Who's Likely to Stick with Obama?

If President Obama were a product, what would it mean to be loyal to him? His job approval rating went from 62% in the second quarter of 2009 to 53% in the third quarter, a 9-point drop that ranks as the steepest reported decline for a newly elected President.

A year ago "Yes We Can" and "Hope" were familiar signs and slogans . To see who's abandoning their support for Obama now, pollsters often ask how voters feel about the state of the economy or the health care debate. To really understand who's likely to support the President, however, you may have better luck if you look at how they shop, drive, and eat.

In choosing what to buy or believe, you face choices about happiness now or in the future, the possibility of a bad outcome, or whether your choice somehow affects others. In deciding what to consume or what cause to support, you can make decisions by gathering a lot of information, looking to others for guidance, or simply deciding to go with what you've always done before.

We call the way people approach decision-making their TRAITS, an acronym for Time, Risk, Altruism, Information, meToo, and Stickiness. In our research, we use decisions people make every day to measure their decision-making approaches.

We measure a taste for Risk by studying whether a person gambles, smokes, drives fast, or plays risky sports. People score high on our Information measure by buying more books, consulting more sources for financial information, and searching out news on the web and cable. Rating whether a person is high on meToo depends on the degree they look to the brand and product decisions of others and are part of a large network of friends. A person's Stickiness rating depends on factors such as the number of cars they considered when shopping, how many fast food or casual dining restaurants they go to, and the number of different cuisines they eat.

Our TRAITS measures let us use how people make decisions on the road or in the supermarket to predict how they react in the voting booth or in political conversations.

Being a fan of a political party is like being a fan in sports or music: you're consuming an identity, expressing an idea, and belonging to a team. Major party fans are easy to spot in their lives as neighbors or shoppers. They're altruistic, enjoy information, show a sense of belonging, and are stickier than most people in their product choices.

Political independents are also easy to spot. They are high on risk, so they're willing to consider new ideas and politicians. They don't show much loyalty in the market, and are willing to shop around for cars and cuisines. They don't look much to the decisions of others for reassurance. They also like to gather lots of information from many sources, and tend to focus on the future when they're making choices.

When we studied changes in President Bush's job approval rating between 2004 and 2005, we found that political fans predictably stuck with their teams. Republicans continued to rate the President much more highly than Democrats, and Independents were somewhere in between in their evaluations. Yet we also found that how people made their purchasing decisions affected the degree that they stuck with the Bush II presidency. In 2005,as news and events went considerably against the President, people who scored high on Information were more likely to express much more dissatisfaction with the President. In 2004, whether someone was focused on today or tomorrow had no impact on President Bush's approval rating. Yet in 2005, a higher concern for the future meant lower numbers for Bush.

Stickiness inclined people to stay with President Bush. To see this, we divided Republicans and Democrats by their Stickiness scores. Republicans who were stickier in the consumer market were more likely to rate Bush favorably in 2005. Democrats who tended to stick with the same products were also more likely to rate Bush favorably. Even though they were from the opposition party, these Democrats stuck with the status quo and stood by the president.

President Bush and President Obama are very different politicians, and support very different policies. Yet people's view about each president's job performance is driven by the TRAITS they reveal as consumers. Major political fans, the people who declare a party identity, will continue to pull for their man. People who are willing to take risks, change their mind, gather information, and care about the community are political independents and more likely to have reactions in between Democrats and Republicans.

A strong predictor of how your friends will react to President Obama depends on two factors, whether they're loyal to products and whether they like information. If the news and events are favorable to President Obama in the future, then people with a high taste for Information will be more likely to rate him favorably. Regardless of which team they pull for, if your friends are generally Sticky in their decisions then they're more likely to approve of President Obama's performance. The people with a favorite car brand and favorite restaurant are also more likely to stick with the President they have.

Scott de Marchi and James T. Hamilton are professors at Duke University and the authors of You Are What You Choose: The Habits of Mind that Really Determine How We Make Decisions.

 

 

Comments

[Keenan Jensen]

When it comes to my backing Obama...I am losing loyalty quickly because he is not following through on his campaign promises. On the other hand Congress has finally starting stepping it up in the past few weeks. We will see how this continues, hopefully Obama starts doing more...and talking less.

[weatherwaxx]

Abortion gag law lifted
Stem cell ban lifted.
Credit-card regulations passed (not in effect yet)

Go to www whitehouse.gov. There has been a lot done, but the accomplishments somehow NEVER seem to make the headlines. And we are closer to healthcare reform now than we have EVER been before.

[anick]

I think it interesting that there are some who post here comment about the President not being able to lead... Can't say that I have ever seen or heard of any of you... Got leadership skills?

I say run for President.­..let us be the judge.

[weatherwaxx]

Run for dogcatcher. Run for the local school board. Put your money where your mouth is.

Backseat driving is easy, real leadership is not.

[Manx]

If President Obama were a product, he could be sued for false advertising.

[dadw5boys]

But not Bush right ?

[audadvnc]

"If President Obama were a product, what would it mean to be loyal to him?"

Reminds me of the question of company loyalty for employees. Back in the day, employment at a job was a symbiotic relationship, and each side (worker and employer) had respect and loyalty for each others' contribution. Then companies decided that workers were "human resources" to be mined and cast aside. How many layoffs, wage reductions, benefits restrictions, etc are required before employees lose loyalty to their corporate families?

As for Pres Obama - how many payoffs to Wall Street, back room deals with drug companies, and broken campaign promises have to occur before we just don't care about you anymore?

[blizb]

Bush was the first to begin the bailout and once started had to be completed or things would be much, much worse.

There are no secret backroom deals because if there were no one would have knowledge of it, all business requires negotiation whether we like it or not.

It doesn't mean campaign promises are broken if there hasn't been adequate time to change.
8 years of Bush can't be fixed in less than a year.

There has been more effort and positive change in the last 8 months than we saw from 8 years of Bush.

I am only loyal as long as I can see the direction and effort being made and I believe there is effort.

I don't agree with everything on the health care plan but I do know it has to be done. I have the patience and understanding to know amendments will happen and change will come about.

I agree and I am also upset with corporate policies on how they treat workers. I agree that we owe no loyalty to corporate greed. But we can't allow ourselves to be disheartened due to the speed with which we want problems to be solved and shouldn't quickly blame Obama.

So many impatient people don't realize they sound like a child asking "are we there yet".

Always remember that this President was burdened with a host of monumental tasks and if anything is to get done, support is needed as well as some patience.

[TruthJusticeForAll]

Do not forget leadership. The president has or never knew it.

[Pearlswan]

Exactly. After all, Obama is just one man and has the same voting power of you and me. He is working with numerous competing interests and he doesn't always get the complete information he needs to make decisions. Even in the private sector, low to mid level managers are always trying to control the information that upper management gets so they can protect their own positions in the company. Same thing happens in the executive branch of government, I'm sure. That's why they call the White House the "Washington bubble." Obama is doing the best he can but that's a lot of power to juggle in Washington. Main stream citizens should keep applying the pressure and never quit because time is an instrument of power too and, in time, the people will be served as long as we keep reminding the bankers and the politicians that we are here and we are watching intelligently as they govern.