Do voters follow the recommendations of voter advice application websites? A study of the effects of Kieskompas.nl on its users’ vote choices in the 2010 Dutch legislative elections

In this article we investigate the electoral effects of a prominent Dutch Voter Advice Application site (www.kieskompas.nl). Our research design combines factual data on the recommendations received by users from the site's log files with users' responses to pre-advice and post-election survey items. We find that the effects of online recommendations on vote choice depend on the congruence of the recommended party with the users' pre-existing preferences. When the site recommended a party that was being seriously contemplated by the user, the user was demonstrably more likely to go on to vote for the recommended party. We find that this effect was not visible among voters who indicated that they were only seriously considering one party for their vote choice when they visited the site. © The Author(s) 2014.