Do people vote for a presidential candidate whose personality they believe is similar to their own?

Gordon DiRenzo, sociology, has been studying that question for 40 years through 10 presidential elections, and he says they do. His ongoing research shows that a personality link between voters and their candidates can play an important role in an election.

DiRenzo is the first to admit there are many factors that influence candidate selection, but he said one of them definitely is the candidate's perceived personality. The key word is "perceived," because people only know a candidate's personality through his or her public persona.

During presidential election years, DiRenzo teaches a course entitled "Personality and Politics" in which he and his students administer a test to a random sampling of registered voters that determines the structure of their personalities. Questions are aimed at determining whether each person has an open-minded or closed-minded personality structure and who they will vote for or prefer as presidential candidates.

Some characteristics of a closed-minded personality include: having a preference for strongly authoritarian leadership, a tendency to be exclusive to one's own values and lifestyles, a need to conform to social norms and an intolerance for ambiguity and uncertainty. The open-minded personality structure is the opposite.

For the class, questionnaires will be administered to between 350 and 500 demographically diverse voters at the end of the October. They ask the voter to agree or disagree with a variety of statements, such as: "It is better to be a dead hero than a live coward," "Even though freedom of speech for all groups is a worthwhile goal, it is unfortunately necessary to restrict the freedom of certain political groups" and "To compromise with our political opponents is dangerous because it usually leads to the betrayal of our own side." Finally, the survey asks a series of questions about for whom they will vote and who would make the best president.

To analyze the personality of the candidates, DiRenzo uses a panel of professional psychologists who examine candidate behavior and speeches and writings. They analyze the words and phrases candidates use, how they use them and even the emphasis they use when speaking.

After the election, DiRenzo and his students will analyze the data and determine the ratio of voters who selected candidates most closely exhibiting their personality structure and type. In 1992, people with closed-minded personalities were twice as likely to vote for George Bush as for Bill Clinton. The correlation between voter and candidate personality structure is even more striking in crossover voters or those who are registered for one party but vote for the presidential candidate of another party.

DiRenzo has done extensive research on political behavior in the U.S. and Italy. He has published two books on the subject, Personality and Politics and Personality, Power and Politics.

–Barbara Garrison

Photo by JACK BUXBAUM