Unit 12

Part B

Opinion Polls

Man: Do you know the thing that's always struck me as odd about opinion polls?

Woman: What's that?

Man: The percentages. Like recently there was a survey about what people thought about traffic, and petrol prices, and public car parks. In some car parks it now costs something like 5 pounds to park a car for half an hour.

Woman: Yeah, but I don't see what you're getting at.

Man: What I mean is the percentages in the results. So there might be 70% of people who complained about high petrol prices, and 60% who want to see the traffic reduced, and 65% who think car park charges are too high. Does that mean that there are 35% who actually think the charges are OK and would even be prepared to pay more, and another 30% who think petrol prices are OK? I mean that's absurd. I don't know anyone who doesn't think they're too high.

Woman: Well, actually I think we should pay more.

Man: Come on, you're joking.

Woman: No, seriously. I think we should pay more for petrol, even twice as much maybe, and certainly far more for inner city car parks.

Man: But why?

Woman: More taxes should be charged on petrol, I think, to discourage people from using cars, and a kind of graded charging system for car parks depending on how far they are from the city center.

Man: What do you mean?

Woman: Well, if you park your car quite far from the city center then you pay a nominal amount as a kind of reward for not polluting the city center. Well, the closer you get to the center, the more you are penalized. Prices in the center should be totally prohibitive. I mean with an efficient bus or tram service there's no excuse for using cars.

Man: Yeah, but you can't penalize people who don't use their car to go into town. I mean if you doubled the price of petrol, it would cost people a fortune to go anywhere, even on short trips, and especially on holidays.

Woman: Don't use your car then. Use a train.

Man: But what about lorries? I mean they use a lot of petrol to transport goods from one place to another.

Woman: So what's to stop these goods being transported by train or even via canal?

Man: Well, anyway, I still can't believe that 30% of those people who said car park charges were OK all think the same as you.

Woman: Well, maybe that's where you are wrong. Just think about what I've said and you'll realize that perhaps it's not so stupid as it sounds.

1. What items are surveyed in the opinion poll mentioned in the conversation?

2. What does the man find absurd about the survey?

3. Which of the following best reflects the woman's view about car parking?

4. Which problem is the woman most concerned about according to the conversation?

5. Which of the following describes the man's attitude toward opinion polls?

Part C

How These Pollsters Do Those Polls

Voters can become weary of polls as a campaign winds down, and in public, candidates invariably declare that they ignore them -- at least, the candidates who are losing. But the fact is, pollsters are good and getting better.

Most election-eve polls in 1992 predicted the voting percentages eventually won by Clinton, Bush and Perot well within the sampling margin of error. Of some 300 such polls, none projected Bush or Perot as the winner.

Typically, these polls are generated by telephone interviews with 600 to 1,000 "likely voters", who are 18 or older, as determined by answers to initial questions. The phone numbers are selected as random digits by a phone-dialing computer.

Hypothetically, almost every person in America has an equal chance of being called since most households have phones. The samples may seem small, but the techniques used in polls are proven enough to be regularly accepted as evidence by the courts when election results are legally challenged. No sample is as accurate as interviewing 100 percent of the people in an election district, of course. A "sampling error" or "margin of error" accompanies every significant result. It is the largest possible difference that could exist between a random national sample and a poll that asked 200 million Americans the same questions. A 3 percent sampling error, for example, means that if a poll predicts that a candidate will get 45 percent of the vote, he may probably get 42 to 48 percent of the vote.

Often, after a random sample is collected, it's compared with US Census statistics to determine the degree of agreement before the poll is finalized. This can help polling professionals correct anomalies so that they can get clients that pay them the big bucks.

The "exit polls" that play a key part in election night drama in American homes are even more accurate than other forecasts because the specially trained interviewers are using respondents who are known voters.

Questions:

1. How is a typical election poll conducted in the US?

2. How large is the sample for a typical election poll?

3. If a poll shows a 50% support for a candidate with a 3% margin of error, what would be the probable percentage of support for him?

4. Why are "exit polls" especially accurate?

5. What is the passage mainly about?

Part D

Use of Public Opinion Polls

Public opinion polls are regularly conducted and published in many countries. They measure not only support for political parties but also public opinion on a wide range of social and political issues. They are frequently published in major newspapers and are generally accepted as useful tools by businesses, political organizations, the mass media and government, and academic research groups. Hundreds of public polling firms operate around the world. The Gallup Poll and Harris Poll are among the best known in the US.

In business, polls are used to test consumers' preferences and to discover what gives a product its appeal. Responses to commercial polls help businesses in planning marketing and advertising strategies and in making changes in a product to increase its sales.

In politics, polls are used to obtain information about voters' attitudes toward issues and candidates, to put forward candidates with winning potential, and to plan campaigns. Polling organizations have also been successful in predicting the outcome of elections. By polling voters on Election Day, it is often possible to determine the probable winner even before the voting booths close.

Newspapers, magazines, radio and television are heavy users of public opinion polling information, especially political information that helps to predict election results or measure the popularity of government officials and candidates. The public's attitude toward various social, economic, and international issues is also considered newsworthy.

Governments use opinion polls to find out public sentiment about issues of interest. They also use polling methodology to determine unemployment rates, crime rates, and other social and economic indicators.

Opinion polls have also been employed extensively in academic research, particularly in the social sciences. They have been valuable in studying delinquency, socialization, political attitudes, and economic behavior. Among the prominent organizations that primarily serve academic research purposes are the Survey Research Center at the University of Michigan and the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago.

Questions:

1. By whom are public opinion polls generally accepted as useful tools?

2. For what are opinion polls used by businesses?

3. For what are opinion polls used in politics?

4. For what are opinion polls used by governments?

5. What new media are heavy users of the information from opinion polls?

6. For what are opinion polls used in academic research?