Campaign mailers can affect voter attitudes, but the effects are strongest early in the campaign and fade rapidly

Over the next two months, in the lead up to the Congressional midterm elections, households will be bombarded with campaign publicity including mailers, which will aim to convince them to vote for one candidate over another. But are such mailers an effective campaign tactic? In new research that uses data from the 2012 elections, David Doherty and E. Scott Adler find that if sent out in the months prior to election, both positive and negative campaign mailers can be effective in increasing candidate recognition, and voter turnout. They also find that mailers sent closer to the election have little effect on voters’ attention and intention, likely because interested voters will have already found out about candidates by this point.