Life in a bubble has voters mailing it in

With America still struggling to adjust to the pandemic, personal bubbles count more than ever.

Over two-thirds of respondents to the latest Franklin Pierce University-Boston Herald poll said they are near no more than six people daily.

The poll shows 40.6% have 0-2 people in their daily bubble; 26.3% have 3-6 people; and 18.3% count 10 or more near them daily.

That’s a tight circle and it will play a role come Election Day. Voters are carefully considering how they’ll vote.

Only 31% of those surveyed are voting in-person on Election Day.

Even more, 42.9%, said they will mail-in or fill out an absentee ballot. And 24.5% will vote early, in-person, the poll shows.

How isolation will affect the vote isn’t quite clear yet, but Franklin Pierce University psychology professor Leslie Buddington thinks the terror management theory will provide insight into how the election will go.

“The past research that has tested this experimentally, at least with the swine flu, that people were more likely to vote in ways that affirmed their culture,” Buddington said. “It depends on what your identity is focused around.”

In short: voters are going to stick to their guns.

Right now, that doesn’t seem to bode well for President Trump, who trailed former Vice President Joe Biden by 14 points in Tuesday’s poll.

Inspired by these unique times, young voters are becoming more politically engaged.

“I’m going to vote in a presidential election for the first time, since I’m now old enough. I want to be engaged and I want to understand what’s going on so I can make a good decision,” Franklin Pierce sophomore Alexis Messina said.

Time in isolation with their families has given young voters the opportunity to navigate their own political beliefs.

Although Messina’s family is not all that active in politics, she has become more definite in her vote.

“I am going to be settling for Biden,” Messina said.

Paul Lambert is a PoliticsFitzU Fellow at Franklin Pierce University where Madison Leslie is a communications major and political science minor.

from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/36ALyZn