Word: exits
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Kerry fiasco was just the worst example of a problem that has long been endemic to exit polls. Over the past 20 years, they have slightly favored the Democratic candidate for President in every election. Many observers believe that's because Democrats are more willing to talk to exit pollsters. Exit polls also suffer from an unusually high margin of error due to the difficulty of choosing sample precincts that mirror all of the diverse precincts in the area...
...this year's exit polls turn out to be more accurate than in past years, as they appear to be, it's not by accident. The National Election Pool (a consortium of ABC News, Associated Press, CBS News, CNN, Fox and NBC News), working with Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International, made changes this year in an effort to do better...
...thing, there has been a strict quarantine in place since 2006 to avoid early leaks of totally unreliable data - which is what happened in 2004. This year, no exit poll data was released until 5 p.m. E.T., and only a handful of National Election Pool officials were allowed to see the early data...
...exit pollsters are also getting better training to help them avoid oversampling Democrats. Here is how an exit poll is supposed to work: pollsters stand outside more than 1,000 precincts around the country, all of which have been scientifically chosen to represent a particular area. As voters leave their polling places, the interviewer tries to randomly select about 100 of them to fill out a questionnaire...
...recent years, exit pollsters have received better training to help them stick to the random selection. This is not easy to do with a large labor force that works for you only one day a year. But it may also help that exit pollsters now include some older people - which may entice more older voters to participate...