THE EVAPORATING INDEPENDENTS REMOVING THE “INDEPENDENT” OPTION FROM THE NES PARTY IDENTIFICATION QUESTION

In this brief paper we contend that the number and composition of individuals identifying with no political party may change substantially when the "Independent" option is omitted from the classic National Election Study (NES) party identification question. Data from two surveys of Vermont residents reveal that when the independent choice is not presented the percentage of self-identified independents drops significantly. Moreover, the relationship between age and partisanship varied depending on whether or not the nonpartisan choice was given. When the independent option was announced, a much higher percentage of younger than older respondents chose the option, but with the nonpartisan choice omitted, more older individuals actually opted to identify as independents. A similar analysis using nationwide survey data from the Roper Organization and NES supports our Vermont conclusions. The increase in Americans not claiming allegiance to a political party is one of the most significant trends in United States electoral politics over the last quarter century. As gauged by the widely used National Election Study (NES) question "Generally speaking, do you think of yourself as a Republican, a Democrat, an Independent, or what?" the percentage of respondents selecting the independent option has grown from just above 20% in the 1950s and early 1960s to approximately 35% in the 1970s and early 1980s. Not surprisingly, this increase has been studied intensely, with scholars researching what the shift signals for the future of the party system (Burnham, 1970; Sundquist, 1983), who PATRICK J. KENNEY is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Arizona State University. TOM W. RICE iS an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Vermont. The names of the authors appear in alphabetical order, implying that this study is in every way a collaborative enterprise. The authors thank John E. Stanga and Nicholas L. Danigelis for their assistance in developing this article. Public Opinion Quarterly Volume 52:231-239 ? 1988 by the American Association for Public Opinion Research Published by The University of Chicago Press / 0033-362X/88/0052-02/$2.50 This content downloaded from 207.46.13.75 on Sat, 03 Sep 2016 04:02:21 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 232 Patrick J. Kenney and Tom W. Rice are the new independents (Abramson, 1976; Converse, 1976; Shively, 1979; Claggett, 1981; Norpoth and Rusk, 1982), and what prompted the movement away from parties (Burnham, 1970; Jennings and Niemi, 1974; Jennings and Markus, 1984). While such attention has yielded a rich understanding of the trend toward political independence as measured by the NES question, it is important to remember that the NES query is only one way of tapping partisanship. Indeed, recent research has revealed partisanship to be a much more complex psychological concept than recognized a few decades ago. For example, Katz (1979), Valentine and Van Wingen (1980), and Weisberg (1980) contend that partisanship is multidimensional-that a person can be both a partisan and an independent simultaneously. These and other studies (Wattenberg, 1981; Miller and Wattenberg, 1983) suggest the need to employ a variety of partisanship measures when studying the trend toward political independence. Put more strongly, to rely too heavily on the NES party identification question is to risk not fully understanding the recent shifts in party allegiance. The purpose of the present study is to examine this concern. Specifically, we show that altering just slightly the wording in the NES question apparently results in a shift in partisan responses. In addition, closer inspection suggests that the shift in partisanship produced by the altered NES survey instrument is due almost entirely to movement among younger individuals. Research Design and Findings As noted above, the standard NES party identification question includes "Independent" as a partisanship choice. While offering the independent category is certainly acceptable, it is quite likely that it enhances the chance that a respondent will identify as an independent. Research by Schuman and Presser (1981) and Bishop (1985) has demonstrated that individuals more readily select a middle response alternative when presented the option than when it is not offered. Although the independent category is not explicitly the middle alternative in the NES party identification question, it may well serve as such for a great number of people. The initial concern of this study, then, was to establish the effect of including the independent category in the party identification question. To do this we compared the results of two random sample surveys of residents of the state of Vermont. The first survey, conducted in 1984, employed a party identification question very similar to the NES question. In the second, conducted a year later, the independent option was inadvertently omitted. The omission conveniently provided us the baseline necessary to examine the effects This content downloaded from 207.46.13.75 on Sat, 03 Sep 2016 04:02:21 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms The Evaporating Independents 233 Table 1. Party Identification, Vermont Surveys "Independent" "Independent" Party Identification Included (1984) Omitted (1985) Democrat 24.5% 28.0% Independent 47.0 37.5 Republican 22.4 28.4 Other/Don't know 6.1 6.1