Research Details
Subject Area: Political and Cultural studies
Supervisor: Dr. Matthew Wall and Dr. Stephen Lindsay
Research Degree: PhD
Thesis Title: Engaging Young People with Voting Advice Application Technologies
Engaging Young People with Voting Advice Application Technologies
Research Synopsis
My research is focused upon Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), which are websites that allow users to match with political candidates and parties based on their agreement on a collection of issues. The thesis provides a detailed review of the literature in the field which explores the design, effects and data of the websites. Furthermore, it seeks to place VAAs within the context of emergent web technologies, questioning their impact upon political engagement within this context.
My work investigates whether these can be used in order to engage young people in politics, measuring whether it has an impact upon their levels of political efficacy. The work with young people includes both introducing VAA usage session, but also realises the importance of debate in building levels of political confidence in young people through using VAA led classroom debate sessions.
My research interests include: political engagement, digital politics and Voting Advice Applications.
