POLITICAL SOPHISTICATION AND MODELS OF ISSUE VOTING

Does political sophistication influence the way in which voters use is sues in evaluating parties and candidates? We consider two models of m ass-elite linkage: the traditional spatial model, which conceives of i ssues as continua of policy options, and the directional model, which conceives of issues as simple dichotomies. The traditional model is mo re cognitively demanding and is the implicit model of journalists and political elites. We would expect, therefore, that better educated and more politically involved voters would rely on it, while less sophist icated voters would follow the directional paradigm. We investigate th is hypothesis with survey data from the 1988 presidential election in the United States and the 1989 parliamentary election in Norway. The r esults show that at all levels of sophistication and in both countries , voters generally follow the directional model.