Improving Public Opinion Surveys: Interdisciplinary Innovation and the American National Election Studies

Political science professor John Aldrich and his co-editor bring together a group of leading social scientists that developed and tested new measures that might be added to the ANES, with the ultimate goal of extending scholarly understanding of the causes and consequences of electoral outcomes.

ANES (American National Election Studies) is the premier social science survey program devoted to voting and elections. Conducted during the presidential election years and midterm Congressional elections, the survey is based on interviews with voters and delves into why they make certain choices. The contributors look at such varied topics as self-monitoring in the expression of political attitudes, personal values and political orientations, alternate measures of political trust, perceptions of similarity and disagreement in partisan groups, measuring ambivalence about government, gender preferences in politics, and the political issues of abortion, crime, and taxes.

Testing new ideas in the study of politics and the political psychology of voting choices and turnout, this collection is an invaluable resource for all students and scholars working to understand the American electorate.