The use of the encompassing principle to resolve empirical controversies in voting behavior: An application to voter sophistication in congressional elections

摘要: Abstract The choice between competing and conflicting theoretical perspectives in the fields of voting behavior political economy party support is beyond capability conventional goodness-of-fit criteria. We propose a statistical alternative—the encompassing principle—which explicitly combines widely used family tests with progressive research strategy. specific implications aid building more accurate characterizations both time series cross-sectional data representations behavior. However, general point centers on model comparison consistent an accepted view progression. Purely mechanistic, yet rigorous, analysis controversies models becomes much than determination accepting or rejecting null hypothesis.