THE RELATIVE IRRELEVANCE OF CANDIDATE SEX

This study tests the relevance of candidate sex to electoral contests. We predict that voters, in general, will use issue or party cues to s elect between candidates and not the sex of the candidate. This will n ot hold under two conditions: party or issue cues are unavailable or c andidate sex is likely to be particularly salient to the voter. Data w ere collected from a random sample of registered voters who were prese nted with hypothetical elections featuring candidates who were systema tically varied by party, position on abortion, and sex. The results ar e consistent with the line of research that suggests that the majority of voters do not use candidate sex as a cue for choice, but candidate sex does affect choice among those for whom gender equality issues ar e particularly salient. Although generally irrelevant, candidate sex c an have significant implications for the outcome of particular contest s.