Statistical sampling is the selection of a statistical sample from of observations within the population and those statistical samples are used to estimate the population’s characteristics ( Meeker & Escobar, 2014) . While it is difficult for a researcher to work with every individual within the statistical population, statistical samples allow a researcher to work with a small number that is within his/her computational power but large enough to be statistically significant.
Difficulties of Statistical Sampling
The difficulties faced by researchers during the statistical sampling process are due to sampling and selection errors( Meeker & Escobar, 2014) . Selection biases occur when the randomization is not achieved thereby resulting in samples that do not represent the population( Meeker & Escobar, 2014) . Sampling errors occur when the parameters such as the quartiles and the mean are different for the sample and the population because the sample does not include all the members of the population( Meeker & Escobar, 2014) .
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Critical Thinking in Polls
Critical thinking should be applied in polls to assess whether the information obtained is factual or personal opinions of the people interviewed. A critical thinker should be able to research the information presented to him/her in a poll and make informed decisions. In this case, critical thinking involves analyzing the questions used in the poll, the number of the people who took part in the poll, and the order of the questions.
The sampling process is often prone to errors. The aim of critical thinking when analyzing a poll is to find the underlying deceptive assumptions and discern how those assumptions might affect the overall results of the poll.
Examples of Accurate polls
President Barack Obama’s 2015 Approval Rates Opinion Polls
Source: McClatchydc.com
The poll illustrated above is an accurate poll because it involved the segmentation of the poll participants according to party affiliations, region, race, and education among others. The figures show that majority of the participants who confess to be Democrats approves the achievements of President Obama, a Democrat President. Also, the majority of the opposition supporters disapproves of President Obama's achievement which is what is expected under normal circumstances.
US 2015’S Presidential Candidates Support Opinion Polls
Source: McClatchydc.com
Like the first poll, the second poll is also accurate because the percentage of Democrats supporting a Democrat candidate is high while the percentage of Republicans supporting Republican candidates is high.
Examples of Deceptive Poll
The UK 2015 General Election Opinion Polls
During the UK’s 2015 general elections, none of the opinion polls conducted in the country predicted that there will be a 7% gap between the Labor and the Conservative Parties(Preston, 2017). A total of 92 campaign polls were conducted but 81 of them predicted that the range between the two parties will range between 0% and 3% (Preston, 2017). Political opinion polls often become deceptive for a number of reasons including a skewed representation of facts for political reasons and ineffective random sampling.
The gap between Conservative and Labor Party in UK’s 2015 general election
Source: bbc.com
Polls on the Number of Electoral College in the US 2016 Presidential Elections
The Financial Times conducted a poll in 2015 that indicated that Democrat Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton would emerge victorious with a margin of 39 electoral college votes against Republican’s Donald Trump ( US presidential election: here's where the polls stand , 2016). However, Trump defeated Hillary by a huge margin in the actual election results as shown below:
Source: Financial Times Magazine
References
Meeker, W. Q., & Escobar, L. A. (2014). Statistical methods for reliability data . John Wiley & Sons.
Preston, P. (2017). Inaccurate opinion polls are what got us into this mess in the first place . the Guardian . Retrieved 1 June 2018, from https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/jun/11/inaccurate-opinion-polls-got-us-into-this-mess-general-election-2017
US presidential election: here's where the polls stand . (2016). Ig.ft.com . Retrieved 1 June 2018, from https://ig.ft.com/us-elections/polls/
