Editors' Guide: Reader Poll

Your job is to pick a poll question from issues raised in today's stories or something topical. Give the reader enough information to understand where the poll topic is coming from. But keep it short!

Here are the general criteria:

  1. All questions are close-ended -- that is, we control the possible answers; users cannot submit their own.
  2. There should generally be two to four possible answers to a question.  
  3. Skip options such as "Don't know" or "No opinion." This isn't an academic study and people who would choose these options are unlikely to participate anyway.
  4. Aim for simple, clear questions, such as ...
  • Which of these brands are you most likely to buy?
  • What is the most important issue in the current election campaign?

Consider these guidelines for writing poll questions from U.S. pollster Craig Charney:

  1. Leading questions can point respondents astray: "Have you stopped beating your wife?" It's the classic leading question: yes or no, there's no answer that gets you off the hook. But lots of polls have asked similar questions--and many still do. In 1937, Gallup asked, "Would you vote for a woman for president if she were qualified in every other way?" (So being female is a disqualification?) Social Weather Stations, a leading polling outfit in the Philippines, once asked whether President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's opponents "should start helping to improve the country and stop too much politics." How many people would say "no" to that one?
  2. Double-barreled or vague questions confuse respondents: When you ask more than one thing at a time, or offer non-exclusive choices, respondents don't really know what their answers really mean--and neither do the questioners. For example, a Fortune 500 company staff survey asked, "Training and career planning are available to me, true or false?" What if training is but career planning isn't? An AP-IPSOS poll once asked, "Do you think the war in Iraq is a worthy cause or a hopeless cause?" What answer do you give if you think it is both worthy and hopeless?
  3. Double negatives in questions cause double trouble: Double negatives in questions create answers with double meanings. Take the Roper poll for the American Jewish Committee in 1992. It asked, "Does it seem possible or does it seem impossible to you that the Nazi extermination of the Jews never happened?" The results? A shock: 34 per cent seemed to say the Holocaust may not have happened. In response to public outcry, the question was reworked in 1994, asking if people were certain the Holocaust had happened. Asked that way, only one per cent said it was possible the genocide never took place and eight per cent were unsure.

    As well ...
  4. Tone down the language: Strong words that represent control or action can skew your results -- so can words that trigger ideological reactions. For example, consider the difference in responses you might get from these questions:
    • "Should the province prohibit insurance companies from raising rates?"
    • "Should the province regulate insurance rates?"
    • "Should the province let the free market set insurance rates?"
  5. Keep it short and use plain English: Voters tend to vote No to questions that are long and difficult to understand
  6. If the question is not Yes/No, use scales in range of answers.
    For example: "How would you rate parks in your neighbourhood?"
    _ Excellent. _Good . _ Satisfactory. _ Poor.

 

Add to CMS

Archive the existing poll before you publish the new one. See below.

1. Archive the previous poll:

  • On the main CMS menu, choose the Edit tab and change Filter by Section to "Polls"
  • In the resulting list, click on the top item to find the most recent poll
  • On the following screen, go to the Options tab and change the Status from "Open" to "Closed"
  • Click "Update"


2. Create a new one:

  • On the main CMS menu, go to the "publish" tab and choose "Polls"
  • In the Title field, describe it generally
  • Add a question and answers. Leave the rest alone. Choose "Quick Save" as you go.
  • Under Submission Options - all user groups need to be checked off
  • When you're done, publish the poll by changing the Status from "Closed" to "Open" in the Options tab. Then Click Update (not Quick Save)
  • Check the live poll

 

You're done!