[PDF] In Defense Of Public Opinion Polling eBook

Author : Kenneth F Warren
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 384 pages
File Size : 25,74 MB
Release : 2018-02-15
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 0429968450

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In the 2000 national elections, $100 million was spent on campaign polling alone. A $5 billion industry from Gallup to Zogby, public opinion polling is growing rapidly with the explosion of consumer-oriented market research, political and media polling, and controversial Internet polling. By many measures from editorial cartoons to bumper stickers we hate pollsters and their polls. We think of polling as hopelessly flawed, invasive of our privacy, and just plain annoying. At times we even argue that polling is illegal, unconstitutional, and downright un-American. Yet we crave the information polling provides. What do other Americans think about gun control? School vouchers? Airline performance?

Author : Leo Bogart
Publisher : Transaction Publishers
Page : 308 pages
File Size : 27,53 MB
Release :
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 9781412831505

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How well can polls measure public opinion? Should government policies follow majority opinion? Do polls influence elections? Can there be polls under a dictatorship? Recent elections throughout the world have made these issues ever more crucial. "Polls and the Awareness of Public Opinion, "initially published under the title "Silent Politics, "is the first book to look upon polls and the awareness of poll results as forces that influence public opinion. It is a penetrating assessment of the uses of polls, their misuses, and the absurdities carried out in their name. Bogart argues that predictions based on polls can be misleading since they reflect a transient stage in a public opinion that is constantly and often rapidly changing.

Author : Ronald H. Hinckley
Publisher : Free Press
Page : 200 pages
File Size : 47,28 MB
Release : 1992
Category : Political Science
ISBN :

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Hinckley examines the effect of public opinion upon foreign policy, influencing, as it does, many vital issues including changing US-Soviet relations, arms control and SDI, terrorism, and the MIddle East. He calls for more attention to be paid to the measurement of public opinion. He reveals that the current popular theories, which argue either that the public is ignorant and cannot be expected to hold serious opinions on policy matters or, alternatively, that the public is responsible, rational, and the most important determinant in foreign policy formulation, are both too sweeping, and he shows that the truth lies somewher in between these views. Hinckley argues that greater attention must be paid to the ever more sophisticated measurement of public opinion as it brings into sharper focus the relationship between the press, the public, and policymakers.

Author : George F. Bishop
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
Page : 248 pages
File Size : 48,61 MB
Release : 2005
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780742516458

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In a rigorous critique of public opinion polling in the U.S., George F. Bishop makes the case that a lot of what passes as "public opinion" in mass media today is an illusion, an artifact of measurement created by vague or misleading survey questions presented to respondents who typically construct their opinions on the spot. Using evidence from a wide variety of data sources, Bishop shows that widespread public ignorance and poorly informed opinions are the norm rather than definitive public opinion on key political, social, and cultural issues of the day. The Illusion of Public Opinion presents a number of cautionary tales about how American public opinion has supposedly changed since 9/11, amplified by additional examples on other occasions drawn from the American National Election Studies. Bishop's analysis of the pitfalls of asking survey questions and interpreting poll results leads the reader to a more skeptical appreciation of the art and science of public opinion polling as it is practiced today.

Author : Susan Herbst
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
Page : 244 pages
File Size : 18,49 MB
Release : 1995-08-15
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780226327433

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Quantifying the American mood through opinion polls appears to be an unbiased means for finding out what people want. But in Numbered Voices, Susan Herbst demonstrates that the way public opinion is measured affects the use that voters, legislators, and journalists make of it. Exploring the history of public opinion in the United States from the mid-nineteenth century to the present day, Herbst shows how numbers served both instrumental and symbolic functions, not only conveying neutral information but creating a basis authority. Addressing how the quantification of public opinion has affected contemporary politics and the democratic process, Herbst asks difficult but fundamental questions about the workings of American politics. "An original and thought-provoking analysis of why we have polls, what they accomplish, and how they affect the current political scene. Herbst's scholarship is impeccable, her writing is clear and crisp, and her findings are original. . . . Every reader will benefit by carefully weighing the issues she raises and the conclusions she draws."—Doris A. Graber, Political Science Quarterly "An intelligent, theoretically rich, and historically broad account of public opinion over several millennia. . . . The historical accounts are interesting and her interpretations are thought-provoking."—Paul Brace, Journal of American History

Author : Graham R. Walden
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 338 pages
File Size : 24,71 MB
Release : 2014-07-16
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 1135786313

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First Published in 1990. The decade of the 1980s witnessed an increasing use of polls and surveys as well as an expanded research effort into public opinion polls and survey research from the economic, historical, legal, methodological, organizational, and political viewpoints. The purpose of this volume is to provide a resource for practitioners, researchers, students, librarians, and others seeking access to this interdisciplinary literature. Instructional guides, handbooks, reference works, textbooks, research studies, and evaluative and critical studies on public opinion polls and survey research published since 1980 are included in this bibliography.

Author : Jeff Manza
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
Page : 402 pages
File Size : 46,25 MB
Release : 2002
Category : Performing Arts
ISBN : 9780195149340

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Do politicians listen to the public? When? How often? Or are the views of the public manipulated and used strategically by elites? In this text, leading scholars of American politics assess and debate the impact of public opinion on policy making. Central issues include the changing relationship between opinion and policy over time, how key actors use public opinion to formulate domestic and foriegn policy and how measurment techniques might improve our understanding of the results of polls and survey research.

Author : Kirby Goidel
Publisher : LSU Press
Page : 178 pages
File Size : 28,37 MB
Release : 2011-05-02
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 0807137839

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The 2008 presidential election provided a "perfect storm" for pollsters. A significant portion of the population had exchanged their landlines for cellphones, which made them harder to survey. Additionally, a potential Bradley effect -- in which white voters misrepresent their intentions of voting for or against a black candidate -- skewed predictions, and aggressive voter registration and mobilization campaigns by Barack Obama combined to challenge conventional understandings about how to measure and report public preferences. In the wake of these significant changes, Political Polling in the Digital Age, edited by Kirby Goidel, offers timely and insightful interpretations of the impact these trends will have on polling. In this groundbreaking collection, contributors place recent developments in public-opinion polling into a broader historical context, examine how to construct accurate meanings from public-opinion surveys, and analyze the future of public-opinion polling. Notable contributors include Mark Blumenthal, editor and publisher of Pollster.com; Anna Greenberg, a leading Democratic pollster; and Scott Keeter, director of survey research for the Pew Research Center. In an era of increasingly personalized and interactive communications, accurate political polling is more difficult and also more important. Political Polling in the Digital Age presents fresh perspectives and relevant tactics that demystify the variable world of opinion taking.