Will Cellular Phones Skew Survey Results?

FriedEgg writes "Recently, many people have started to forgo traditional landline telephones in favor of cellular phones only. This presents a problem for telephone pollsters who are prohibited by the FCC from calling cell phones with automated equipment, and from calling people for whom receiving the call costs money. While they recognize the exclusion of cellular only users can skew their results, they're not yet sure how much... because they're unable to survey cellular only users to find out their demographic information. Some evidence does indicate the frequency of cellular-only is highest among 18-24 year olds, traditionally the hardest to survey anyway. If the problem grows worse, it's possible we could end up with a "Dewey Defeats Truman"-like situation where the telephone poll results were skewed because Truman supporters were less likely to own a telephone."

Comments

The results are bogus already ...

[Dark$ide]

Aren't the results of any phone survey skewed already. If someone calls me unsolicited I'll tell them to go away impolitely.

Haven't the Americans just got a 50 million list of folks who don't want to be called.

Do the folks who fit those two categories have a common demographic?

Won't matter much for elections

[Anonymous Coward]

The 18-24 demographic is the one least likely to vote anyway

Boo f-ing hoo!

[glassesmonkey]

Seriously, cry me a river. So, politicians won't know what to think. TV execs won't know what good shows to cancel next. Phone polling is the equivalent of jury duty and we know who is sitting on juries in this country. So next time a telemarketer calls, just tell them "I love chinks."

(before people get all politically upset do a little research, I can't help it that you don't watch Conan O'Brien or even have a sense of humour)

Tell that to the people in Florida...

[Raul654]

...whose election was decided by just over 500 votes. That's what, a small high school?

And People who read news & blogs online not po

[Cryofan]

Because often they are using their phone line to go online via their dialup ISP connection. These people are those who spend MOST of their leisure online reading news, blogs, and doing other leisure reading and reading, ALL online. And at night or at other times, they download books and music from Kazaa or Usenet. Thus, they cannot be reached by phone by either parent, friend, or pollster. Thus, the Always-Online political persuasion is not reflected in political polls, such as Presidential race polls (Go Kucinich!) and other polls.

I propose that we Always-Online types are often of radical political persuasions. And because our opinions are not reflected in the polls, the polls come out looking LESS radical, and more mainstream than America really is in reality.

And since one big factor in politics is The BandWagon Factor, our absence from political polls means that America is being deradicalized. Look for example at online polls. DO they have somewhat different results from telephone polls? You bet!

What can we Always-Onliners do about it? VOTE!!

See you at the polling place.

I don't understand this position

[GregWebb]

I _want_ the world to reflect my tastes. I want companies to introduce products that match what I want, I want my favourite TV programs to get more airtime, I want my political positions to be listened to and regarded as significant.

Opinion polls are an excellent way to do this. I've not been invited to participate in any number by phone but have several by e-mail or banner ads. Unless it's simply not possible for me to participate for some reason, I _will_ complete the poll. Yes, it's a small contribution but it's another point in their dataset and it corresponds to _me_ and helps drag data towards me just a little.

I won't participate in loyalty card schemes because I don't like the data density they're building up and don't think many shoppers appreciate quite how much data is being stored on exactly what they do and what can be done with it. Polls are rather different though - it's upgront about what's being gathered and due to the different nature of the data, has rather less nefarious possibilities for data mining. Net result I'm absolutely fine with giving them data to help swing towards me. After all, if I've got the chance to help steer the world towards what I want and I _can_ take it, why shouldn't I?