Candidate Choice Research Articles

Finding the One: Ease of Candidate Choices in High Information Open‐List PR Systems

Vote choice in an open‐list proportional representation (OLPR) electoral system can be considered a complex process. In systems where votes are cast for individual candidates the choice is complicated by the large number of candidates, the two layers of competition involving both individual candidates and parties, and the amount of information required to make an informed choice. Hence, voters are expected to apply strategies to narrow down the pool of candidates from which the actual choice is made, that is, to create a delimited consideration set using cognitive heuristics. The types of strategies that facilitate voters' candidate choice are studied. More specifically, the voters' perceptions of the ease with which they choose their candidate and how this is related to three decision‐making patterns are studied: the party‐centric, in which the voter looks for party‐related and ideological cues; the socio‐normative, in which the voter considers their social in‐group; and the candidate‐related, in which the voter puts emphasis on specific features of the candidates, such as political experience, age and gender. Our study is situated in the Finnish OLPR system, characterized by many candidates, intense intra‐party competition and mandatory preferential voting. Using data from the 2019 Finnish National Election Study and ordinal probit selection models, the mechanisms that facilitate the ease of candidate choice are outlined. Our findings suggest that voters feeling close to a political party and knowing the candidate personally or through friends or family perceive their candidate choice as easier.

Enhanced specificity of bimetallic ions via mesoporous confinement for phosphopeptides in human saliva

Phosphopeptides were of great significance in disease diagnosis and monitoring its dynamic changes. In this article, we proposed a more efficient method to synthesize a kind of bimetallic mesoporous silica nanomaterials (Fe3O4@mSiO2-PO3-Ti4+/Zr4+) and applied it to the analysis of phosphopeptides in human saliva samples based on IMAC technology. The chelation group was introduced into mesopores at the same time as the formation of mesoporous silica which significantly reduced the synthesis procedure and improved the synthesis efficiency. The as-prepared materials showed great sensitivity, selectivity and size-exclusion performance for phosphopeptides in standard β-casein digests. More importantly, the materials identified 85 phosphopeptides in disease saliva samples which provided a candidate choice in future clinical examination.

The Choice of Candidates in Survival Markers Based on Coordinated Gene Expression in Renal Cancer.

We aimed to identify and investigate genes that are essential for the development of clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) and sought to shed light on the mechanisms of its progression and create prognostic markers for the disease. We used real-time PCR to study the expression of 20 genes that were preliminarily selected based on their differential expression in ccRCC, in 68 paired tumor/normal samples. Upon ccRCC progression, seven genes that showed an initial increase in expression showed decreased expression. The genes whose expression levels did not significantly change during progression were associated mainly with metabolic and inflammatory processes. The first group included CA9, NDUFA4L2, EGLN3, BHLHE41, VWF, IGFBP3, and ANGPTL4, whose expression levels were coordinately decreased during tumor progression. This expression coordination and gene function is related to the needs of tumor development at different stages. Specifically, the high correlation coefficient of EGLN3 and NDUFA4L2 expression may indicate the importance of the coordinated regulation of glycolysis and mitochondrial metabolism. A panel of CA9, EGLN3, BHLHE41, and VWF enabled the prediction of survival for more than 3.5 years in patients with ccRCC, with a probability close to 90%. Therefore, a coordinated change in the expression of a gene group during ccRCC progression was detected, and a new panel of markers for individual survival prognosis was identified.

Assessing the Performances of Vendor Firms by Optimization Technique Industry 4.0 GSC Architectures

Green supply chain is the process used for diminishing the exploitation of resources and producing sustainable technological development. The aim of the research work is to build the proficient Industry 4.0 green architectures index for assessing the feasible candidate choice. In the research work, a crisp numbers set-based MOORA-FMF advanced technique is executed for examining the Industry 4.0 green architectures of vendors firms. The managers are assisted with an Industry 4.0 green architectures index with optimization technique to quantify the performances of alternatives. Therefore, a real case study of a steel manufacturing plant is carried to simulate the proposed Industry 4.0 GSC architectures. Eventually, the results are presented in the conclusion.

Just a Number? Voter Evaluations of Age in Candidate Choice Experiments

Around the world, humans are living longer and politicians are getting older. But what do voters think about politicians of advanced age? We conduct a meta-analysis of sixteen conjoint design-based candidate choice experiments in seven democracies, revealing that older hypothetical candidates are consistently less likely to be favored by respondents—whether compared to the youngest alternative or the second-oldest alternative. We then report the findings of a novel conjoint experiment on Japanese voters designed to elicit whether the milestone of entering a new decade of age (70 versus 69 years) affects respondents’ preferences for hypothetical candidates. Although at most 730 days separate candidates of these ages (limiting concerns of substantial differences in health or fitness), we find a significant penalty for the older candidate. Together, our findings highlight the mismatch between voters’ preferences for younger politicians and the ostensible gerontocracy that governs much of the world.

Factor Influences for Diagnosis and Vaccination of Avian Infectious Bronchitis Virus (Gammacoronavirus) in Chickens.

Infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) is a major economic problem in commercial chicken farms with acute multiple-system infection, especially in respiratory and urogenital systems. A live-attenuated and killed vaccine is currently immunized to control IBV infection; however, repeated outbreaks occur in both unvaccinated and vaccinated birds due to the choice of inadequate vaccine candidates and continuous emergence of novel infectious bronchitis (IB) variants and failure of vaccination. However, similar clinical signs were shown in different respiratory diseases that are essential to improving the diagnostic assay to detect IBV infections. Various risk factors involved in the failure of IB vaccination, such as various routes of application of vaccination, the interval between vaccinations, and challenge with various possible immunosuppression of birds are reviewed. The review article also highlights and updates factors affecting the diagnosis of IBV disease in the poultry industry with differential diagnosis to find the nature of infections compared with non-IBV diseases. Therefore, it is essential to monitor the common reasons for failed IBV vaccinations with preventive action, and proper diagnostic facilities for identifying the infective stage, leading to earlier control and reduced economic losses from IBV disease.

Reconsidering the Relationship between Authoritarianism and Republican Support in 2016 and Beyond

Authoritarianism has become increasingly associated with Republican partisanship and vote choice for Republican candidates in presidential elections. Many have relied on this fact to explain the fo...

Intravenous immunoglobulin-induced severe vesicular eczematous eruption successfully treated with narrow band-ultraviolet B therapy.

Intravenous immunoglobulins (IVIg) are increasingly being used to treat a wide spectrum of dermatological and neurological autoimmune diseases. Although the administration of IVIg does not usually result in severe adverse reactions, side effects of IVIg reportedly occur in 6-13% of patients. Most reported cases were not severe, and IVIg is considered a relatively safe drug. Some reports described a vesicular eczematous eruption caused by IVIg that was cured by applying topical steroid ointments or systemic steroids. Herein, we present, to the best of our knowledge, the first case of severe vesicular eczematous eruption all over the body induced by IVIg that was unresponsive to topical steroid ointment and was subsequently treated with narrow band-ultraviolet B (NB-UVB) therapy successfully. NB-UVB was started at a dose of 400mJ/cm2 once a week, and swift improvement was observed. The skin rash disappeared in the first 2months, and the pathogenesis of IVIg-induced eczematous eruption remains unelucidated. No change in eosinophils and complement levels were observed in our case. Given the increase in the widespread use of IVIg, we have shown that NB-UVB therapy is a candidate choice for the treatment of IVIg-induced severe vesicular eczematous eruption.

You seem like a great candidate, but…: race and gender attitudes and the 2020 democratic primary

AbstractThe 2020 Democratic presidential primary unfolded in a context with significant attention to issues of racial and gender inequality and identity. The field began as an historically diverse one but a white male candidate received the party's endorsement. Did the race and gender attitudes of Democratic primary and caucus participants play a role in shaping the pool of candidates? Using a survey of self-identified Democrats, this study provides evidence that racial resentment, hostile sexism, and modern sexism enhanced the assessments on several evaluative criteria of the white male candidate, while depressing the assessment of the Black woman candidate. These relationships are driven primarily by white respondents. These findings add to our understanding of how race and gender attitudes affect the electoral process well before the general election, particularly by shaping the ultimate choice of candidates in that contest.

A Password Meter without Password Exposure.

To meet password selection criteria of a server, a user occasionally needs to provide multiple choices of password candidates to an on-line password meter, but such user-chosen candidates tend to be derived from the user’s previous passwords—the meter may have a high chance to acquire information about a user’s passwords employed for various purposes. A third party password metering service may worsen this threat. In this paper, we first explore a new on-line password meter concept that does not necessitate the exposure of user’s passwords for evaluating user-chosen password candidates in the server side. Our basic idea is straightforward; to adapt fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) schemes to build such a system but its performance achievement is greatly challenging. Optimization techniques are necessary for performance achievement in practice. We employ various performance enhancement techniques and implement the NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) metering method as seminal work in this field. Our experiment results demonstrate that the running time of the proposed meter is around 60 s in a conventional desktop server, expecting better performance in high-end hardware, with an FHE scheme in HElib library where parameters support at least 80-bit security. We believe the proposed method can be further explored and used for a password metering in case that password secrecy is very important—the user’s password candidates should not be exposed to the meter and also an internal mechanism of password metering should not be disclosed to users and any other third parties.

The Elizabethan Nobility: A Recount and a Reassessment of Elizabeth's Reasons for Creating Noblemen

AbstractElizabeth I is regarded as having been parsimonious in creating new noblemen, allowing the nobility to decrease in size as she sought to maintain the exclusivity of the caste. In reality, the queen created a larger nobility than her Tudor predecessors had done. Her failure to sustain this high number was due not to a policy of limiting the number of noblemen but rather because she did not need so many. Elizabeth had a policy of economy with regard to both creating and using noblemen as she maintained a nobility appropriate for the circumstances of the time, as assessed by her and Lord Burghley. Early Elizabethan peerages honoured her family and restored old titles. Later the choice of candidates was influenced by Burghley's need for more noblemen in parliament and in the counties. However, although Burghley proposed candidates, it was Elizabeth's decision whether to follow his advice and in 1589 she chose to do otherwise.

How voters choose one out of many: a conjoint analysis of the effects of endorsements on candidate choice

ABSTRACT Candidate endorsements affect the likelihood that people vote for a candidate since they reduce the efforts devoted to vote choices. However, the effects of endorsements from different sources remain under-explored. Furthermore, the effects of endorsements are believed to vary with the level of political sophistication, as voters with low sophistication are more reliant on such shortcuts, but it is unclear whether these differences are similar for different sources. We study the effects of endorsements from three different sources – family and close friends, networks on social media and Voting Advice Applications (VAAs) – on candidate favorability. We do so with a choice-based conjoint experiment embedded in a survey from Finland (n = 1021), where we also examine differences in effects across political sophistication (political interest, frequency of political discussions, internal political efficacy, party identification, and voting in the last parliamentary election). The results show that endorsements from VAAs and family and friends have positive effects while social media networks do not. We do not find systematic differences in effects across levels of political sophistication no matter how we operationalize it. This shows that it is important to consider the source of an endorsement to appreciate the effect, no matter who is the recipient.

As eleições legislativas de 1921 no Alentejo

This study focuses on the 1922 legislative elections that took place in the six electoral districtsof the Alentejo (Portugal).It addresses topics related to political contextualization, the choice of candidates for deputies, the electoral campaign, clientelism, electoral fraud and agreements.It also presents a review of the electoral results of the Alentejo, moving away from the numbers followed by Portuguese historiography

Celebrity Advertisement and Young Voters’ Choice of Political Candidates in Ghana: Looking Through the Lens of Tertiary Students

The drive to win elections by political candidates has resulted in the employment of marketing tools such as celebrity advertising. Celebrities have been engaged in endorsing various political candidates. The current study sought to investigate the influence of celebrity advertisement on young voters’ choice of political candidates in Ghana. The study employed the quantitative technique through regression statistics to establish the influence. A sample of about 400 students (respondents) was drawn for the study. The results showed that there was weak positive but significant influence of celebrity advertisement on young voters’ choice of political candidates. This indicates that political parties that engage celebrities in advertising for their candidates and brands stand the chance of winning over young voters to vote for their candidates. It is recommended that celebrity advertising should be designed in such a way that it could improve the capacity of creating long lasting impact in the minds of young voters, influencing young voters to better recognize political candidates at voting points as well as influencing recalling of political candidates during national elections. Policies makers should put measures in place to regulate the contents and type of adverts that can be run by celebrities for political parties since most of these adverts are directed to and consumed by young voters.

Dynasties and brand names in the political sphere of the post-industrial society

During the formation of contemporary democracy, its ideologists strived to create a management mechanism that did not resemble monarchy at all, so that to emphasize the radical nature of social-political changes in the transition from pre-industrial to industrial society. The dynastic transfer of power in all its manifestations and at all levels of governance was denounced as outdated, ineffective, and violating the very foundations of the peoples will. The article shows that, despite the initial criticism, dynasties are widespread in contemporary politics. The family is a part of politics and systems of public administration in a truly post-industrial form - as a brand, image, and symbol. The transition to the post-industrial society predetermines a change in the attitude to dynasties and their role not only in politics but also in systems of interaction with the population (electorate). Based on the analysis of other research and authors data on political dynasties at different levels of government in 17 countries, the article proves the changing attitude to political dynasties even within democratic systems. Political dynasties increasingly often contribute to the creation and expansion of social networks, establishing sustainable political ties, ensuring gender presentation in government, etc. There are numerous manifestations of dynasties in countries with different levels of social-economic development (developed and developing) and different types of government (authoritarian and democratic) due to the application of marketing thinking and technologies in politics. Dynasties allow to effectively use the family potential to create and promote political brands, to ensure sustainable social choices of political candidates and parties, to facilitate political socialization of new generations and relative predictability of politicians behavior, who would follow a family line in making important decisions.

Voter's choice of a presidential candidate: An empirical study

Since the consolidation of democracy and the inception of reforms thereof in Ghana, one raging subject matter that has over time come under intense scrutiny, and persistently, altogether eminently preoccupied the attention of political scientists, pollsters, marketers and strategists in particular, has been one bordering on voter's behavior. Understanding voter's behavior is crucially indispensable to reshaping the democratic process and devising political strategies. In spite of this, there is however a paucity of research focus targeted at unraveling the distinct behavior patterns and underpinnings relative to voters' choices. Against this backdrop, the main idea of this research is to explore the antecedents of voters' choice. The theory of consumer behavior has been used as the theoretical framework. Using the survey approach, data was elicited from card bearing registered voters and analyzed with the aid of the structural equation modeling technique. Results of data (n = 363) analysis revealed a confluence of voters' choice antecedents anchored on; quality, trust, attractiveness, expertise and image. Based on the results, study implications are discussed, and suggestions for future research are subsequently delineated.

Monograph v. manuscript: exploring the factors that influence English L1 and EAL candidates’ thesis-writing approach

ABSTRACT Writing a doctoral thesis with publications or by publication (TBP) has become an increasingly popular choice for PhD candidates seeking a competitive edge in the post-doctoral job market. However, many candidates continue to write traditional chapter monographs. While research into the TBP has steadily grown over the past two decades, there remains few studies examining candidates’ decision to write traditional theses. Further, despite the widely documented increase of international candidates pursuing their PhDs in OECD countries, there is very limited research examining what role, if any, a candidate’s language background has on the thesis-medium decision. The present study seeks to explore the factors both ‘native’ English (L1) and English as an Additional Language (EAL) candidates consider when choosing which thesis-writing approach to adopt. It reports on questionnaire data from 75 PhD candidates, supported with qualitative interview data from fourteen of those candidates and four doctoral supervisors. We found that EAL candidates were almost twice as likely to pursue a TBP whereas their English L1 peers equally pursued the two thesis-writing approaches. We report in depth on the reasons candidates cite for their chosen approach and discuss how an understanding of their decision-making process may better inform doctoral candidate orientation, support and training.

An Inclusive Survey of Contactless Wireless Sensing: A Technology Used for Remotely Monitoring Vital Signs Has the Potential to Combating COVID-19

With the Coronavirus pandemic showing no signs of abating, companies and governments around the world are spending millions of dollars to develop contactless sensor technologies that minimize the need for physical interactions between the patient and healthcare providers. As a result, healthcare research studies are rapidly progressing towards discovering innovative contactless technologies, especially for infants and elderly people who are suffering from chronic diseases that require continuous, real-time control, and monitoring. The fusion between sensing technology and wireless communication has emerged as a strong research candidate choice because wearing sensor devices is not desirable by patients as they cause anxiety and discomfort. Furthermore, physical contact exacerbates the spread of contagious diseases which may lead to catastrophic consequences. For this reason, research has gone towards sensor-less or contactless technology, through sending wireless signals, then analyzing and processing the reflected signals using special techniques such as frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) or channel state information (CSI). Therefore, it becomes easy to monitor and measure the subject’s vital signs remotely without physical contact or asking them to wear sensor devices. In this paper, we overview and explore state-of-the-art research in the field of contactless sensor technology in medicine, where we explain, summarize, and classify a plethora of contactless sensor technologies and techniques with the highest impact on contactless healthcare. Moreover, we overview the enabling hardware technologies as well as discuss the main challenges faced by these systems.

Democracy’s Disparity? Gender, Equality, and the 2020 Iowa Caucuses

The Iowa caucuses are often praised for exemplifying the ideal of deliberative democracy. From this perspective, voters come together publicly on equal footing to debate and choose their preferred presidential candidate. Critics contend, however, that the caucus process is not as democratic as supporters believe. In practice, they claim, caucuses mirror power asymmetries rooted in society-based differences based on gender, race, or sexual orientation. To assess these competing claims, we test whether there is a relationship between group identity and the degree of comfort Iowa voters feel expressing an opinion during the deliberative process. Using interviews, observations, and results from a survey taken by 1024 Iowan voters, we find data consistent with both perspectives. Men and women are generally comfortable voicing beliefs at the caucus, but men more so. Additionally, women are more likely than men to feel social pressure to vote a certain way, discuss their candidate choice with others, and express a sense of community through the process. We conclude that female participants are more open and sociable than men while attending a caucus, but less assertive in sharing their opinions. Based on this criterion, we determine that the Iowa caucuses, while generally approximating the ideal of deliberative democracy, are nonetheless less democratic than its proponents contend.

Elections under biased candidate endorsements — an experimental study

We construct an election game to study the electoral impacts of biased candidate endorsements. We derive a set of testable predictions. We test these in a laboratory experiment and find that observed election outcomes and vote shares are well predicted. We find no support, however, for our prediction that the relationship between election outcome and the endorser's bias is non-monotonic; i.e., ex ante, a candidate's winning probability will first increase and then decrease as the endorser becomes more biased towards her. Voter turnout is much less responsive to the bias than predicted. We argue that observed voting behavior can be explained, to a substantial extent, by three behavioral mechanisms: (a) distinct levels of rationality for candidate choice and turnout decisions, (b) conservative belief updating, and (c) ‘partial competition neglect’, where voters underestimate the correlation between the information released by an endorsement and the closeness of elections.