競選期間選民對候選人評價的變化：以2012年台灣總統選舉為例

Abstract

競選期間，隨著投票日的接近，選民暴露在資訊愈趨多元與豐富的政治環境中，同時也因選情逐漸緊繃，各項競選策略紛紛出現，強化台灣政黨對立的政治氛圍。這意味著選民的政治態度將隨著投票日的到來，不但立場愈明確、好惡更明顯，同時也將與自身的政黨認同更為緊密連結。本文以2012年台灣總統選舉為例，利用選前「滾動式橫斷面電話訪問」(rolling cross-sectional telephone interview)，針對選民的候選人評價進行分析。研究發現，隨著競選活動的進行，愈接近投票日，選民對候選人的情感好惡確實愈趨明確與對立，尤其對於關注選舉的選民愈是如此。此外，選民對候選人的情感好惡，乃至於對總統施政滿意度，也隨著投票日的接近，與自身政黨認同的關連性顯著提升，證實了競選期間政黨認同影響力的強化。

The political context to which the electorate is exposed is filled with a variety of political information and becomes more and more competitive during political campaigns. This seems to mean that a given campaign facilitates the electorate to create for itself clearer and more drastic political preference based on party identification up to voting day. The author utilizes the pre-election survey data from rolling cross-sectional telephone interviews during the 2012 Taiwan`s presidential election to detect the influence of party identification on candidate evaluation during the political campaign. It was found that the electorate had a significantly clear preference between the main candidates up to voting day, especially for the more involved voters. Furthermore, the correlations between voters` party identification and its political attitudes including candidate evaluation and government performance become increasingly tighter as voting day approaches. In conclusion, this study proves the reinforcement of the party identification effect during political campaigns and suggests that it would be worthy to investigate it in a different political context in the future.