Female candidates are more likely to use Twitter to discuss policy issues and to ‘go negative’ in their campaign.

Abstract

In the 2016 presidential primaries, both female candidates, Hillary Clinton and Carly Fiorina, have made extensive use of Twitter to reach out to female voters. In new research, using data gathered during the 2012 election, Heather Evans and Jennifer Hayes Clark look at how female candidates make use of Twitter. They find that women are much more likely to ‘go negative’ on Twitter, and to use Twitter to discuss policy issues, especially those that affect women the most