Chapter#6 - The Politics of Public Opinion

Page 1: The Politics of Public Opinion

• Factors that influence political attitudes
  • Race/Ethnicity
  • Geographic regions
  • Social Class
  • Family
  • Education
  • Media
  • Public Opinion
  • Religion
  • Gender
  • Marital status
  • Socialization
  • Political environment

Page 2: Political Ideologies

• Political Ideology: The set of underlying ideas and beliefs through which we come to understand and interpret politics.
• Liberal: Generally support social and political reform, government intervention in the economy, more economic equality, expansion of federal and social services, and greater concern for consumers and the environment.
• Conservative: Generally support the social and economic status quo and are suspicious of efforts to introduce new political formulas and economic arrangements; conservatives believe that a large and powerful government poses a threat to citizens' freedom.
• Socialist: Generally believe in social ownership, strong government, free markets, and reducing economic inequality.
• Libertarian: Supports individual liberty over government authority in economic, personal, and social realms.

Page 3: Political Socialization

• People’s attitudes about political issues and elected officials tend to be shaped by their underlying political beliefs and values.
• The process through which these underlying political beliefs and values are formed is collectively called political socialization.
• 5 agents of socialization that foster differences in political perspectives:
  • Family
  • Membership in social groups
  • Education
  • Religion
  • Political environment

Page 4: Agents of Socialization

• Families
  • Most people acquire their initial orientation to politics from their families.
  • Children raised in households where the primary caregivers are Democrats tend to become Democrats, whereas children raised in homes where their caregivers are Republicans tend to favor the Republican Party.
  • Example: Not all children absorb their parent’s political views. Ronald Reagan’s three children rejected their parent's conservative values and became active on behalf of Democratic candidates.
• Social Groups
  • Other important sources of political values are social groups to which individuals belong, including political parties, labor unions, military, and educational groups.
  • Membership in a particular group can give individuals experiences and perspectives that shape their view of political and social life.

Page 5: Agents of Socialization (Continued)

• Education
  • Education may be the greatest equalizer. Governments use public education to teach a common set of civic values; it is mainly in school that Americans acquire basic beliefs in liberty, equality, and democracy.
  • Differences in formal education are strongly associated with differences in political outlook.
  • Example: college graduates tend to vote, join campaigns, and protest more than those who do not pursue a college education.
• Religion
  • Religions or religious leaders are important instructors, especially regarding morality and self-sacrifice; they are important factors in the development of personal identity.
  • Conservative denominations and religions (e.g., Southern Baptist or Catholics) tend to impart more conservative attitudes, especially regarding abortion, than more liberal churches do.

Page 6: Agents of Socialization (Continued)

• Political Environment
  • Although beliefs are influenced by family, social groups, education, and religion, the content and character of these views are largely determined by the political environment.
  • Example: The baby-boom generation that came of age in the 1960s was exposed to Vietnam War, widespread antiwar protests on college campuses and in urban areas, which fundamentally shaped their opinions.
  • Similarly, events like September 11 and the war on terrorism helped shape the political lives of those who came of age in the 1990s and 2000s.

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Page 8: Measuring Public Opinions

• Historically, leaders gauged public opinion by crowds at meetings and applause; this direct exposure did not always yield accurate knowledge of public opinion, but gave leaders confidence in public support.
• Today, public officials extensively use public-opinion polls to decide whether to run for office, what policies to support, how to vote on legislation, and what kinds of appeals to use in campaigns.
• All recent presidents and other major political figures work closely with polls and pollsters.

Page 9: Different Types of Polls (Part 1)

• Straw Poll
  • Early method: unscientific opinion samples from 19th-century newspapers used to predict a winner.
  • Not guaranteed to be representative of the population.
  • Example: 1936 Literary Digest poll predicted Alf Landon would defeat Franklin D. Roosevelt, but Roosevelt won in a landslide.
  • Reason for error: relied on telephone directories and automobile registration rosters; during the Great Depression only wealthier Americans owned telephones and cars, excluding working-class Americans who supported Roosevelt.
• Random Sampling
  • Polling method that canvasses people at random from the population or uses a random-number generator.
  • Each member of the population has an equal and independent chance of being selected.

Page 10: Different Types of Polls (Part 2)

• Stratified Sampling
  • Participants are chosen based on age, income, and socioeconomic background to mirror the larger population; the opposite of random sampling.
• Exit Polling
  • Polling technique that predicts winners as polls close by surveying departing voters; identify precincts that approximate the larger entity and sample accordingly.
• Tracking Polls
  • Repeatedly sample the same voters during a campaign to identify shifts in opinions and correlate with media strategy, voter issues, and candidate mistakes; helps determine which campaign strategies work.

Page 11: Methods Used to Conduct Public-Opinion Polls

• 3 Methods Used to Conduct Public-Opinion Polls:
  • Phone Surveys
  • Online Surveys
  • Face-to-Face Surveys
• Example of a survey instrument (Likert-scale):
  • Very Satisfied • Satisfied • Neutral • Unsatisfied • Very Unsatisfied

Page 12: Methods Used to Administer Public Opinion Polls

• Telephone Surveys
  • A computer random number generator is used to produce a list of 10-digit telephone numbers.
  • Given that 95\% of Americans have telephones, this technique usually results in random national samples.
  • The Telephone Consumer Protection Act restricts the use of autodialers to contact cell phones and requires explicit consent for any automated calls.
• Online Surveys
  • Can be more efficient and less costly; include larger samples of young people and yield more accurate results within age groups.
  • Many online surveys do not use random sampling and thus may not be representative; reflect those willing to take a quiz online.
• Face-to-Face Surveys
  • The American National Election Studies (ANES) have conducted face-to-face surveys; costly, so ANES uses a sample of 2,000+ respondents from different regions.
  • In-person surveys remain one of the most valuable and accurate methods.

Page 13: Polls

• Polls are useful predictive instruments but are not always reliable.
• The way a question is phrased can significantly affect results. Examples:
  • Do you support a woman’s rights over her body? vs. Do you support the right to terminate a pregnancy in the first trimester?
• Stakeholders (candidates, corporations, interest groups) can influence poll results through careful phrasing (carrying out push-polling).
• Hundreds of polls are conducted in presidential election years; more polls do not necessarily produce better results, though in the last three presidential elections they have been fairly accurate.
• Example: In the 2008 presidential election, polls on the eve of the election projected an Obama advantage of 7.52\%; Obama’s actual margin of victory was 7.2\%.

Page 14: What Can Cause Poll Results to be Inaccurate? (Part 1)

• Selection Bias
  • Polling error that arises when the sample is not representative of the population, causing over- or under-representation of certain opinions.
  • Example: The 1936 Literary Digest poll again, due to reliance on telephone directories and automobile rosters; wealthier Americans were overrepresented and working-class Americans were underrepresented.
• The Bandwagon Effect
  • A shift in electoral support to the candidate whom public opinion polls report as the front-runner.
  • Polling results can influence people to support the leading candidate.

Page 15: What Can Cause Poll Results to be Inaccurate? (Part 2)

• Push Polling
  • A polling technique in which questions are designed to shape the respondent's opinion.
  • Notable example: the 2000 South Carolina Republican presidential primary where a push poll suggested that John McCain had fathered an illegitimate black child.
  • Callers working for Bush supporters asked conservatives white voters if they would be more or less likely to vote for McCain knowing about the alleged child; many voters accepted the premise.
  • The push poll is cited by McCain as an instance of smear tactics used in campaigns; it contributed to the broader concerns about exposing families to the stresses of political races.