Political scientists have assumed that the process of making a voting decision is different than any other decision in a person's life. But we're finding there are a lot of similarities. Our findings may be surprising to some political scientists, but they won't be a surprise to psychologists who study decision-making. This means that the first ideas you develop about a candidate will influence your vote more than those you learn later. For candidates, this means that advertising early in the campaign probably has a bigger positive impact than later ads.
Voters start with positive attitudes toward unknown candidates.
Most researchers have assumed that people are neutral toward candidates in the beginning, but this study showed that voters have a slightly positive attitude even before they know anything about those who are running, Krosnick said. Candidates can take advantage of the fact that they start the campaign on the positive side with most potential voters. Negative information has more impact on voters than positive information. This helps explain why negative campaign ads are so effective. Less knowledgeable voters make their decisions in much the same way as do informed voters.