That gangly-limbed human skyscraper standing next to you on the bus? They probably voted for Malcolm Turnbull - at least according to a new study.
The research, published in the British Journal of Political Science, found that tall people are more likely to vote conservative - and it's largely because they earn more money than their short-statured neighbours.
![Tall people are more likely to be right-wingers, finds study.](/web/20170508001102im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/q/x/x/g/l/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gqxwh2.png/1471837897792.jpg)
Using data from the 2006 British Household Panel Survey, the study's co-authors - Dr Sara Watson, assistant professor of political science at Ohio State University, and Raj Arunachalam, of economic consulting firm Bates White LLC in Washington DC - compared the heights and political leanings of over 10,000 Britons and found a notable link.
"If you take two people with nearly identical characteristics - except one is taller than the other - on average the taller person will be more politically conservative," Watson said in the report.
The link was stronger, albeit slightly, amongst men: for every added inch in height, men were 0.8 per cent more likely to be right-wingers, compared to 0.4 per cent for women.
The likely explanation for the tall-conservative connection? Tall people generally earn more, as previous studies have found.
Using data which found that each additional inch in height equates to an increase of about £350 (around $600 AUD) in income, Watson and Arunachalam determined that each 10 per cent rise in income increased the likelihood of voting conservatively by 5.5 per cent.
"The reason we focused our attention on height is precisely because height is a strong predictor of income - and many social scientists, including economists and anthropologists, believe that this relationship is at least partly causal," Watson explained.
"So we do think there is a causal relationship between height and voting which operates through income."