Public Opinion

Public opinion

-Opinions/attitudes that have to do with politics and are held by ppl about political issues, events, and personalities.

Individual opinions

-correspond to political phenomenon
-don't become public until the individual tells/disclose their opinions

How are opinions formed?

-interactions with the outside political world
-feelings, experiences, biases and principles that informs and helps us interact
-comes from environment
-taught by parents, family, society, education

Political Socialization

-the process through which we learn our feelings, bias, morals, beliefs, and principles to frame opinions
-role is to inform political opinions and attitudes

Agents of Socialization (AOS)

-Intermediaries that help us get to political opinions

Agents

-the institutions that mediate the process/help pick up and learn (societal beliefs and values)

Primary Agents

-Encounter at early stage of life and enjoy some level of intimacy
-Ex: family, schools, relatives, religious institutions

Secondary Agents:

-Encounter later on with our lives
-Ex: peers/friends, coworkers, classmates, the media - Agenda setting, political leaders and events

*major diff between primary and secondary is the level of closeness and intimacy*

Agenda setting

the final say of what to cover and what not to cover

Frames of reference

-acquired through political socialization
-reference points/angles/prisms through which we evaluate the political world around us
-"shortcuts" or "heuristics" we employ to make sense/organize the political world around us

Types of frames of reference

-Party ID
-Ideologies
-Group Orientation

Party ID/label

-refers to strong emotional attachment to political party - "fans"
-part of person's identity, their passion
-a fluid phenomenon (ppl can switch betw. Rep and Demo)
-leads to selective perception

Selective perception

-refers to those who have strong attachment to a party and perceive the world around them selectively, willing to interact with info that confirms their pre-existing beliefs → becomes a screen

Ideologies

-refers to the set of beliefs and principles about the role and purpose of the gov't
-Liberals and Conservatives

Economic Liberals

-want big gov't in economy
-gov't regulates

Economic Conservatives

-want small role of gov't in economy
-gov't stay away from regulating (free market)

Social Liberals

-want gov't to play small role in social life

Social Conservatives

-want gov't to play major role in social life

Populist

-a person who believes gov't should play a major role in economic and social life

Libertarian

-a person who believes gov't should play a small role in economic and social life

Group Orientation

evaluating through groups:
-race and ethnicity
-gender/sexuality
-age
-religion
-economic class

How do u measure public opinion

polls

Random/probability sampling

-method by which each element of the sample has a known probability of being picked

Samples must...

-be randomly picked
-put into categories from population (ex: party ID, age, gender)
-reflect characteristics of population

Margin of error

-tells/indicates how much the results deviate from results of the whole population
-most important info on polls
-if >3%, results are shaky

Confidence Interval (CI)

-If repeated 100 different times, its going to be at least 95% (95/100)

Fixable Problems of Polling

-Incomplete/not representative
-ex: telephone polling
-Arrangement is too abstract
-wording of question
-solution: running question through focus groups

Unfixable problems with polling

-Sensitive issues: people will assume, and as not to get judged, they'll say something "politically acceptable/correct"
-Unfamiliar issues: if ppl don't know, they have no opinions → expands margin of error