How People Understand Voting Rules

Antoinette Baujard, Roberto Brunetti (), Isabelle Lebon and Simone Marsilio
Additional contact information
Roberto Brunetti: GATE Lyon Saint-Étienne - Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon - Saint-Etienne - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - UJM - Université Jean Monnet - Saint-Étienne - EM - EMLyon Business School - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, CREM - Centre de recherche en économie et management - UNICAEN - Université de Caen Normandie - NU - Normandie Université - UR - Université de Rennes - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Simone Marsilio: UniSR - Universita Vita Salute San Raffaele = Vita-Salute San Raffaele University [Milan, Italie]

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Abstract: If individuals are to be empowered in their selection or use of a voting rule, it is necessary that they understand it. This paper analyzes people's understanding of two voting rules: evaluative voting and majority judgment. We first distinguish three components of understanding in this context: how to fill in the ballot; how votes are aggregated; and how to vote strategically. To measure each component, we draw on results from a lab experiment on incentivized voting where participants are exogenously assigned single-peaked preferences and answer comprehension questions on the rules employed. We find that most participants understand how to fill in the ballot with both voting rules. However, participants' understanding of vote aggregation under majority judgment is lower and, crucially, more heterogeneous. While some participants correctly understand its aggregation property, a sizable group fails to grasp it. We also observe no difference in voting behavior between evaluative voting and majority judgment: the data confirm the theoretical prediction that under evaluative voting there will be a high incidence of strategic voting through the use of extreme grades, but contradict the prediction that under majority judgment voters will vote less strategically. Finally, we find that with majority judgment, the better voters understand how votes are aggregated, the more they vote strategically, hence resulting in inequality in voter agency.

Keywords: voting rules; understanding; evaluative voting; majority judgment; laboratory experiment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-11-21
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-04653702v2
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Related works:
Working Paper: How People Understand Voting Rules (2025)
Working Paper: How people understand voting rules (2025)
Working Paper: How People Understand Voting Rules (2024)
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