Young voters favour Obama over Clinton

Washington Barack Obama may have lost Pennsylvania, but Harvard's Institute of Politics gave him some encouraging news on Thursday: Young voters overwhelmingly prefer him to Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. The institute, which has been conducting extensive surveys of the youth vote for eight years, found that 70 per cent of Democrats ages 18 to 24 favour Obama, compared with 30 per cent for Clinton.

Obama's strength among young voters is evident on the campaign trail and has contributed to his wins.

In Iowa, for example, the under-30 vote tripled, helping him to an upset win in the caucuses. "The youth vote has been central to [determining] who's going to be the next president of the United States, and who's going to be the nominee," said Jim Leach, director of the institute and a former Republican congressman from Iowa.

"We may be in the midst of a civic reawakening of a new generation," he said, citing statistics showing steady, dramatic growth in turnout among young voters since 2000.