Michael Pope reports Who's on first? In many cases, it's the winner of an election. That's because academic research consistently shows that the first candidate on a ballot or an early candidate have an edge. Credit Mallory Noe-Payne/Radio IQ Darren Grant at Sam Houston University in Texas has researched ballot order, and he says the reason for this remains a mystery. "One theory is that people work through the ballot, and they have kind of a good-enough standard. And so they're going down a list of options and as soon as they find a candidate that they think is good enough, then they vote for that person and then just move on to the next race on the ballot."