TY - JOUR A1 - Lindemann, Korinna A1 - Stoetzer, Lukas F. T1 - The effect of televised candidate debates on the support for political parties JF - Electoral Studies N2 - During campaigns for legislative elections, a large portion of the general public follows televised debates between the front-running candidates. How can the candidates use the public interest in the debates to increase the support for their party? In this article, we argue that especially challenger candidates can improve the public perception of their valence qualities, such as personal integrity, leadership, and competence, and can - as a result - raise the support of their party. We expect that the perceived policy stances of the candidates matter less. Building on televised debate experiments during the German Federal Elections of 2009 and 2013, we analyse the effect of the debates on party vote and in how far this relationship is mediated by changes in valence and policy evaluations of the candidates. Results show that changes of candidate valence, but not changes in policy perceptions, of the social-democratic front-running candidates mediate the vote intention for the party. Respondents who perceived the candidates more competent, empathetic and have integrity as a result of the debate are more likely to vote for the candidate's party. Our analysis further reveals, however, that this valence effect is not long-lasting and does not carry-over to vote intention briefly before the election. KW - Televised debates KW - Candidate valence KW - Voting decisions KW - Legislative election campaigns Y1 - 2021 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.electstud.2020.102243 SN - 0261-3794 VL - 69 ER - TY - THES A1 - Lindemann, Korinna O. T1 - The Indelible Past: The Effects of Authoritarianism on Political Behaviour T3 - Dissertations submitted to the Hertie School - 11/2023 Y1 - 2023 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-51975 N1 - Shelf mark: 2023D011 + 2023D011+1 ER - TY - RPRT A1 - Lindemann, Korinna A1 - Stoetzer, Lukas F. T1 - The Effect of Televised Candidate Debates on the Support for Political Parties N2 - During campaigns for legislative elections, a large portion of the general public follows televised debates between the front-running candidates. How can the candidates use the public interest in the debates to increase the support for their party? In this article, we argue that especially challenger candidates can improve the public perception of their valence qualities, such as personal integrity, leadership, and competence, and can - as a result - improve the support of their parties. We expect the perceived policy stances of the candidates to matter less, as parties often already have well-defined policy profiles that matter to voters. Building on televised debate experiments during the German Federal Elections of 2009 and 2013, we analyse the effect of the debates on party vote and in how far this relationship is mediated by changes in valence and policy evaluations of the candidates. Results show that changes of candidate valence, but not changes in policy perceptions, of the social-democratic front-running candidates mediate the vote intention for the party. Respondents who perceived the candidates more competent, empathetic and have integrity as a result of the debate are more likely to vote for their party. Our analysis further reveals, however, that this valence effect does not carry-over to vote intention briefly before the election. Y1 - 2024 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-54385 ER -