Its Not Easy Being Green Minor Party Labels as Heuristic Aids

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It's Not Easy Being Green: Minor Party Labels as Heuristic Aids Author(s): Travis G. Coan, Jennifer L. Merolla, Laura B. Stephenson and Elizabeth J. Zechmeister Source: Political Psychology, Vol. 29, No. 3 (Jun., 2008), pp. 389-405 Published by: International Society of Political Psychology Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20447128 Accessed: 26-01-2016 18:26 UTC  Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/ info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.  Wiley and International Society of Political Psychology are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Political Psychology.  http://www.jstor.org  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  PoliticalPsychology, Vol.29,No. 3, 2008  It's Not Easy Being Green: Minor Party Labels as  HeuristicAids Travis G. Coan Claremont Graduate University Jennifer L. Merolla Claremont Graduate University Laura  B. Stephenson  University of Western Ontario  Elizabeth J.Zechmeister University of California, Davis  This paper examines if,when, and towhat extentU.S. minor party labels influenceindi vidual opinions over a rangeofpolitical issues.Based on data froman experimentalstudy, we reach threegeneral conclusions.First, as cues,party labels are more likelyto influence opinions over complex issues. Second, familiaritywith and trustina party conditioncue acceptance. Third,as a whole,minorparty labels act as effectivecues less consistentlythan major parties. This finding,we suggest, indicates that thereexists some thresholdlevel of minorpartiesmust reach in thema; ss public inorder tobe effective familiarityand trustthat cues. This research isvaluable because itextendscurrentwork on party labels as heuristic devices and more general work on cues; our findingsare additionally importantgiven recenttrendsinpublic opinion data, which indicate thattheU.S. public is becomingmore accepting ofminor parties as permanentfeaturesof thepolitical system. KEY  WORDS:  Heuristics,  Information Shortcuts, Party Cues, Minor  Parties  A large body of political science research focuses on the utility of cognitive heuristic devices for rational decision making by otherwise underinformed indi viduals. It has been argued that cues may provide "all the information that is required" forpolitical choice (McKelvey & Ordeshook, 1986, p. 934). Within the 389 0162-895XC 2008 International SocietyofPoliticalPsychology PublishedbyBlackwellPublishing.Inc.,350Main Street, Malden,MA 02148,USA, 9600Garsington Road,Oxford,OX4 2DQ, andPO Box 378CarltonSouth,3053VictoriaAustralia  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Coan et al.  390  larger population of cues, party labels are considered one of themost useful of such aids due to theiraccessibility and relevance to a variety of political decisions (Huckfeldt, Levine, Morgan, & Sprague, 1999). This optimistic picture of the utility of party cues, however, has recently been questioned by several studies that examine more carefully the conditions under which party labels are useful aids for decision making (e.g., Lau & Redlawsk, 2001; Lupia & McCubbins, 1998). Using experimental data, we extend work in this area by exploring whether, and towhat extent,minor party labels in theU.S. influence individual opinions on a range of political issues. Focusing on minor parties is of particular value given that their influence appears to be increasing in recent years. Among the public, therehas been an increase in general dissatisfaction with the twomajor parties and in the percentage who think there should be "a thirdmajor party" (Collet, 1996). Furthermore,minor parties are beginning to compete inmore elections, especially at the state and local levels (Lacy & Monson, 2002), and have cost major party candidates the election in some contests (Burden, 2005). Given the increasing presence of minor parties, it is fitting to ask whether they act as information shortcuts for citizens in the same way as major parties. However, to thispoint, the literature is theoretically and empirically silent on the effects of minor party cues. Theoretical  Perspectives  on Party Labels  as Cues  A long line of work has argued that citizens can make reasonable choices through the use of information shortcuts, even if they possess minimal levels of information about the political world (e.g., Downs, 1957; Sniderman, Brody, & Tetlock, 1991). One common heuristic aid is theparty label. Downs (1957) argued that one of themain purposes of political parties is to provide an information shortcut for voters to help them understand the issue positions and/or ideology of political actors. Campbell, Converse, Miller, and Stokes (1960) extended this idea, arguing that the psychological attachments underlying party identifications shape political attitudes and evaluations, while also helping individuals to establish coherent sets of political opinions (see pp. 128-136). A great deal of contemporary scholarship has investigated the use of party labels as heuristic devices invarious domains. Scholars have found thatpeople rely on partisan cues in the voting booth (e.g., Lau & Redlawsk, 2001; Rahn, 1993); in predicting the issue and ideological positions of candidates (e.g., Conover & Feldman, 1981; Huckfeldt et al., 1999; Koch, 2001); and in forming preferences on novel issues (Kam, 2005). Given this literature,party labels should be influ ential cues in the realm of opinion expression; specifically, knowing where a party stands on an issue should influence an individual's own stand on that issue. However, some recent work has questioned whether party cues are always useful.With respect to voting, if the positions of candidates are inconsistentwith those of the party, voters are less likely to select the "correct" candidate (Lau & Redlawsk,  2001; Rahn, 1993). More  generally, Lupia  and McCubbins'  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  (1998)  Minor PartyLabels as HeuristicAids  391  theoretical and empirical results suggest thatcues-party  or otherwise-are only to extent useful the that they convey "information about knowledge and trust" (p. 206). To test this proposition, Lupia and McCubbins (1998) conducted an experiment inwhich subjects were told of a policy endorsement by a well-known talk show host. The experiment confirmed that individuals who believed the host was knowledgeable and shared a common interest (trustworthiness) were more likely to accept thehost' s policy stance. In contrast, respondents who reported not perceiving the speaker as knowledgeable and not trusting the endorser were more likely to "listen to the speaker's advice and do theopposite" (p. 194). Other studies of persuasion and priming have also found that individuals are more positively incorporate messages  when  likely to they trust the sender of the message,  especially in low information and motivation environments (e.g., Chaiken, 1980; 1986).  Miller & Krosnick, 2000; Petty & Cacioppo,  In short, the existing literature suggests that theusefulness of a party cue will vary depending on how the party is perceived by the voters. In general, we expect thatmajor party labels are likely to be more effective heuristic aids thanminor party labels, given that the former have more established reputations whereas many individuals lack awareness of the latter. In particular, we argue that two factors condition cue acceptance and rejection: one's familiaritywith theparty and one's level of trustin thatparty.Both familiarityand trustmay be important to cue acceptance formajor parties; however, these factorsmay take on even greater relevance when examining minor parties as cues. As we discuss below, the lower visibility, inconsistency, and lack of office-holding experience characteristic of minor parties may make their "brand names" vulnerable to a lack of familiarity and trustamong the general public which, in turn, should make their labels less useful to citizens looking to employ cognitive shortcuts. Considering the firstfactor,one's familiaritywith the party, studies of mar keting and persuasion suggest that individuals are more likely to accept cues that theyare familiarwith (Stermthal,Dholakia, & Leavitt, 1978; Weisbuch, Mackie, & Garcia-Marques, 2003; Ziegler & Diehl, 2003). For instance, itmay be easier to convince individuals to try a new product endorsed by Nike rather than one endorsed by some generic sports company. Following this reasoning, the useful ness of the labels of parties with minor profiles is clearly questionable. For example, while individuals may have heard of a particular minor party, theymay be unfamiliar with the party's stances on many issues; that is, theymay lack knowledge of the party's program. Further, even among minor parties that are better known, candidates running under a single label often take inconsistent positions. In such a case, individuals should feel less familiar with any given candidate and thusmay be more suspicious of accepting the party's cue (Ziegler, Diehl, & Ruther, 2002). Therefore, in the case ofminor parties, knowing where the party stands on a single issue might not help the average individual figureout his or her own stance on that issue. In fact, unfamiliarity with a minor party may produce uncertainty and psychological discomfort, which may subsequently be  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  392  Coan et al.  translated into dislike (Miller, Mazis,  & Wright, 1971). Thus, individuals may  actually reject a cue, if they lack familiaritywith the party. The second relevant factor, in some ways related to familiarity, is one's level of trust in a party.As we noted, studies of persuasion show that individuals are more likely to be persuaded by thosewhom they trust,especially in low informa tion and motivation environments (e.g., Chaiken, 1980; Miller & Krosnick, 2000; Petty & Cacioppo,  1986). Similarly, theymay reject and even react against cues  that they do not trust (Lupia & McCubbins, that these two concepts-familiarity als who  1998). For minor parties, it is likely  and trust-are positively correlated. Individu  are not familiar with parties are likely not going to trust them. As  familiarity increases, allowing some level of brand recognition with respect to that party, individuals may become more trusting.Given themore established reputa tion of themajor parties, it is not necessarily the case that those who are more familiar will also be more trusting.The validity of the latter statement remains a question for empirical testing. In summary, we hypothesize the following. First, in general, major party labels will be more effective as cues for opinion formation and expression. Second, and more specifically, when individuals lack familiarity with and/or trust in a party (which ismore likely to happen with minor parties) they should be less likely to adopt preferences in line with that stance (and, in fact,may reject it and "do the opposite"). As  familiarity and trust increase, individuals  should begin to accept the party label cue-though issues, as discussed below. Research  this effectmay vary across  Design  In order to test the travelling capacity of arguments about party cues from major tominor parties, we conducted an experiment. The core of the experiment consisted of asking subjects to fillout a questionnaire about political opinions, in which we embedded a series of issue questions. For these issue questions, respon dents in treated groups were toldwhether a given party supported or opposed a policy and were then asked for theirown opinion on the issue. With respect to the treatments,we chose three parties to use as cues: one dominant party (Republican) and twominor parties (Green and Reform). We chose a dominant party to have a baseline for comparison between major and minor parties. Given thatour pool of subjects, on average, tended to take a more Demo cratic position, theRepublican Party offers a more difficult testof our hypotheses. We also selected twominor parties, rather thanone, so thatwe would have as much variation as possible in individual familiarity and trust across these types of parties. We expected that theGreen party would have a slightly better reputation than theReform party for at least three reasons: Nader's run foroffice in 2000 and 2004; the fact that the party takesmore consistent positions; and, the fact thatour sample ismore left-leaning than the general population.  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Minor PartyLabels as HeuristicAids  393  In a pretest, we asked respondents to indicate their level of familiarity and trustwith respect to the parties included in the study, in order to test our hypoth esis that cue acceptance  or rejection is moderated by these factors.We also introduced an additional dimension to our study by including different types of issues. Extant research suggests that individuals respond differently to issues  depending on their level of difficulty (Carmines & Stimson, 1980). With easy issues, individuals are more likely to have the capacity and the time to develop issues increase in complexity, citizens might relymore on cues in  opinions. As  the expression of their political preferences (see Kam, 2005; Ratneshwar & 1991). To test this notion and to create as fair a test as possible for the effect of party labels on opinion expression, we included issues of various  Chaiken,  complexities. Our expectation is that individuals will move in the direction of the given party cue as their levels of trustin and familiaritywith theparty increase.We also expect thatparty cues are more likely to be influentialwith respect to opinions on more complex issues. Finally, we expect that themajor party cue will be more influential than theminor party cues on political opinions, given that subjects will likely have more awareness of themajor party, and given thewealth of studies showing thatmajor party cues work well in opinion formation. Participants and Design The participants in our study were 248 undergraduate students enrolled in undergraduate classes at a public university inNorthern California. As part of the political science department's ongoing research program, students were offered class credit in exchange for participation in a study about political opinions and attitudes. The study took place in the spring of 2005 in the department's experi ment lab. Subjects were randomly assigned to a treatment (Republican N = 54, Green N = 50, and Reform N = 66) or control group (N = 78). They then com pleted a computer-based survey,which included questions about basic demograph ics, political predispositions, and a number of political issues. The experimental condition was embedded in a series of four issue opinion questions: prohibit abortion in all cases; decrease services and spending; place more limits on imports; and limit class action law suitswhile moving many from state to federal courts.We selected these four issues based on two criteria.First, the issues vary in difficulty.For example, the issue of abortion has long been on the political agenda, giving individuals a significant amount of time with which to develop theirown stance on the issue. In contrast, the issue of class action lawsuits is relatively new, obscure, and technical. Second, the issues vary across party lines. Using survey data and congressional reports,we selected issues on which the parties we examine take differentand (at leastmostly) consistent stances. Table 1 lists the four issues, along with the direction of the party prompt given for each issue, and our categorization of the issues from easy to hard.  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Coan et al.  394 Table  1. Issues Questions  and Direction  of Prompts  (with expected  sign in parentheses*)  Type of Issue  Prohibitabortioninall cases Republican:Support(-)  Easy  Green: Oppose  Easy Intermediate  Hard  (+)  Reform:Oppose (+) Decrease servicesand spending Republican:Support(-) Green:Oppose (+) Reform:Support(-) Place more  Intermediate  limits on imports  Republican:Oppose (-) Green:Support(+) Reform:Support(+) Limit class action law suits and move many  Hard  from state to federal courts  Republican:Support(-) Green: Oppose  (+)  Reform:Oppose (+) *The sign in parentheses higher values  reflects the anticipated effect after the variables were recoded such that  indicate more  the cue are persuaded  liberal responses and reflects only the situation in which  to adopt stances in accord with that party's stance (as compared  those receiving to those in  thecontrolgroup).  In order to confirm our categorization of these issues, from easy to hard, we analyzed the percent of individuals who either did not respond to the policy question or selected "don't know." We assume thatmore respondents are able to express opinions on easier issues.' The percent of individuals unable to answer each policy question was as follows: abortion 3.63%, services 4.84%, tariffs 15.73%, and class action 23.79%. On average, subjects were most capable of answering the abortion question and least capable of answering thequestion about class action lawsuits. With respect to the intermediate issues, as expected, the services question falls closer to being an "easy" issue, while the tariffsquestion falls closer to the "hard" extreme. In each of the treatmentgroups, the four issue questions were preceded by statements thatone of theparties supported or opposed the issue. Individuals in the control group received a neutral cue: "Some politicians. . . ."After each prompt, the subjects were asked for their own opinion on the issue. For example, the abortion question read as follows in theRepublican treatment: "The Republican Party supports prohibiting abortion in all cases. Do you support or oppose pro hibiting abortion in all cases?" If the cues work as expected, we should find that individuals with higher levels of familiarity and trust in the given party are more 1 See Bartels (1986) and Alvarez and Franklin (1994) forworks that consider "don't know" responses as an indicator of uncertainty. We assume questions that are more difficult will be those that evoke higher levels of uncertainty from the pool of respondents.  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  395  Minor PartyLabels as HeuristicAids Table  2. Summary Statistics for Familiarity and Trust  Familiarity  N  Mean  Std.Dev.  Min  Max  RepublicanParty DemocraticParty GreenParty ReformParty Trust RepublicanParty DemocraticParty GreenParty ReformParty  250 250 250 250  4.168 4.408 3.060 2.320  0.975 0.837 1.189 0.949  1 1 1 1  6 6 6 5  250 250 250 250  3.040 3.832 2.752 1.812  1.414 1.103 1.465 1.105  1 1 1 1  6 6 6 5  likely to adopt preferences in linewith the given party cue (see Table 1) and that these effectswill be more pronounced for themore complex issues.2  Results Before testingour hypotheses, we firstassessed whether perceptions ofminor and major parties differ in termsof average levels of familiarity and trust,which may tapmore broadly into the reputation of theparty label. Lupia andMcCubbins (1998) state: "brand names and party labels are valuable to consumers and voters only if the brands have strong and consistent connections to particular outcomes" (p. 36). In this regard, theRepublican and Democratic Party labels are akin to Dunkin' Donuts and Krispy Kreme, while theGreen and Reform party labels are less-well known donut establishments whose products can be hit or miss. Trans lated intomore scientific language and expectations, we expect thataverage levels of familiarity and trustwill be higher within our pool of subjects for themajor party labels as opposed to theminor party labels. To measure the former,we asked subjects for their familiaritywith four parties: Democrat, Republican, Green, and Reform (see Table 2). This variable is measured on a 6-point scale from very unfamiliar to very familiar, and reads as follows: "According to the scale below, please indicate how familiar you are with the Republican (Democratic, Green, Reform) Party." As expected, subjects are more familiar with themajor parties compared to theminor parties, and these differences are statistically significant at p < .001, according to t-tests.Likewise, 2 The placement of the four issue questions was not randomized; thus, one concern could be thatwe are simply detecting a question order effectwhereby subjects "learn" how to use the cue as issues became more complex. While we cannot completely rule out this possibility, we believe it is unlikely for at least two reasons. First, nonresponse was much higher for themore complex issues, which should not occur if subjects are learning how to use the cue. Second, we conducted a similar study on the in which we tested for order effects with a split-sample of party label cues in Canada, design. Half the sample received the questions in order from easy to hard and the other half received the questions ordered from hard to easy. Our analyses of these data did not reveal any clear and consistent evidence of order effects (see Merolla, Stephenson, & Zechmeister, 2007).  usefulness  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Coan  396  we measured  et al.  truston a 6-point scale, from highly distrust to highly trust,with an  option forbeing unfamiliar with the given party.The exact question wording is as follows: "Please indicate how much you trust the groups in the following ques tions. If you are not familiarwith the group, thenplease select 'Unfamiliar.' How much do you trusttheRepublican  (Democratic, Green, Reform) Party?"3 For trust,  our results indicate that subjects are significantlymore trustingof theDemocratic and Republican parties compared to the Green and Reform parties.4 In short, respondents are more familiarwith and more trustingof themajor as opposed to theminor parties, on average.5 The results also show that there is a fair amount of variance in the degree to which individual respondents trustand are familiarwith major and minor parties. This variance suggests thatwhile on average minor party labels might be less useful and major party labels more useful as cues, the exact effect of these labels on opinion expression may vary by an individual's level of trustand familiarity. Consequently, with support forour characterization of the levels of familiarityand trustfor themajor and minor parties, and evidence of individual-level variance, we now turn tomultiple variable analyses for each issue, testing the effectof different party cues on policy preferences, and examining whether trust and familiarity condition the influence of party label cues. Multiple Variable Model Our expectation is thatparty labels influence opinion expression conditional upon levels of familiarity and trust in those parties. That is, individuals who are high in familiarity and high in trustshould be more likely tomove in the direction of the cue, while those at lower values may be more likely to reject, and possibly react against, the cue. We  furtherexpect that the effect of party labels varies by  3 While  all subjects answered the familiarity question, we had some missing values on the trust measures, especially for theGreen and Reform Parties. In order to ensure thatwe did not lose too many observations for our later analyses, we recoded all missing values to the lowest measure on the trust scale. For a similar treatment, but in this case with respect to "don't know" responses, see trustquestion (4), Alvarez and Franklin (1994). Since very few people did not answer theRepublican we reasoned that the nonresponse was likely a factor of being unfamiliar with the party. If one is unfamiliar with a party, they are likely not trusting of it.To double check this assumption, we tested tomake sure that those who did not answer the party trustquestions registered a response of being unfamiliar with the party. This was the case for the vast majority of respondents. Furthermore, we also  looked at the trustvalues given by those who indicated that theywere unfamiliar with the party and the vast majority of these subjects placed that party at the lowest or second lowest value on the trust  question. For the comparison between theDemocratic Party and the twominor parties, differences are signifi cant at p < 0.001 for both cases. For the Republican Party comparison differences are significant at p < .04 and p < .001 for theGreen and Reform labels, respectively. 5 While we are interested here in average levels, not surprisingly, these values do vary by party are even higher among strong party identi identification. For example, trust values forRepublicans fiers (mean = 5.14). This tendency combined with the fact that our sample ismore left-leaning, as we  4  stated earlier in the text, accounts forwhy the values on trustand familiarity for theDemocratic are higher than those for the Republican Party.  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Party  Minor PartyLabels as HeuristicAids  397  type (major vs. minor) and issue complexity (easy to hard). Given our theoretical expectations, it is necessary to examine the effects of theminor and major party cues in a multivariate context. Specifically, we need to devise an empirical model that incorporates the influence of our treatment effects, as well as interactions among the treatments, familiarity,and trust. Before specifying thatmodel, we firstexplored whether we could combine ourmeasures of trustand familiarity,since we expect that the effects should move subjects in similar directions. The advantage to combining these twomeasures is that it provides a clean and more parsimonious model with potentially three interaction terms as opposed to six. Thus, we ran a principal components factor measures foreach party and, forboth themajor analysis on the familiarityand trust (Republican) and theminor (Green and Reform) parties, only one factorwith an eigenvalue over 1.0 emerged. Both variables loaded highly on the factor and in the same direction; thus,we use these party factors to test for the conditional effects of familiarity and trust.6The model we test of opinion on each of the four issues is the following: Opinion = Bo + B1Republican + B2Green + B3Reform + B4Republican Factor + B5Green Factor + B6Reform Factor + B7Republican * Republican Factor + B8Green *Green Factor + BgReform *Reform Factor The dependent variables in the analyses (Opinion) consist of the respondent's opinions on each of the fourpolitical issues described above and inTable 1. These issues are measured on 5-point Likert scales, which are coded such that higher values indicate a more liberal response. Since these variables are measured on an ordinal scale, we ran ordered probit analyses. The variables Republican, Green, and Reform (B 1-B3) are dummy variables for each treatmentgroup. The baseline, comparison group is theControl group (those respondents who received neutral, party-freeprompts). Republican Factor, Green Factor, and Reform Factor (B4-B6) are factors thatcapture the respondent's familiaritywith and trustin each party.To testwhether our familiarity/trustfactorsmoderate the effect of party labels, we include an interaction between each factor and each party treatment (B7-B9). Support forour argumentwould consist of finding that the treatmentvariables move subjects in thedirection of thecue as their level on the familiarity/trust factor increases. Individuals at lower levels of familiarity/trust may move in theopposite 6 We  recognize that, theoretically, familiarity and trustneed not have loaded on one factor for themajor party. That is, and as we noted earlier, someone familiar with a party may not necessarily be trusting of it.While the correlation between familiarity and trustwas lowest for the Republican Party (.22), compared to the minor parties, Green (.49) and Reform (.36), the relationship is still positive.  Furthermore, the rotated factor loadings of the familiarity and trustvariables for theRepublican Party were high by practical standards (.78). Moreover, these loadings are comparable to those found for both theGreen (.86) and Reform (.82) parties.  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Coan  398  et al.  direction of the cue. Given that the Republican Party is better established and scored higher on trustand familiarity,we expect that this cue will have stronger effects in moving subjects in the direction of the cue. Finally, drawing from Carmines and Stimson's work on issue difficulty,we also expect that the effect of the cues will be more pronounced as issues become more complex.  MultipleVariableAnalysisResults The results of our analysis for each issue are presented in Table 3.7 The presence of the interaction termsmakes the interpretation of the results a bit difficult.The coefficient and p-value on the treatmentsare the effects among those at zero on the factors. The coefficients on the interaction terms are not directly interpretable and thus one needs to calculate the effects at different values of the presence of interaction terms in themodel, the results are supplemented by Table 4, inwhich we calculate the change in the the conditioning variable. Given  probability (or first difference) of falling into the most liberal (5) and most conservative (1) categories when one moves from the control group to a given treatmentgroup at differentvalues of the conditioning familiarity/trustfactor.The change in theprobability of falling into themost conservative category is recorded under the "Cons" column in Table 4, while the value associated with falling into themost liberal category is recorded under the "Lib" column. The effects are broken down by treatment (i.e., Republican, Green, and Reform) and by the value of the conditioning (or the familiarity/trust)factor (minimum, -1, 0, 1, maximum). The firstdifferences were generated using Clarify (King, Tomz, & Wittenberg, 2000; Tomz, Wittenberg, & King, 2001). We report one-tailed tests for the effect of the treatmentgroups (at different levels of the factormeasures), since we have strong reasons to expect that individuals will move in the direction of the cue as familiarity/trustincreases (and tomove away from the cue as the factor decreases). To determine whether the treatment is significant,we look at Table 4, which gives the effect (and significance) of the treatment at different values of the conditioning factor (again, the result for the treatmentvariable alone is the effect when the factor is 0). Turuing firstto theRepublican treatment,we find thatwhen the familiarity/trustfactor is at itsmaximum, individuals are significantly less likely to fall into themost liberal category of responses and more likely to give 7 As  a robustness check, we considered several other specifications of themodel. Checking distribu and attitudinal variables, we found some uneven tions of subjects along basic sociodemographic distribution along gender and religiosity across the conditions. In order to rule out the possibility that other factors, specifically ideology and the uneven distribution of gender and religious attendance, are driving the results, we replicated the analysis with controls for female, ideology, and religiosity. The pattern of results for the key variables of interest (the interaction terms) was virtually identical in the  models with and without controls. The consistency across models allows us to be confident that the results provided in Tables 3 and 4 are unbiased estimates of the underlying relationships of interest.  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Minor PartyLabels as HeuristicAids Table  3. Effectiveness  of Party Cues  399 inOpinion  Expression, Ordered Probit Results  Easy Issue: Easy Intermediate Hard IntermediateHard Issue: Abortion Issue:Social Services Issue:Tariffs Class Action RepublicanTreatment (T)  -0.193 (0.202) GreenT -0.219 (0.214) ReformT -0.066 (0.192) RepublicanT*Rep_Factor -0.002 (0.169) GreenT*Green_Factor -0.109 (0.184) ReformT*Reform_Factor 0.049 (0.168) -0.207** Republican-Factor (0.086) Green_Factor 0.371*** (0.100) -0.117 Reform_Factor (0.095) -1.616 _cutl (0.169) _cut2 -1.100 (0.148) -0.803 _cut3 (0.140) _cut4 .030 (0.133) N 239 PseudoR2 0.039 LR chi2 (10, 11) 25.230 Prob> chi2 0.002 ***p  0.01, **p  -0.161 (0.194) -0.564*** (0.210) -0.139 (0.187) 0.168 (0.162) -0.235 (0.173) 0.218 (0.166) -0.427*** (0.087) 0.338*** (0.095) -0.151* (0.091) -2.143 (0.198) -1.087 (0.145) -0.582 (0.138) 0.738 (0.140) 236 0.067 43.950 0.000  -0.015 (0.202) -0.169 (0.232) -0.279 (0.200) -0.247* (0.161) 0.606*** (0.193) 0.129 (0.173) 0.051 (0.090) -0.114 (0.103) 0.008 (0.098) -1.678 (0.184) -0.302 (0.146) 0.649 (0.149) 2.447 (0.311) 209 0.029 15.790 0.072  -0.247 (0.236) 0.236 (0.247) -0.051 (0.213) -0.289** (0.174) -0.190 (0.203) -0.321 (0.183) 0.054 (0.094) -0.018 (0.117) 0.266** (0.108) -2.689 (0.381) -0.864 (0.160) 0.522 (0.154) 2.181 (0.266) 189 0.027 11.440 0.247  0.05, *p ' 0.10.  conservative responses for two issues: tariffsand class action. These findings are also supportive of themoderating effect of issue complexity, as significant results only obtain for the twomore complex issues. For the tariffsand class action issues, once familiarity/trustreaches a certain a statistically significantmanner-to move in the point, individuals begin-in direction of the cue; for instance, once subjects reach a certain critical level of with respect to theRepublican Party, they take a more conserva familiarity/trust tive position (i.e., in linewith the direction of the prompt). At themaximum level of the factor,respondents are 22 percentage points more likely to fall into themost conservative category on the tariffsissue. For the class action issue, respondents at themaximum factor level in theRepublican treatmentare 10.3 percentage points  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  400  Coan et al.  >  ._  n 00 C1 11 cs  o.-0  .  o~~~~~~~ 000  o  0  o.  0o o ooc1 N -  o. o.  o. n  00 o  mc o0  o o *0 o o  .  o.  o.  o. o,.  o.  on  o  * i~~~~~~~~~  0  N  g0  *  ~0 S  o  ~  ~  ~  X~~~~~~~ .> o  ~  -  o  en--0 )OCD9 .0 o.  6  90  r  .  o  c~~~0C) 0 0- 0't -O o. o. o.  o.  o. 0-0  C)  N o. o.  -~'  C 009 o.  i  i-r0  t0 o.C  990 .  000 ~ 000ooN  cfcm 0^ o  D~~~~~~~~ o X~~~~~~~  V  c~~~~~e~i  C000D o. o. o,o.  s  o  otto o. o.  o. 9990  oo.  o.  10 It* 'IC I  400  Ct; i  .w  o^  3  o~~. o. o.  o. o. o.  o. o. o.  . o.  .  (U  SO~~~~~~~~' ~ r 0  'noo~C  M  t-00N CIA~  cn  O *nI r1c1tn  W) C7\  Y~~~~~~~~,  000m  0tC) *. o nrn0C .* r-u- cIN  O  W' o oo o. o o?  O Ol  It  * * o.>~~~~~~~~ 900 r- \1  s~~ D~~~~~~~C 00 0U F-  i  0=  coo -00m eC~0  000I o4  00 c D  S~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~i * *C .=~~~~~~~ c0  ~  0 0 O  0o0  CO  _4~~~  n)  o~~~~ ;  --0 0 - 00 >o C 4  ~  ~  o ~  > ~  ro .  0  mooo  C ~ obo  U  ^>O0  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Minor PartyLabels as HeuristicAids  401  less likely to fall into themost liberal category. The values in the lowest factor level (min) cells for the tariffsand class action issues suggest that subjects with low levels of familiarity/trust may be rejecting the cues to some degree; however, only for the tariffsissue are subjects rejecting the cue at a statistically discernable  level.  Turning next to theGreen party,we find that this treatmentonly has signifi cant effects for the tariffs issue. Table 4 shows that individuals who trusted and were familiarwith the party accepted the cue, but those who did not have a high value on the familiarity/trustfactor rejected the cue, actually registering opinions in the opposite direction. For example, at themaximum value of the familiarity/ trustfactor, the probability of giving themost liberal response is 19.1 percentage points higher,while at theminimum value of the factor, the probability of giving a conservative response is 14 percentage points higher (compared to those in the control group). These findings indicate the importance of the familiarity/trust factor in conditioning an individual's reaction to the party cues in theminor party context. They also suggest, however, thatboth the nature of the party label (major vs. minor) and the issue itselfplay a role in how cues and familiarity/trustinteract to influence acceptance, since significant results only obtain once and for an issue that is relatively difficult. Finally, theReform party treatmentalso only attains statistical significance for the tariffsissue. Respondents move in a conservative direction at low levels of the factor, thus, rejecting the cue. For example, individuals at theminimum level of the factor become 10.1 percentage points more likely to fall into the conservative category. At themaximum level of the factor, individuals do not move in the direction of the cue (i.e., the results are insignificant).We only find evidence for the rejection of the cue among those in theReform party treatmentgroup. To summarize, we find that our model works best for themajor party on complex issues. The model works less well forminor parties.We suspect that the weak effects for cue acceptance are due to the fact that trustand familiarity in general were much lower for theGreen Party and, especially, theReform Party compared to theother parties. In short, these results suggest thatminor parties may need to obtain a certain level of recognition to establish a relatively consistent (trustworthy) reputation before they can be persuasive. To more clearly depict themodel's results,we supplement our analysis with a graph showing how the different cues influence opinions on the tariff issue. Figure 1 illustrates the fact that,with respect to the issue of tariffs,all of the party labels moved  subjects in those treated groups in the directions expected by  prompts, with theRepublican cue making subjects more supportive of reducing limits on foreign imports and theGreen Party and Reform Party prompts moving subjects in the opposite direction. The figure shows that these effects are condi tional upon the value of the familiarity/trustfactor.Finally, the results also show that the effect of themajor party cue ismore substantial than the effects of either of theminor party cues, independent of familiarity and trust.  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Coan et al.  402 0.3  0.2  0.1 0 (o  0 F  -e1Republican Gre Reform  -0.1  -0.2  -0.3  Figure  min  1. Change  -  mean 1max FactorValues  in the Probability of Being in theMost Conservative Category Levels of the Factor, by Condition for theTariffs Issue.  at Different  Discussion and Conclusion We draw several conclusions from our study and analysis. First, with respect to all three parties examined, the cues only had significant effects as the issues became more complex. When dealing with issues over which individuals have well-formed opinions, learning where a party stands on an issue will likely not have much effect on one's own opinion. However, as issues become more complex-for example, the tariffsissue or the class action issue in our study individuals may come to rely on party cues more in the formation of preferences. This finding is consistent with general work on issue complexity by Carmines and Stimson (1980) and extant research on party cues and issues. Our study extends previous work by comparing the effectiveness of party labels as cues for issue expression across both issue types and party types.Whether throughballot propo sitions, legislative initiatives, themedia, or othermeans, new and often technically complex issues are frequently introduced to themass public. Our study speaks to thepotential effectof party labels as cues foropinion formation and expression on such difficult issues. Specifically, our results suggest that citizens will be able to determine theirposition on new issues, in particular ifmajor parties take clear and strong stances on those issues. Our second major conclusion is related to the effects of the cues themselves. The results indicate that some level of familiaritywith and trust in a cue giver is important forpersuasion in the realm of heuristic-based processing. As expected, we found that one's level on the familiarity/trustfactor for a party influenced  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Minor PartyLabels as HeuristicAids  403  acceptance or rejection of thatparty's cue. With respect to themajor party cue, subjects high on the familiarity/trustfactormoved in the direction of the cue for the complex issues, as expected. The minor party cues, on the other hand, pro duced mixed results. First, theywere only significant for the tariffsissue. Second, factor to reject the cue while theGreen cue led subjects low on the familiarity/trust and subjects high on the factor to accept the cue, theReform cue only had the formereffect.As indicated above, we take this finding to suggest that theremay be some type of familiarity and/or trust threshold that needs to be reached before minor party cues can cause people tomove consistently in the direction of the cue  on difficult issues. The weaker findings for cue acceptance for theminor parties are relevant to some otherwork thathas been done in the field.8For example, Lau and Redlawsk (2001) and Rahn (1993) find that people still move in the direction of party heuristics (vote incorrectly or vote on party cues even in the presence of issue information), even if the candidates of that party present positions inconsistent with those of the party. In our study, it is likely thatmost subjects were unable to know whether the prompts we reported on the most difficult of issues were consistent with the parties' actual stances.9Yet, for theRepublican Party prompt, individuals were influenced by the cue (conditional upon trustand familiarity). This was less the case, of course, for theminor parties. The resultmight suggest that some of thepotential errors thatmay come with heuristic use may only obtain among parties thathave reached a certain threshold of familiarityand trustamong the public. Given that the party label is apparently perceived as less useful, individuals may in factmore closely scrutinize the platforms of candidates that come from parties with weaker reputations. Third, and finally,our results suggest thatfamiliarityand trustcondition party label cue acceptance. However, the results also highlight thatmore work needs to be done to understand the dynamics of party label heuristics in theminor party context. For example, future researchmay seek to test the conditions under which minor party labels reach the levels of familiarity and trust that are necessary for cue acceptance to take place. Furthermore, futurework might also explore whether people rely less on party cues and more on issue information forminor party 8  It is important to point out that differences across theminor and major parties in our experiment may be due to ideological differences, as our major party is conservative and our minor parties are liberal or centrist.While we certainly cannot rule this out as a possible cause, we have little reason to believe it to be the case. There are no theoretical reasons to believe that conservative cues are more effective  than liberal cues across a range of issues?especially given that our sample tends to be more liberal, on average. 9 The stances were consistent, but the argument here is that subjects would not necessarily have had the necessary knowledge of the issue with which to assess this. In fact, interestingly, thewording of the class action issue could suggest that theRepublicans would be against it (when they are not) because  there is mention of moving suits to federal courts (a move thatmight result in a bigger national government); the presumably rare individual in our study familiar with this issue would know that, in do support thismove (likely because class action lawsuits succeed at a lower rate fact, Republicans in federal courts).  This content downloaded from 137.149.200.5 on Tue, 26 Jan 2016 18:26:09 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions  Coan  404  et al.  is, knowing that a party candidates as opposed tomajor party candidates-that label may be relatively unhelpful, do individuals work harder to collect and assess other information relevant to the decision-making  process  than they would  otherwise? ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to thank the IGA JuniorFaculty Research Program atUC Davis forproviding funding for the project, Robert Huckfeldt for the use of the experi mental lab at UC Davis, facultymembers who gave their class extra credit for participating in the study, and research assistants Ryan Claassen, David Green wald, Steve Shelby, Breana Smith, and Brandon Storment. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to JenniferL. Merolla, Claremont Graduate University, Department of Politics and Policy, 160 East Tenth Street, Claremont, CA 91711-6168. 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