Alan,
I would appreciate your clarifying your comments. My confusion is
between survying attitudes vs. surveying behaviors.
Survey research is excellent for assessing people's attitudes. In this
context, "bias" is about preferences. (Even with this we have remarkable
sensitivity to survey question formulation, making valid and meaningful
survey construction something of a black art.)
Survey research is very nearly useless for assessing people's actual
behaviors., past, present or future. This is because people do not track
and record the behaviors objectively, so their "self-report" is one of
their subjective sense of things.
For very simple assessments of very simple behaviors (did you wake up
yesterday, or which of two candidates will you vote for today) survey
technology can do pretty well. Not for anything more complicated.
d/
Monday, March 24, 2003, 2:52:14 AM, you wrote:
AD> Kee Hinckley <nazgul(_at_)somewhere(_dot_)com> wrote:
AD> However, by measuring data from from biased systems, we can get a
AD> good indication of what those biases may be, how extensive they are,
AD> and even discover the shape of the non-biased systems.
AD> Pollsters use these methods all the time. They call people, collect
AD> precise, accurate data about personal biases. The people may lie, but
AD> with enough data, that bias may be accounted for.
Ad/
--
Dave Crocker <mailto:dcrocker(_at_)brandenburg(_dot_)com>
Brandenburg InternetWorking <http://www.brandenburg.com>
Sunnyvale, CA USA <tel:+1.408.246.8253>, <fax:+1.866.358.5301>
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