A cash lottery increases voter turnout

Area of Science:

• Political Science
• Behavioral Economics
• Experimental Social Science

Background:

• Traditional voter turnout reforms focus on reducing participation costs or enhancing civic duty appeals, yielding limited success.
• The potential impact of extrinsic rewards on political participation remains underexplored in academic research.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the effectiveness of extrinsic rewards, specifically lottery incentives, in encouraging voter turnout among undergraduate students.
• To determine if lottery incentives can significantly increase participation in low-turnout elections.

Main Methods:

• A field experiment was conducted during a student government election at a major public university.
• Undergraduate students were offered lottery prizes as an incentive to vote.
• Voting behavior was compared between a control group and an experimental group receiving the lottery incentive.

Main Results:

• Extrinsic rewards, in the form of lottery prizes, significantly increased voter turnout.
• The impact of lottery incentives on voting was particularly pronounced among students from lower socio-economic status backgrounds.
• The findings suggest lottery incentives are a viable strategy for boosting participation in elections with historically low turnout.

Conclusions:

• Lottery incentives can be an effective tool for increasing voter turnout, especially in contexts with low participation rates.
• The study highlights the differential impact of extrinsic rewards across socio-economic groups, suggesting targeted interventions may be beneficial.
• Future research could explore the long-term effects and scalability of using extrinsic rewards to promote civic engagement.