San Antonio College Library

Covering the good, the bad, and the ugly of polling, this work serves as an important handbook on the ways to understand what citizens are really thinking and how those views can be translated into governmental action.

In a rigorous critique of public opinion polling in the U.S., George F. Bishop makes the case that a lot of what passes as public opinion in mass media today is an illusion, an artifact of measurement created by vague or misleading survey questions presented to respondents who typically construct their opinions on the spot. Using evidence from a wide variety of data sources, Bishop shows that widespread public ignorance and poorly informed opinions...