In the APSA Public Scholarship Program, graduate students in political science produce summaries of new research in the American Political Science Review. This piece, written by Karra McCray, covers the new article by Wayde Z. C. Marsh, Washington University in St. Louis, “Trauma and Turnout: The Political Consequences of Traumatic Events”.
With a never-ending news cycle and the dominance of social media, people are exposed to traumatic events far too often. It is difficult to capture those impacted accurately and the lasting effects of such trauma. We know that exposure to trauma is linked to unfavorable psychological effects, but how does such trauma shape political behavior?
Wayde Z. C. Marsh seeks to find how traumatic experiences affect citizens’ willingness to participate politically in his recent APSR article. As defined by Marsh, a traumatic event is the “perceived or actual threat of death or serious violence during the event or in its aftermath” that inspires posttraumatic stress or growth responses. Using Black church arson attacks, mass shootings, and natural disasters, Marsh presents a theory of posttraumatic political response to examine how likely citizens are to vote in presidential elections after politically relevant traumatic events.
In the article, an event is categorized as traumatic and politically relevant if law or historical precedence demands a governmental response, it is severe enough to make the government take action, or it involves policy demanders that encourage action beyond the government. Individually these events—Black church arson, mass shootings, and natural disasters—do not appear to be politically relevant. Still, pressure from activists who make the public aware of patterns of these systemic issues is ideal for this study.
Although everyone can be traumatized, racial/ethnic minorities, women, and individuals who belong to a lower-class status are more likely to experience and develop stress responses from such traumatic events. To identify the impact of trauma on individuals, Marsh uses census data, historical records, and turnout data of US presidential elections from 1976 to 2016 to find how geographic variation, proximity in time, and shared social identity affects citizens’ decisions to show up at the polls. According to Marsh’s theory, an individual who experiences trauma is either demobilized and less likely to vote or encounters a posttraumatic growth response that mobilizes them to vote.
“(…) His findings suggest that if a traumatic event occurs close to an election, it is more likely to mobilize voters, while if it is further away, it is more likely that voters will not vote.” He tests his hypotheses using two statistical methods to measure the change in exposure to traumatic events and turnout behavior. First, he compares turnout data within counties to individuals. Second, he compares the turnout level in counties that experienced a traumatic event with those that did not. He discovers that arson attacks decrease voter turnout between 1.3 and 3.7 percent, and mass shootings and natural disasters decrease turnout less, by 0.6 to 1.8 percent and 0.1 to 0.5 percent, respectively. Over time, non-Black voters affected by Black church arson attacks consistently vote less, while Black voters show more resiliency and higher turnout rates.
Marsh’s study presents interesting findings for proximity (in time and location) and shared salient social identity. He shows that voters affected by traumatic events vote at significantly lower rates. Furthermore, his findings suggest that if a traumatic event occurs close to an election, it is more likely to mobilize voters, while if it is further away, it is more likely that voters will not vote. However, due to Black social identity, racialized traumatic events mobilized Black Americans.
One of Marsh’s biggest takeaways is that if government officials do not increase aid and resources to communities affected by traumatic events, they risk leaving Black Americans, women, and individuals with lower socioeconomic status out of the democratic process.
- Karra McCray is a 3rd-year Ph.D. candidate at Brown University, with research subfields of American Politics and Political Theory. Her research examines ideological differences among members of race-based caucuses. Karra has worked with the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies to co-author the 2018 Racial Diversity Among Top U.S. House Staff report and most recently, the Black Representation Among Commissioned Officers in the Biden White House. Karra holds a Masters’s in Black Politics from Howard University and a Bachelor’s in Political Science and English from the University of South Carolina.
- MARSH, WAYDE Z. C. 2022. “Trauma and Turnout: The Political Consequences of Traumatic Events.” American Political Science Review, 1–17
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