# Tracking the American electorate: the Cooperative Election Study October 25, 2024 - [ Features ](/news-categories/features) ## The long running Cooperative Election Study, with support from the Institute for Quantitative Social Science, offers up key insights into the minds of American voters #### by Colleen Walsh Every other year Stephen Ansolabehere takes a trip to Park City, Utah to take the pulse of American politics. With peersfrom around the country, Ansolabehere dissects the results of an annual political survey he created in 2006 that today includes hundreds of thousands of responses. [The Cooperative Election Study (CES)](https://cces.gov.harvard.edu/), supported by Harvard’s Institute for Quantitative Social Science with the National Science Foundation and [administered by YouGov](https://today.yougov.com/), began almost 20 years ago in an effort to help scholars better understand Americans’ electoral habits and how their voting behavior and experiences vary according to political geography and social context. Today, the survey answers, compiled in a comprehensive dataset that’s publicly available on the [Harvard Dataverse](https://dataverse.harvard.edu/), continue to offer experts access to deep insights into the minds of American voters. In Park City, the presentations are brief (there’s a two-slide rule per presentation), leaving attendees plenty of time for discussions around the discoveries they’ve pulled from the data. It wasn’t always the case. “The first time we did this conference about 75% of the papers were null effects,” recalled [Ansolabehere, Harvard’s Frank G. Thomson Professor of Government](/people/stephen-ansolabehere). But over time, as the data sets grew, the researchers became more sophisticated “about designing studies and winnowing in advance,” he said. “It’s been really great watching the whole discipline step up and take ownership and improve itself.” ### A democratic project Sort[ ![Stephen Ansolabehere](/sites/g/files/omnuum8171/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/ansolabehere_stephen_shouldersup_sm.jpg?itok=f6B-yFD_) ](/people/stephen-ansolabehere) [Stephen Ansolabehere](/people/stephen-ansolabehere) The project focused on tracking trends in American democracy is by its very design democratic. In the early 2000s, Ansolabehere was teaching a graduate seminar on public opinion at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and eager to run a survey on Congressional districts for his course. With the power of the World Wide Web just coming into focus, Ansolabehere tapped a researcher at Stanford and the head of an internet survey firm for help. The cost was manageable, and soon Ansolabehere was in full recruiting mode. “The problem we'd always had with national election studies was that we couldn't get the sample big enough to actually say anything about Congressional districts because there are 435 of them, and if you have 2,000 people that's only five people per district,” said Ansolabehere. Within months, the Harvard political scientist had enlisted 30 different universities from around the country who produced 1,000 respondents each. A 30,000-person survey was born. Soon the number of schools doubled, with institutions big and small taking part. “It completely democratized the survey research field,” said Ansolabehere. “Places like Mississippi State and Reed College and the University of Akron that couldn’t have afforded to have a survey done by a big survey research center were able to get into the game for a modest sum, participate in a big consortium, and have a national sample. Collaboration and allowing people the freedom to do their own thing has also led to significant improvement in training for everybody in the discipline,” he added, “with professors, assistant professors, graduate and even undergraduate students learning how to better write and analyze questions. We’ve created value simply by coordinating people.” Today the 60 schools generate a total of 61 surveys. One overall survey uses a set of common questions, and each school designs their own survey questions for their individual 1,000-person samples. The annual survey unfolds in two waves during an election year. A pre-election survey is administered in September and October and includes questions about general political attitudes, demographic factors, and voter intentions. In the post-election survey, respondents answer specific questions about how they cast their votes. Sort ![Matthew Blackwell and Maya Sen](/sites/g/files/omnuum8171/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/harvard-iqss/files/matt-maya_composite.png?itok=kLnAM5yE) [Matthew Blackwell](/people/matthew-blackwell) *&* [Maya Sen](/people/maya-sen) Interest in the survey is wide-ranging and includes Canadian and European researchers who are developing similar efforts based on the CES model. Scholars from a range of specialties have mined the CES data produced over the years for insights into legal issues, national security, and racialized voting patterns. [Matt Blackwell](/people/matthew-blackwell), an associate professor of government in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, and [Maya Sen](/people/maya-sen), professor of public policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, are both IQSS faculty affiliates, and used CES data to inform their book 2018 “[Deep Roots](/news/using-data-map-political-legacy-slavery-how-blackwell-and-sen-won-2019-apsa-prize): How Slavery Still Shapes Southern Politics.” Additionally, journalists regularly analyze survey responses for their reporting on politics, elections, and American society. ### Tracking our differences and our similarities Sort[ ![Brian Schaffner](/sites/g/files/omnuum8171/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/harvard-iqss/files/brian-schaffner_2024.jpeg?itok=Dpmeemxa) ](/https:/www.iq.harvard.edu/people/brian-schaffner) [Brian Schaffner](/people/brian-schaffner) [Brian Schaffner](/people/brian-schaffner), a political scientist at Tufts University, didn’t hesitate when Ansolabehere approached him about joining the CES project in 2010. He was attracted to the scope of the work, he said, and excited by the “richness of what this data would be for political scientists seeking to better understand public opinion and voting behavior.” Schaffner also liked the idea of helping researchers with all sizes of budget generate their own high quality survey data. “Before the CES, we were limited to using one of a very few major surveys that were controlled by just a few scholars at elite institutions,” said Schaffner. “But the CES allowed hundreds of scholars to have a hand in creating the data they needed for their research.” The survey questions point to how deeply entrenched certain issues are in the American psyche. Many of the topics surveyed in 2006 are the same today, such as gun rights, abortion, the economy, and job security. Over the years the survey has increasingly included questions involving “immediate policy decisions or legislative decisions that Congress and the President have made,” said Ansolabehere, data culled from key roll call votes before Congress and executive orders. More recently, researchers have begun adding more questions related to recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions. And while many of the replies highlight just how divided the electorate is, other answers point to a range of shared concerns. Currently, Ansolabehere and Schaffner are working on a book titled “American Mosaic.” The forthcoming work, based on the responses from the more than 600,000 people who are part of the CES database, examines the political divide in America, as well as areas of common ground. “Because the CES is so large, we are able to take a holistic view of American politics and really understand which social identities really divide us the most politically,” said Schaffner, noting that four influential groups make up 60% of the population and provide the bulk of support for their respective parties: white Evangelicals who lean conservative on the political spectrum , and members of the Black community, the LGBTQ community, and people who identify as atheists or agnostics, who support liberal candidates . “Despite this, we are not actually as divided as we might think,” said Schaffner. “This is especially true when it comes to a lot of bread-and-butter issues that have come up over the past two decades.” In analyzing the survey data, the pair found all four groups support allowing the government to negotiate with drug companies for lower prices on prescription drugs; the granting of legal status to all illegal immigrants who have held jobs and paid taxes for at least three years and not been convicted of any felonies; the large infrastructure bill passed during Biden's presidency; and requiring police officers to wear body cameras and banning their use of chokeholds. “We actually think there is quite a bit of hope that Americans can come together,” said Schaffner, “especially when it matters most.” Sort[ ![CES logo](/sites/g/files/omnuum8171/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/ces_logo_rgb_1.png?itok=NHMgUlNz) ](/news/crunching-data-american-elections-cooperative-congressional-election-study-cces) ##### RELATED FEATURE ### [Crunching the Data on American Elections: The Cooperative Congressional Election Study (CCES)](/news/crunching-data-american-elections-cooperative-congressional-election-study-cces) Share on:- [ Facebook ](#) - [ Twitter ](#) - [ Linkedin ](#)