surveys

2 posts

The Votes Are In! The New Name for the Retired Hipster Is…

It was a hard fight that came down to the wire with one edging out the other by only the tiniest of margins, sort of like that whole Santorum/Romney Iowa debacle. Sheesh. Yikes. While we’re renaming things, can we rename both Santorum and Romney? How about Conservatives Unite Moneybomb (C.U.M)? Oops, that’s already taken. Gosh Darn! How could they know what we were thinking? This is probably the best name of anything in the whole world ever! Hipsters need to hire Rick Santorum to be their PR man.

Well, you know, those hipsters who aren’t retired. The retired ones? Yeah, we’ve already got a name for them. Continue reading →

Adventures in Survey Research Part 1: The Respondent

Working in Social Science/Public Opinion research has made me very sympathetic to anyone who makes their living talking on the telephone. Something about the anonymity of the phone seems to make people feel very safe in expressing their deepest (racist/sexist/classist) thoughts to the interviewer. Conversely, many people are certain that you are trying to steal their money, their opinions, nay, their very souls through your insidious questioning about their attitudes toward any number of innocuous things. I want to discuss some basics of survey research and explain some of the qualities of any kind of opinion or attitudinal research. These are often the surveys that form the basis of the “97% of Americans HATE BREATHING AIR” kinds of stories that we see on a daily basis. Continue reading →