VOTING BEHAVIOR AND EDUCATION Introduction Pive

However, the returns of a higher education can be strong and varied. One of these returns, Piven and Cloward (2000) state, is a greater interest and participation in civic affairs such as voting. In other words, the more educated tend to vote in higher frequencies than the less educated.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the literature on education and voting behavior and to then analyze and discuss the findings of a survey conducted to examine for an association between educational level and presidential selection in the 2000 election. The paper ends with a summary and discussion of findings observed for the conducted analysis.

What is the relationship between educating and voting behavior? The National Center For Education Statistics (NCES, 1996) has noted that:

Education plays a vital role in preparing individuals to actively participate in the political, economic, and social lives of their communities

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aper took a closer look at the contribution of education to presidential voting by analyzing the responses of a survey sample of voters to questions concerning their political views and voting behavior. Educational and other data were collected as well as responses to a survey item asking them who they voted for president in the 2000 election. Findings Observed For Analyses of Survey Data The analysis presented here examined one voting behavior (who did you select for President in the 2000 elections) in relation to the educational attainments of a sample of survey respondents. There were 139 respondents to the survey. Table 1 presents some descriptive findings observed for the survey sample in terms of their education, their ethnicity, who they voted for as president and what ethnic group or groups they believed were most likely to vote for people like themselves. As can be seen from inspection of Table 1, the majority of survey respondents (45.3%) were white. Non-Whites or Latino voters comprised a total of 36 percent of the sample. However, a good deal of the sample's ethnic background is unknown because 11.5 percent of those surveyed did not provide information regarding their racial/ethnic background. As to their views of
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Approximate Word count = 2262
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page)