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8/11/2019 The Case For and Against the Public Opinion Polls
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8/11/2019 The Case For and Against the Public Opinion Polls
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THE JOURNAL OF MARKETING
11
loading is increased by the use of the
word "reforms," which is known by psy-
chologists to have an unfavorable con-
notation when applied to politics. An-
other example taken from the work of
the same survey agency:
Do you think that any decision between
war and peace for this country should be
submitted to popiilar vote, even though it
might me n
a delay or would you prefer to
leave the war decision to Congress?
The words "even though i t might mean
a delay" point out a disadvantage of the
referendum plan, and therefore the ques-
t ion infers that the popular vote may be
the poorer of the two m etho ds. As would
have been predicted, this quest ion
showed a greater proportion in favor of
Congressional decision than did other
more neutral quest ions used by other
surveyors.
I t is only too evident that loaded
phrasings do occasionally occur. B ut this
is no indication th a t all polls m ak e this
error, or even that the guilty agencies do
it frequently or intentionally. Rather,
such biased questions seem to be the re-
sult of two factorsthe public opinion
poll technique is still developing and all
sources of bias are not always fully ap-
preciated, and a few inferior research
men are working in the field. Within a
short time, if present progress continues,
both of these sources of error will dis-
appear. In the meantime, the qualif ied
polling agent fortifies himself with "ex-
perimental" quest ionnaires to be sure of
his ground before he at tempts a large-
scale poll.
Genera l Hugh Johnson has charged
that polls sometimes ask questions on
subjects about which the public has no
real opinion. Actually, the conscientious
curately obtained than opinion about th
gold content of the dollar . In the lat te
case, the average person is not informe
abo ut th e pros and cons of the argu m ent
For accurate results , the informatio
covered must^be close to the experience
of the public .
As a check upon the scope and phras
ing of the questions, the poll superviso
depends upon the experiences of the in
terviewers who test the questions befor
they are used on a wide scale. Her
again, reliance is placed upon "test" in
terviews conducted by experienced inter
viewers wh o are frequently able to det ec
when a respondent is giving an answe
which reflects indecision or lack o
knowledge.
Despite the many well-known axiom
of selecting proper issues and phrasings
one polling agency has repeatedly pro
pounded questions which a college pro
fessor would find difficult to answer (ye
their respond ents do give answers )
Consider, for example, this quest ion th a
was recently asked:
Which of these courses of action come
closest to describing what you think Americ
should do about the present European war
Enter the war at once on the side of Eng
land and France.
Stay out now and for as long as we can
but go into the war on the side of Englan
and France if they are in real danger o
losing, and in the meantime help that sid
with food and materials.
Do not enter the war but supply Englan
and France with materials and food,^an
refuse to ship anyth ing to Germ any. *^
Take no sides and stay out entirely, bu
offer to sell to anyone on a cash and carr
basis.
Find some way of supporting Germany.
It seems impossible that the average re
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THE JOURNAL OF MARKETING
What about the criticism that polls do
not adequately measure the intensity of
feeling? A minority might favor the re-
turn of Prohibition, but this minority
could presumably be so vociferous and
well-organized that they would do a
great deal more than the "lifeless" ma-
jority in influencing legislation, custom
and editorial policy. It is true that al-
most all the present polls are quantita-
tive rather than qualitative. And the
mere asking of a question as to whether
the person feels "mildly" or "strongly"
is by no means a solution to the problem.
Let us suppose that 90% of the public
was found to be sympathetic to Finland
in its war with Russia. Even if 85% of
the 90 were "strongly " sympathetic, this
would not provide any measure of how
far their attitudes might influence their
behavior. It would be much more reveal-
ing to ask the 90% whether the United
States should ship war m aterials or foods
and clothing, lend money with or with-
out restrictions, send troops to aid the
Finns, etc.
This approach is being emphasized in
many poll questions even today. For ex-
ample, inarecent study one question was
phrased this way: "Do you ever turn
down your radio when an advertisement
is being broadcast?" This sort of ques-
tion provided a description of behavior
which reflected intensity of attitude, and
hence secured much m ore meaningful re -
sults than a question such as: "Do you
like or dislike advertisements on the ra-
dio? Very much or just a little?" In
other words, intensity can be measured
adequately in behavioral terms by in-
quiring what the person has done or
would do which would reflect the degree
of his feeling. The problem, then, is still
cause they are based on a very limited
number of interviews. Dr. Gallup has
pointed out that assuming 10,000 per-
sons are interviewed every week, it
would require 120 years before everyone
of voting age in the country had been
questioned. What General Johnson does
not understand is that the
nature
of the
sample is tremendously more important
than its mere size Probably no poll in
this country ever went wrong because of
its lack of size, but sizable polls have
been inaccurate because of a poor cross-
section, as witness the Literary Digest
fiasco. Practically all polling groups are
careful to secure a typical cross-section
of persons in terms of geographic dis-
tribution, type of community, sex and
age proportions, party affiliations, and
income levels (with appropriate propor-
tions of WPA'-ers and reliefers). Scien-
tific sampling is one of th e chief points of
difference between modern polls and the
former straw votes. If a representative
group of persons is interviewed, with a
total of only 600 to 900 interviews it is
possible to secure results that will be
representative of the views of the entire
nation within 5%. However, most na-
tional polls depend upon samples of con-
siderably larger size than this.
Most ridiculous of all charges against
the polls is that they destroy the demo-
cratic functions of government. For ex-
ample, it has been said that poll results
force legislative action, and thus take
power away from our legislators. It was
reported recently that a minority pres-
sure group went before a Congressional
committee to demand that a particular
bill be killed. mem ber of the committee
simply retorted that a public opinion
poll showed that the people wanted the
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THE JOURNAL OF MARKETING
cratic government, perhaps we should
have more of it.
Charges have been made that in elec-
tions the apparen t losers, as indicated by
poll results, will give up the fight, and
that therefore the poll technique leads
away from democracy. But this point
does not stand analysis either. The So-
cialists continue to nominate a Presiden-
tial candidate every four years, and to
put on a reasonably active campaign, al-
though they must be sure that they have
no chance of winning the election. Simi-
larly, it has been said that polls have a
bandw agon effect, that a large pro-
portion of persons will go over to the
apparently winning side. The most
widely publicized poll of its day was t hat
of the Literary Digest. Where was the
rush to climb on the bandw agon of the
apparently victorious Landon?
The poll technique does not lead to the
breaking down of democratic govern-
ment, but actually leads to greater de-
mocracy by giving legislators an accu-
rate index of public opinion. Further-
more, it has real value in a democratic
government by separating issues an
persons. For example. President Roose
velt interpreted his re-election as indi
cating popular approval of his pu rg e
and Supreme Court revision plans. A
the time of these efforts, all opinion poll
showed an overwhelming majority op
posed to both these plans, even thoug
still favoring Roosevelt as president.
Polls also play a large part in increas
ing democracy in another way. They fo
cus public attention on social and politi
cal issues, and by so doing, create
more enlightened public. As well as bein
good for democracy, they are good fo
business. Businesses have found that th
public opinion poll is their only means o
accurately measuring public reaction t
their companies, their policies, their ad
vertising, and their products. Being ofs
many diverse values, the public opinion
poll is here to stay .
Considering the many possible source
of error in the making of opinion surveys
the accuracy of the polls is indeed amaz
ing and a tribute to the scientific worker
in the field.
SOME FUNDAMENTAL CONSIDERATIONS IN THE
CONDUCT OF POLLS
LAWRENCE C. LOCKLEY
AND
ALFRED N. WATSON
Division qf Commercial Research
The Curtis Publishing Company
NY ARTICLE w hich dir ec ts at te n ti o n
,. of m arket research people to the
conditions under which polls of public
opinion and market surveys can advan-
tageously be used performs a service. It
may be possible, however, to over-sim-
plify a discussion of this problem to the
point where attention is focused on the
considerations controls the accuracy o
th efin ingsof any poll of opinion or m ar
ket survey:
1. Confining the objectives of the survey
to points about which the people to b
questioned have information to give o
have adequate information upon which
to form an opinion
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