Craig Harper

The response to last week’s column was great, with another 200 people completing the Big Election Survey.

These responses have broadly supported the results that were reported in the previous post, with Labour commanding over a third of the vote – a share that would see Lucy Rigby named as Lincoln’s next elected representative in Westminster.

In second place is Conservative candidate Karl McCartney, who seems to have lost much of the support that saw him claim victory in the city five years ago.

The next biggest group of voters who are certain of which party they will vote for are those supporting the UK Independence Party (UKIP) – a result that will certainly be encouraging to their candidate, Nick Smith.

To take part in the Big Election Survey, just follow the link here. Remember, we’re offering a £25 Amazon voucher each week, with the winner being drawn at random, based on all completed responses that we receive.

You can enter once per week, but please come back each week to update your results. We’ll be contacting winners very soon!

I was pleased to see a number of you discussing the content of the survey on social media. Whilst a number of the points that you raised (such as having no ‘Retired’ option for the employment section, or no option for ‘In a Civil Partnership’ for the relationship section) can’t be addressed now that the link is now open and live, I thought it might be a good idea to let you know why some of the initial questions are being asked.

The idea that Prof. Todd Hogue and I are looking at through this study is called ‘ontological insecurity’. Put simply, this is a feeling of insecurity that people have when their view of the world is challenged by changing social values.

It is also brought about by changes in social structures, economic instability, and perceptions that society is essentially unequal. The causes of such insecurities are many, including mass immigration, growing secularism and the erosion of traditional religious values, and the wider economic downturn (and responses to these issues by the existing political system).

Until our recent work, there was no measurement instrument for ontological insecurity, meaning that claims about its impact on political and social views tended to be grounded in researchers’ opinions, rather than evidence. However, using our new scale – developed through the survey we’re working on with The Lincolnite – we are now able to scientifically examine levels of ontological insecurity in relation to support for different political parties and ideologies.

Our data so far have revealed some interesting trends in relation to levels of ontological insecurity and its link to social and political attitudes, and support for specific political parties.

On the measure of political ideology, which contained questions in relation to attitudes towards crime, welfare, and government involvement in civil life, ontological insecurity was positively associated with right-leaning views. That is, as ontological insecurity grew higher, the political views of those who have responded so far became more conservative.

The question remained, however, about whether ontological insecurity differed according to support for specific political parties. Our analysis was conclusive. There were no differences in levels of ontological insecurity expressed by supporters of any party, with one exception – UKIP. On our newly-developed scale, UKIP supporters were significantly more ontologically insecure than supporters of any political party.

Now, these differences indicate a relationship between UKIP support and increased levels of ontological insecurity. Whilst this relationship appears to be conclusive at face value, further analysis is needed before we can confirm the direction of the relationship.

Two possibilities exist: (1) ontological insecurity causes an individual to be drawn to UKIP, or (2) exposure to UKIP’s messages causes ontological insecurity.

On explanation one, people who are ontologically insecure, through feeling uncomfortable with the pace of social change, and the reduction of security in the workplace see UKIP’s message and think “at last, there’s somebody standing up for us – a party who outwardly advocate “British jobs for British workers”, and a swing back to traditional social and moral values.

The second explanation for UKIP support is slightly different, and argues that UKIP’s message is pulling undecided voters inwards. Here, being exposed to ideas such as Britain losing its national identity, and ‘immigrants coming to steal your jobs’, causes ontological insecurity within both people and communities.

The key difference between these two routes to UKIP support is simple – in the first, people are actively seeking somebody to represent their view at a national level (the traditional ‘political party’ model of support), whereas in the second, people are essentially talked into anxiety through political communication (a model of support more often found in advertising a brand).

Both of these strategies can be found in UKIP’s campaigning, with the party stressing the personal impact of immigration in areas with high migrant numbers, and arguing that Britain is losing its national sovereignty in areas with lower levels of immigration.

The key question still remains – what is driving support to a party like UKIP? According to our data, ontological insecurity appears to be intricately linked to an intention to vote UKIP.

The direction of this link is still something to investigate further, but being insecure within society appears to be a key issue that underpins UKIP support. One thing that we can say with some certainty, though, is that support for UKIP does appear to have some form of psychological underpinning. Therefore, it seems that support for UKIP represents more than just the metaphorical ‘protest vote’.

I’m really excited to welcome you to this first column, letting you know about the results we’re getting from the Big Election Survey that we, at the University of Lincoln’s School of Psychology, are running in conjunction with The Lincolnite.

In February, we launched the Big Election Survey, which is designed to give you – the residents of Lincoln and the surrounding areas – the opportunity to tell the electoral candidates what the most important issues are to you, and how you intend to vote on May 7.

So far, we’ve had a fairly good response, with almost 400 of you giving us your opinions. Remember that this is a rolling survey, so if you’ve taken part before, you can come back week-on-week to keep updating us with your views.

In terms of how the election is shaping up, you’re telling us that Lincoln could swing back towards the Labour Party, with Lucy Rigby gaining support from 35% of you who have taken part so far.

In second place is Karl McCartney of the Conservative Party, with a share of the vote at an estimated 22%, according to the figures we’ve collected since the survey was launched on February 24.

In third is Nick Smith of UKIP, taking around 8% of the pre-election votes. Clearly, this may not be representative of the constituency as a whole, and is based on 400 responders, but it may be indicative of how the city will vote in just less than a month’s time.

In terms of what you see as the most important issues facing the local area, health seems to be a key concern, with almost a third of responders so far ranking the NHS as the most important political issue locally – just ahead of the economy, and housing.

Nationally however, those who have taken part in the survey rank getting the economy back on track as the most important issue. This is followed in second place by the NHS, with immigration being considered the third most-pressing issue facing the country as a whole.

Arguably the most important group to the electoral candidates will be those who say they are still ‘Undecided’ about who to vote for.

According to our data, these voters, which currently make up almost 20% of responders to the survey, are particularly concerned about the NHS, the economy, and the welfare system.

These may become important issues for the candidates to address in the upcoming weeks – particularly at the Lincoln Debate, hosted jointly by The Lincolnite, Lincolnshire Echo, and BBC Radio Lincolnshire at the LPAC in election week.

These results indicate that voters do view local politics in a slightly different way to national politics, which is interesting in-and-of itself. However, we do need many more responses in order to be sure about the results that we’re getting.

To take part, just follow the link here. Remember, we’re offering a £25 Amazon voucher each week, with the winner being drawn at random based on all completed responses that we receive.

You can enter once per week, but please come back each week to update your results. The first batch of winners will be contacted very soon.

I’ll be updating this column weekly in the run-up to the election, so keep checking back for updates on the survey, and in-depth analysis of how support for each of the parties is looking.