Manipulation of Election Methods

Most election methods are subject to manipulation. A group of voters can manipulate an election if by misrepresenting their honest preferences they can secure an outcome they all prefer. We show that when a candidate would win a 1-man-1-vote election with an absolute majority, it is not possible to individually manipulate this election in favour of another candidate. This is because changing only one vote will never change the outcome of the election; hence no individual manipulation will be successful. On the contrary, if a candidate with an absolute majority would win a 1-best-1-worst election, depending on the preferences of the participating voters, it is possible to manipulate. This is proven by giving an example of a manipulable profile with a winner with the absolute majority

Asking “why” helps action control by goals but not plans

The present research investigated whether asking "why" concerning the pursuit of one goal can affect the subsequent pursuit of a previously chosen goal. Asking "why" should activate cognitive procedures involving deliberation over the pros and cons of a goal (why-mindset). This mode of thinking should spill over to subsequently pursued goals, with different consequences for goal striving guided by goal intentions and for goal striving guided by implementation intentions (if-then plans). As goal intentions guide behavior by effortful top-down action control processes motivated by the expected value of the desired outcomes, being in a why-mindset should induce defensive postdecisional deliberation and thereby promote goal pursuit. In contrast, implementation intentions guide behavior by automatic bottom-up action control processes triggered by the specified situational cues; in this case, being in a why-mindset should eliminate the effects implementation intentions have on goal pursuit. Performance on a handgrip self-control task (Study 1) as well as on a dual-task (simultaneous go/no-go task and tracking tasks; Study 2) supported these predictions: why-mindsets reinforced goal intention effects and impaired implementation intention effects on handgrip and dual-task performance. Implications for effective goal striving are discussed