The end of the solidly democratic south: The impressionable-years hypothesis

Political Psychology

Volumn 32, Issue 1, 2011, Pages 81-108

  Osborne, Danny ^a   Sears, David O ^a   Valentino, Nicholas A ^b  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

^b UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN   (United States)

Author keywords

Cohort replacement; Impressionable years; Party identification; Southern realignment

Indexed keywords

EID: 78650375271     PISSN: 0162895X     EISSN: 14679221     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9221.2010.00796.x     Document Type: Article

References (53)

1. Abramowitz, A. I., & Saunders, K. L. (1998). Ideological realignment in the U.S. electorate. Journal of Politics, 60(3), 634-652.
2. Aiken, L. S., & West, S. G. (1991). Multiple regression: Testing and interpreting interactions. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.
3. Alwin, D. F., Cohen, R. L., & Newcomb, T. M. (1991). Political attitudes over the life span: The Bennington Study. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
4. Beck, P. A. (1974). A socialization theory of realignment. In R. G. Niemi (Ed.), The politics of future citizens (pp. 199-219). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
5. Black, E., & Black, M. (1987). Politics and society in the South. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
6. Black, E., & Black, M. (2002). The rise of Southern Republicans. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
7. Black, M. (2004). The transformation of the Southern Democratic Party. The Journal of Politics, 66(4), 1001-1017.
8. Bullock, C. S., & Rozell, M. J. (Eds.). (2003). The new politics of the old South: An introduction to Southern politics (2nd ed.). Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
9. Campbell, A., Converse, P. E., Miller, W. E., & Stokes, D. E. (1960). The American voter. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
10. Carmines, E. G., & Stimson, J. A. (1989). Issue evolution: Race and the transformation of American politics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
11. Converse, P. E. (1969). Of time and partisan stability. Comparative Political Studies, 2(2), 139-171.
12. Converse, P. E. (1976). The dynamics of party support: Cohort-analyzing party identification. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
13. Converse, P. E., & Markus, G. B. (1979). Plus ca change...: The new CPS election study panel. The American Political Science Review, 73(1), 32-49.
14. Downs, A. (1957). An economic theory of democracy. Boston: Addison-Wesley Publishing, Inc.
15. Erikson, R. S., MacKuen, M. B., & Stimson, J. A. (2002). The macro polity. New York: Cambridge University Press.
16. Fiorina, M. P., Abrams, S. J., & Pope, J. C. (2006). Culture war? The myth of a polarized America (2nd ed.). New York: Pearson Longman.
17. Firebaugh, G., & Davis, K. E. (1988). Trend in antiblack prejudice, 1972-1984: Region and cohort effects. American Journal of Sociology, 94(2), 251-272.
18. Green, D. P., Palmquist, B., & Schickler, E. (2002). Partisan hearts and minds: Political parties and the social identity of voters. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
19. Hatemi, P. K., Funk, C. L., Medland, S. E., Maes, H. M., Silberg, J. L., Martin, N. G., et al. (2009). Genetic and environmental transmission of political attitudes over a life time. The Journal of Politics, 71(3), 1141-1156.
20. Jennings, M. K. (1996). Political knowledge over time and across generations. Public Opinion Quarterly, 60(2), 228-252.
21. Jennings, M. K., & Markus, G. B. (1984). Partisan orientations over the long haul: Results from the three-wave political socialization panel study. The American Political Science Review, 78(4), 1000-1018.
22. Jennings, M. K., & Zhang, N. (2005). Generations, political status, and collective memories in the Chinese countryside. The Journal of Politics, 67(4), 1164-1189.
23. Lewis-Beck, M. S., Jacoby, W. G., Norpoth, H., & Weisberg, H. F. (2008). The American voter revisited. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
24. Lublin, D. (2004). The Republican South: Democratization and partisan change. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
25. Mannheim, K. (1928/1952). The sociological problem of generations. In P. Kecskemeti (Ed.), Essays on the sociology of knowledge (pp. 276-322). London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
26. McCarty, N., Poole, K. T., & Rosenthal, H. (2006). Polarized America: The dance of ideology and unequal riches. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
27. McGuire, W. J. (1964). Inducing resistance to persuasion: Some contemporary approaches. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 1, pp. 192-229). New York: Academic Press, Inc.
28. McGuire, W. J. (1968). Theory of the structure of human thought. In R. P. Abelson, E. Aronson, W. J. McGuire, T. M. Newcomb, M. J. Rosenberg, & R. H. Tannenbaum (Eds.), Theories of cognitive consistency; A sourcebook (pp. 140-162). Chicago: Rand McNally.
29. McGuire, W. J. (1993). The poly-psy relationship: Three phases of a long affair. In S. Iyengar & W. J. McGuire (Eds.), Explorations in political psychology (pp. 9-35). Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
30. Mendelberg, T. (2001). The race card: Campaign strategy, implicit messages, and the norm of equality. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
31. Miller, S. D., & Sears, D. O. (1986). Stability and change in social tolerance: A test of the persistence hypothesis. American Journal of Political Science, 30(1), 214-236.
32. Miller, W. E. (1991). Party identification, realignment, and party voting: Back to the basics. The American Political Science Review, 85(2), 557-568.
33. Miller, W. E., & Petrocik, J. R. (1987). Where's the party? An assessment of changes in party loyalty and party coalitions in the 1980s. Washington, DC: Center for National Policy.
34. Petrocik, J. R. (1987). Realignment: New party coalitions and the nationalism of the South. Journal of Politics, 49(2), 347-375.
35. Phillips, K. P. (1969). The emerging Republican majority. New Rochelle, NY: Arlington House Publishers.
36. Richardson, B. M. (1991). European party loyalties revisited. The American Political Science Review, 85(3), 751-775.
37. Scammon, R. M., & Wattenberg, B. J. (1970). The real majority: An extraordinary examination of the American electorate. New York: Coward-McCann.
38. Schuman, H., & Corning, A. D. (2006). Comparing Iraq to Vietnam: Recognition, recall, and the nature of cohort effects. Public Opinion Quarterly, 70(1), 78-87.
39. Schuman, H., & Rodgers, W. L. (2004). Cohorts, chronology, and collective memories. Public Opinion Quarterly, 68(2), 217-254.
40. Schuman, H., & Scott, J. (1989). Generations and collective memories. American Sociological Review, 54(3), 359-381.
41. Schuman, H., Steeh, C., Bobo, L. D., & Krysan, M. (1997). Racial attitudes in America: Trends and interpretations (2nd ed.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
42. Sears, D. O. (1981). Life-stage effects on attitude change, especially among the elderly. In S. B. Kiesler, J. N. Morgan, & V. K. Oppenheimer (Eds.), Aging: Social change (pp. 183-204). New York: Academic Press.
43. Sears, D. O. (1983). The persistence of early political predispositions: The roles of attitude object and life stage. Review of Personality and Social Psychology, 4, 79-116.
44. Sears, D. O., & Levy, S. (2003). Childhood and adult political development. In D. O. Sears, L. Huddy, & R. Jervis (Eds.), Oxford handbook of political psychology (pp. 60-109). New York: Oxford University Press.
45. Sears, D. O., & Valentino, N. A. (1997). Politics matters: Political events as catalysts for preadult socialization. The American Political Science Review, 91(1), 45-65.
46. Shafer, B. E., & Johnston, R. (2006). The end of Southern exceptionalism: Class, race, and partisan change in the postwar South. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
47. Stoker, L., & Jennings, M. K. (2008). Of time and the development of partisan polarization. American Journal of Political Science, 52(3), 619-635.
48. Sundquist, J. L. (1983). Dynamics of the party system: Alignment and realignment of political parties in the United States. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.
49. The American National Election Studies (2005). The 1948-2004 ANES cumulative data file. Retrieved from
50. Valentino, N. A., & Sears, D. O. (1998). Event-driven political communication and the preadult socialization of partisanship. Political Behavior, 20(2), 127-154.
51. Valentino, N. A., & Sears, D. O. (2005). Old times there are not forgotten: Race and partisan realignment in the contemporary South. American Journal of Political Science, 49(3), 672-688.
52. Visser, P. S., & Krosnick, J. A. (1998). Development of attitude strength over the life cycle: Surge and decline. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 75(6), 1389-1410.
53. Woodard, J. D. (2006). The new Southern politics. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers.