by Abby Fingerlin Hypothesis and MotivationThrough my research I sought to gain a better understanding of the relationship between civic engagement, education level, and familial income. My research is intended to help readers understand the weight and implications of variables such as education level and familial income on rates of voter turn out. By exploring how societal disparities impact voting, readers can gain better insight to the conditions that potentially lead to under representation of marginalized groups in politics. My research focused on extrapolating data from a Political Analysis survey conducted on students at Fort Lewis College in order to critically analyze the stated variables and their potential significance. Null Hypothesis: There is no variation in civic engagement from students of different education levels when controlling for familial income. Alternative Hypothesis: There is a statistically significant variation in civic engagement from students of different education levels when controlling for familial income. Variables StudiedIn my research, I utilized response data from a question on the Fort Lewis Political Analysis survey asking if participants were voting or not [Vote2020YN]. This served as my dependent variable. I cross examined the rates of voter turn out with information on participant's education level, which was figured through another question on the survey which asked the current year of college the participants were in [CollegeYr]. The college year of participants acted as my independent variable. This cross analysis was done with the hope to better understand and measure how rates of civic engagement vary by education level. In my data analysis I controlled for parental income [ParentSES], in attempt to understand the weight of income as a causal mechanism for accessing higher education and likelihood to vote. Literature AnalysisIn preparation for my research I evaluated works such as Are there civic returns to education? by Thomas S. Dee. In his research Dee presented indication of a statistically significant relationship between access to more education and civic engagement. His literature exhibited evidence that higher levels of education are associated with substantial increases in voter turn out. Dee's research explicitly considered family income as a latent variable because it is believed to impact both access to education and civic engagement (Dee). It is interesting to note that Dee's study included a statement of concern regarding the inclusion of "proximity to a 4-year college" as a variable, this was due to the potential for data bias. He explained that due to the "unobserved determinants of both educational attainment and civic behavior. In particular, the unobserved traits of communities near colleges (e.g., high socioeconomic status) could simultaneously encourage both higher educational attainment and increased civic participation" (Dee). This point raised concern for potential data bias in Fort Lewis's survey, due to the study having been conducted primarily on a college campus. A study comprised of participants from a single college campus is not necessarily representative of the general population, which may lead to skewed results. Another resource I explored for my research includes Do Surveys Overestimate or Underestimate Socioeconomic Differences in Voter Turnout? Evidence from Administrative Registers by Hannu Lahtinen, Pekka Martikainen, Mikko Mattila, Hanna Wass, and Lauri Rapeli. This study evaluated the potential impact of nonresponse bias to underestimate the influence of socioeconomic factors on civic participation. This study attempted to minimize potential for misreporting by using a register linked survey with information on the education, occupational social class, income, and voting of both respondents and nonrespondents. I was interested in this literature because it evaluated both education level and income to analyze voter turnout rates, along with taking nonrespondents into consideration. The results of this study indicated that nonresponse bias potentially leads to not only a significant overestimation of the overall level of turnout, but also an underestimation of educational and income-related differences in civic engagement. This study supports the hypothesis that access to opportunities for higher education and civic engagement are likely impacted significantly by income. Concepts, Data, and Measurement MethodologyParticipants were given an ordinal dichotomous measurement question to either reply Yes [1] or No [0] to the prompt "Are you voting in the 2020 Presidential election?" [Vote2020YN] In the data reported in the Fort Lewis Political Analysis survey, only 6 participants (3.4%) responded that they were not voting in the Presidential election. 154 participants (88.0%) responded that they were voting in the election. It is worth noting that these results are statistically different from rates of civic engagement in the general population of the United States. Participants were given a likert scale question to identify the answer to the prompt "What is your year in college?" [CollegeYr]. The available options were: first year [1], second year [2], third year [3], fourth year [4], fifth year or more [5]. The mean year of college for the 174 participants was 2.34 years. Participants were given a likert scale question to identify the answer to the prompt "What do you estimate your parents' socioeconomic status to be?" [ParentSES]. The available options were: lower class [1], lower middle class [2], middle class [3], upper middle class [4], upper class [5], don't know/ prefer not to answer [.]. The mean response of 168 participants was 2.87, middle class/upper middle class. It is notable that these results are statistically different from the averages of reported income in the general population of the United States. While running cross tabs analysis on the data from [Vote2020YN] and [CollegeYr] responses while controlling for [ParentSES], the resulting Sig. values on the Omnibus Test of Model Coefficients and Variables in the Equation reflect that there is no statistical significance found to correlate the analyzed variables. Because the Sig. values are above the threshold of statistical significance (0.05), we can conclude that there is no correlation found in the Fort Lewis Political Analysis survey between a person's civic engagement and their college year when controlling for familial income. It is worthy of nothing that there is potential for data bias due to survey limitations. Analysis and ResultsEvaluating the results of Fort Lewis's survey, I was unable to find evidence of statistical significance indicating a link between education level, familial income, and civic participation. As a result, I am unable to accept my alternative hypothesis that there is a statistically significant variation in civic engagement from students of different education levels when controlling for familial income. It is noteworthy that the study has risk of data bias due to variables including: politically active participants being more likely to take a political analysis survey than the average population leading to unbalanced representations of civic participation, limitations of scope due to data coming from a single college campus, and misrepresentations of familial income due to self reporting. The results found in this research do not reflect data found in studies with more: time, funding, resources, and population variation. It is still important to reflect on this information in order to understand what kind of variables impact the integrity of research and data in order to prevent misrepresentation in the future. Works CitedThomas S. Dee, Are there civic returns to education?, Journal of Public Economics, Volume 88, Issues 9–10, 2004, Pages 1697-1720, ISSN 0047-2727, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpubeco.2003.11.002.
Hannu Lahtinen, Pekka Martikainen, Mikko Mattila, Hanna Wass, Lauri Rapeli, Do Surveys Overestimate or Underestimate Socioeconomic Differences in Voter Turnout? Evidence from Administrative Registers, Public Opinion Quarterly, Volume 83, Issue 2, Summer 2019, Pages 363–385, https://doi.org/10.1093/poq/nfz022
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
|