Social and Traditional Media Use and Influences on the Vote in India

• In Event: Social Media and Influence in Election Campaigns: Evidence From Europe and Asia

Abstract

India’s 2014 national election outcome resulted in an unprecedented absolute majority of seats for the BJP. However, in Delhi, the nation’s capital city state, where the BJP won all Lok Sabha seats, in the early 2015 State Assembly election the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) won all but three seats. We discuss the influences on vote choice in these two elections, drawing on our two-wave panel study of a representative sample of Delhi voters in the national election designed to measure the uses and influence of old and new media, as well as analysis of Tweets from party leaders and candidates, and a third panel wave after the State Assembly election. We model predictors of changing vote choice during the campaign using McFadden choice models controlling for prior support and incorporating both case specific and alternative specific predictors. While traditional media were a more important influence on voting behavior than the Internet in these elections, we expect this to evolve with the wider availability of low-cost smartphones.

Authors

• Holli A. Semetko, Emory U

• Anup Kumar, Cleveland State U

• Taberez Ahmed Neyazi, Centre for Culture, Media and Governance

• Jonathan Mellon, U of Oxford

• Dhavan Shah, Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison

• Arash Sangar, U of Wisconsin-Madison