12 questions to ask about political polls
Skeptical about the latest polls? Experts offer some advice.The American Association for Public Opinion Research lists a dozen questions that journalists, and voters, should be asking when evaluating the credibility of political polls. Here they are:
- Who paid for the poll and why was it done?
- Who did the poll?
- How was the poll conducted?
- How many people were interviewed and what’s the margin of sampling error?
- How were those people chosen? (Probability or non-probability sample? Random sampling? Non-random method?)
- What area or what group were people chosen from? (That is, what was the population being represented?)
- When were the interviews conducted?
- How were the interviews conducted?
- What questions were asked? Were they clearly worded, balanced and unbiased?
- What order were the questions asked in? Could an earlier question influence the answer of a later question that is central to your story or the conclusions drawn?
- Are the results based on the answers of all the people interviewed, or only a subset? If a subset, how many?
- Were the data weighted, and if so, to what?
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