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Definition
| To reinforce what they already believe |
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Term
| According to V.O. Key, what is public opinion? |
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Definition
| "Those opinions held by private persons which governments find it prudent to heed" |
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| What exactly does V.O. Key's definition mean? Who are private persons? In American government, which group really matters? Whose opinions should we care about? (one answer) |
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| Why should office holders heed (notice) public opinion and the voters? |
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| They want to get reelected |
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| We always say public opinion, but we talk of people's opinion. |
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| Just a random fact that you need to know |
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| In the early days of the repubic, what did parties and newspapers conduct to determine elections outcomes? |
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| What did polling become with the development of new instruments and statistical methods in the 20th Century? |
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| In its infancy, was scientific pollin great? |
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| What is an example of scientific polling not being great? |
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| The 1936 Presidential election - Literary Digest |
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| What happened in the 1936 presidential election with Literary Digest? |
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Definition
| They tried to poll their readers, so when they did, they got a completely biased result, and said that Franklin Delano Roosevelt was going to lose, but he won with a landslide |
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| What do pollsters do to get their scientific guess? |
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Definition
| They take a Simple Random Sample of the population whose opinions they desire to measure (Like voters |
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| Good pollsters techniques can help them yeld remarkably accurate results |
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| No matter how large the population, a sample of around 1,000 will yield results with how big of a margin error? |
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| What kind of questions must you ask when you take a simple random sample? |
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| Question _______ and ________ can influence the way respondents view the question and answer. |
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Definition
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Term
| What are you suppose to do with the answers? |
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Definition
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| From most polls, what is it difficult to do? |
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Definition
| Generalize (make conclusions) |
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| We need a true ransom sample to get better results to come closer to generalize (a conclusion), but even then, how big of a percent is there that your sample was just terrible? |
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Definition
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| What are two common polling mistakes? |
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Definition
Push Polling
Biased/self-selecting sample |
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Term
| How does puch polling occur? |
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Definition
| When a question is leading (leads the person to answer a certain way) |
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Term
| What is an example of a biased/self-selecting sample? |
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Definition
| Having a t.v. show and talking about a certain topic over and over again, and then taking a vote on what you were talking about. (biased) |
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Term
| What are three places where public opinion comes from? |
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Definition
| Attitudes, Ideology, and partisanship |
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Term
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Definition
| An organized and consistent manner of thinking, feeling, and reacting with regard to people, groups, social issues, or more generally, any event in one's environment |
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Term
| What 4 things do attitudes combine? |
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Definition
| feelings, beliefs, thoughts, and predispositions (the way we act) |
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Term
| Most of the time, what kind of structure is there for attitudes? |
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Definition
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| What is an example of a loosly structured attitude? |
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Definition
| I hate abortion, by that doesn't mean I hate other things because of that |
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| Elaborately organized sets of political attitudes (highly organized) |
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| What are two ideologies in American? |
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| What do attitudes and ideology tend to reflect? |
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| What are two examples of core values? |
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| Who are ideologically extreme? |
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| The political attitude that shapes opinions and organizes other attitudes most consitently is a person's attitude toward the politcial party. (The way you feel about the two parties structures how you will view other things) |
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Term
| How is partisanship related to voting? |
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Definition
| It is central to voting. (I can predict which person you will vote for based on partisanship) |
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| What does attitude derive from? |
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Definition
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Term
| What is political socialization? |
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Definition
| The process of aquiring political attitudes and opinions (molding your beliefs) |
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Term
| What are 6 political socializations in one's life? |
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Definition
| Family, religion, education, friends, personal experience, and collective experience |
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Term
| What is an example of personal experience that he went over in class? |
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Definition
| When people get a family or more money, they become more conservative, but if they lose their job, they become more liberal |
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Term
| What are 5 collective experiences? |
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Definition
| Slavery, prejudices (opinion not based on experience), unemployment, war, and Economic boom and bust |
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Term
| What is an example of slavery in Collective experience? |
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Definition
| Like blacks voting for republicans because they were trying to gain civil rights |
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Term
| What is an example of Unemployment in Collective experience? |
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Definition
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Term
| What is an example of War in Collective experience? |
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Definition
approval ratings go up.
George W. Bush after 911- approval ratings go up |
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Term
| What do most Americans not pay that much attention to? |
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Definition
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Term
| Since most Americans not pay that much attention to politics, so many of their opinions are what? (2) |
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Definition
| Loosly held and unstable over time. (ask a question today, and the same question a year from now, and that answer could be completely different) |
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Term
| We all want spending cuts, but what don't we like? |
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Definition
| We don't want to cut certain things within the spending cuts. When we dive deeper and offer potential programs to cut, we don't want spending cuts |
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Term
| What is a good example of an illustation of a lack of information about diving deeper into something? |
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Definition
| November 2010 CNN poll about the health care reform law. (Graph that says we want to cut some of the health care, but once we go into the deeper meaning, the people don't want to cut certain things) |
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Term
| If individual responses change overtime, are people just really stupid? |
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Definition
| They are more likely ambivalent |
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Term
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Definition
| People just don't care that much... one way or the other |
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Term
| What does a persons response mainly depend on? |
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Definition
| Whatever comes to mind when the question is asked |
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Term
| What does the media do to a question to elicit different responses? |
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Definition
| They can frame the question (choosing how to present it) |
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| When the media covers one aspect over another, what do they do? |
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Definition
| They prime people to use those frames in responding to political phenomena |
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| Individual opinion changes do what to each other? |
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| What does shifting aggregate opinion require? |
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Definition
| A fairly momentous shift in the public mood |
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| How is mood change in the public? |
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Definition
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| Since there is a lack of information or awareness, what does the public do? (2) |
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Definition
| They free ride and rely on opinion leaders for guidance (seek out shortcuts) |
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Term
| What are three opinion leaders? |
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Definition
Media
Party Leaders
Elected Officials |
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Term
| What is an example of the public relying on opinion leaders for elected officials? |
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Definition
| Obama is against something so I am against something because I like his opinion. (I don't actually like Obama fyi) |
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| We use opinion leaders as a type of what? |
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