Abstract

In an era where voters are encouraged to make choices based on individual policy preferences—a practice known as “issue voting”— new research suggests that deeper ideological patterns may still exert a powerful influence. Monzel, Grünhage, and Reuter (2025) investigated this phenomenon by analyzing 5,963 user responses to Wahl-O-Mat, Germany’s most widely used voting advice application (VAA), across three federal election cycles.