Share this page!

Enter URL or ID to Unroll

You can paste full URL like: https://x.com/threadreaderapp/status/1644127596119195649
or just the ID like: 1644127596119195649

How to get URL link on X (Twitter) App

  1. On the Twitter thread, click on or icon on the bottom
  2. Click again on or Share Via icon
  3. Click on Copy Link to Tweet
  4. Paste it above and click "Unroll Thread"!
  5. More info at Twitter Help
Natalie Jackson Profile picture
Natalie Jackson
@nataliemj10
VP @GQRResearch, columnist @nationaljournal, polsci PhD Rural TX native, WTAMU/OU alum Pollster/public opinion researcher for two decades Opinions are my own.
Feb 8 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
This is making a big splash. But there's a big problem, here.
@pewresearch has documented that opt-in online panels (the only way to get 100k+ respondents, so has to be the methodology here) have a lot of error in measuring young people's opinions - SPECIFICALLY on antisemitism.Image
Image It's connected to the fact that opt-in online panels reward "bogus" respondents who aren't taking the surveys seriously and are just trying to get rewards for taking it. They also may be trolling.

Link to the Pew study: pewresearch.org/short-reads/20…
Nov 10, 2024 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
"The keys depend on a rational, pragmatic electorate deciding based on governance..."

I mean, literally every political scientist studying American political behavior could have told you that is the worst possible assumption.

Laying it on Elon Musk is laughable. Also, I'm pretty sure most of us DID say that this was a bad way to do it prior to the election.
Oct 26, 2024 • 13 tweets • 3 min read
On a different note, I do want to say more about why polls might converge around similar estimates.

The idea that poll estimates should follow a normal distribution is a flawed assumption for a number of reasons.

This will take multiple tweets to explain. First, I don't dispute that low-quality pollsters might herd. But the originally quoted tweet is looking at higher quality pollsters.

Now on to the statistics of it:
Aug 18, 2024 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Not saying this is the answer, but worth remembering that polls are really bad at measuring opinion at the very high and low levels.

It’s why the biggest “errors” occur in the reddest/bluest states.

Polls just don’t usually measure 90% support levels. Never have. Part of it is undecideds/item nonresponse. If your margin is 90-7-3 (+83), then any deviation makes the margin difference look huge.

And if you’re weighing partisanship/past vote across the board rather than by subgroup, you will falsely inflate some group’s Trump margins.
Jun 23, 2024 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
CBS/YouGov hasn't shown the same age depolarization that other polls have - I believe this to be due to their sampling and weighting practices that keep samples steadier at the subgroup level. Topline-only weighting that many others do can result in weird subgroups. To be clear, I do not have inside info on how public pollsters are currently weighting, I just know YouGov's practices, and I know what happens when I weight polls in different ways (topline vs. subgroup). Topline only has different results for subgroups.
May 2, 2023 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
When polls force respondents to pick one of two partisan jargon options without an effort to find out what *the respondents* really think, we're quite possibly misrepresenting public opinion.

this week's Leading Indicators @nationaljournal
(unlocked)
nationaljournal.com/s/721303/how-p… @nationaljournal Now, if it's reported appropriately, great. But more often than not, both pollsters and headlines run away with the results as "this is what people want!!" (provided it aligns with their priors)
May 1, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
The adult population of Texas is about 22.5 million people. Abbott received about 4.4m votes. Rural red outvoted urban blue, as it always does.

I've been saying for years that Dems have an organizing problem in Texas. Beto O'Rourke was never going to single-handedly solve that, nor was all the out-of-state support specific to Beto.
Mar 13, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
I mean, yes, but this is machine politics the way it always has been. Nothing new in the world. It's how we got Biden.

Is that how it *should* be? Eh. idk. The other method isn't really working out for Republicans.

I think the real answer to why Democrats underwhelm is that we're more of a centrist country than most liberals want to believe.
Feb 8, 2023 • 9 tweets • 4 min read
NEW REPORT from the PRRI team:

We estimate that 10% of Americans are adherents to Christian nationalist beliefs. Another 19% are sympathetic to those beliefs.
Mar 18, 2022 • 11 tweets • 4 min read
Then we have this. Survey design 101: If you ask people if something is a problem, they will tell you it's a problem. This is called acquiescence bias - and it's usually discussed with agree-disagree questions, but it's also an issue with one-sided scales like this. The question needs to be interpreted with caution knowing that is a possibility - not used to yell about a huge societal problem. The acquiescence problem is also supported by: 55% of people say they hold their tongues, yet 84% say this is a somewhat/very serious problem.
Mar 18, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
A thread on why the NYTimes op-ed is a bad use of polling.
To be clear, I am talking about the USE of it; this is not about the fine folks at Siena.

The poll is used to say OMG, LOOK, WE HAVE A BIG PROBLEM. Here's why that's a bad use of the polling: We start here. People are saying they "hold their tongue." Okay. I grew up with the attitude that you don't talk about politics or religion in polite company. (lol that I study both - that lesson sank in, eh?) Filtering is a way of getting along in the world. This is not new.
Feb 5, 2022 • 10 tweets • 4 min read
In case anyone else wants to spend part of their Saturday combing through Texas polling crosstabs. The @TexasMonthly
article is a good summary.

texasmonthly.com/news-politics/…

uttyler.edu/politicalscien… @TexasMonthly Texas generally looks a whole lot like the epicenter of the culture war - conservative bent is still very strong, but socially sliding a bit leftward.

I'd love to see many more tabs on this - urban/rural, more religion breaks, etc - but I probably mostly know what they'd say.
Jan 11, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
It's beginning to feel like the downsides of forcing a filibuster vote are pretty significant for Democrats... the circular firing squad has clearly developed and taken the attention from the question of why 0 Republicans will support a voting rights bill. Color me unimpressed with Dem leadership... (although that's kind of always - I'm that person in the Pew party typology who really dislikes everyone on every side.)