Are you aware of any research specifically into the risk of demotivating people who expect the ability to participate directly, but are then facing a situation

Are you aware of any research specifically into the risk of demotivating people who expect the ability to participate directly, but are then facing a situation where e.g. a single superdelegate can nix an initiative (this is a possibility I saw mentioned in the Jabbusch analysis)? I'd be interested to know how much of that is just my own perception vs. what the actual data says.