As vaccines for the coronavirus enter review for emergency use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the share of Americans who say they plan to get vaccinated has increased as the public has grown more confident that the development process will deliver a safe and effective vaccine. Still, the […] Read more »
How The 2020 Election Has Changed Trust In U.S. Democracy
NPR’s Lulu Garcia-Navarro speaks with Brendan Nyhan, professor of government at Dartmouth College, about the erosion of democratic norms as some dispute the 2020 election results. NPR News The OPINION TODAY email newsletter is a concise daily rundown of significant new poll results and insightful analysis. It’s FREE. Sign up here: opiniontoday.substack Read more »
Probing the Relationship between Social Trust and Vote Choice
A growing theory for polling error in the 2016 and 2020 elections is nonresponse bias along social trust levels. Low social trust Americans have long been underrepresented in surveys, but historically this hasn’t mattered for pre-election polls because social trust was uncorrelated with the outcome of interest in elections — […] Read more »
Another Black Eye For Polling Industry, Media That Rely On It
Nearly all election polls forecasted a blue wave. But when that failed to materialize, pollsters looked foolish — and the news organizations they partner with lost credibility too. David Folkenflik, NPR News The OPINION TODAY email newsletter is a concise daily rundown of significant new poll results and insightful analysis. It’s FREE. Sign […] Read more »
Moral Combat
Most of us have a clear sense of right and wrong. But what happens when we view politics through a moral lens? This week, we talk with psychologist Linda Skitka about how moral certainty can produce moral blinders — and endanger democracy. Hidden Brain, NPR Read more »
Confidence in Accuracy of U.S. Election Matches Record Low
Fifty-nine percent of Americans say they are “very” (19%) or “somewhat confident” (40%) that votes in the upcoming presidential election will be accurately cast and counted throughout the country, matching the low Gallup recorded in 2008. … The 11-percentage-point drop since 2018 in the national figure on confidence in election […] Read more »