Instructional Practices

Polls, Politics and Public Opinion relies primarily on lecture, although discussion and group work, some involving joint student projects, are also used. Lectures, discussions and readings focus on patterns of public opinion regarding such things as inequality, race, political tolerance, support for democratic institutions, and how these distributions vary by gender, income, education, and a number of other factors. Lectures and readings also treat the origins of opinions focusing on the role of family, schools, peers, the media, and major social and historical events. Lectures and discussions attempt to confront students with their own opinions, examine the bases for their opinions, whether or not their opinions are consistent with their values and other opinions, and the policy consequences of their opinions should they be enacted into law. Readings and lectures also focus on the extant research dealing with the impact of public opinion on office holders and through them public policies, including a number of models conceptualizing the different ways in which office holders might come to reflect public opinion or at least the opinions of those to whom they are responsible. Readings also treat at some length but in a nontechnical way the mechanics of polling and focus group procedures. The goal is to make students competent consumers of polls and focus group results to enable them to judge the reliability of each in communicating an accurate picture of what the public believes and thinks. In an effort to engage students, topics are often presented in the form of questions, eg., what social class do you belong to, are Americans racist, can a Jew be elected vice president, etc.

With respect to course assignments, there are several designed with the above goals in mind. During the first class period, students are asked to fill out a questionnaire focused on a number of significant dimensions in the discipline related to public opinion. [See student questionnaire in Appendix.] The responses are useful throughout the semester in contrasting patterns for the class with the nation as a whole as well as each student’s individual opinions with those of their classmates. The exercise facilitates self-awareness as well as understanding as each student examines their opinions in relationship to others.

To convey the mechanics of focus groups, several students are recruited to be participants based on their responses to the student survey. For example, during Fall 2000, those who indicated that they were undecided in the upcoming presidential election were selected for analysis. These students were asked a number of questions in a focus group setting with the rest of class observing the interaction and taking notes. [See focus group session in Appendix.] All wrote a paper based on the focus group results with the purpose of developing a campaign strategy to attract the undecided voters in the 2000 election. Not only did the exercise familiarize student with the methodology of focus groups, it also revealed a high level of opinion agreement among the participants, in sharp contrast to the division of opinion within the nation as a whole.

Students also were asked to monitor a week of television evening news on one of the networks for evidence of news bias. [ See Bias in the News in Appendix]. The assignment enabled students to assess the media, namely television news, as a agent of opinion formation, as well as to subject some of their stereotypes regarding news bias to analysis.

Students were also asked to participate in a statewide poll in order to acquaint them with the major elements of polling, namely sampling, questionnaire design, and analysis. Each student was asked to interview five households selected at random in their hometown or county. These were pooled into a single poll and students did a short analysis testing a proposition derived from the reading or simply something they were interested in as long as it made sense. [See Public Opinion Poll in Appendix.] Based on the results of the poll, pairs of students were asked to write a paper identifying and justifying their proposition, analyzing information from the poll to assess their proposition, and evaluating the implications of their findings. [See paper format in Appendix.] The exercise enabled students to be a part of the polling process from beginning to end.

The above materials and exercises were employed with the idea that students will meet the goals of the course by doing and discovering things for themselves. The choice of methods reflect my personal preferences – I prefer to supervise and oversee rather than lecture – and a desire to involve students in their own education, based on the belief that what students discover for themselves they are more likely to remember.