SURVEY RELEVANCE: Presidential politics
The survey topic chosen is the opposition to Trumps’ refugee and immigrant policy; improved views of the economy. This is due to the fact that the migrant and refugee crisis is a major topic in the daily United States politics in the face of growing diversity in Congress as of the last midterm elections. The refugee policy in the United States is one of the most defining factors of the Trump administration and one of the most media-highlighted presidential politics topics in the recent past.
The poll was conducted in February between 7th and 12th 2017 with 1,503 adult participants. Most political polls use a sample of 500 to 2000 people. A 500 sample size will give a confidence interval of +/-5 times nineteen out of twenty (95%). A sample of 1500 gives a confidence interval of +/-3 nineteen times out of twenty (95%). A bigger samples size poses uncertainty as opposed to a sample size between this range since the deviation tends to be maintained making this sample size a reasonable number to give a better reflection on the opinions of the population(Schnepf, 2018). The larger the sample size the more accurate the reflection of the opinion of the population but larger sample sizes are costly to survey and might take long times rendering the results irrelevant and invalid since the opinions of the populations can change untimely.
A group that does not identify with the president or the presidency can use the poll results to further its political objectives by convincing the electorate that the president and his administration are failing. The presidency can use the results to better its services or to change the strategies and the current policy to a more efficient one that is accepted by the population. The presidency can also use the results to determine the kinds of services needed by the population.
Environmental issues
The survey topic chosen is ‘how Americans view the top energy and environmental issues since the building of the crude oil pipeline from Canadian oil sands to the united states gulf coast ports elicited a lot of politics within the Congress and the media with most of the Republicans viewed to be favoring the project as opposed to Democrats. The poll was conducted between March and September among 1233 adult participants. Sample 1233 gives a confidence interval of +/-3 nineteen times out of twenty (95%). A bigger samples size than this, say 100, 000 poses uncertainty and cost inefficiency as opposed to a sample size between the ranges of 500 to 2000 since the deviation tends to be maintained making this sample size a reasonable number to give a better reflection on the opinions of the population. The larger the sample size the more accurate the reflection of the opinion of the population (Schnepf, 2018).
A group that supports the idea can use the survey results to further their objectives and have an idea of how the population views the idea for the sake of acceptability. The government on the other hand can use the result of the survey to inform its strategy changes and advance its political goals. Information from the polls can shed light on political and environmental issues or other political topics and potentially enables the drawing of inferences about population attributes.
References
Schnepf, S. (2018). Insights into survey errors of large-scale educational achievement surveys Abstract While educational achievement surveys revolutionised research on education cross-nationally, the surveys have been repeatedly subject of heated debate since first results were published. This paper reviews existing research examining the design and methodology of educational achievement surveys. Results are reported by allocating them to the specific survey error component of achievement estimates they address. Different … (№2018–05).
