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What’s the big deal with polls?
Posted at: Nov/06/2012 : Posted by: mel
Related Category: Politics & Gov, Watching America,
It is election season 2012 and it is virtually impossible to turn on the TV, the radio, look at a blog or new site and not be barraged by polls. Me, I love numbers so it is hard for me to tune out what is being reported. Nevertheless, the more I pay attention, the less I feel any of it makes any sense. Do polls report the leanings of society? Do polls really influence candidates? Are polls self-fulfilling by their very nature? I could go on and on with my questions about polls. Ultimately, are polls reporting the truth, or creating behavior? The first accepted example of an opinion poll was a local “straw poll” conducted in 1824 by a newspaper in Harrisburg Pennsylvania. The poll showed Andrew Jackson leading John Quincy Adams by a margin of 335 to 169 votes in the Presidential race. Note: A “straw poll” means a vote with a non-bind result. Since Jackson went on to win the popular vote in the full election, the newspaper promoted their efforts at being able to predict election outcomes. Such straw polls gradually became more and more popular, but they remained local, usually confined to a city-wide scope. The first national poll was conducted by the “Literary Digest” in 1916. They attempted to raise their circulation by mailing out millions of postcards and simply counting the returned cards. Using this technique they were able to successfully predict the victories of Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt. In 1936, the now 2.3 million “voters” of the Literary Digest predicted Alf Landon would defeat Franklin Roosevelt. The Literary Digest failed to take into account that their readership was dominated by Republicans and voters with Republican sympathies. At the same time, George Gallup conducted a survey from a smaller group, but focused on having a demographically representative group. Gallup predicted Roosevelt would win by a landslide. It should be no surprise that the Literary Digest soon went out of business while the science of demographically sampling or surveying a population took off with George Gallup at the forefront. Leveraging on what George Gallup started, the modern opinion poll or “poll” for short is basically a survey of public opinion from a specific and measured sample. Modern polls are considered a science by many. Small groups of people are surveyed and the results are analyzed based on the demographics of the group. The presumption is that by first selecting the right demographic group you end out with a representative sample of the larger population. From this small sample larger generalities can then be extrapolated within some hopefully small degree of sampling error (also called high degree of confidence). For those who make a career and a science of polling, the margin of error is usually defined as the radius of a confidence interval for a particular statistic from a survey. When a single, global margin of error is reported for a survey, it refers to the maximum margin of error for all reported percentages using the full sample from the survey. If the statistic is a percentage, this maximum margin of error can be calculated as the radius of the confidence interval for a reported percentage of 50%. Others suggest that a poll with a random sample of 1,000 people has margin of sampling error of 3% for the estimated percentage of the whole population. This is why the survey’s we hear reported, generally state a margin of error at 3% despite their sampling base being only a few thousand at best. Over the past 30 years opinion polls have become an integral part of the political election process. Do polls affect media coverage during the run up to an election? I think the answer is an obvious yes. Whether print, television or other media, losing candidates who poll poorly get less media coverage and less focus by reporters. Being seen and heard on the news is essentially free air time and publicity. These same low polling candidates rapidly fade from our view and attention. Winners get more questions and more media time which substantially drives the name recognition component and public visibility components of their campaigns. Should we blame the poll or the new media? I’m not sure it matters because it becomes one of those chicken and egg scenarios. Ultimately, the poll becomes the news as much as the candidate or issue that is being polled. Do polls make us shallow? I think the clear answer is “No, we're already shallow.” That's why we focus on body language, tone of voice and so many other surface issues during a presidential debate. During a recent presidential debate, the follow-up conversation included a political analysis focused more on remarks about Big Bird, than critical support or dissent on the Simpson-Bowles or Dodd-Frank laws. As opposed to a mere 30 years ago, polls have become an integral part of what drives a political campaign. Candidates are seldom focused on the same agenda 3 weeks before an election as 9 months before. This shift in agenda is driven by polls indicating specific issues being higher in the public view that what the candidate focused on when the candidate first entered the election cycle. A candidate can be against ethanol subsidies well into their campaign, once the polls indicate they will only win with the Iowa farm vote, their pronounced view will flip. Are polls really truthful? According to the polling agency, that’s what their margin of error accounts for. Despite all the scientific talk from the pollsters, I disagree with this notion. Imagine a poll taker stopping you on the street or calling you with the following questions: • Do you brush your teeth 3 times a day? • Do you eat at least 4 ounces of fruits and vegetables daily? • Do you wash your hands every time before leaving the restroom? • Do you use your turn signals before changing lanes while driving? There are hundreds if not thousands of other similar questions. In each of these questions I believe the survey results would be erroneous. Most people will respond with the answer they believe they are “supposed to say” rather than the “true confessions.” I am aware that personal hygiene is not the same as politics, but the notion of valid answers while dramatized, may be similar. People like to answer questions in a manner that they perceive will be accepted as a “good answer” by the community as a whole. If your candidate of choice is Newt Gingrich, but polling has him a distant 3rd, 4th, or 8th, you are likely to respond with one of the front runners. The behavior seems to be associated with a desire to be part of the group, or to be somewhat “main-stream.” Polling questions can be very misleading. “Do you believe in a woman’s right to choose?” “Do you believe in killing unborn babies?” “Do you believe our tax code is fair?” “Do you believe that the wealthy should pay more in taxes?” These are typical polling questions, each pair is essentially asking the same thing, but phrased in a manner to exhibit a specific response. These differences often vary greatly depending on who is sponsoring the poll. Do you know anyone who believes in killing babies? Clearly, you can skew the results of a poll or survey just by how you phrase the questions. Despite all my concerns, polls may also be an aid to the democratic process. Many politicians seem driven to appear that they are “in touch” and serving “the will” of their constituents. Public polls can be a means to democratize power. In this manner, polls may actually be a means of enabling democracy and access to our elected officials. As I mentioned earlier, I love numbers. Numbers have always for me been very truthful and straight forward. There is nothing subjective about numbers. For these reasons I have always found it difficult to ignore the radio or TV news man when they start to recite numbers. I’m sure this would now be considered a weakness on my part that can be manipulated or exploited of by others. I was once told that a good pollster can make the ugliest sow’s ear look like a silk purse. Maybe this is really more about our 24/7 news and information cycle. In the quest to report something the other outlet hasn’t reported, polls become news. This is where everything starts to blur to shades of gray. I guess the real question is, when do polls go from measuring the news to being the news? So maybe polls aren’t the problem…we are! Time to vote what I believe and not what I hear.
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