Ethics of Polls

1. Ethics of Polls March 30, 2011

2. Objectives By the end of this meeting you should be able to: • Apply the guidelines of the AAPOR to survey research. • Identify the rights of survey respondents. • Effectively consider ethical professional practices when doing survey research.

3. Polling Ethics • Worries about scientific abuse has led to the creation of a number of codes of conduct for researchers. • For instance, in order to be certified by the American Association for Public Opinion Research you must sign a code of conduct that expresses how you should act.

4. Excerpts from the AAPOR Code of Professional Ethics • When preparing a report for public release we shall ensure that the findings are a balanced and accurate portrayal of the survey results. • We recognize our responsibility to the science of survey research to disseminate as freely as possible the ideas and findings that emerge from our research.

5. Excerpts from the AAPOR Code of Professional Ethics • We shall avoid practices or methods that may harm, humiliate, or seriously mislead survey respondents. • We shall respect respondents' concerns about their privacy. • Aside from the decennial census and a few other surveys, participation in surveys is voluntary.

6. Excerpts from the AAPOR Code of Professional Ethics • We shall not misrepresent our research or conduct other activities (such as sales, fund raising, or political campaigning) under the guise of conducting research. • Unless the respondent waives confidentiality for specified uses, we shall hold as privileged and confidential all information that might identify a respondent with his or her responses. We also shall not disclose or use the names of respondents for non-research purposes unless the respondents grant us permission to do so.

7. Excerpts from the AAPOR Code of Professional Ethics • We understand that the use of our survey results in a legal proceeding does not relieve us of our ethical obligation to keep confidential all respondent identifiable information or lessen the importance of respondent anonymity. • The documents goes on to state the minimum disclosure that each survey should have, this includes sample size, margin of error, population, method, etc.

8. Respondents Rights • The right not to be injured • Informed consent • Priming dangers • Social desirability bias • Polling sponsorship • Confidentiality • Sensitive topics

9. Oversight • Institutional review boards • Surveys are generally omitted, provided anonymity • Surveys of public officials are completely acceptable • Academic codes of conduct • Industry codes of conduct

10. Professional practices • Disclosure rules • Sponsored research • Fraudulent polls (including push polls) • AAPOR defines a "push poll" as a form of negative campaigning that is disguised as a political poll. “Push polls” are actually political telemarketing -- telephone calls disguised as research that aim to persuade large numbers of voters and affect election outcomes, rather than measure opinions • Limits to surveys

11. For Next Time • Read Clawson & Oxley: Chapter 1 • Which theory of democracy do you think more accurately describes democracy in the United States? Democratic elitism or pluralism? Why is that the more accurate theory?