What Motivates Students to Vote?

The Campus Vote Project (CVP) Research Collective looks into the different push-and-pull factors that affect student voting to improve future voter outreach strategies

In order to achieve 100% student voting, we must address the why. Why are students motivated to turn out to vote? Is it a sense of civic duty or a desire for civic action? Moreover, why are certain groups of students voting at marginally lower rates than others? 

The Campus Vote Project Research Collective is working to create a research-backed survey template for universities nationwide to use to help identify and measure the barriers and motivators to student voting on their individual campuses. This data will help enhance students understanding of their campus reports from the National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement (NSLVE).

This project was inspired partially by student-led research already being conducted on various campuses, specifically at the University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin) and the University of Florida (UF).

Students at the University of Louisville celebrate National Voter Registration Day in 2020. From Leah Murray.

Student-Led Research Initiatives

At UT Austin, student researchers worked with CVP and TX Votes to conduct a survey of over 500 students and interviews with 50 students, evaluating (1) where and how students receive their political and voting information, (2) where and how students talk about politics, and how this differs across different majors, and (3) the impact(s) of COVID-19 on political participation. 

Overall, the research conducted at UT Austin revealed that COVID-19 significantly increased in partisan siloing. Due to the pandemic, many students’ social circles shrank, and conversations became confined to family members and close friends who frequently shared similar political views. These conversations then reinforced preexisting conceptions and beliefs and separated students with differing political views from the ‘mainstream,’ leaving them potentially isolated and politically apathetic. 

At the University of Florida (UF), students serving as Democracy Fellows with CVP conducted a similar survey that explored when and how students last voted and the various factors that influenced that decision. Students who were not registered to vote were asked about potential barriers that may have prevented them from registering.

The UF survey included 80 participants from all years and schools of study. Overall, survey participants indicated that the central motivating factor for their decision to vote was a sense of civic duty. However, ‘civic duty’ meant different things to different respondents. While some students indicated a broad passion for the nation’s democratic process, when asked to get more specific about their understanding of civic duty, many students said they were motivated to vote in order to support specific, preferred candidates and viewed their vote as a form of civic activism.

On the other hand, deterrents to voting included a general lack of information- not knowing about the election, the correct polling place, or ID requirements, as well as schedule conflicts. Finally, all the respondents who were not registered to vote but were eligible to do so recorded that the reason they failed to register is that they forgot!

Future Research: CVP Research Collective Initiatives

These mixed-method evaluations on student voting at individual campuses, coupled with the invaluable measures of student voter turnout provided by NSLVE data, will paint a fuller picture of the state of the student vote on individual campuses. From there, advocates can use this information to improve their current voter outreach efforts by tapping into what motivates students on their specific campus to turn out to the polls. 

Furthermore, the results of these surveys on individual campuses can be synthesized at the national level to create and improve campaigns for student voting in areas being overlooked and by appealing to what motivates students in order to achieve 100% student voter turnout. 

The Campus Vote Project Research Collective is open to everyone and always looking for new members and research projects to engage with. For more information about the collective and how to join, check out our website! https://www.campusvoteproject.org/researchcollective

Marissa Farmer (she/her) is a third year student at the University of Florida, studying statistics, political science, and sociology. She is currently the National Research Intern at Campus Vote Project, where she works with the CVP Research Collective to promote and develop current research projects that help measure student voting. Previously, Marissa served as a CVP Democracy Fellow at UF, where she became interested in conducting political research projects. In the future, she is planning on pursuing a career in polling and public opinion.