National Polls Research Articles

Multidimensional Measurement of Sexual Orientation: Present

To understand the current state of research on sexual orientation, we need to address some important questions. Is the distribution of sexual orientation discrete or continuous? Is it best measured with one dimension or two—or more? Just what is sexual orientation, anyway? When studying sexual orientation, should we focus on the beloved, not the lover (i.e., interpret attraction as a function of the attractive person, rather than the person who is attracted)? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the Klein Sexual Orientation Grid as we move into the next phase of sexual orientation measurement? Finally, as we move from small-scale surveys to large-scale national polls (as some have already begun to do), what modifications of our inventories and procedures need to be made? This section of this issue contains articles that address each of these questions, and this review essay enlarges upon them.

Knowledge and perceptions of the Affordable Care Act by uninsured patients at a free clinic.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) has as one of its main objectives to reduce the number of uninsured Americans. The understanding of the ACA reforms by uninsured patients will likely influence the degree of success in achieving this objective. This study assessed the basic knowledge and opinions regarding the ACA of patients at a free clinic and the impact of a brief educational intervention on respondents' knowledge and opinions. One hundred uninsured adult patients completed a brief survey about the ACA before and after viewing a video outlining the major features of the act. The study cohort initially performed worse than national polls on all knowledge questions. Significant improvement was observed after the educational video. Our study suggests a need for educational efforts directed at those individuals most likely to benefit from the ACA. We demonstrated that a brief intervention during a routine office visit may improve knowledge of the ACA.

Urban Backlash against Democracy: Battling the Tyranny of the Majority or the Rise of Rural Power?

During the 29 months between the overthrow of the Mubarak dictatorship and the military coup against the democratically elected government of Muhammad Mursi, about thirty million Egyptians voted in four major national polls – the constitutional referendum of March 2011, the parliamentary elections of November 2011-January 2012, the presidential elections of May-June 2012, and the constitutional referendum of December 2012. Despite the shifting alliances and counter-alliances that characterized these electoral battles, voting patterns reveal a consistent nationwide dominance of the Freedom and Justice Party that was rooted in the provincial capitals and villages of the Nile Delta with particularly enduring strength in Upper Egypt. Eventually, holdovers from the Mubarak regime allied with local elites (‘ayan) connected to the Wafd Party and with Christian groups tied to the Egyptian Block in mobilizing an opposition coalition that was centered in the more prosperous districts of Cairo and a handful of neighboring governorates in the southern Delta. Although the opposition managed to enlist the military in removing the elected government and repressing its followers, we can expect to see similar voting patterns if free elections are held again even if the competing parties adopt different names and slogans.

The Importance of Local Parties and Incumbency to the Electoral Prospects of the Liberal Democrats

It has been argued, based upon national polling and mid-term election results, that Britain's Liberal Democrats will lose a substantial number of seats at the next general election. However, such argument is in danger of underestimating the unique importance of strong local party organisation and incumbency to the Liberal Democrats as a platform for subsequent general electoral success. This article examines the changing income, expenditure and membership of the party's strongest local constituency associations since 2010, and concludes with a short assessment of the possible implications for the Liberal Democrats at the next election and beyond.

Hierarchical Models for Estimating State and Demographic Trends in US Death Penalty Public Opinion

SummaryOne of the longest running questions that has been regularly included in US national public opinion polls is ‘Are you in favor of the death penalty for persons convicted of murder?’. Because the death penalty is governed by state laws rather than federal laws, it is of special interest to know how public opinion varies by state, and how it has changed over time within each state. We combine dozens of national polls taken over a 50-year span and fit a Bayesian multilevel logistic regression model to estimate support for the death penalty as a function of the year, the state, state level variables and various individual level demographic variables. Among our findings were that support levels in northeastern and southern states have moved in opposite directions over the past 50 years, support among blacks has decreased relative to non-blacks, but at slightly different rates for men and women, and support among some education groups varies widely by region. Throughout the paper, we highlight the use of a variety of analytical and graphical tools for model understanding, including average predictive comparisons, finite population contrasts for overparameterized models and graphical summaries of posterior distributions of group level variance parameters.

When discourses collide: creationism and evolution in the public sphere

This review essay focuses on Ozgur Taskin’s discussion of the theory of evolution (TOE), intelligent design (ID) and the convictions of fundamentalist science educators and students in his paper entitled: An exploratory examination of Islamic values in science education: Islamization of science teaching and learning via constructivism. It examines the competing social discourses of evolution and creationism in the United States, which is partially maintained by national public opinion polls and states’ legislation about the TOE in the science curricula. The examination of US social discourses presented here is framed by James Gee’s (2008) theory that Discourses with a capital “D,” are unconscious and uncritical socially accepted ways of speaking/listening and writing/reading that are merged with “distinctive ways of acting, interacting, valuing, feeling, dressing, thinking, [and] believing…so as to enact specific socially recognizable identities…” (p. 155). Such Discourses identify insiders of and outsiders to religious affiliations and other social or cultural groups. The context of this examination is unique in that is draws from the national conversation about the inclusion of ID alongside of the TOE in the public school science programs. Gee’s (2011) concept that Discourses serve as tools of inquiry guides the analysis of video recorded public messages from Bill Nye and Lawrence Krauss as well as Creation Museum president Ken Ham. The analysis and discussion of the national conversation about creationism and public education suggests that the education community must consider the global landscape of science literacy both locally and internationally. It also indicates that preservice and practicing science educators may require special training and support. In order to provide unbiased, religious-resistant, evidence-based science instruction, science educators must understand how to separate church from state regardless of their personal beliefs. They must also know how to navigate conversations about the TOE among diverse communities of learners that include both religiously and non-religiously affiliated students.

Medication Errors in the Intensive Care Unit

Medication Errors in the Intensive Care Unit

Labor's 1943 Landslide: Political Market Research, Evatt, and the Public Opinion Polls

This paper examines market research commissioned by or on behalf of candidates in the early 1940s, a period that long pre-dates the introduction of market research identified in earlier accounts; its particular focus is on a 1943 opinion survey conducted by Sylvia Ashby in H. V. Evatt's electorate of Barton, the earliest piece of political market research for which there remains a full report. In the light of the Barton survey it offers a critical re-analysis of the national and state-based opinion polls conducted ahead of the 1943 federal election, the first for which Australian newspapers commissioned polls. And it argues that since Labor's sweeping victory was anticipated long before the election not only by the Barton survey but also by a proper reading of the newspaper polls, it is unlikely the election campaign itself was decisive in securing Labor its record result - the unexpected nature of its historic victory notwithstanding.

US public support for drone strikes against asymmetric enemies abroad: Poll trends in 2013

Military drones have been much in the news, and numerous polls have sought to measure public opinion relating to US drone strikes – a recent but already iconic image of asymmetric conflict. I examined eight US national polls conducted in 2013 and found that, while a consistent majority supports targeting terrorists with drones, there is a small but increasing minority that disapproves. This trend, along with strong disapproval of US drone strikes in many other countries, points to a possible future in which drones are less acceptable for the stronger side in asymmetric conflict or more accessible to the weaker side.

Lesbiche, gay, famiglia

"Family" has been a contested institution for the first Italian gay movement in the Seventies, sharing the feminist rebellion against patriarchy. It was Arci Gay that started using the word famiglie (in the plural) in the 90s during the political campaigns for a legal recognition of same-sex couples, while more radical groups still contested the term. In the mainstream political debate, the use of the singular family vs the plural families became a sign of closure or opening towards the GLBT movement's requests. National polls and Eurobarometers have tested the level of social acceptance for same-sex unions and adoptions overtime, and are a good source to describe the changing social situation for families with lesbian and gay parents. In 2000s political groups formed specifically around the issue of GLBT parenting. The word omogenitorialitÀ was coined after the french example, and used in the political debate. Notwithstanding the long debate and the diffusion in many countries all over the world of the recognition of same-sex partnerships and parenthood, in Italy no law has been approved yet, and opposition is still strong.

Testing Backlash: The Influence of Political Institutions on Public Attitudes Toward Gay Rights

Recent litigation contesting marriage equality has been controversial in part because the claim is sometimes made that public opinion sways against those who obtain rights through courts. That is, the fear of backlash has been used to discourage litigation over equality. We provide the first rigorous assessment of backlash. We begin with an experiment designed to induce backlash in response to policy that promotes the interests of gays and lesbians. We test the degree to which backlash occurs on the general population using Amazon.com’s Mechanical Turk (MTurk) program to recruit subjects into an online survey with an embedded experiment. We then determine who is most sensitive to the stimuli and whether backlash is triggered solely by policy or whether it can also be triggered by a perception of activism by, or increased societal acceptance of, gays and lesbians. We validate these results using data from national public opinion polls conducted over time. We demonstrate which citizens are most likely to experience backlash, identify how backlash manifests (whether through changed issue position, increased issue intensity, or both) and identify which institutions (courts or legislatures) are most likely to trigger backlash. We also take advantage of the DOMA and Prop 8 oral arguments to conduct a natural experiment. We show that gays and lesbians should not hesitate to litigate as backlash is modest and no different whether success is obtained through courts or legislatures.

Adoption of Self‐Protective Behaviors in Response to a Foodborne Illness Outbreak: Perspectives of Older Adults

AbstractUsing national polling data from the U.S.A., this study assessed differences between older (>64) and younger (18–64) adults in their levels of concern about getting sick from a hypothetical outbreak and their likelihood of adopting each of several protective behaviors in response to a warning and a recall. Concern levels among older adults were lower than younger adults when outbreak‐related illnesses were reported in the same state or town as the respondent, but concern among both increased as cases were reported in closer geographic proximity. Majorities of both older and younger adults reported that they were very likely to adopt a range of recommended protective behaviors, but older adults were less likely to adopt many. For example, if the outbreak was described as mild (no deaths), older adults were less likely to stop purchasing affected items and throw out affected items in the home. Under a severe scenario (with deaths), older adults were also less likely to take several actions, including throwing out the affected item, not purchasing the affected item at stores that sell groceries and not ordering the affected item in restaurants.Practical ApplicationsThe findings from this study suggest there need to be improved communications to older adults in regard to foodborne illness outbreaks. Future communications should focus more on providing actionable information regarding ways that consumers can change their behavior to reduce their risk of infection. For example, it may be important to highlight clear directions for identifying recalled units of foods or drinks so older adults can easily find them if they are in their own kitchens. Communications should also include channels that are better targeted toward older consumers, such as networks of senior services. Materials should follow guidelines that have been shown to be effective with older adults, such as including basic changes like larger font sizes and clear graphics on printed materials.

New developments in the law for obesity discrimination protection

Obese individuals are frequent targets of weight-based discrimination, particularly in the employment setting. Victims of weight discrimination have sought legal restitution like others who have suffered from different forms of discrimination. However, in the vast majority of the United States, body weight is not a protected class and weight-based employment discrimination does not provide a basis for a legal claim. Some have attempted to seek legal recourse under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 or the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (collectively, the ADA), which protect against discrimination based on mental or physical disabilities in a variety of settings. Until recently, claims of weight discrimination under the ADA have also been largely unsuccessful. However, Congress recently passed the ADA Amendments Act, expanding the definition of what constitutes a disability and incorporating a broad view of ADA's coverage. This short communication provides an update of the law as it relates to employment based discrimination of obese people. The authors propose a legislative direction for future legal recourse. The authors conducted legal research into the ADA Amendments Act, and synthesized this work relating to discrimination against weight in the employment context. In light of the ADA Amendments Act, courts and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission have provided protection for severely obese people from discrimination based on actual or perceived disability in the employment context. The authors discuss this positive legal development and additionally propose a targeted solution to address weight discrimination in the employment setting. National polling suggests there is considerable public support for such a measure. The authors thus recommend the implementation of a "Weight Discrimination in Employment Act" modeled after the Age Discrimination in Employment Act to adequately address this pervasive and damaging injustice toward individuals who are affected by obesity.

The influence of national temperature fluctuations on opinions about climate change in the U.S. since 1990

Public opinion in the United States about human-caused climate change has varied over the past 20 years, despite an increasing consensus about the issue in the expert community. Attitudes about climate change have been attributed to a number of factors including personal values, political ideology, the media environment and personal experience. Recent studies have found evidence that the temperature can influence one’s opinion about climate change and willingness to change behaviour and/or support climate policy. Although there is some evidence that individual cool or warm years have influenced large-scale opinion about climate change, the extent to which temperature can explain the past variability in public opinion and public discourse about climate change at the national level is not known. Here we isolate the relationship between opinion about climate change and temperature at the national scale, using data from opinion polls, a discourse analysis of opinion articles from five major daily newspapers, and a national air temperature database. The fraction of respondents to national polls who express “belief in” or “worry about” climate change is found to be significantly correlated to U.S. mean temperature anomalies over the previous 3–12 months. In addition, the fraction of editorial and opinion articles which “agree” with the expert consensus on climate change is also found to be significantly correlated to U.S. mean temperature anomalies at seasonal and annual scales. These results suggest that a fraction of the past variance in American views about climate change could potentially be explained by climate variability.

We Speak for the Data

We live in an era of Big Data. Hydrogeologists work at the confluence of ever-faster computers, sophisticated modeling packages, parameter estimation software, geographical information systems, remote sensing, and geophysical techniques. Does the existence of all this information and technology mean that we have the black box that accepts our information and *poof* produces accurate predictions—objectively honoring the data and obviating human intervention? In his new book, The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail–But Some Don't, political and sports prediction guru Nate Silver suggests that successful predictions include subjective judgment. His track record predicting national election outcomes for The New York Times is impressive. He models elections using a combination of state and national polls. The way the polls are combined is a matter of subjective judgment. Performance by polls in past elections is a relatively objective measure, but other information about relevance and quality is subject to interpretation. Scientists might squirm at the notion of releasing their grip on the grail of impartial objectivity. And yet, we know that modeling includes subjective decisions, informed by judgment. Should we ignore this veiled subjectivity and pretend that cold hard data provide all the information we need? Or is it time to recognize and embrace the value of subjectivity? Consider improvements in short-term weather forecasting—especially hurricanes. In weather, like groundwater, the physics is well understood so the models are process-based—not just correlations. Yet, as in groundwater, the true complexity is not fully represented and observations of outcomes are still uncertain. What are the secrets to their success in forecasting? First is running multiple models with different conceptualizations and initial conditions. Second is a post audit of predictions with actual outcomes. Finally, weather forecasters incorporate a certain amount of subjective judgment—gleaned from insights about the modeled system, past model performance, and even quirks of specific software. Big Data helps, but judgment plays a vital role in interpreting the data and in culling valuable signals out of the noise. Weather prediction is deeply informed by models, but improvements are due, in part, to recognition that not all data are equally informative and that judgment calls are needed as to how data and models are combined. Silver says: “The numbers have no way to speak for themselves. We speak for them.” Modelers make many decisions to determine how observations are used in both model construction and parameter estimation. It would be foolish to ignore the data, but it may be equally foolish to assume there is only a single way for the data to “speak.” Silver is a Bayesian. The Bayesian perspective provides a way to combine the objective and the subjective through conditionality and updating. Conditionality is the formal recognition that predictions depend upon everything that feeds them. This includes “hard” data like observations of heads and flows; “soft” data perhaps related to conceptual information about the depositional environment; and seemingly intangible information like software choice, discretization, and so on. Updating occurs when soft data augment hard data and when old information is updated with new information. In the Bayesian perspective, subjectivity is not taboo. For example, changes to the information upon which a model is conditioned, not surprisingly, also change the predictions. These concepts should be familiar to experienced modelers. In groundwater projects, models evolve as we rule out the ridiculous and reinforce the plausible. If we acknowledge and render explicit this subjectivity, this evolution in the modeling approach is not jarring, but naturally becomes part of the process. Progress in prediction will depend on bringing all information, subjective and objective, to the conversation. Taking advantage of both kinds of information, predictions will be more robust, and our analysis more complete. When “speaking for the data,” it is up to us to choose the data that really have something meaningful to say. Note: Opinions expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of the National Ground Water Association.

ELECTION FORECAST: A LOOK BACK AT THE TIME FOR CHANGE MODEL AND THE 2012 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

The Time for Change Model once again correctly predicted the winner of the US presidential election. In late August, before the Republican and Democratic national conventions, the model predicted that President Obama would win 50.6% of the major party vote to 49.4% for his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney. When all the votes are counted, it now appears that Obama will end up with approximately 51.8% of the vote, making the Time for Change Model one of the nation's most accurate statistical forecasting models. Despite the fact that this prediction was made more than two months before Election Day, the Time for Change forecast was more accurate than the results of many national polls conducted immediately before the election including the Gallup and Rasmussen tracking polls both of which predicted a popular vote win for Mitt Romney.

The Obama Trigger: Presidential Approval and Tea Party Membership

ObjectiveThis article utilizes national polling data to identify factors driving Tea Party membership.MethodsFirst, in order to clearly define the Tea Party movement, the researchers will report Tea Party demographics drawn from the Blair‐Rockefeller Poll, which includes a national sample of 3,406 respondents. Second, the researchers will create a logit model to predict Tea Party membership.ResultsIn addition to party identification and ideology, Tea Party membership (10.6 percent of the sample) is impacted both by fiscally conservative policy preferences and by presidential approval. To a lesser degree, age and a belief in biblical literalism are also significant indicators in the model.ConclusionsThe Tea Party is a distinct entity from the Republican Party and is triggered, not only by current economic attitudes, but, specifically, by opposition to President Obama.

Exit polls: surveying the American electorate, 1972-2010

Every two years, exit polls become the most widely analyzed, written about and discussed data-set in the United States. Although exit polls are known for their use in predicting elections, they are in fact the best tool for explaining election results. Exit polls are taken from actual voters, whereas pre-election polls that tally people's intended votes are estimated to overstate the number of people who will actually go to the polls. Exit Polls: Surveying the American Electorate is a groundbreaking new reference work that explores for the first time the trends in longitudinal variables asked in the national Election Day exit polls from their beginning in 1972 to the present. The book documents comparable survey items that have appeared in multiple exit polls over time. Authors Samuel J. Best and Brian S. Krueger - both election commentators for CBS news and statistical experts - present more than 100 tables and 100 figures showing the changes in the electorate and its voting patterns over time. This work represents the first time exit poll data has been combined over time to show trends. Offering unique insight into the American electorate, this important new work is meant to serve novice and expert researchers alike.

Polls and Elections: Still Part of the Conversation: Iowa and New Hampshire's Say within the Invisible Primary

We propose that the extant literature has underestimated the central roles of Iowa and New Hampshire within the invisible primary and, thus, party nominations. Since candidates and the news media focus disproportionately on these states early in the nomination season, impressions of candidate performance within these states have a disproportionate influence on the invisible primary long before their actual outcomes are observed. Using a Bayesian vector autoregression we find that polls within Iowa and New Hampshire have a more consistent influence on candidates' levels of national news media coverage and national polling than vice versa. We also find that campaign contributions are as responsive to early state polls as they are to national forces or campaign activities. Although these findings do not dispute that candidates need a broad basis of national support to win a party's nomination, they explain why candidates continue to campaign early and intensely in these first-in-the-nation contests.

A Layered Approach to Raising Public Awareness of Macular Degeneration in Australia

Between 2007 and 2011, the Australian Macular Degeneration Foundation conducted a multifaceted campaign to increase public awareness of macular degeneration. Regular national polls conducted by an independent social research company have shown that awareness of macular degeneration increased from 47% to 80% in Australians aged 16 years or older and from 58% to 92% in those aged 50 years or older. The percentage of people aged 50 years or older who reported having had their macula checked in the 2 years prior to the survey increased from 33% to 70% from 2007 to 2011. Other measures, including analysis of Medicare data, have confirmed the success of the campaign.