Volume 1.1 - Election Issues - Fall 1996

Title: Watching the Polls: Elections, the Media and Polling

Author: Norman Bradburn

Abstract: Every four years, as presidential elections roll around, a plague of polls descends upon the country. After remaining at about 10 percent of front-page presidential election related stories through the 1980's, the proportion of such stories more than doubled to 22 percent in the 1992 election (Lavrakas and Bauman,1995) and few doubt that the trend has yet reached its peak. One contemporary estimate (Wall Street Journal, September 13, 1996) puts the number of media-commissioned polls in the first four months of 1996 at 125, compared with 125 for the entire 1992 election year.

Is this development a good or bad thing for democracy? Even if polls play a positive role in general, is too much of a good thing, a bad thing? In this paper, I will review some basics about polls, discuss their current use by the media and suggest some ways in which their interpretation can be improved. I will argue that polls in general are a positive force in democracy and that more rather than fewer polls are the best defense against misuse of polls.

About the Author: Norman Bradburn is the Tiffany and Margaret Blake Distinguished Service Professor in the Irving B. Harris Graduate School of Public Policy Studies, the Department of Psychology, Graduate School of Business and the College of the University of Chicago. He is also the Senior Research Vice President of the National Opinion Research Center and is the author (with others) of Polls and Surveys, Asking Questions and, most recently, Thinking About Answers.

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