From: "Anthony Crifasi" <crifasi-AT-hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Shadia Drury on Leo Strauss und Amerika
Date: Sat, 18 Oct 2003 01:54:19 +0000


Jan Straathof wrote:

>Anthony, it's not that i doubt the value of polls or polling agencies, in 
>fact
>i think they have become an essential (and maybe necessary) element and
>factor in modern day western democracies, but we must always stay cautious
>and examine carefully their findings when we draw conclusions. The quality
>of a good poll is determined by two methodological requirements, namely,
>the principle of internal validity and the principle of external validity.
>
>The issue of internal validity regards the reliability of the data 
>collection
>process. In the case at hand it would f.i. focus on questions as: In what
>language was the poll held, was it in arabic or english ? Who did the
>interviewing, were it native Iraqis or westerners (inter/cultural bias) ?
>When and where did the polling take place, was it at some freefood
>delivery outlet, at the entrance of a hospital, at a cafe, or at a mosque
>after the friday prayers ? How familiar are the respondents with the
>medium 'polling' ? [There is an old methodological caveat: the less
>familiar the respondents are with a medium of research the more they
>will tend to be biased by socially acceptable behavior and responses.]
>Which incentives are given to the respondents to participate, do the
>respondents know why the poll is held, where it will be published, for
>what purpose and in whose interest ?

The poll was done by Gallup, and on the Gallip website is the following, 
which gives the details on how the poll was planned and done:

Question
How was the Gallup Poll of Baghdad conducted?

Answer
The Gallup Poll of Baghdad

Sample Design

The strict, probability-based sample used by Gallup to conduct this survey 
projects with scientific accuracy to all adults (aged 18 and older) residing 
in urban areas within the governorate of Baghdad. All 1,178 interviews were 
conducted face-to-face, in the privacy of the respondent’s own home.

Interviewing was conducted during the period of Aug. 28 through Sept. 4, 
2003. The cooperation rate exceeded 97%, that is, fewer than 3% of those we 
contacted refused to be interviewed. Average interview length was 70 
minutes. For results based on this sample, one can say with 95% confidence 
that the maximum error attributable to sampling and other random effects is 
±2.7%.

The governorate (mohafatha) of Baghdad has a total population of 6,386,067 
(2003 estimate) -- a quarter of the entire population of Iraq. It is 
comprised of administrative units known as qadha. Qadhas may contain both 
urban and rural districts; those qadha closest to the city’s center, 
however, are comprised solely of urban districts. Because the objective was 
to survey the views of urban residents, rural districts lying within the 
outer boundaries of the Baghdad governorate were excluded from the survey’s 
sampling frame.

Each qadha, in turn, consists of multiple neighborhoods, known as nahiyas, 
which vary in population size. There are a total of 728 urban nahiyas within 
the governorate of Baghdad. The adult population of each of these, (defined 
as those born in 1985 or earlier), was obtained by Gallup from a 2002 
Central Statistical Office update. These data allowed Gallup to assign the 
appropriate population weight for each of the nahiyas into which a sampling 
point (PSU) for our survey fell.

Each nahiya is made up of blocks, or majals. Majals contain multiple, 
proximate housing units, often along the course of a given road or street 
(longer roads stretch across multiple majals). Within our sampling frame, 
there are nearly 30,000 (29,779) majals.

Selection of the sample was done at the qadha level, with a total of 122 
primary sampling units (PSUs) selected on a strict, 
probability-proportional-to-size basis. An average of 10 interviews, one per 
household, was conducted in each of these locations.

Once the number of PSUs to be allocated to a given qadha was determined, 
these were then assigned -- again, on a probability-based basis -- to 
specific nahiyas and majals within that qadha, with no more than one majal 
selected within any given nahiya.

For example, the qadha of Rasafa was allocated, on the basis of its total 
population, 25 of the sample’s 122 PSUs. Rasafa consists of 210 urban 
nahiyas, and 6,738 majals; our 25 PSUs for Rasafa were selected from among 
these 6,738 majals, not more than one per nahiya, on a random probability 
basis.

Interviewers were given the all the relevant address details for each PSU. 
However, since the only available residential listings were based on a 1997 
census, all residential listings had to be updated.

In addition, the available listings consisted solely of dwelling addresses, 
regardless of the number of independent families residing within a given 
housing unit. Therefore, we compiled separate listings identifying 
independent families, based on the criterion of their preparing or eating 
meals independently.

In those instances where more than ten independent families resided in a 
given, selected majal, a random selection table was used to select which 
families would be interviewed.

Finally, within each selected household, the specific adult to be 
interviewed was selected by the Kish method. This research procedure, 
designed to ensure proper representation of all age groups and both genders 
in the sample, involves first recording the ages and sex of each of a 
selected household's adults on a grid. The respondent to be interviewed is 
then selected according to a prescribed systematic procedure.

===========================
This is the website:

http://www.gallup.com/poll/focus/sr030924.asp

Some things on the site require a subscription and others don't, but I 
haven't checked every link to know which is which.

Anthony Crifasi

>
>Any doubt, disturbance or misinterpretation on the side of the respondent
>will trigger the mechanism of cognitive dissonance, i.e. people say A, but
>do B (and v.v.). And the actual reality they are living in is war and 
>chaos.
>Futhermore there is the issue of 'suggestive wording/questioning'. One of
>the questions in the poll was, if i remember well: "Is live better than two
>months ago ?", but why not ask "Is live now better than two years ago ?".
>And what about the phrase "any hardships endured since". What does it
>mean, what does it suggest for an Iraqi dasein. What would Iraqis have
>replied when Saddam had polled them after the first Gulf War, in promise
>of a brighter future ?
>
>The question of external validity deals with the possibilty of 
>generalization
>of conclusions. Here we talk about issues as sample size and sample 
>selection.
>Is the polled group an accurate representation of the Iraqi society, are 
>all
>social strata proportionally represented in the sample e.g. qua gender,
>age, socio-economical status (un/employed), religion etc. ? As far as i can
>tell,
>only some (who, how many ?) residents of Baghdad have been polled. Given
>the fact that at the moment there only live 3-4 mill. people in Baghdad, 
>when
>the total population of Iraq is app. 19 mill., i can hardly call this a 
>valide
>representation. Thus to conclude that these polls show an "overwhelming
>support from the Iraqi population" is methodologically questionable.
>
>For me these are important methodological questions and without straight
>answers the basic minimum of any reliable interpretation is absent or at 
>least
>in jeopardy. Btw. a poll is a poor instrument when it comes to measurement
>of trends in socio-economical change or life improvement, for this there 
>are
>much better indicators, i.e. levels of income, heathcare, education .... 
>see
>the UN website.

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