With fewer than 100 days until the midterms, there’s a lot of buzz about election season — including the literal buzzing of cellphones. Political operatives have taken to texting voters to get the word out about key races, dates and other bits of information in the days leading up to the midterms. But just how effective is texting as a strategy for galvanizing voters? New research suggests that it can move the needle in getting voters to turn out — but only slightly.
Published recently in Political Behavior, researchers found that Short Message Service, or SMS, messages increased turnout by 0.25 percentage points during the 2018 U.S. midterms — or an additional 2.5 voters per 1,000 people — when compared to a control group that received no messages. “Text messages are effective, but we’re finding that the effects are relatively small,” said Katherine Haenschen, assistant professor in Northeastern University’s departments of communication studies and political science, an author on the study.
