
We examined associations between childlessness and voting in Europe. We used cross‐sectional European Social Survey data from 20 countries (n = 37,623). Our results suggest that there is a “childless vote” in Europe. Supporting our pre‐registered hypothesis, childless individuals voted for parties that had visibly positioned themselves at the Green‐Alternative‐Libertarian (GAL) pole of the GAL‐TAN (GAL vs. Traditional‐Authoritarian‐Nationalist) ideological dimension. The pre‐registered explorative analyses of associations between childlessness and economic left–right ideology or other policy positions of the party for which the individual had voted did not yield results. Explorative analyses suggested in the review process showed that self‐rated religiosity was independently associated with childlessness, but ideological left–right self‐placement or self‐ratings of political attitudes were not. Our results suggest a new demographic prognostic of vote choice, thus adding to the literature on demographic processes associated with political dynamics.
Politics, Political attitudes, Europe, Religion, Fertility, Cross-Sectional Studies, Attitude, Psychology, Humans, Demographics, Voting, Ideology
Politics, Political attitudes, Europe, Religion, Fertility, Cross-Sectional Studies, Attitude, Psychology, Humans, Demographics, Voting, Ideology
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