Origin of Public Opinion

                “Polling gives every person the right to be his own oppressor”Nowadays, polling or voting is a common word in politics, reality shows and many educational researches. But have we ever thought where and when this feature was born !Polling namely known as “Public Opinion” today, laid its root in 19th century when interested groups and newspapers attempted to investigate voting preferences among common people. Polling organizations needed to prove that they could accurately determine public sentiment using a small sample of population.                                      The first known example of a poll was a local Straw Poll  done by the supporters of Andrew Jackson who was elected as President in 1824 by conducting polls in rallies and gatherings for Jackson. This poll showed Andrew Jackson leading by 99 votes in the contest for the US Presidency. Since he won the popular vote in that state, such straw votes became more popular in the city level.In the year 1936, Literary Digest conducted a polling for that year's presidential election. Mock ballots were sent to people to mark their preference. Finally this magazine embarked the national survey and predicted Woodrow Wilson's election as president. It does not matter whether the sample is selected from all the people in one country, or from a bunch of colored balls in a barrel; the same rules apply. These rules will apply only if every person in the country or every ball in the barrel has an equal chance of being selected every time a choice is made. Surveys were not necessarily all political. The other factors that stimulated the development of scientific polling was the increased rate of manufacturers to reach buyers. Eventually by the end of 20th century, polling became a customary feature in newspapers and magazines. The advertisers turned to scientists for guidance in facilitating the distribution processes and collected elements of survey like research designs, questions and training of pollsters in their earlier psychological studies. Even the food and cigarette manufacturers engaged in market research to find out how to appeal to different categories of buyers and the level of competition.Advancement in statistical methods of analysis brought greater understanding of sampling in studying large segments of population. John Watson, founder of American behaviorist psychology, performed surveys to determine customers opinions about specific products. Watson became one of the first researchers to pay attention to “brand loyalty ” to a particular product.In many cases, polling was done by newspaper employees hired to go out and question whomever, they found available, or by asking cut out questionnaires from the paper, fill them out, and then mail them in. Customary polls were conducted by sending questionnaires to people with telephones and magazine subscribers. New methods to increase polling accuracy was started by many specialists in 1932. Inspired by the accurate prediction, George Gallup founded the American Institute of Public Opinion in 1935. One of the major activities of the Institute was to conduct a series of weekly national polls on policy- related issues.The popularity of polls grew rapidly, as more funds became available to researchers. The National Opinion Research Center was established at the University of Denver in 1941 and later found a new home at the University of Chicago. In 1960s, majority of people expressed positive opinions about polling. Between 1940s and 1970s, more than 60% of people believed opinion polls were a good thing for a country. After 1970s, most polling companies switched from face-to-face interviews to telephone surveys.  Eventually , the use of polling systems improvised and became easy to use for youngsters and teenagers also, as it was available on  all social media sites  through online poll makers. Some of the popular sites which provides  tools for online polling are Survey Monkey, PollDeep, Survey Nuts, Poll Snack. These sites have made the best use of polling techniques and have taken the level of polling to a higher level. Nowadays polls have become indispensable to find out what people think and how they behave. The poll results are constantly reported by national and local media to skeptical public. There is no scope running away from the flood of polls in this modern era as the internet has enhanced both the use and misuse of such polls. So it has become necessary to cope up with the new advancements that are taking place in the polling systems.