TAMU POLS 206 - Chapter 9 Public Opinion
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Ch.9- Public OpinionI. History of Public ParticipationII. Political Socializationa. American Political CultureIII. Pollinga. Samplingb. Margin of ErrorI. -Why is public opinion important?-Representative democracy-Public opinion is about representation, it allows the government to let them know what we want, tells the government what the will of the people is.-Founding era, Madison wouldn’t agree with it.-Didn’t want to bring us into government and didn’t want to give us a lot of power to influence the government. -Public opinion is very modern.-Paine interested in representation link but his doesn’t end up in constitution. Madison’s do end up in the constitution. He is a leadist. II. -Process by which individuals acquire political beliefs and values- political socialization-Formal and informal influences on this process.-Formal process of political socialization- education- knowledge about our systemInformal process: Influence on you- comes from your family (whether they care aboutpolitics/don’t), peer group/friends have a sway on your socialization (go to school andrealize other people have other backgrounds, discuss issues, exposed to different opinions/beliefs and you evaluate them) and also the media (brings up new ideas and new sides of issues. Can reinforce what you think)-Partisanship- if you feel a strong attachment to a party. Difference from vote choice but if you feel a strong attachment, that is party identification.-Family is a long lasting influence-Biology side- 1) Whether or not your DNA, if that influences your partisanship. Democrat or Republican. 2) Does your DNA tell if you have a strong attachment to aparty. -Research shows that your party ID 1) no biological component to it. 2) there is a biological component that helps explain if you will be a strong party supporter or not.Socialization is key when it comes to party ID. In your family but not in your DNA.-US has a singular political culture.-Cultural differences, geographic differences; we have an American political culture. We all agree on demographic self-rule, that we are a republic, basic rights, basic liberties.-Differences between us and European country-Never had feudalism, landed gentryOur idea of equality is different when you don’t have a feudal background.-We have no tradition of socialism in the US. Because we didn’t have feudalism, we didn’t have a call to overthrow the bourgeoisie.-Make us feel more cohesive because we agree on these basics.-Louis Hartz wrote “Liberal Tradition in America”. About American political culture.Argues we have the liberal tradition. Based on the words on John Locke. Classical liberalism that limited government, basic rights, liberties; things that we can agree on.III. -Public opinion has been important in our modern idea of polling and surveys. -How do we figure out what public opinion is?-Polling; really bad examples:1) 1936 election, Roosevelt FDR was running against Landon. It was a landslide for Roosevelt. Comes as a shock to discover that the literary digest forecasted a win for Landon.2) 1948, Chicago Tribune; Dewey defeats Truman. They actually announceit. Truman actually won. -Early polls were a mess. -Voting, after an election you can see what the voters said. -One problem, in US we tend not to go and vote so our percent of eligible voters hovers around 50% of those who actually participate. -Voting and elections will only tell you the opinion of half of the country. -Crowd response, give a stump speech- whether they would almost boo or clap. Big way to figure out public opinion before polling. Nowadays, not as big.-Protests and demonstrations , tells you what that group of people think. But only tells you what that group of people think. -Basic tool of polling:What group (population) you want to actually poll? You are going to need a sample from your population because you aren’t going to be able to survey every person in your population. -You need a random sample . A random sample means that every person in your bigger population has the same probability to be chosen for the sample. We are interested in measuring opinion for everyone. -Sub-groups- (women vs men might have different opinions from one another)1936 Election- sub-groups were missing. Literary Digest (magazine) polls its readers who they were going to vote for. Readers being wealthy did not support FDR and his New Deal Plans because they were doing fine and didn’t need help from the government. Only polled the wealthy because they were the only readers.-Margin of error. Number of respondents in your survey. A way of measuring the random sampling error. Somewhere in between 500-1,000 people. The margin of error affects whether or not there are statistical differences on poll results. -Want to think about the types of questions- be a consumer of news. -Who sponsored the poll? Who did the polling? Who was interviewed? How many? What questions were asked? When were the interviews conducted? What is the margin of error? -Question wording can affect the answer.-Exit polling means they will send people outside of polling votes to ask who someone voted for. -It is about your sampling. 1) Statement: The country isn’t spending enough $ on assistance to the poor: 63%2) Statement (same survey): The country isn’t spending enough $ on welfare. Agreement:


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TAMU POLS 206 - Chapter 9 Public Opinion

Type: Lecture Note
Pages: 3
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