Lara Portmann
Biographic Data
| ID | 354704 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Lara Portmann |
| GIVEN NAMES | Lara |
| FAMILY NAME | Portmann |
| SIGNATURE | PORTMANN L |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Lucerne |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2866-2570 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 12 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 145 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 12 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2019 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
The future might be female
Recently, scientific experts have become increasingly influential in political decision-making. Although previous research has examined the extent and conditions under which politicians use scientific evidence, we know less about how citizens perceive scientific experts. In this study, we argue that the credibility of experts depends not only on the message they deliver or the medium they use, but also on the individual characteristics of the exp…
Electoral Discrimination, Party Rationale, and the Underrepresentation of Immigrant‐Origin Politicians
Immigrants and other minorities are underrepresented in politics in most Western democracies. We argue that strategically acting party gatekeepers who update their nomination strategies based on voter behavior contribute to this representation gap. Drawing on unique panel data from Swiss local elections, we find that candidates with a “foreign‐sounding” name systematically receive not only fewer votes but are also fielded on less promising list p…
Does anxiety increase policy learning
Does anxiety affect how public officials process policy information? It is often argued that the increasing number of policy failures can be explained by a lack of policy learning by decision makers. While previous studies show that socioeconomic and partisan variables are related to the perception of policy information, little attention has been paid to the role of emotions, such as anxiety, in the policymaking process. In this paper, we investi…
Desocializing Social Media
Commercial image banks powerfully shape the cultural meanings of social media, especially when circulated as 'fact' in the news media. To this end, we report a social semiotic analysis that documents the representational, compositional, and interpersonal framing of social media in a corpus of 600 stock photographs top-sliced from three global image banks. This core analysis is complemented with reference to (a) keywords used to categorize photos …
Crafting an audience
To date, little attention has been paid to how producers of digital media complicate notions of participation and audience in digital media. Taking the work of user experience (UX) writers as a case study, I offer an analytic framework for approaching the conceptual challenges that come with this. The empirical focus of my analysis is an emblematic example of UX writers’ work: the ubiquitous microcopy (i.e. user interface texts) produced for cook…
What Makes a Successful Candidate? Political Experience and Low-Information Cues in Elections
It is well established that politically experienced candidates are electorally more successful than "novices." However, methodological challenges have prevented scholars from establishing how much of this is attributable to voters who use political experience as a cue to infer competence. Further, information about political experience may decrease the weight voters place on other, less informative cues. In a natural quasi-experiment, I exploit t…
Theorizing policy diffusion
In recent decades, we have witnessed the diffusion of policy diffusion studies across many sub-disciplines of political science. Four mechanisms of policy diffusion—learning, competition, emulation and coercion—have become widely accepted as explanations for how policymaking processes and policy outcomes in one polity influence those in other polities. After pointing to major shortcomings of this inductively gained set of mechanisms, we present a…
Are Immigrant-Origin Candidates Penalized Due to Ingroup Favoritism or Outgroup Hostility
An influential explanation for the persistent political underrepresentation of minorities in elected office is that minority candidates are discriminated against by voters of the dominant ethnic group. We argue, however, for the need to distinguish between two forms of discrimination: ingroup favoritism and outgroup hostility. We measure the impact of each by using an extensive data set drawn from Swiss elections, where voters can cast both posit…
Do Stereotypes Explain Discrimination Against Minority Candidates or Discrimination in Favor of Majority Candidates
Scholars have examined the role that negative stereotypes play in electoral discrimination against minority candidates. Incorporating literature on in-group favoritism, the author argues here that some degree of this discrimination can be explained instead by voters holding positive stereotypes of majority candidates and discriminating in their favor. Based on the results of an original moderation-of-process survey experiment carried out in Italy…
Why do states admit refugees? A comparative analysis of resettlement policies in OECD countries
Many refugee-receiving countries have restricted their asylum policies and stepped up their border control policies to prevent asylum seekers from reaching their territories. At the same time, the resettlement of refugees has gained popularity. Many states have introduced resettlement schemes or have increased the number of refugees they resettle. Why do states voluntarily admit refugees by expanding resettlement? This article develops a comprehe…
Visualizing teens and technology
Previous research on verbal representations shows how the news media consistently depicts young people’s uses of digital media in a narrow, negative light. In this article, we present an innovative methodology for demonstrating how young people and their digital practices are visually depicted. We focus on stock photography produced by the commercial image banks which source the news media with much of its imagery. Following an indicative analysi…
Electoral Discrimination Against Immigrant-Origin Candidates
Electoral Discrimination Against Immigrant-Origin Candidates
Theorizing policy diffusion
In recent decades, we have witnessed the diffusion of policy diffusion studies across many sub-disciplines of political science. Four mechanisms of policy diffusion—learning, competition, emulation and coercion—have become widely accepted as explanations for how policymaking processes and policy outcomes in one polity influence those in other polities. After pointing to major shortcomings of this inductively gained set of mechanisms, we present a…
Are Immigrant-Origin Candidates Penalized Due to Ingroup Favoritism or Outgroup Hostility
An influential explanation for the persistent political underrepresentation of minorities in elected office is that minority candidates are discriminated against by voters of the dominant ethnic group. We argue, however, for the need to distinguish between two forms of discrimination: ingroup favoritism and outgroup hostility. We measure the impact of each by using an extensive data set drawn from Swiss elections, where voters can cast both posit…
Do Stereotypes Explain Discrimination Against Minority Candidates or Discrimination in Favor of Majority Candidates
Scholars have examined the role that negative stereotypes play in electoral discrimination against minority candidates. Incorporating literature on in-group favoritism, the author argues here that some degree of this discrimination can be explained instead by voters holding positive stereotypes of majority candidates and discriminating in their favor. Based on the results of an original moderation-of-process survey experiment carried out in Italy…
What Makes a Successful Candidate? Political Experience and Low-Information Cues in Elections
It is well established that politically experienced candidates are electorally more successful than "novices." However, methodological challenges have prevented scholars from establishing how much of this is attributable to voters who use political experience as a cue to infer competence. Further, information about political experience may decrease the weight voters place on other, less informative cues. In a natural quasi-experiment, I exploit t…
Does anxiety increase policy learning
Does anxiety affect how public officials process policy information? It is often argued that the increasing number of policy failures can be explained by a lack of policy learning by decision makers. While previous studies show that socioeconomic and partisan variables are related to the perception of policy information, little attention has been paid to the role of emotions, such as anxiety, in the policymaking process. In this paper, we investi…
Electoral Discrimination, Party Rationale, and the Underrepresentation of Immigrant‐Origin Politicians
Immigrants and other minorities are underrepresented in politics in most Western democracies. We argue that strategically acting party gatekeepers who update their nomination strategies based on voter behavior contribute to this representation gap. Drawing on unique panel data from Swiss local elections, we find that candidates with a “foreign‐sounding” name systematically receive not only fewer votes but are also fielded on less promising list p…
Visualizing teens and technology
Previous research on verbal representations shows how the news media consistently depicts young people’s uses of digital media in a narrow, negative light. In this article, we present an innovative methodology for demonstrating how young people and their digital practices are visually depicted. We focus on stock photography produced by the commercial image banks which source the news media with much of its imagery. Following an indicative analysi…
Desocializing Social Media
Commercial image banks powerfully shape the cultural meanings of social media, especially when circulated as 'fact' in the news media. To this end, we report a social semiotic analysis that documents the representational, compositional, and interpersonal framing of social media in a corpus of 600 stock photographs top-sliced from three global image banks. This core analysis is complemented with reference to (a) keywords used to categorize photos …
The future might be female
Recently, scientific experts have become increasingly influential in political decision-making. Although previous research has examined the extent and conditions under which politicians use scientific evidence, we know less about how citizens perceive scientific experts. In this study, we argue that the credibility of experts depends not only on the message they deliver or the medium they use, but also on the individual characteristics of the exp…
Why do states admit refugees? A comparative analysis of resettlement policies in OECD countries
Many refugee-receiving countries have restricted their asylum policies and stepped up their border control policies to prevent asylum seekers from reaching their territories. At the same time, the resettlement of refugees has gained popularity. Many states have introduced resettlement schemes or have increased the number of refugees they resettle. Why do states voluntarily admit refugees by expanding resettlement? This article develops a comprehe…
Crafting an audience
To date, little attention has been paid to how producers of digital media complicate notions of participation and audience in digital media. Taking the work of user experience (UX) writers as a case study, I offer an analytic framework for approaching the conceptual challenges that come with this. The empirical focus of my analysis is an emblematic example of UX writers’ work: the ubiquitous microcopy (i.e. user interface texts) produced for cook…
Visualizing teens and technology
Previous research on verbal representations shows how the news media consistently depicts young people’s uses of digital media in a narrow, negative light. In this article, we present an innovative methodology for demonstrating how young people and their digital practices are visually depicted. We focus on stock photography produced by the commercial image banks which source the news media with much of its imagery. Following an indicative analysi…
Electoral Discrimination Against Immigrant-Origin Candidates
Crafting an audience
To date, little attention has been paid to how producers of digital media complicate notions of participation and audience in digital media. Taking the work of user experience (UX) writers as a case study, I offer an analytic framework for approaching the conceptual challenges that come with this. The empirical focus of my analysis is an emblematic example of UX writers’ work: the ubiquitous microcopy (i.e. user interface texts) produced for cook…
What Makes a Successful Candidate? Political Experience and Low-Information Cues in Elections
It is well established that politically experienced candidates are electorally more successful than "novices." However, methodological challenges have prevented scholars from establishing how much of this is attributable to voters who use political experience as a cue to infer competence. Further, information about political experience may decrease the weight voters place on other, less informative cues. In a natural quasi-experiment, I exploit t…
Theorizing policy diffusion
In recent decades, we have witnessed the diffusion of policy diffusion studies across many sub-disciplines of political science. Four mechanisms of policy diffusion—learning, competition, emulation and coercion—have become widely accepted as explanations for how policymaking processes and policy outcomes in one polity influence those in other polities. After pointing to major shortcomings of this inductively gained set of mechanisms, we present a…
Are Immigrant-Origin Candidates Penalized Due to Ingroup Favoritism or Outgroup Hostility
An influential explanation for the persistent political underrepresentation of minorities in elected office is that minority candidates are discriminated against by voters of the dominant ethnic group. We argue, however, for the need to distinguish between two forms of discrimination: ingroup favoritism and outgroup hostility. We measure the impact of each by using an extensive data set drawn from Swiss elections, where voters can cast both posit…
Do Stereotypes Explain Discrimination Against Minority Candidates or Discrimination in Favor of Majority Candidates
Scholars have examined the role that negative stereotypes play in electoral discrimination against minority candidates. Incorporating literature on in-group favoritism, the author argues here that some degree of this discrimination can be explained instead by voters holding positive stereotypes of majority candidates and discriminating in their favor. Based on the results of an original moderation-of-process survey experiment carried out in Italy…
Why do states admit refugees? A comparative analysis of resettlement policies in OECD countries
Many refugee-receiving countries have restricted their asylum policies and stepped up their border control policies to prevent asylum seekers from reaching their territories. At the same time, the resettlement of refugees has gained popularity. Many states have introduced resettlement schemes or have increased the number of refugees they resettle. Why do states voluntarily admit refugees by expanding resettlement? This article develops a comprehe…
Desocializing Social Media
Commercial image banks powerfully shape the cultural meanings of social media, especially when circulated as 'fact' in the news media. To this end, we report a social semiotic analysis that documents the representational, compositional, and interpersonal framing of social media in a corpus of 600 stock photographs top-sliced from three global image banks. This core analysis is complemented with reference to (a) keywords used to categorize photos …
Does anxiety increase policy learning
Does anxiety affect how public officials process policy information? It is often argued that the increasing number of policy failures can be explained by a lack of policy learning by decision makers. While previous studies show that socioeconomic and partisan variables are related to the perception of policy information, little attention has been paid to the role of emotions, such as anxiety, in the policymaking process. In this paper, we investi…
The future might be female
Recently, scientific experts have become increasingly influential in political decision-making. Although previous research has examined the extent and conditions under which politicians use scientific evidence, we know less about how citizens perceive scientific experts. In this study, we argue that the credibility of experts depends not only on the message they deliver or the medium they use, but also on the individual characteristics of the exp…
Electoral Discrimination, Party Rationale, and the Underrepresentation of Immigrant‐Origin Politicians
Immigrants and other minorities are underrepresented in politics in most Western democracies. We argue that strategically acting party gatekeepers who update their nomination strategies based on voter behavior contribute to this representation gap. Drawing on unique panel data from Swiss local elections, we find that candidates with a “foreign‐sounding” name systematically receive not only fewer votes but are also fielded on less promising list p…
Political science (10 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Politics (7 works) · Economics (6 works) · Electoral Systems and Political Participation (6 works) · Law (6 works) · Psychology (6 works) · Computer Science (5 works) · Law (5 works) · Gender Politics and Representation (4 works)