The voting strategies of young people: a conceptual framework

This study offers a new framework for understanding the decision-making strategies of first-time voters. Using data from in-depth interviews with young people prior to the 2013 Australian federal election, the paper explores the extent to which our participants were knowledgeable about the upcoming election and the degree to which they invested cognitive effort into making their voting choice. The analysis reveals five distinct voting strategy typologies, which we use to construct a conceptual model that identifies and describes different voting approaches employed by young people. The findings show that young people are not a homogenous group of disinterested and disengaged voters. Instead, within a population of young citizens there are varying levels of interest and effort being invested into electoral participation.