia 26, 57–82 (2009)
Ajzen, I., Fishbein, M.: The influence of attitudes on behavior. In: Albarracín, D., Johnson, B.T., Zanna, M.P. (eds.) The Handbook of Attitudes, pp. 173–221. Erlbaum, Mahwah, NJ (2005)
Greenwald, A.G., McGhee, D., Schwartz, J.L.K.: Measuring individual differences in implicit cognition: the implicit association task. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 74, 1469–1480 (1998)
Osgood, C.E., Suci, G., Tannenbaum, P.: The Measurement of Meaning. University of Illinois Press, Urbana, IL (1957)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 Springer International Publishing AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Di Conza, A., Di Marco, M., Tanganelli, F., Sergi, I., Senese, V.P., Gnisci, A. (2018). Italian General Elections of 2006 and 2008: Testing the Direct and Indirect Impact of Implicit and Explicit Attitudes on Voting Behaviour. In: Esposito, A., Faudez-Zanuy, M., Morabito, F., Pasero, E. (eds) Multidisciplinary Approaches to Neural Computing. Smart Innovation, Systems and Technologies, vol 69. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-56904-8_33
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-56904-8_33
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-56903-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-56904-8
eBook Packages: EngineeringEngineering (R0)