Wishful Thinking in the 2008 U.S. Presidential Election
This is a little wonky, but interesting. I found it while searching for another journal on a database and then was able to find a link via Google Scholar that has public access. I'm posting only the abstract, if you want more then you can click on the link:
Zlatan Krizan, Department of Psychology, Iowa State University, Ames, IA
Abstract
In elections, political preferences are strongly linked to the expectations of the electoral winner—people usually expect their favorite candidate to win. This link could be driven by wishful thinking (a biasing influence of preferences), driven by a biasing influence of expectations on one’s wishes, or produced spuriously. To examine these competing possibilities in the 2008 U.S. presidential election, a longitudinal study assessed uncommitted young voters’ electoral expectations and preferences over four time points during the month before the election. The findings indicated clear support for wishful thinking: Over time, people’s preferences shaped their expectations, but the reverse was not the case. Moreover, these relations were larger among those more strongly identified with their political party and held even when perceptions of general candidate popularity were taken into account. Finally, changes in electoral expectations were consequential, as they shaped disappointment in the electoral results even after taking candidate preferences into account.
http://www.psychology.iastate.edu/~./zkrizan/pdf/Krizan_etal_2009.pdf