To what extent, they wondered, was the rising presence of polling in media and election coverage coming to influence the very public whose opinions it was supposed to be measuring? As Morwitz and Pluzinski observed more than two decades ago, the basic premise of election polling is that it straightforwardly reflects popular opinion. For what it’s worth, while pollsters didn’t predict last week’s election with perfect accuracy, many indeed came fairly close. “Public opinion firms looking for clout publish polls. That begins with the simple recognition that, far from merely reflecting public opinion, polls have also come to actively influence it as well.

Source: thestar June 12, 2022 06:01 UTC