In November, Gallup reported that just a bare majority of Americans would rather the government approve new gun laws instead of only enforcing existing laws. The previous month, however, referring to the very same poll (but different questions), Gallup came to a starkly different conclusion: “The great majority of Americans […] Read more »
Poll Hub: How the polls fared in the Virginia governor’s race
The pre-election polls in Virginia were wildly inconsistent. The disparate methodologies, specifically how samples were selected, muddied the narrative of the gubernatorial contest. As the Poll Hub team explains, the traditional method of conducting live interviews using a Random Digit Dial sampling method proved the most accurate in predicting this […] Read more »
After a Tough 2016, Many Pollsters Haven’t Changed Anything
A year after polls broadly overestimated Hillary Clinton’s strength in the decisive Rust Belt battleground states, top pollsters and analysts across the survey industry have reached a broad near-consensus on many of the causes of error in the 2016 presidential election. But so far, public pollsters — typically run by […] Read more »
How polling methodology affects Ralph Northam’s lead in the Virginia governor’s race
Final polls show Democrat Ralph Northam holding a slight edge over Republican Ed Gillespie before Tuesday’s election for governor of Virginia. But a lot of uncertainty remains, especially given the typically low turnout in off-year elections and recent poll misfires in Virginia. Polls significantly underestimated Republican candidates in the 2013 […] Read more »
Please Don’t Call It a Push Poll: Transgender Edition
Danica Roem and Bob Marshall are facing off in an unusually high-profile race for the Virginia House of Delegates — Roem, a transgender Democrat, is challenging Marshall, a conservative Republican. The race reached a new level in the final weeks when allegations of a so-called push poll came to light. […] Read more »
Poll Hub: It’s All in the Wording
In this episode of Poll Hub, the team does something they have never done before – calling out poor question wording. CONT. Marist Poll Read more »