Wrap-Up Of Our National Democratic Poll Seminar
by Chris Bowers, Sat May 19, 2007 at 01:56:51 PM EDT
I live in a neighborhood in Philadelphia called University City. This past week, most of the students who live in the area have moved out, as the semester is over. After yesterday, I kind of feel like our little investigation into national Democratic nomination polling came to an end. Like a semester, it lasted around four months, and I think was quite informative. Here are the conclusions I have drawn from our studies:
The seminar's syllabus can be found in the extended entry.
- National Democratic nomination preference polls include too wide a net of people in their sample, typically somewhere between 35%-50% of the Voting Age Population. Typically, outside of New Hampshire, only about 10-15% of the Voting Age Population participates in Democratic Presidential primaries. However, at this early date, it would not be wise to significantly narrow the sample universe, as it is too early to know who will actually form the electorate in the Democratic primary / caucus season. That might change, come January 2008.
- Some early indications of voter turnout favor Clinton and Edwards, while others favor Obama. Specifically, Clinton and Edwards do well among older poll respondents and Clinton does better among self-identified Democrats than among Independents who lean Democratic. However, Obama does better among poll respondents who are paying more attention to the campaign. When averaged together, these effects might very well cancel each other out / compliment each other.
- Clinton does better in polls where undecided respondents are pushed to make a decision, thus emphasizing her advantage among voters who are not paying close attention to the campaign. However, Obama does better in automated IVR polls like Rasmussen that have a history of including more young voters in their samples. Once again, when combined, these skews might cancel each other out / compliment each other.
- Al Gore draws a significant percentage of support (roughly 10-15%) from all three "top tier" candidates) simply by being included in the question. This usefully shows, once again, that there is a significant amount of "soft" support for all candidates. However, Al Gore is also currently not running, thus making it quite difficult to justify including him in polls that are meant to be an accurate snapshot of public opinion on the current campaign. The solution here is probably for polls to ask "someone else" as an option for respondents, rather than to name specific candidates who have not announced. Overall, until polls settle on a consistent list of candidates to include in their questions, it will be necessary to collect two different polling averages, one with Gore, and one without.
- As demonstrated by the soft support of undecideds, the still large number of potential Gore supporters, the varying movement in the national campaign over the past couple of months, and the wide difference in results between different polls conducted at the same time, there is a lot of movement yet to be had in the Democratic primary season. However, it is probably wrong to assume that said movement is on the level of 2004, either to the degree to which early Lieberman "supporters" abandoned him before Iowa throughout 2003, or to the degree that Democrats flocked to Kerry after the 2004 Iowa caucuses. Increased star power in the field, a higher level of voter engagement, increased Democratic satisfaction with the field, and the lack of a 2004 "perfect momentum storm" are among the reasons that will probably reduce poll movement compared to the 2004 primary season.
- A few of side notes. First, there does not appear to be a large "anti-Hillary" vote in the Democratic electorate. Second, social pressure to say you are voting for a woman or an African-American does not appear to be artificially inflating either Clinton or Obama's poll numbers. Third, while Clinton performs slightly worse than Edwards or Obama in general election trial heats, the gap is not massive (currently between 2.8% and 6.9% depending on the matchup). While this is not currently indicative of an "electability" problem, and is more indicative of Clinton's longer exposure to the Republican Noise Machine, if these numbers hold, or even increase, through January of 2008, that could change.
The seminar's syllabus can be found in the extended entry.
Syllabus: Understanding 2008 Democratic National Nomination Polls
Main Texts: MyDD.com, Pollster.com, Real Clear Politics, Polling Report, Rasmussen Reports
Main Texts: MyDD.com, Pollster.com, Real Clear Politics, Polling Report, Rasmussen Reports
- Jan 19: Clinton And National Primary Poll Trends
- Jan 24: Vote Without Kerry & the Anybody But Clinton Theory (Mystery Pollster)
- Jan 30: Calling Bullshit On The Blogosphere's National Trial Heat Narrative
- Feb 07: Pew: Can We Trust What Polls Say About Obama's Prospects? (Mystery Pollster)
- Feb 20: Primary Season Polling Wishlist
- Feb 28: "Anti-Hillary" Concept Deeply Flawed
- Mar 07: Undecideds In National Polls
- Mar 09: Primary Polling Primer I: Turnout (Mystery Pollster)
- Mar 14: Primary Polling Primer II: More on Turnout (Mystery Pollster)
- Mar 15-26: Spring Break!
- Mar 27: Primary Polling Primer: Timing (Mystery Pollster)
- Mar 27: Does Hillary Clinton Have An Electability Problem?
- Mar 31: General Election Trial Heats, February Through March
- Apr 12: Most Primary Polls Inflating Clinton's Advantage
- Apr 13: Do National Polls Inflate Clinton's Standing? (Mystery Pollster)
- Apr 18: Rasmussen's Democrats -- Don't Tell Mama? (Mystery Pollster)
- Apr 18: Right Now, General Election Polls Are Useless Indicators Of Electability
- Apr 20: Only One Way To Test The Inflated Clinton Poll Theory
- Apr 23: More on the Rasmussen Democrats (Mystery Pollster)
- Apr 24: The Inflated Clinton Poll Theory: Are Clinton And Obama Tied? (Marc Ambinder)
- Apr 26: Inflated Clinton Poll Theory: Great New Pew Crosstabs
- Apr 27: Do Attentive Voters Prefer Different Candidates? (Mystery Pollster)
- Apr 27: California Polls, Turnout and the Democratic Vote (Mystery Pollster)
- Apr 27: On Trying To Figure Out Where the Campaign Stands
- Apr 30: State Polling Insight
- May 02: Pres08: A closer look at primary trends (Charles Franklin)
- May 14: Culture, Ideology, The Two Coalitions, and the 2008 Democratic Nomination
- May 14: How Much Will Iowa Matter?
- May 17: Inflated Clinton Poll Theory: So, really, why is Rasmussen different?
- May 18: Final Project number one: Inflated Clinton Poll Theory: The First Field Test
- May 18: Inflated Clinton Poll Theory: Prudence Sets In
- May 18: Final project number two: Where the Campaign Stands, Table Form
- May 19: Wrap-Up
Tags: Democrats, inflated Clinton poll theory, polls, President 2008 (all tags)
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