Transcript Problems with Polls

Chapter 6
Public Opinion,
Political Socialization
and Media
Public Opinion
 Aggregate of individual attitudes or
beliefs shared by some portion of
adult population
 No one public opinion; many different
“publics”
 Key role in policymaking
 Source of power
 Helps candidates identify issues
 Sets limits on government action through
public pressure
Measuring Public
Opinion
 Opinion poll = method of
systematically questioning small,
selected sample of respondents deemed
representative of total population
 Simple random sample = each
member of population has equal
chance of being selected for sample
 Most scientific; sample represents
population’s diversity in demography and
opinion
Problems with Polls
 “Snapshot in time”
 Classic errors: presidential election polls
(1948, Dewey beating Truman; 1980, Carter
beating Reagan)
 Sampling errors (e.g., biased samples,
samples too small, etc.)
 Question wording/influence of
interviewer
 Unscientific polls (Internet, phone-in, push
polls)
 High non-response rates
Political Socialization
 Process by which individuals acquire
political beliefs, attitudes, and opinions
 Agents/forces









Family
Education
Peers
Religion
Economic Status/occupation/class
Political Events
Opinion Leaders
Media/TV/Internet
Demography/Age/Gender
Family
 Most important agent
 Communication and Receptivity
 Parents communicate preferences to children
 To please parents children receptive to their views
 Important for party identification
 Class poll: How many of us have followed in
our parents’ footsteps when it comes to party
identification?
Education and Peers
 Education
 patriotism, structure of government,
how to form positions on issues
 more education, more likely
interested in politics
 Peers
 most likely to shape political opinions
when peer group is politically active
Religion
 Traditional view definite effect
 Roman Catholics  more liberal
 Protestants  more conservative
 Jews  more liberal
 More recent trends
 Non-religious  very liberal socially; mixed
economically
 Protestants and Catholics vary socially and
economically
 Social conservatism among Christians
 Degree of religious commitment
 Conservative, evangelical, or fundamentalist
SES/Class
 Income strong predictor of liberalism or
conservatism


Lower income
 More likely to favor government action, benefit poor, promote
economic equality
 More likely to be socially conservative
 More likely to be Democrat
 Less likely to participate
Higher income
 More likely to oppose government action or economic equality
 More likely to be socially liberal
 More likely to be Republican or Libertarian
 More likely to participate
 Socioeconomic status (SES) = best predictor of
participation
Political Events
 Can shape people’s political
attitudes
 Generational effect = long-lasting
effect of events of particular time on
political opinions of those who came of
age at that time




Great Depression
World War II
Vietnam War
9/11?
Media
 Media = channels of mass
communication
 Newspapers, television, radio and
Internet strongly influence public
opinion
 Certainly what to think about, known
as agenda setting
 Mainly private, for-profit
corporations
Demography
 Region
 South, Great Plains, and Rockies  Republican
 West Coast and Northeast  Democratic
 Residence (urban/suburban/rural)
 Big cities  liberal and Democratic
 Small communities  conservative and Republican
 Ethnicity
 African Americans more liberal
 Whites  more conservative
 Gender
 Men more likely to vote Republican
 Women more likely to vote Democratic
Political Process
 Public opinion
 Source of power
 Identify key issues
 Shape campaigns
 Political culture = collection of beliefs and
attitudes toward government and political
process
 Symbols and shared beliefs
 Provides environment of support (trust, legitimacy)
 Political trust = degree of trust in government and
political institutions
 Standard for evaluation of performance
Media and Politics
 Functions of Media
 Entertainment
 Reporting news
 Identifying public problems
 Setting public agenda = issues perceived by
political community as meriting public
attention and governmental action
 Socializing generations
 Providing political forum
 Making profits
 Enormous impact on politics
Television
 Most influential medium
(primary source for 90% of
Americans)
 Big business
 Increase in news-type
programming
 Influence on political process
 Highly superficial, “Sound bites”
 Narrowcasting
Media and Campaigns
 Advertising (very costly campaigns)
 Negative advertising works
 Reduces participation, increases cynicism
 Management of news coverage
 spin = interpretation favorable to
candidate’s campaign
 spin doctors = campaign tries to convince
journalists of truth of favorable
interpretation