The Broadus Effect

Polls that show more than 60% approval on propositions/measures are predicted to pass. Prop 19 has a bit less than 60% approval in recent polls, however the Broadus Effect has been coined to describe the disparity between the polls and public opinion.

During this past week of campaigning and phone banking I have only encountered 2 people that were against 19....an illegal grower and a police chief. I have spoken to literally hundreds (phone banked 200 yesterday alone) of voters that are supporting prop 19. The polls do not accurately reflect what we are hearing and seeing from the voters.

The Broadus Effect is a play on the term Bradley Effect. Bradley effect describes why in 1982 Bradly was far ahead in the polls yet lost, he is black his opponent was white. People were embarrassed to express their racism in the polls and said they were voting for Bradley when they were truly planning on not...because he is black.

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2010/07/broadus-effect-social-desirability-bias.html

The Broadus Effect can explain why the polls are so close in numbers. Voters are hesitant to say they support prop 19 because of the negative social implications associated with marijuana (all of which are unsupported yet still touted by the federal gov't). On the robo polls the numbers are much closer to 60% than on real person polls simply because people are embarassed to admit they want legalization.

Hopefully, the anonymity and privacy of voting will show that many more support legalization than the polls currently reflect.

also:

the polls that are shown on media outlets are ONLY based on the amount of people who volunteered to be in that poll for that poll.

Another interesting note, the companies that do the polling want to phone people as cheaply as possible. It's more expensive for them to call cell phones, so they tend to call land lines. The people who still have land lines tend to be older, and lean towards the conservative attitude, therefore the poll results are slanted to the right of center.

It's part of what I call "How to make statistics lie for you."

potroast said:

Another interesting note, the companies that do the polling want to phone people as cheaply as possible. It's more expensive for them to call cell phones, so they tend to call land lines. The people who still have land lines tend to be older, and lean towards the conservative attitude, therefore the poll results are slanted to the right of center.

It's part of what I call "How to make statistics lie for you."

Click to expand...

I've talked to lots of people about this that would never publicly admit to supporting it publicly are going to vote for it due to the economics.