Discussion Questions for Approaches and Methods
I. Approaches and Methods: How
Can Public Opinion Be Measured and Studied?
Donald Kinder. “Attitude and Action in the Realm of
Politics.”
1.
Kinder’s Handbook
chapter is a useful summary of broader trends and questions in the study of
public opinion and political behavior and will be useful as a review when we
take up various topics in more detail later the course. Note the social
psychological bent of Kinder’s perspective, and the more limited treatment of
self-interest or rational choice perspectives in his summary of the literature.
One might ask, Why is it that rational choice models appear less useful as the
analysis becomes more micro? When might rational
choice models be more useful, even necessary, in explaining political behavior?
Donald Kinder, “On Behalf of an Experimental Political
Science”
2.
According to Kinder and Palfrey, what is “triangulation
across multiple methods” and what are some of its advantages? What are some of
the strengths of experimental research, as well as some of its disadvantages? (Note that experiments are one way to achieve
calls for greater “causal
inference” in political science, and field experiments are increasingly
used to evaluate policies and study ways to “get out the vote.”) In what ways might the study of political
behavior (defined broadly) benefit from increased reliance on experiments? How might it suffer? What about your specific
area of interest? Which method do you think is more likely to help advance
knowledge in your field of interest?
3.
More recently, Kinder has said, in the study of framing: “Enough
already with the experiments!” in “Curmudgeonly Advice,” Journal of Communication 57 (2007) 155–162. What’s up with that, do
you think?
David Sears. 1988. “College sophomores in the
laboratory…”
4.
According to Sears, a social psychologist who uses survey
data, what are some of the problems associated with the heavy reliance on
experiments in social psychology? Is the problem Sears is addressing due more
to the subject population, or the
method of experimental research? Are the problems more or less severe or are
they different for political scientists who study political behavior (e.g.,
racial attitudes, media influence, etc.)?
5.
To turn Sears’ analysis around, how does an exclusive
reliance on survey research limit the theories and explanations that can be
developed in political behavior?
Zaller
and Feldman, "A Simple Theory of the Survey Response…”
6.
This is a classic and heavily cited article that seeks to provide
a new theory of the survey response and, in the process, provides something of
a compromise between two views on response stability by Converse (errors are in
respondents) and Achen (errors are in measures). In
developing their theory of the survey response, Zaller and Feldman distinguish
between explanations of response instability by Converse and Achen. What are the differences between these two
explanations and the problems with each? In what ways does the Zaller and
Feldman’s model agree with and yet depart from each of these two explanations?
7.
What are the three axioms of Zaller and Feldman’s theory of the
survey response and where do they come from?
8.
What are some of the broader implications of the theory for the
way public opinion should be studied, for studying response stability,
persuasion, and democracy? Are survey responses “real,” or just epiphenomenal
constructions? How malleable or fixed is public opinion?
9.
Interestingly, some analysts have taken Z&F’s theory of the
survey response as a model of how citizens form their opinions in the real
world, not just in an interview. Is this reasonable? How does the model help to
put the political environment and “politics” back into the study of public
opinion?
10. Questions
to ponder now and later:
a)
Pick an issue on which public opinion has moved or hasn’t moved
and do your best to apply this theory to explain public opinion on this issue.
b)
How might you critique this theory? Does it have enough axioms? Do
the deductions follow directly from the axioms? Can it be tested
rigorously? Can it be falsified?
c)
How does the model help explanation issue framing by elites? What
implications does the model have for the fluidity of building coalitions of
support or opposition among the public? What implications does the model have
for helping to explain media influence on public opinion?
d)
The model, which is admittedly sparse, borrows selectively from
theories of information processing, attitude change, framing and so on.
If one advantage of the model is parsimony, what are some of the costs of
relying on this more abbreviated model? More generally, what are some of the
major problems with the model, as you see them, both theoretically and in its
application?
Kuklinski and Cobb. 1998. “When White Southerners
Converse About Race.”
11.
What concerns and issues about survey research does the
selection by Kuklinski and Cobb raise? Do you agree with the authors in their
explanation of the problem? How pervasive is this concern likely to be for
other areas of survey research?
12.
After this week’s readings, do you have any confidence
whatsoever in social scientists’ ability to measure political attitudes and
behavior?
TESS, Hutchings, Weaver
13.
How cool are these studies, anyway?
14.
What innovations do web-based surveys afford the study of
political behavior? What are their limitations, compared with traditional lab
experiments?
15.
If you had the opportunity to participate in a TESS study,
what web-based survey would you like to include?
Innovations in theory and substance have often followed
trends in the availability of data and methods for exploiting them.
a)
Traditional cross-sectional survey
i)
Its strengths
ii) Its
weaknesses.
a)
Internal validity: stronger assumptions of causal modeling,
panel designs, more control in experiments and variations (survey experiments,
web-based experiments).
b)
Ignore social context: focus groups, experiments, surveys
with context data added, snowball samples and network analysis, multilevel
analysis.
c)
Superficial responses: focus groups, Q methodology,
open-ended questions, depth interviews
(1)
Focus on product versus process of thinking.
d)
Unnatural setting:
e)
Response biases in survey research:
(1)
Examples: yea-saying, acquiescence response, question wording
effects, order effects, race of interviewer bias, social desirability bias,
random and non-random measurement errors.
(2)
Solutions: better question design, multiple formats, “format”
experiments,
b)
Panel design
c)
Field research
d)
Quasi-experimental design