Opinion Polls Research Articles

Cultural Consensus Analysis of Stakeholder Beliefs toward Coastal Restoration in Southeast Louisiana

Coastal land loss is a singular threat to the people, economies, and biodiversity of Louisiana. Though opinion polls indicate broad support for restoration efforts, aspects of current plans remain contentious for some stakeholders. We used cultural consensuses analysis (CCA) to go beneath the surface of restoration policy debates and identify shared beliefs about coastal land loss and restoration efforts among select occupational stakeholder groups in Louisiana. Three latent consensus groups, spanning stakeholder groupings, were identified. Data indicate broad consensus on core beliefs related to the peril of land loss and the urgency of action. And though staunch disagreement exists, there is some evidence that differences are not wholly intractable. These findings highlight a need to better understand the nature of beliefs and the frames that motivate those beliefs in policy debates and offer CCA as avenue for doing so.

Социологический опрос как политическое высказывание

The article is devoted to linguistic problems related to public opinion polls. These issues are considered as a statement within the framework of political discourse. Concrete empirical material demonstrates the deformations that lead to distortion of the results of these surveys. The reason for these deformations and distortions is the refusal to take into account two important circumstances: firstly, what the speech producer transmits never coincides with what the recipient perceives, and secondly, verbal and cognitive units are not identical.The article is devoted to linguistic problems related to public opinion polls. These issues are considered as a statement within the framework of political discourse. Concrete empirical material demonstrates the deformations that lead to distortion of the results of these surveys. The reason for these deformations and distortions is the refusal to take into account two important circumstances: firstly, what the speech producer transmits never coincides with what the recipient perceives, and secondly, verbal and cognitive units are not identical.

Sentiment Analysis using Machine Learning

With the rise of e-commerce, consumers are becoming accustomed to shopping online and leaving reviews of their experiences on retailer and review websites. These op-ed pieces provide future customers with useful information for making decisions, and they also help businesses improve their goods and/or services. Yet, when the number of reviews increases quickly, users are forced to deal with a serious information overload issue. Several opinion mining techniques, such as opinion summarization, opinion polling, and comparative analysis, have been suggested to address this issue. How to correctly estimate the sentiment direction of review sentences is the main challenge. Sentiment analysis is a quickly developing subfield of the study of Natural Language Processing (NLP).In recent years, it has drawn a lot of interest. Sentiment analysis is used to assess or investigate user comments in order to make judgements about their opinions. Sentiment analysis is a machine learning (ML) technique in which computers classify and investigate human attitudes, feelings, and viewpoints towards the things that are communicated through text, star ratings, thumbs up and down, and other textual or graphical representations. The data for this study came from online product reviews acquired from the model website we created. Adjectives and adverbs can convey the opposite feeling with the use of negative prefixes. Such words are located using a negative phrase identification method. By using evaluation measures, the performance is assessed. Finally, we provide insight. Finally, we also provide a preview of our upcoming sentiment analysis research.

More Than Words? How Highlighting Target Populations Affects Public Opinion about the Medicaid Program.

The Medicaid program provides health insurance coverage to a diverse set of demographics. We know little about how the policy community describes these populations (e.g., on Medicaid-related websites or in public opinion polls and policy writings) or whether and how these descriptions may affect perceptions of the program, its beneficiaries, and potential policy changes. To investigate this issue, we developed and fielded a nationally representative survey of 2,680 Americans that included an experiment for priming respondents by highlighting different combinations of target populations of the Medicaid program as found in the Medicaid policy discourse. Overall, we find that Americans view Medicaid and its beneficiaries rather favorably. However, there are marked differences based on partisanship and racial animosity. Emphasizing citizenship and residency requirements at times improved these perceptions. Racial perceptions and partisanship are important correlates in Americans' views about Medicaid and its beneficiaries. However, perceptions are not immutable. In general, the policy community should shift toward using more comprehensive descriptions of the Medicaid population that go beyond the focus on low income and that include citizenship and residency requirements. Future research should expand this work by studying descriptions in the broader public discourse.

Urban air mobility (UAM) in the metropolitan region of São Paulo: Potential and threats

Purpose: The increase in congestion and pollution in large cities combined with the innovation of air transport technology (drones and vertical takeoff and electric propulsion vehicles – eVTOL) and with the advances in autonomous technology have stimulated this research on the potential of Urban Air Mobility – UAM as an alternative to improve mobility conditions in urban centers. In this research, the evaluation of the UAM's potential was carried out with a focus on the metropolitan region of São Paulo (RMSP), the largest metropolitan region in Brazil, with about 22 million inhabitants, and one of the ten most populous metropolitan regions in the world.Design/methodology/approach: In addition to evaluating challenges such as vehicle certification, infrastructure and ATM, an assessment of public acceptance of UAM (based on a survey) was carried out. The survey identified the perceptions of potential customers regarding the gains of the air mobility alternative, as well as the restrictions and fears in relation to the UAM. The opinion poll was carried out along the same lines as the work carried in Europe, allowing the comparison of results between the two markets.Findings: The main results highlighted the identification of the biggest problems for the implementation of UAM services in the metropolitan region of São Paulo, as well as the expectations and restrictions of customers, which will be important subsidies for the development of public policies to improve conditions mobility in the region.Originality/value: UAM is a new, disruptive mobility technology that can improve travel conditions in highly congested urban centers, such as the RMSP. The success of this new technology depends on understanding the challenges and opportunities, but mainly on the perception and expectations of potential customers.

Representation of the Media Image of the Baikal Region in the Mass Consciousness of the Audience of Regional Media

Mass media play an important role in the development of regions creating their media image. The desire of each of its members to take part in the development of the region, living and carrying out their activities on its territory, depends on the representation of this image in the minds of the audience. The article considers the process of representation of the media image of the Baikal region in the mass consciousness of the audience of the regional media of Irkutsk region. The study conducted a public opinion poll about Baikal region and its image in the media. The research examined the preferences of Irkutsk media audience in the choice of information channels, the perception of the media image of Baikal region by the audience, the influence of this image on the opinion and behavior of the audience, the tone of the associations and the attitude of the audience to the region as a whole. The study found that a positive image of the Baikal region has been formed in the minds of Irkutsk media audience. The audience perceives Baikal region as a unique region located in close proximity to the Lake Baikal, and considers it an attractive region for personal and professional development. At the same time, the most popular channel for obtaining information about the events in the Baikal region among the audience is online media, therefore, in the process of forming the media image of the region, it is necessary to use this channel. The results of the study can be used by journalists to address professional problems related to the development of the Baikal region through the formation of its positive media image, as well as by researchers to study the process of creating media image of other regions of Russia.

Is Putin’s popularity (still) real? A cautionary note on using list experiments to measure popularity in authoritarian regimes

ABSTRACT Opinion polls suggest that Vladimir Putin has broad support in Russia, but there are concerns that some respondents may be lying to pollsters. Using list experiments, we revisit our earlier work on support for Putin to explore his popularity between late 2020 and mid-2022. Our findings paint an ambiguous portrait. A naive interpretation of our estimates implies that Putin was 10 to 20 percentage points less popular than opinion polls suggest. However, results from placebo experiments demonstrate that these estimates are likely subject to artificial deflation – a design effect that produces downward bias in estimates from list experiments. Although we cannot be definitive, on balance our results are consistent with the conclusion that Putin is roughly as popular as opinion polls suggest. Methodologically, our research highlights artificial deflation as a key limitation of list experiments and the importance of placebo lists as a tool to diagnose this problem.

Byzantine heritage in contemporary Turkey: Research features and political significance

The article considers the politics of memory of the Turkish government in relation to the Byzantine heritage in the country and the reaction of the states whose historical narrative and identity are associated with the Byzantine Empire’s legacy. The article is based on a wide range of sources in Turkish, Greek, English and Russian. The authors believe that the Turkish policy of Islamization and the ideology of neo-Ottomanism, which are implemented by the ruling AK Party under the leadership of the President R.T. Erdogan, lead to the gradual dismantling of the remaining Byzantine heritage, which was proved by the transformation of the Monastery of the Choir and the Hagia Sophia into mosques. Turkish society, except for a few dissidents many of whom have already left the country, does not show interest in the history of Byzantium and perceives the policy of the ruling party quite pragmatically, according to the opinion polls. The international reaction to the decisions of the Turkish leadership was quite restrained and in general did not focus on Byzantium and its role in history. Thus, European politicians and researchers criticized mainly the anti-Western idea of Erdogan’s actions and rhetoric, while Greece fears mostly the revival of Ottoman imperialism and considers the Byzantine legacy as a part of Hellenism. The authors conclude that it was Russian society that defined the policy of Erdogan as the destruction of the Byzantine heritage of the Eastern Orthodox civilization (primarily due to the position of the Russian Orthodox Church), which made the Russian political leadership discuss this issue at the highest level. Moreover, in the international dimension, Ankara’s consistent policy to dismantle the Byzantine heritage affects the image and ideology of the Russian state to a greater extent than that of Greece, which is determined by the sustainable perception of Russia as the successor of the Byzantine tradition.

Social conformity or attitude persistence? The bandwagon effect and the spiral of silence in a polarized context

ABSTRACT This study examines whether and to what extent the bandwagon effect and the spiral of silence impact opinion formation in a polarized context, where individuals tend to be persistent in their policy attitudes. Focusing on contentious policy issues at the heart of the culture war in American politics, our aim is to study the relative importance of attitude persistence and social conformity in the opinion-formation process, and how these responses depend on individuals’ ideological commitments. We conducted an experimental study of US citizens, where participants donated money to organizations advocating opposed positions on seven of the most contentious issues in American politics. Utilizing the presentation of opinion polls as a treatment, the findings are threefold. First, we show that polls cause ideologically moderate people to abandon the minority and conform to the majority opinion regardless of the issue at stake. By contrast, we show that attitude persistence prevails among ideologically extreme people. Second, we demonstrate that seeing polls generally demobilizes people with minority views. Third, we find that opinion-conversion and demobilization jointly undermine minority opinions, while only a small minority of extremists repels both mechanisms. These findings have important implications for research on opinion formation in today's polarized political landscape.

The determinants of a resilient food system for Finland in the 2020s—three opinion polls for improvements based on a Delphi study among food system experts

Sudden shocks, disturbances, and changes in today’s and the future’s operating environment call for a more resilient food system. COVID-19 and Russia’s latest war in Ukraine have revealed that rapid shocks and disturbances in global social-ecological systems can affect societies and pose various risks to food security. The discussion of food security and especially food supply security under uncertain changes has therefore been highlighted. In this study, food system resilience and the driving forces and current trends affecting it were evaluated in an expert panel study. We used the Delphi technique for the data collection, which included several rounds of iterative evaluation of future food system development up to 2030. We analysed the results using cluster analysis. Based on the results, three clusters were identified which weigh different points within the development foci of food system resilience, namely: (1) the lack of efficient and consensual global crisis preparedness, (2) looking after domestic food production, and (3) trusting the current good efforts in resilience building. The key resilience determinants in each cluster and their importance analysis are presented. We also present enablers and barriers from techno-economic, politico-institutional, and socio-cognitive perspectives that hinder or support resilience building.

EFL Students' Perceptions of Employing Technology Tools in Learning English at King Khalid University

Technology can be employed as a means of boosting FEL student interaction. Due to the universal use of computers and the internet in academic institutions, EFL teachers are motivated to implement this technology in their classes to facilitate language teaching and the learning English language process. This study purports to identify EFL students' perceptions of the utilization of technology tools in learning English at King Khalid University. This research adopts the descriptive analysis technique. Moreover, the theoretical framework of the study was an opinion poll prepared by the two researchers to get information and was applied to fifty-six selected EFL students to get their perceptions of the utilization of technology tools in learning English at King Khalid University. The results demonstrate that most King Khalid University EFL male and female students had positive responses to employing technology tools in learning English. The study findings have pedagogical implications and some recommendations for strategies and instructions for further investigations and facilitating the utilization of technology in teaching and learning at primary and secondary levels.

The people versus the money: What drives interest group influence in the European Union?

AbstractThis paper evaluates whether lobbying influence is open to the highest bidder or boosted by congruence with popular opinion. Common wisdom holds that well‐endowed organizations prevail in lobbying battles. This perception contrasts with recent observations, which point to the decisive role of public opinion. This paper unites these seemingly contrasting stances by arguing that both economic resources and congruence with public opinion are paramount for lobbying influence. What matters, we argue, is the interplay between the two. Lobby groups that already enjoy substantial economic capacities are expected to benefit most from congruence with public opinion. We test our expectations in the context of European Union policy making. We draw from a sample of 41 policy issues for which public opinion polls were conducted, an extensive content analysis of 2,085 news articles and 183 lobbyists’ survey responses. We demonstrate that interest groups with more economic resources are generally more influential, but only if their policy positions are congruent with a public majority.

Terrorized by Immigration? Threat Perceptions and Policy Preferences

ABSTRACT Does exposure to terrorism affect attitudes toward immigration policy? If so, is it the sense of threat that impacts these attitudes? Previous studies could not find conclusive evidence of increasing hostility toward out-groups as a direct consequence of terrorist events, as they struggle to separate attitudinal migration policy preferences and reactions to terrorism. Drawing on intergroup threat theory, we conducted two original public opinion polls (N = 954) in Israel, using a unique model that refined both the measure of the intensity of exposure to terrorism–more intensive (Study 1) and less intensive (Study 2)—and differences in the measure of different levels of geographic proximity to the attacks (high/low). Results indicate that in times of intense terror attacks, high levels of exposure to such attacks affect people’s conflict-related threat perceptions, which drive their support for exclusionary migration policies. These findings improve our understanding of the spillover effects of terrorism on public opinion about migrants who are not involved in the conflict that prompts the terror attacks.

Yugoslav experts, Yugoslavism and the national question in the 1960s

ABSTRACT The paper is focused on Slovene and Serbian state socialist experts and their role in the scientific field of researching the Yugoslav national question in the first half of the 1960s, with emphasis on their research and debates regarding the concept of national Yugoslavism. The institutes being examined are the Institute for Ethnic Studies (Inštitut za narodnostna vprašanja, INV) in Ljubljana and the Institute of Social Sciences (Institut društvenih nauka, IDN) in Belgrade. In the early 1960s, Yugoslav soft nation-building reached its peak with the famous Ćosić–Pirjevec debate. The latter coincided with the end of the ‘transitional period’ at INV and its new leadership under Drago Druškovič. Some Serbian lawyers shifted the fight for the establishment of a socialist Yugoslav nation from political debates to the Yugoslav Association for International Law, where the dispute reached a climax in late 1964. With the abandonment of the Yugoslav national idea, IDN prepared an ambitious programme of researching Yugoslav interethnic relations, which would include several institutions from all Yugoslav republics. The League of Communists of Yugoslavia financed research on interethnic relations in Yugoslavia to create ‘correct’ policies with regard to the national question. Huge amounts of data were collected (public opinion polls, newspaper clippings) and analysed by the research institutions mentioned earlier, which often gave expert opinions to leading Communists. In the late 1960s, amateur research and opinion polling conducted by Yugoslav newspapers challenged the monopoly of the Party on the scientific research field of interethnic relations. Thus, in the early 1970s, the Party struggled to retake control.

Deliberative democracy and the digital public sphere: Asymmetrical fragmentation as a political not a technological problem

Deliberative democracy and the digital public sphere: Asymmetrical fragmentation as a political not a technological problem

13. The Acoustic Analysis of Violins and the Artistic Impressions Evaluated by Musicians

Abstract Violin studies can be classified into two main types: psychoacoustic studies, which are based on the artistic perception of audibility by violinists and vibro-acoustic studies, which are based on the spectral analysis of the vibrations and sounds produced by the instruments. The paper presents the acoustic analysis of violins by means of specialized software, their main acoustic characteristics being extracted in the form of frequency spectrum, spectrograms, specific modes and number of harmonics. These results were compared with the results of the opinion poll among musicians regarding the acoustic qualities of violins, based on musical auditions. The results highlighted the fact that the acoustic analysis technique cannot detect in totality the psycho-acoustic effects of musical sounds, therefore the establishment of the acoustic quality of the instruments on objective foundations, since the personal touch of an instrumental artist aims at the approach and articulation of the musical discourse, in a complex manner, combined with the interpretation of forms and styles.

Reability of Public Opinion Polls in China

Reability of Public Opinion Polls in China

El consumo de información y de conversación política interactiva en las actitudes y la participación política de los jóvenes en la zona metropolitana de Monterrey, Nuevo León, México. Escenario preelectoral 2018

Traditional media (print media, radio and television) or those represented by the digital age (Internet and social networks) are suitable channels for the process represented by political communication; in turn, this is a factor that impacts on political attitudes and political participation of citizens. In correlation to the above, the main objective of this research is to determine the explanatory level of the consumption of political information and interactive political conversation against the political attitudes and participation of young people. The research design is quantitative, since an opinion poll was applied in the pre-electoral scenario 2018 in the Metropolitan Area of Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico. The main results indicates that the consumption of political content online is the variable that has a higher level of explanation about the interest in the policy of the participants of the study, There is also evidence that could bring the results of the research closer to the theories of political mobilization. On the other hand, in relation to political attitudes there is a very important contrast since there is a political interest and a feeling of openness of the relatively high political system in opposition to a very marked political cynicism on the part of young people.

The value of public service broadcasting in Japan during COVID-19 pandemic: An analysis of WTP by Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition

The first case of COVID-19 in Japan was detected in January 2020, and the first outbreak occurred between March and May of that year. In this study, changes in the willingness to pay (WTP) for public service media (PSM) were analyzed using data from public opinion polls conducted before and after the period of the first outbreak. A comparison of the samples obtained via Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition revealed the importance of and satisfaction with the news that viewers felt, and their viewing frequency increased after the pandemic, as did WTP. The findings can be interpreted as an increase in the demand for news as the infection spread. The analysis also showed that the WTP for PSM decreased a little owing to the reduction in sports programs. The results demonstrate the importance of PSM in moments of crisis, such as pandemics.

Building a Model for Integrative Computational Social Science Research

Universities are increasingly interested in providing courses that equip students with data science skills and engage experiential learning, particularly in the social sciences. However, these courses can be costly to implement and time-consuming for instructors to develop. This article describes an integrative learning model for teaching computational social science skills to undergraduate students. There are three elements to the model: content delivery through collaborative learning, skill development in an applied lab setting, and student mentorship. I apply this model to an experiential course where undergraduate students learn to create and conduct a national public opinion poll. The model addresses the need for university classes that equip undergraduate students with computational social science skills, and provides a pathway for training student researchers as teaching assistants for future courses. This model builds the research capacity of faculty, graduate assistants, and undergraduates, invests in data science by providing an infrastructure for the collection of large scale data over time, and integrates experiences inside and outside of the classroom. This model is replicable at other institutions and will be of benefit to programs seeking to implement best practices and maximize learning effectiveness through research integration.