Go to the websites listed below and then answer the questions that follow.

The Genetic Basis of Political Participation, James Fowler
(http://jhfowler.ucsd.edu/genetic_basis_of_political_cooperation.pdf)
Twin-based study that concludes that political participation may be related to the tendency to socialize, a heritable trait. The author hypothesizes that efforts to increase voting may not succeed, in large part, because of the fact that political activity may be tied to how humans are "wired."

The Internet and Youth Political Participation (Mark E. Kann, Jeff Berry, Connor Gant, and Phil Zager)
(http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue12_8/kann/index.html)
A look at three different types of "online worlds" that may act as inducements to political participation by youth.

"Book reveals media choice hurts political participation," Princeton Weekly Bulletin
(http://www.princeton.edu/pr/pwb/07/1112/book/)
Markus Prior contends that too many choices of channels of information make it easier for people to opt out of the political process entirely. Prior believes that partisanship itself has not globally increased but that non-interested people have tuned out of politics altogether, leaving only those who are committed to the political process to be heard.

1			Do you think there could be a genetic basis for the participation of some people and the non-participation of others in our political process?
2			Do the authors of "The Internet and Youth Political Participation" believe there will be a "new age" of youth participation in politics? Why or why not?
3			Do you tune out politics? Do you feel that the array of media sources makes it easy to do so? Or do you wish others would participate in the political process on a higher level?