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

Re:OT: America is a continent, USofA is a country

[operagost]

I've met several Mexicans abroad who were really offended by the term "American" being used to describe U.S. Citizens

Well, now you know several Americans who are offended by being called "USians"- me, and several Slashdotters above and below this thread. Choosing what to call a people is determined by that people, not some global committee. So stop calling us that, or I'll start picking out the names I like for other nationalities. How about "BadToothies" for the Brits, "Drunkies" for the Irish, and "Cowardies" or "WeLoveSaddamies" for the French.

Frankly, you might as well ignore Mexicans when they bring up worthless items like this- they're still trying to take back the land they lost in the war.