Analyzing a Mainstream Media Poll

When it comes to public opinion polling I often feel like I can trust a survey conducted by a large corporation such as the New York Times and CBS News as long as its not an obvious marketing scheme. Because of this, I choose a survey that was reported on in the first week of April about a brightening outlook on the U.S. economy. The reason I picked this specific article is that I am skeptical as to how confident Americans are of Mr. Obama, taking into consideration that he had only spent a few months in the white house. I am also somewhat surprised by the other anomalies reported in this poll such as that fact that only 31 percent had a favorable view of the Republican Party. Does this survey use a quality sample and is it conducted fairly or are the numbers simply misleading? Is there a way to find out or do we just have to trust the reporter? Using The 20 Questions A Journalist Should Ask About a Poll, I examine just how useful this article is and what could have been done to lend more credibility to the poll.

A few things that the journalists excelled at included providing a comparison with past polls (only ones they had done in this case), using a study with a large sample base, and quoting follow-up interviews to the poll. They also stated that the poll was conducted by telephone with 998 adults and that the margin of sampling error was plus or minus three percentage points. Because the study was conducted at the same time that Mr. Obama was in Europe, it was able to capture how Americans felt at the time about being represented by Mr. Obama and how much Americans perceived that leaders of other countries would respect him. In terms of the 20 questions, I found that these journalists did a relatively good job in answering the important questions such as who did the poll, what was the sampling error, how many people were interviewed, how were the interviews conducted, and what kinds of questions were asked. Many of the answers given to these questions were very solid and easy to find.

Unfortunately there were several holes in the story including the title. The poll actually had more to do with politics and the approval ratings of democrats (specifically Mr. Obama) and republicans than the brightening outlook on the economy. Because it was clearly stated in the article we knew this was a phone survey and therefore it was only able to reach the people who were at home with a phone. We also know that 998 adults were surveyed but we don’t know how the people were chosen other than the fact that they answered their telephone; for this we just have to trust The New York Times and CBS. Another unknown to the average audience is why the poll is being conducted. The article states that they have been doing the poll for 25 years, which undoubtedly lends credibility to the study, but we still don’t know exactly why the poll was conducted. Further this article doesn’t make known that there were over 100 questions asked, making this a lengthy phone survey.

For the most part I agree with this article and would assume that the statistics fairly represent Americans. There seems to be a good method in place for tracking the responses based on what party the respondent voted for. Also, in the actual survey they dug a little deeper by asking about social class, age, race, gender, work status, etc. The article did a rather good job of staying independent and sticking to only the statistics gathered in the survey.  It was fascinating to see the statistics regarding specific initiatives such as that 74% said they supported tax increases on those making $250k or more.

One downside I see is that there is an overwhelming amount of data here and nearly all of it implies that Mr. Obama is the reason for American’s growing optimism. This particular position doesn’t match up with some of the other results, such as that 70 percent of the respondents are concerned that someone in their household will be out of work in the next 12 months. Toward the end they leveled out their argument by saying that Americans strongly support Mr. Obama but not all of his initiatives. I would rewrite the story to highlight that there is growing optimism that Mr. Obama will steer the economy in the right direction. Overall the survey seemed to have much more credibility than was expressed in this article. While I appreciate the optimism, I would prefer to have more of the facts about how the survey was conducted along with some reference to similar surveys by other agencies that have been done.

Works Cited:
ADAM NAGOURNEY and MEGAN THEE-BRENAN.  (2009, April 7). Poll Finds Brightening Outlook on U.S. Economy :[National Desk]. New York Times   (Late Edition (east Coast)),  p. A.1.  Retrieved May 6, 2009, from ProQuest National Newspapers Core database. (Document ID: 1674574971).

Gawiser, S. R., & Witt, G.E “20 Questions A Journalist Should Ask About A Poll.” Retrieved online from the National Counclil on Public Polls (www.ncpp.org).