On the young voters' agenda: exploring issue salience during the 2004 presidential election

Issue agendas for young adults spanning primary and general election phases of the 2004 U.S. presidential campaign are reported in this article. Results from pretest and posttest experiments and a postelection survey show that young adults' issues remained stable throughout early and late phases of the campaign. Issues such as the war in Iraq, education, terrorism and homeland security, economy and jobs, and health care were consistently among the young adults' top-ranked issues. Civil liberty issues also garnered a significant place on young adults' agenda. Any concern that young adults are fickle about issues is erased as the issue agendas spanning the 15 months were highly correlated. Keywords: agenda setting; issues; young voters; war in Iraq; economy; education; terrorism; health care