Pew Research Center

In any given election, the vast majority of House districts are won by the party that already holds them. In 2020, for instance, 93% of districts were retained by the same party; only 18 of 435 districts (4%) flipped. https://pewrsr.ch/4e50b69

What are pollsters doing to fix the polls? Polling legend Scott Keeter sheds light on what pollsters are doing this year to capture public opinion more accurately. https://lnkd.in/ewRGmTng

Can we trust the polls this year? Pew Research Center’s vice president Courtney Kennedy has the answer. https://lnkd.in/eN5t_rRa

When will we know how well the polls performed? Polls have shown that the 2024 presidential election is a tight race. If battleground state results are also close, that would be consistent with pre-election polling. But if one candidate wins most of those battleground states, that could signal a systematic miss in polls. After the election, a group of experts will explore causes for any potential polling error. But this is an intensive process, and results could take months.

We hope these lessons have been helpful to your understanding of polling and made you feel better prepared to tell a good poll from a bad one. You may have finished the course, but there is always more to learn! Below are some ways you can keep your polling knowledge fresh. And don't forget to test your knowledge with our 10-question quiz: https://lnkd.in/eYvePePh

New from our methods blog, Decoded: Validating 2022 voters in Pew Research Center’s survey data https://pewrsr.ch/3A8JusQ

17 states have never had a female U.S. senator, according to our analysis of Senate historical records. This fall, Senate races in Delaware, Indiana, New Mexico, Rhode Island and Utah each feature a woman nominee who could become the state’s first. https://pewrsr.ch/4ftvlp6

In the 2016 and 2020 elections, many polls underestimated the strength of Republican candidates, including Donald Trump. What are pollsters doing to fix what went wrong? They're trying other approaches. Nearly 4 in 10 pollsters used different methods in 2022 than they did in 2020. More are now using registered voter samples and/or panels recruited from lists of residential households. And some are using multiple methods to contact potential voters. And pollsters are changing how samples are weighted to make them more representative of the true share of Republicans and Trump supporters in the population. Figuring out who will actually vote is a special challenge for election polls, and Trump appeals to many voters who have never or seldom voted in the past. Further reading: https://lnkd.in/gWzQUnEm

Is it harder these days to be a teen? Or do today’s teenagers have it easier than those of past generations? We asked the following question of 1,453 U.S. parents and teens: Compared with 20 years ago, do you think being a teenager today is harder, easier or about the same? RELATED RESEARCH Report: Why Many Parents and Teens Think It’s Harder Being a Teen Today https://lnkd.in/emBYzfav... (August 2024) Report: Teens, Social Media and Technology 2023 https://lnkd.in/emBYzfav... (Dec 2023) Report: How Teens and Parents Approach Screen Time https://lnkd.in/emBYzfav... (March 2024) Report: Teens and Video Games Today https://lnkd.in/emBYzfav... (May 2024)

With Halloween and the election on your mind, you may have forgotten that this weekend, we'll be "falling back" -- get ready! Here are some great facts Pew Research Center published last year about daylight saving time to mark the occasion: - Only about a third of countries in the world practice daylight saving time and the vast majority of them are in Europe - Some countries, including the U.S., have daylight saving time in only part of the country And, my personal favorite fact: if you want to schedule a meeting that's convenient for the most people on Earth, consider using the UTC+8 time zone. Around a fifth of the world's population lives in that one. More here: https://lnkd.in/dsHCgZ3d