How close is a Presidential election? In most elections in the United States, we can judge closeness simply by looking at the number of votes that separate the candidates on the ballot. With the addition of the Electoral College, assessing closeness in US Presidential elections becomes far more complicated. Closeness is not simply determined by the popular vote, but also by the distribution of the Electoral College votes, and both of those measures are then viewed through partisan lenses by politicians, pundits, and the general public. While the public and the mass media have developed what could be generously described as ad hoc measurements, we will test they ways in which members of the public assesses the closeness of presidential elections using both surveys and panel studies.
