| Term | Definition |
|---|
| Public Opinion | a random selection of opinions throughout the population. |
| What is the problem with determining public opinion as a whole? | everyone does not agree about everything. public opinion polls try to compensate for this with random sampling |
| How do we measure public opinion? | telephone interviews, mail interviews, internet surveys, face to face interviews |
| Accuracy | in order to be 95% accurate about your results in a survey, you need to have 1500 people in your survey. There is a 5% chance that you are wrong. This gives you a baseline of American opinion. |
| Random Digit Dialing | a way of selecting participants for a survey using their telephone numbers. sampling is completely random |
| What kind of issues are involved in the sampling process? | question wording effect, question order effect, response bias, push-polling, bandwagon |
| Question wording effect | wording used in surveys affect response |
| Question Order effect | asking questions in a specific order affects response. |
| Response Bias | people answer questions the way they think you want them answered. There are some questions they simply don't want to answer truthfully. |
| push-polling | unethical way of influencing respondents in a sample. involves informing the participant in a way that doesn't have to be correct, that is completely biased, and seemingly unconnected to the sampling at hand, just before the actual sampling. example: 'how would you feel if McCAin snorted cocaine?' during phone interview. |
| bandwagon - effect | telling participant '53% of voters will vote for Obama'. |
| How many times in history has the outcome involving the government branches not followed public opinion polls? | 4 |
| How do people form an opinion? | primarily through socialization and interactions, family, education, peers, media |
| media | primary way we learn about information |
| Is the government responsive to public opinion? | yes, as evidenced by studies done by Stimson at UNC |
| Who conducted a long term study of every U.S. opinion poll ever taken while at UNC | Stimson |
| What did Stimson's public opinion polls studies involve? | He coded the answers (liberal-0, conservative-5), looked to see over time how lib or cons the public is, then looked to see if public opinion correlated with government policy at the time. |
| What were the results of Stimsons public opinion poll studies? | 960's-public, congress, court, president all more liberal. his findings were that public opinion affects government policy, but policy does not affect the public mood. conservative government policy will not affect a liberal public |
| What is the benefit of public polling? | you dont need alot of resources, you can sit at home-someone will call you for your opinion, no work required, surveys are egalitarian, provides an unbiased view of people's opinions when done scientifically, allows people to voice opinions about president, administration. (note: does not indicate strength of preferences, only choices of preferences] |
| What are the disadvantages of public polling? | survery creators sometimes create counter productive surveys, citizens cannot tell what is important to them, citizens don't get to tell us what matters to them because survey questions are limited |
| Two types of news media | print and broadcast] |
| Internet makes it _______ to distinguish the difference between print and broadcast media. | harder] |
| ____ of people get their news from broadcast media (tv) | 60%] |
| ____ rely exclusively on print media | 20% |
| ____ get information from both broadcast and print forms | 20% of people get info where? |
| author 'Amusing Ourselves to Death' | Neil Postman] |
| What is 'Amusing Ourselves to Death' by Neil Postman about? | people don't sit down and discuss the news the way they used to, people are more passive in their news reception, tv has changed the way we communicate and see the world, when media was print oriented, our discourse was more intelligent, more people could read , images weren't as important in newspaper] |
| reading newspaper is the only way you can get informed | fallacy] |
| media | entertains, identifies public problems, educates, provides political forum (place for political debate), #1 function is to make a profit.] |
| How do we shape the news? | Agenda setting, Priming, Framing Effects] |
| Agenda setting | the media decides what is important. They decide what is the most prominent in our minds. ] |
| Priming | how publics are primed for news with stories that are purposefully connected by being run one after another to shape perspectives on the next one. (story about a dog, then the environment, then gas prices)] |
| Framing effects | how the story is framed, worded. (using the word 'welfare' vs 'social assistance'. Framing a tragedy using all the 'good points'. (Library fire - no one killed, fire stopped quickly, rebuilding)] |
| Regulation of Media | equal time rule, right of rebuttal, fairness doctrine] |
| Equal Time Rule | each candidate gets equal time for speeches after election.] |
| Right of Rebuttal | if someone writes a book, and that book is featured/criticize/attacked one sidedly on air, then the author has to be given a chance to rebutt/defend him/herself on air.] |
| Fairness Doctrine | required by the FCC, requiring that broadcasters provide time for opposing views in shows/documentaries/whatever at the end of their broadcast.] |
| Media prefers to show | entertainment stories rather than political stories, negative media than positive media, crises, breaking news, new things, more stories about individuals rather than about groups, media has an ideological bias - some prefer liberal/conservative] |
| Who spins/interprets the news? | journalists/producers, topic is important, audience -who is being targetted?, ,spin doctors for each campaign - people who 'spin' stories or reactions to stories in their comments to the media in ways that support their own campaign.] |
| Participation in Politics | voting, being a member of an interest group, protesting, writing a member of your campaign, lobbying, donating money, litigating] |
| Voting Rights | suffrage, extending the franchise, everyone can vote except convicted felons in some states, voting extensionsL 15th, 19th, 26th amendments] |
| suffrage | the right to vote] |
| extending the franchise | letting more people vote ] |
| everyone | can vote except for convicted felons in some states] |
| voting extensions | 15th, 19th, 26th amendments] |
| 15th amendment | gave men of any race the right to vote. jim crow laws created to prevent black people from voting] |
| 19th amendment | in 1920 gave women the right to vote] |
| 26th amendment | voting age dropped from 21 to 18 during Vietnam to allow 18 year old soldiers the right to vote.] |
| What decides who is more likely to vote? | Age - younger people vote less, Education - more educated vote more, Income - higher income people vote more, Sex - more men vote] |
| 1892 voting VS present | voter turn out was 70% of those who could vote, present time a primary is lucky to get 50%, midterm election 30-35% range] |
| What is the reason for the decline in voting over time? | declining efficacy they don't feel their votes matter, dropped voting age, 18-21 year olds don't vote so much, less social involvement] |
| Robert Putnam | authmoior 'Bowling Alone'] |
| What was Putnam's book 'Bowling ALone' about? | said Americans are disengaging from society. They prefer to watch TV and surf the net to joining social groups or bowling teams and are less involved, less involvement in the community involves less concern for elections, people are forced to 'bowl alone', weakening attachment to parties. People are getting less attached., there is less mobilization. People are far more willing to give out money than get up and go to the poles. ] |
| What determines how you vote? | party affiliation, pictures - image portrayed in pictures (are they young, exciting, did they wear a red tie, are they old, do they have white teeth?), issues that matter to the candidates (do they care about Hope Scholarships, potholes in piedmont?, do they care about what I care about?)] |
| What have been obstacles to voting | poll tax, grandfather clause, white only primaries] |
| poll tax | requiring a payment to vote] |
| grandfather clause | if your grandfather voted before the civil war, you can vote] |
| How do we get more people out to vote? | look at socioeconomic status, involve interest group participation (they are far more interested in the turnout of a vote), mobilization (asking people to turn up to vote does get people to turn up and vote)] |
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