Pengukuran Opini Publik

Survey Research
 Survey research is a technique that well designed for
assessing the prevalence and distribution of attitudes, as well
as factual material about respondents

 Surveys measure the attitudes of a population of interest. In

particular, scientific sample surveys ask questions of a sample
of members of that population, taking enough interviews to
be able to generalize to that larger population and trying to
minimize nonresponse by people included in the sample,
while using tested methods to measure the attitudes of
respondents
Survey Research
 Surveys are generally weak in assessing causation. Finding
that a difference between respondent is associated with a
difference in their opinion does not determine the real cause
of the opinion difference. Experiments are better suited to
determining causation

 Another limitation of surveys is that they measure individual

opinions, whereas opinions are often generated as part of
group processes. Focus group and ‘deliberative polls’ may be
better suited than regular surveys for measuring opinions
within a group context
Survey Errors
 Early work on survey accuracy emphasized mainly the
sampling error in surveys, probably because the precision of
the formulas for calculating sampling error for some type of
sample allowed that error to decreased by simply increasing
the sample size

 It was sometimes admitted that non-sampling error also

exists, but the other sources of error could not be computed
and minimized
Designing Reliable and Valid Questionnaire
 Obtaining accurate, reliable and valid assessment of public opinion is
critical for any survey project

 It requires considerable knowledge, skill, and experience in question

wording and questionnaire structure

 Requires attention to subtle relationships between questions, and how

those relationship might affect the meaning of the question for the
respondent

 Also requires an understanding of basic concepts associated with

reliability and validity and with techniques employed to produce
questions with these qualities and methods to measure the degree of
reliability and validity present
Designing Reliable and Valid Questionnaire
 Designing reliable and valid public opinion questionnaires
brings together elements from:

 Psychometrics, the discipline formally concerned with

reliability and validity in measurement

 Survey methodology, especially focusing on techniques

developed to write clear, unambiguous survey questions

 psychology of survey responding, a discipline aimed at

understanding the task respondents face as they encounter a
survey question
Validity from a Psychometrics Perspective
 For survey questionnaires, a key feature of validity is that it explicitly
links a particular survey question to researcher purpose for conducting
the research

 Researcher are to be good at thinking about their purpose in abstract

conceptual terms. However respondent can only properly answer
specific, concrete question

 The art of questionnaire development is to map clear, specific, concrete

questions to the abstract concepts of the researcher in such a way that
the data obtained meet the researcher’s goal

 Validity is the link between the survey question an the researcher

objective
Turning Ideas into Questions
 In public opinion research, the goal is to make sure that the
data are an accurate reflection of research topics of interest

 Fowler (1992) states two conditions for this to be

accomplished:

 Survey questions should be understood by all respondents in a

consistent way

 Survey respondent must interpret the questions in the same way

that the researcher has intended the question to be interpreted
What Can Be Measured in Public Opinion Surveys

 A distinction should be made between obtaining a person’s

‘opinion’ and measuring ‘public opinion’

 Public opinion surveys measure attitudes, behaviors, behavioral

intentions, belief, circumstances, knowledge, values, and opinions
with respect to a political topic, entity, or event

 It is impossible to imagine that most citizens have the detailed

knowledge necessary to judge the performance of such multi-
faceted, incredibly complex job. The variety of things one might
measure under the rubric of ‘public opinion’ presents researchers
with a wide array of choices with which to understand the
political arena
Question Wording and Structure
 The choice of words is a major consideration for public opinion
questions

 Studies has shown that when asking questions about social programs,
both the way the program is construed or the implication of positive
action in the question stem can affect responses

 Question that are double-barreled- those that have two references- often
show up in public opinion surveys

 The placement of questions in the questionnaire is important to

consider. For attitude or opinion questions, related prior questions can
affect responses to questions about little known topics, or to questions
about which the respondent has mixed feelings.