Does voting in a church turn you into a Tory?

A new study suggests that the kind of building your polling station is may well affect how you vote

On polling day in 1964, Harold Wilson persuaded the BBC to reschedule Steptoe and Son because he feared its 9pm slot would decimate the Labour vote. The weather, too, is supposed to influence elections: rain in the evening is said to be bad for the working-class Labour turnout; a wet morning supposedly hits the retired Tory vote. (In fact, there's no statistical correlation.)

But it seems where you vote may well influence your decision. A new US study has found "significantly more conservative social and political attitudes" among people near churches than those near municipal buildings like schools. Since both serve as polling stations, voting location could affect a close-run election.

The research is reinforced by a 2008 study by Stanford business school, which found that in Arizona's 2000 elections, people voting in schools were – regardless of other factors – more likely to support higher education spending. In a control experiment, people shown images of churches proved less likely to back stem cell funding. "Environmental cues", they concluded, may in some cases influence voting outcomes even more than political views.