Polls and Elections Some Folks You Just Can't Reach: The Genetic Heritability of Presidential Approval

For more than a half century, scholars have studied the dynamics of presidential approval. Whether it is because high approval ratings influence the president's ability to negotiate favorable policy outcomes with Congress (Canes-Wrone 2006; Canes-Wrone and de Marchi 2002; Kernell 1986) or because presidential approval influences presidential power (Mayer 1999; Yates and Whitford 1998), the foundations of presidential approval are of great interest to scholars. Over the last several decades we have learned much about how people evaluate the president's job performance. Yet some questions remain unresolved. For instance, some argue that presidents can use rhetorical skill to manipulate public evaluations of presidential performance (Druckman and Holmes 2004; Jacobs and Shapiro 2000). Others are more pessimistic and think that public evaluations of presidential performance are stable and are less susceptible to political manipulation (Brace and Hinckley 1991; MacKuen 1983). Similarly, the individual-level mechanisms that influence how people evaluate the president are not clear. While some argue that prospective evaluations of the economy influence presidential approval (Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson 2000; MacKuen, Erikson, and Stimson 1992), others think that retrospective evaluations of elites are more influential (Nadeau et al. 1999). From party identification (Fischle 2000; Gronke and Brehm 2002) to policy attitudes (Erikson, MacKuen, and Stimson 2002; Gronke 1999) and gender differences (Clarke et al. 2005; Gilens 1988), new approaches lead incrementally to a more complete understanding of how people evaluate the U.S. president. However, despite the growing literature that demonstrates the genetic heritability of political attitudes, ideologies, and behaviors, we do not know how one's genetic makeup might influence their evaluations of the president. The behavioral revolution in political science emphasized the influence of social and family environments on the development of political values, beliefs, and attitudes (Campbell et al. 1960; Jennings and Niemi 1968; Jennings, Stoker, and Bowers 2009; Niemi and Jennings 1991), and we now know that much of this is genetically heritable (Alford, Funk, and Hibbing 2005; Hatemi et al. 201 la; Hatemi, Eaves, and McDermott 2012; Hibbing, Smith, and Alford 2013; Settle et al. 2010; Verhulst et al. 2012). Similarly, the study of presidential approval began with models developed using aggregate data, which were clarified once scholars began looking at individual variation (Druckman and Holmes 2004; Krosnick and Kinder 1990; Miller and Krosnick 2000; Mondak 1993). Yet, genetic differences explain significant variation in individual political attitudes. By exploring how genetic differences influence presidential approval evaluations, this article helps clarify previous research and refines our understanding of this concept. The remainder of this article develops a model that explains both the long-term stability and the short-term fluctuations in presidential approval. Independent of other factors that explain attitude stability--such as party identification--our genes are strongly associated with stable attitude structures that tend not to shift dramatically (Eaves and Eysenck 1974; Hatemi, Eaves, and McDermott 2012; Hatemi, Funk et al. 2009; Martin et al. 1986). Insofar as genes influence individual evaluations of presidential performance, they likely cause stable views. This could be why presidential approval ratings tend to revert back to a baseline level following brief changes due to rally events, elections, and the like (Brace and Hinckley 1991; MacKuen 1983). Yet, our genetic makeup also predisposes us to react to our environment in particular ways (Hatemi 2015; Hibbing, Smith, and Alford 2013). The level of patriotism invoked in response to an attack on the United States is likely the result of genetic predispositions rather than social upbringing. …