In less than one week, the country will be filled with the familiar sights and sounds of Election Day: Polling stations will open, ballot cards will be punched--and potential youth voters will let out a collective yawn.

Other than a slight rise in turnout during the 1992 presidential campaign, which featured a saxophone-playing Bill Clinton on "The Arsenio Hall Show," the percentages of youth voters has been dropping steadily since the 1970's.

The numbers reached an all-time presidential-election year low in 1996: According to the Federal Election Commission, only 31 percent of college-age students voted that year, compared to 49 percent of the general population.

And the numbers are not expected to change significantly this Election Day.

"I think that young people are turned off by politics and politicians right now," said Institute of Politics (IOP) Director David H. Pryor, a former Democratic senator from Arkansas.

At Harvard, students seem less apathetic than their counterparts nationwide--according to the IOP, 63 percent of students registered in a recent voter drive. But even here, only five days before America chooses between a Harvard man and a Yalie, excitement in many quarters seems mild at best.

Apathy Ascendant

While most Harvard students have registered, and the majority of those interviewed say they plan to vote, dining halls have been less than abuzz with pre-election excitement.