Political Polls
A political poll is a type of public opinion poll that asks a sample of people for their feelings and sentiments on political issues. An inquiry into public opinion conducted by interviewing a random sample of people, it is one of the most prominent applications of survey research conducted. Although election polls attract a great deal of attention for their ability to predict the outcome of elections, their most important function is to help journalists and citizens understand the meaning of the campaign and the election. When done right, public opinion polling is an accurate social science with strict rules about sample size, random selection of participants and margins of error.
- Political polls can be misleading if they are conducted incorrectly
- Before relying on a poll, read the actual details - not just the headlines
- Polls can be biased if they oversample certain populations
- To be accurate, political polls need to
- Only survey registered voters (those who can legally vote)
- Only survey those who are likely to vote ( on ~50% of registered voters vote)
- Survey a representative sample of political parties (of current alignment, not past elections)
- Other ways polls can be wrong
- Polls are lagging indications - recent events could have changed voters minds
- National polls for local elections are misleading - they don't sample the correct population