The Pros And Cons Of Polls

Everywhere you turn, there is some type of means of asking you for your opinion. There seems to be opinion polls attached to the side of every website you visit, every receipt you get from your favorite retailers, and a report about a new survey taken makes nightly news fairly often. But what is the point of all of these polls, and are they even effective?

Though there are quite a few polls that are created for entertainment purposes, there are many research groups that poll with scientific accuracy. The most popular examples are the polls taken during presidential elections. These polls prove time and time again to be incredibly accurate in predicting winners in elections. This accuracy goes for many other topics as well, from views on social

The measles outbreak that hit Disneyland California from December 2014 to April 2015 gave renewed vigor to the vaccine debate in the U.S., especially pertaining to the growing population of parents who are choosing not to vaccinate their children for reasons that range from religious to fear over the harmful effects of vaccines. However, polls that were taken towards the end of the outbreak showed that a majority of parenting adults still show strong favor for vaccines, and feel that they are still at least relatively safe, though these numbers differ between generations. The Pew Research Center conducted a poll from February 5-8th, 2015, and targeted a universe that focused on two main categories; parents of children under 18 and those who did not have children in that age bracket. The sample for Pew's poll was of 1,003 adults that were chosen at random by telephone with a margin of error of 3% plus or minus. Their research concluded that 83% of the population believes that vaccines, and more specifically the measles vaccine, is safe for children, with 80% of parents of children under 18 saying they are safe and 85% of those without children in that age category saying so. However, the poll showed that those who specifically held these beliefs varied based off age. Millennials have the highest rate of believing vaccines to be

CBSNews took a poll with almost the exact same sample size and methods as Pew, at 1,006 adults surveyed from February 13-17th of 2015 and a plus or minus error margin of 3%. CBS divided their results based off of political party affiliation, and the opinions they surveyed for were more on whether or not the volunteers felt that the measles vaccine was safe, and whether or not they thought that it should be mandatory. They found that a large portion of their universe still highly favors vaccines and consider them safe. Democrats hold the highest approval of vaccines at 70%, and 75% believe that they should be required for healthy children. Independents have the lowest approval at 56%, yet 64% of independents believe that they should be required for healthy children. CBSNews also asked their participants how they felt about the idea of vaccines causing neurological disorders in developing children, such as autism. The universe was fairly even split, with Independents holding a higher concern that vaccines are “somewhat likely” to cause autism with 24% of those polled, verses 19% of Democrats and 15% of