RESEARCH INTERESTS
My main line of research sheds light on the influence of political campaigns on voting behavior. I study the influence of negative (and hostile) partisanship on voters' electoral behavior as well as motivated reasoning during political campaigns. I also participate in collaborative research projects aiming to understanding why voters support corrupt politicians in Latin America, vote-buying in Mexico, and scientific opinion on climate change.
- American and Comparative Politics.
- Survey/Experimental Methods, Public Opinion, and Voting Behavior.
- Political Campaigns, Partisanship, and Motivated Reasoning.
- Misinformation, Clientelism and Vote-Buying.
- Survey Research, Expert Opinion, and Climate Change.
My main line of research sheds light on the influence of political campaigns on voting behavior. I study the influence of negative (and hostile) partisanship on voters' electoral behavior as well as motivated reasoning during political campaigns. I also participate in collaborative research projects aiming to understanding why voters support corrupt politicians in Latin America, vote-buying in Mexico, and scientific opinion on climate change.
BOOK PROJECT
My book project--“Politics of Anger: Negative Partisanship, Campaigns, and the Breakdown of the Mexican Party System”— explains why voters stopped supporting traditional parties and triggered the breakdown of one of the most stable party systems in Latin America. My research identifies the powerful role of anger explaining the rise of the populist left in the 2018 presidential election in Mexico. In a context of perceived poor governance and widespread corruption, the Mexican left identified the source of grievance—the incumbent PRI and the PAN as part of the political establishment—and translated voters’ anger into electoral behavior. Based on an original two-wave panel survey, a postelectoral survey as well as nine survey experiments conducted during the presidential campaign, my book project answers two interrelated questions: 1) what conditions changed to lead voters to support the left after rejecting the same presidential candidate in the two previous presidential elections and, 2) what variables activated anger among Mexican voters? My research identifies three variables that moderated voters’ anger and made possible to translate it into political behavior: negative partisanship, misinformation, and political campaigns.
COLLABORATIVE PROJECTS
I am also participating in a number of collaborative research projects. As investigator of the Mexico team that conducts the National Electoral Study—which is part of the Comparative Studies of Electoral Systems (CSES)—we study vote-buying in recent elections at the gubernatorial, legislative, and presidential level in Mexico. Methodologically, we find that sensitive survey techniques like list experiments underestimate vote buying. We identify conditions under which list experiments estimate results that contradict direct questioning or provide nonsensical results (e.g. negative prevalence of a sensitive behavior). Given the cognitive taxing process required by the technique, list experiments are difficult to use among less educated populations (who, in fact, are the most likely to be targeted by clientelism). In turn, direct questioning that help voters remember whether they receive a gift makes respondents more likely to report receiving such gifts. We also find that Mexican parties have adopted the GOTV model of voter mobilization. However, instead of only delivering messages to increase turnout, candidates deliver clientelistic gifts in households without the need of political brokers.
My second collaborative project seeks to understand why voters support corrupt politicians in new democracies, focusing on voters’ responsiveness to sources of information, which sheds light on an important link in the larger process through which citizens hold politicians accountable. Relying on original survey experiments conducted in Colombia, El Salvador, Mexico, and Argentina, we find that only accusations of corruption coming from perceived credible sources and from media outlets that are ideologically close to voters’ partisan preferences drive down levels of support for corrupt politicians. We also find that voters are more likely to forgive politicians’ wrongdoings when benefits are redistributed than when they are not (illicit enrichment). My research expands on this collaborative project by studying how partisanship makes some voters less likely to hold co-partisan politicians accountable even when they clearly misbehave.
I also participate in a project that studies a quintessential topic of misinformation among elites and the American public: climate change. Relying on an original elite survey of top environmental biologists, we found that experts agree on climatic change projections, but have less consensus about strategies of climate change adaptation, and varying levels of certainty about consequences of climate change.
My second collaborative project seeks to understand why voters support corrupt politicians in new democracies, focusing on voters’ responsiveness to sources of information, which sheds light on an important link in the larger process through which citizens hold politicians accountable. Relying on original survey experiments conducted in Colombia, El Salvador, Mexico, and Argentina, we find that only accusations of corruption coming from perceived credible sources and from media outlets that are ideologically close to voters’ partisan preferences drive down levels of support for corrupt politicians. We also find that voters are more likely to forgive politicians’ wrongdoings when benefits are redistributed than when they are not (illicit enrichment). My research expands on this collaborative project by studying how partisanship makes some voters less likely to hold co-partisan politicians accountable even when they clearly misbehave.
I also participate in a project that studies a quintessential topic of misinformation among elites and the American public: climate change. Relying on an original elite survey of top environmental biologists, we found that experts agree on climatic change projections, but have less consensus about strategies of climate change adaptation, and varying levels of certainty about consequences of climate change.
