Why do we always vote for the same candidate?

I want to ask you a question: how can you tell if a certain person is loving, or selfish, or violent, or any other qualifier that comes to mind?

For purely operational reasons, I cannot hear your answer, but I can imagine it: Surely you I would say that in order to know if the person in question possesses these qualities he should first be able to observe behaves. And this does not surprise me. We judge others, and eventually we apply qualifiers to them, observing how they conduct themselves in their daily lives.

What does turn out to be a rather curious fact is that many times we use the same methodology to judge ourselves themselves. We know if we are affectionate by doing a mental review of the affectionate gestures that we usually have with our partner, or our children, for example.

Usually the dynamics follows that order, although we are not aware of it: First we look at how we behave and then we apply a label to ourselves, or we join a certain category, be it that of brave, funny, optimistic or sensitive. This is the first question that I want to establish in order to answer the question that shapes the title of this article.

• You may be interested: "Post-truth (emotional lie): definition and examples"

Consistency as a value

And speaking of human qualities, the second question to keep in mind is the need for congruence that we experience most human beings.

Consistency, defined as a certain harmony between what a person says and does, is a highly valued virtue in all cultures. Otherwise, Inconsistency, results in erratic behavior, inconsistent or unpredictable. And the truth is that no one likes people who fail to conform to a line of conduct.

It is normal that people who constantly change their minds, or are easily influenced, are labeled as lazy, weak-willed, or just plain stupid. A) Yes, consistency is a highly prized personality trait. When we form an image of ourselves, we strive to be consistent with that image.

At all times, our own behavior tells us a lot about ourselves, even at election time. When we vote for the Doe candidate, we simultaneously build a whole scaffolding that begins to function as support and facilitator that will help us to vote again in the following elections. In that sense, if we already decided on John Doe the first time, it is consistent for us to continue in the same line of action and vote for John Doe the second time.

• Related article: "Cognitive dissonance: the theory that explains self-deception"

Electoral biases and persistence

The phenomenon becomes even more powerful if when we elect our candidate the first time, we proclaim it loudly and make it known to the whole world. When we openly communicate our support for John Doe in a kind of amateur party militancy, the need to be consistent under the watchful eye of others is imposed on us with even greater force.

At this point, when it comes to voting again, we not only suffer internal pressure to be Consistent with our earlier decision, we also experience external pressure from those who they know us.

But the subject does not end there, but has some more surprising edges still: It has been experimentally demonstrated that when a person has formed an opinion on any subject, show him concrete evidence that shows that the truth is in the path of in front, it does not serve to persuade you the vast majority of the time; worse, any solid evidence that this or that person could be wrong, contrary to common sense, helps that person hold on to his belief even more.

This curious psychological phenomenon is known as "persistence" And as it is theorized, once someone has invested time and effort to convince themselves of something, they vehemently stick with that idea in the face of any hint of doubt or external threat. Know that dismantling a belief entrenched in the mind is extremely painful for the brain.

• You may be interested: "Gregariousness: the Bandwagon effect and the Underdog effect"

Why we always vote for the same candidate

It does not matter too much the brutal mess in economic or educational matters that the inoperative politician on duty may be doing; to those who voted them, They have no choice but to continue defending him at all costs, patching up here and there, and constructing all kinds of rationalizations and fallacious justifications that help sustain the precarious cognitive scaffolding that is now faltering.

To accept that this time, instead of voting for Doe it would be better to vote for Mengano, is also to accept that they were wrong from the beginning, and of In doing so, they are also implicitly accepting their own stupidity, and throwing away all the personal resources put into play until that time. moment.

Most likely for that reason, despite everything, politicians who only focus on their own benefitTotally estranged from the needs of the majority of the people, they continue to make good choices once they have come to power.

The need for internal consistency of those who originally voted for them can be very powerful. And the psychic cost of retracting, too high.