Voting to Tell Others
通过实地实验，研究人们因担心被问及投票情况而产生的社会形象动机对投票率的影响，估计出“告诉他人”的投票价值约为15美元，贡献了2个百分点的投票率。
Why do people vote? We design a field experiment to estimate a model of voting “because others will ask”. The expectation of being asked motivates turnout if individuals derive pride from telling others that they voted, or feel shame from admitting that they did not vote, provided that lying is costly. In a door-to-door survey about election turnout, we experimentally vary (1) the informational content and use of a flyer pre-announcing the survey, (2) the duration and payment for the survey, and (3) the incentives to lie about past voting. The experimental results indicate significant social image concerns. For the 2010 Congressional election, we estimate a value of voting “to tell others” of about $\\$$15, contributing 2 percentage points to turnout. Finally, we evaluate a get-out-the-vote intervention in which we tell potential voters that we will ask if they voted.