Direct democracy and minority rights: same-sex marriage bans in the U.S

The Link between Democratic Institutions and Population Health in the American States

CONTEXT

This project investigates the role of state-level institutions in explaining variation in population health in the American states. Although cross-national research has established the positive effects of democracy on population health, little attention has been given to subnational units. The authors leverage a new data set to understand how political accountability and a system of checks and balances are associated with state population health.

METHODS

The authors estimate error correction models and two-way fixed effects models to estimate how the strength of state-level democratic institutions is associated with infant mortality rates, life expectancy, and midlife mortality.

FINDINGS

The authors find institutions that promote political accountability are associated with lower infant mortality across the states, while those that promote checks and balances are associated with longer life expectancy. They also find that policy liberalism is associated with better health outcomes.

CONCLUSIONS

Subnational institutions play an important role in population health outcomes, and more research is needed to understand the link between democracy and health. The authors are the first to explore the link between democratic institutions and population health within the United States, contributing to both the social science literature on the positive effects of democracy and the epidemiological literature on subnational health outcomes.

Proposition 8 and Homophobic Bullying in California

BACKGROUND

Bias-based bullying is associated with negative outcomes for youth, but its contextual predictors are largely unknown. Voter referenda that target lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender groups may be 1 contextual factor contributing to homophobic bullying.

METHODS

Data come from 14 consecutive waves (2001-2014) of cross-sectional surveys of students participating in the California Healthy Kids Survey (N = 4 977 557). Student responses were aggregated to the school level (n = 5121). Using a quasi-experimental design, we compared rates of homophobic bullying before and after Proposition 8, a voter referendum that restricted marriage to heterosexuals in November 2008.

RESULTS

Interrupted time series analyses confirmed that the academic year 2008-2009, during which Proposition 8 was passed, served as a turning point in homophobic bullying. The rate of homophobic bullying increased (b _linear = 1.15; P < .001) and accelerated (b _quadratic = 0.08; P < .001) in the period before Proposition 8. After Proposition 8, homophobic bullying gradually decreased (b _linear = -0.28; P < .05). Specificity analyses showed that these trends were not observed among students who reported that they were bullied because of their race and/or ethnicity, religion, or gender but not because of their sexual orientation. Furthermore, the presence of a protective factor specific to school contexts among lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender youth (gay-straight alliances) was associated with a smaller increase in homophobic bullying pre-Proposition 8.

CONCLUSIONS

This research provides some of the first empirical evidence that public campaigns that promote stigma may confer risk for bias-based bullying among youth.

Identifying psychological responses of stigmatized groups to referendums

Public votes and referendums on the rights of marginalized communities are utilized in 27 states and occur with some regularity. However, research has only recently begun to examine the psychological consequences of these voter referendums for members of stigmatized groups, and a number of important questions remain regarding the internal validity and generalizability of the existing evidence. The current study advances this literature by combining survey data from a large probability-based sample conducted in 2012 [lesbian, gay, bisexual, and/or transgender (LGBT) n = 939; non-LGBT n = 31,067] with media market ad-buy data in states where marriage equality was on the ballot. Television media markets cross state boundaries, ensuring that there was an unintended group of people in 12 states who were exposed to the same-sex marriage discourse but who did not live in states with the voter referendum ("media market spillovers"). We take advantage of this unique data structure by comparing LGBT people in the media market spillovers to those residing in the same state but in nonspillover markets with no ad exposure. LGBT people are emotionally affected by these campaigns, and non-LGBT people are unaffected. LGBT people in markets with a cumulative total of 400 ads have a 34.0% greater probability of reporting stress than LGBT people not exposed to ads. Additionally, while the negative ads evoked sadness, positive ads evoked enjoyment and happiness. Thus, public votes on minority rights represent both a source of minority stress and resilience.