 | |  |
 |
|
|
|
Poll
Crazy in Campaign Coverage |
Posted:
10.20.04
|
|
|
While the media often emphasize the latest polls to determine
who's winning a presidential campaign, experts say the public
should focus on the issues and character of the candidates, rather
than the "horse race."
Printer-friendly versions: HTML
/ PDF
|
|
|
|
|
"It's a draw!"
No, wait -- "the Democrat won by 13-points!" That may
sound like an unusual sportscast, but it actually refers to the
news coverage following the last presidential debate between Republican
President George Bush and Democratic challenger Senator John Kerry.
 Just
25 minutes after the debate on October 13, ABC News declared the
face-off a "draw," according to its poll of 566 "registered
voters." Forty-two percent said Sen. Kerry won the debate,
while 41 percent said President Bush did a better job, according
to the poll. The poll had a "margin of error" of 4.5
percent, meaning the results could have been 45.5 for the president
and 37 percent for Sen. Kerry or vice versa, a notable difference.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The news
media's love of polls |
|
|
|
|
|
Sometimes polls -- and the competition between candidates --
can dominate news coverage entirely, at the expense of more informative
stories that could actually help voters decide which candidate
they prefer.
For instance, during the 2004 Democratic primary, the largest
group of news stories covered the competition (68 percent), followed
by character (18 percent) and lastly policy (14 percent) of each
candidate, according to a recent study by the University of Missouri's
Communication Department.
Most people assume that the news informs them about who will
make a better president, but what the news is best at is informing
them about who is the most efficient campaigner, according to
William Benoit, the professor who led the study.
|
|
|
|
Favoring
polls over substance |
|
|
|
|
|
Given these apparent contradictions in polling data and their
lack of substance, why do news organizations cite polls on a daily
basis?
Media experts say covering elections like a competitive sporting
event, like a horse race, creates a more exciting and compelling
story for the audience.
"Polling is one way to create a veneer of excitement about
the race," said Jay Rosen, a journalism professor at New
York University.
 Issue-based
political coverage, such as the policy positions of each candidate,
can seem boring, according to Stephen Hess of the Brookings Institution.
"Substance stories are about issues and candidates' qualifications
for office. Horse race stories are more fun. Substance stories
are more important," Hess wrote.
Journalists also want to report new information. "A poll
just out is new; Sen. Kerry's or Mr. Bush's stand on an issue
is not new...I think a reason the media over-emphasize polls is
that it allows a story to tell something new," Benoit said.
This trend is nothing new. Polls have been widely used by the
media since the 1950s, according to an analysis by the University
of Missouri's Communications Department.
"There's a premium on information about the election that
seems objective, scientific, nonpartisan, not just 'spin' -- facts
that are free from all those tricky problems of human judgment.
Polling seems like one of those things -- here are the numbers,"
Rosen said.
|
|
|
|
The problems
with surveys in news coverage |
|
|
|
|
|
But, even if polls provide "spin-free" facts during
a presidential election, experts strongly caution against taking
poll results at face value because the method of collecting data
for the survey may be flawed.
"There is no standard methodology in the polling profession
for identifying likely voters...Each [polling] firm uses a calculus
of its own...This is part of the art of polling, rather than the
science," Michael W. Traugott, a communications professor
at the University of Michigan, recently told the Boston Globe.
Even the most reputable polling firms, such as Gallup and Zogby
International, have their own guidelines for selecting a group
of people, or sample of the population, to survey. Even polls
on the same subject can therefore have very different results.
|
|
|
|
Substantive
news or just numbers? |
|
|
|
|
|
Most importantly, experts say the media often report polling
data in a misleading way.
"Too much emphasis is on what the latest poll numbers show.
Not enough emphasis is on what do these polls mean... very often
the typical news report is just a recitation of a top line...and
that confuses more than it informs," Andrew Kohut, president
of the Pew Research Center, told the NewsHour.
 News
reports often do not mention the "margin of error" or
provide specifics about the group of people surveyed, said Benoit.
Details about the sample -- such as "likely voter" and
"registered voter," or "Republican" and "Democrat"
-- are important because they can dramatically affect the results
of a poll.
Despite these flaws, polling is not likely to disappear from
the news. Instead, the public can learn to interpret polls intelligently
on their own.
Benoit advises: Know the polling sample, keep in mind the margin
of error of the poll and the date of the poll since people's opinions
can change after the poll. Finally, ask yourself if it is a reputatable
and unbiased polling organization, or a political group, that
is conducting the poll.
In other words, always read the fine print.
--
By Liz Harper, Online NewsHour
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
American schools and financial aid should be only for legal citizens of the United States. There should be no exceptions to this.
