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Voting Behavior

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Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research

Synonyms

Abstention from voting; Electorate; Political preferences

Definition

Voting behavior pertains to the actions or inactions of citizens in respect of participating in the elections that take place for members of their local, regional, or national governments. The behavior results either in support for political candidates or parties or abstention from the voting process. The behavior of voters can be traced to the benefits or disadvantages to their quality of life that they perceive would be a consequence thereof.

Description

Trends in voting or abstention from voting has demonstrable statistical relationships with the socioeconomic characteristics of an electorate and the spatial context within which its political socialization has occurred. Among these are levels of income, age group, ethnicity, religious affiliation or beliefs, urbanization, and region. A model of the changes in electoral cleavage that took place in Europe subsequent to the advent of representative...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Outsourced Insight cc, 2034, Greenside, South Africa

    Stephen Rule

Authors
  1. Stephen Rule
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Stephen Rule .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Northern British Columbia, Prince George, BC, Canada

    Alex C. Michalos

  2. (residence), Brandon, MB, Canada

    Alex C. Michalos

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© 2014 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

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Rule, S. (2014). Voting Behavior. In: Michalos, A.C. (eds) Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0753-5_3181

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0753-5_3181

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-007-0752-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-007-0753-5

  • eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and Law

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