The treatment works: Revisiting a key link in contextual theories of political behavior

Abstract

The use of self-reported contextual factors is prominent in political science. While recent research demonstrates that perceptions of contextual factors positively associate with census measured factors, it is less clear for whom and under what conditions this relationship holds. In this paper, I examine the relationship between census measured racial and ethnic composition and perceived racial and ethnic neighborhood composition. I use the 2008 and 2012 Collaborative Multi-Racial Post-Election Study (CMPS) datasets and append US Census data to test how well respondents understand the racial and ethnic composition of their neighborhood. Leveraging the non-White oversamples in the CMPS, I am able to test this relationship among Latinos, Blacks, and Whites. I find a positive relationship between perceived neighborhood composition and census measured composition. Respondents who live in areas with higher proportions of a racial/ethnic group are more likely to perceive that their neighborhood is composed of that group. These findings hold across Black, Latino, and White sub-samples. These findings complement and extend recent work about how well respondents understand their local environment.