Project 1
Overview
For our project we were given two different made up candidates both running
for the US Senate. We were then given surveys for people to fill out regarding both of
the candidates. Both had exactly the same information and all the details were the
same, the only difference was the picture on the front of our surveys. One was a picture
of a professionally dressed white man and the other was of a black man. Both surveys
had exactly the same questions and our goal was to find out if racism would play any
role in how people answered the surveys. We surveyed 25 men and 25 women. We
gave the first 12 of each the survey with the white man, and the next 12 the black man.
I personally surveyed people at a wedding reception, church and at home for my part of
the results why the other locations varied so we could get a very broad group of results.
Hypotheses
When we were first given this assignment, my first thought was that our results
would for sure be skewed towards the white man, but as we talked as a group and with
my parents before we did the surveys, I felt much more as though the results would be
very similar and we would most likely see no difference. My hypotheses would be that
the results coming out of our little experiment would be non-racist and that we would
see little to no change between the two candidates.
Methodology
I was put into a group with six people and each one of us had to survey eight people,
four men and four women, and we were allowed to go wherever we wanted as long as
we didn’t go door to door asking people or just asking our family and our brothers and
sisters to feel them out. If we decided to go to a store to interview people we needed
to make sure we had permission from a manager beforehand so we didn’t get into any
trouble. We then printed out 10 of the surveys for each person just in case we had any
issues with the surveys and set a date the following week that all of us would have it
done by. To ask people if they would be interested in taking a survey, we would
approach people who looked like they weren’t very busy or looked like they would be
an excellent person to survey. We’d then approach them and ask them if they would be
willing to fill out a quick survey regarding a candidate running for Utah’s senate. If they
said yes, we would hand them the survey, and if they said no we would thank them for
their time and to have a nice day. If someone who was willing to take the short survey,
but was obviously not taking it seriously, we would thank them again for their time and
then toss the data as it would be inaccurate and unprofitable for our final data analysis.
The standard questions in the survey were:
1. He has a sufficient education to be a U. S. Senator from Utah.
2. He has sufficient work experience to be a U. S. Senator from Utah.
3. He demonstrates strong leadership skills.
4. He has the kinds of life experiences that will help him understand average Utahans.
5. I support more of his policy positions than I oppose.
All the questions had the answers of strongly agree, Agree, Neutral, Disagree, or
Strongly Disagree. The question we decided to add was:
6. I would trust him to make the best choices for Utah’s citizens.
We decided to add this question as it is really asking the person taking the survey if they
really would trust this candidate once elected to make all the best decisions for Utah’s
citizens. We felt that by asking them that, if there was any racism or thought of it in
their minds that it would for sure come out on this one and we could have more
interesting results.
Results
50
40
30
Stongly Agree
20
Agree
10
Disagree
Strongly Disagree
0
Black
Male
White Black White
Male Female Female
These results are showing how many people out of the 50 we surveyed checked
each type of the different types of answer. I decided to leave off neutral as it wouldn’t
tell us much and would mostly just be worthless data. The results actually turned out
very similar for each of the candidates. They both had very similar responses for each of
the two races, and the differences are almost negligible. I found that many of the
people I was taking surveys from would almost put neutral for every answer, and that
slightly impacted our data, but we still got a lot of good information. According to the
data, the black candidate was more preferred by the males, and the white candidate
was more preferred by the females who took the survey. I found this kind of odd as I
thought the black candidate was much more attractive in the picture and I felt like
women would be more inclined to vote for the more attractive candidate. But, this was
not the case and the white candidate almost doubled the black one in agrees from the
women surveyed. On the male side of things, the black male received more agrees than
the white, but this could be attributed to the males who filled out the survey on the
white candidate almost only feeling out neutral for every answer which isn’t shown in
this chart. I feel like we received the results we got because people of this generation
aren’t nearly as racist as they once were. I feel like people we surveyed didn’t even
have the candidates race run through their head, let alone let in influence their answers.
The data backs this up as the results show almost the same ratings for each candidate. I
feel like all these results mean that society has come a very long way from the days long
past where slavery was everywhere, and when there were Jim Crow laws in place to
restrict blacks from almost doing anything. People used to be unbelievable racist, and I
know some who are, but overall, we have come a very long way as a society.
Conclusions and Suggestions for Future Research
Coming to an end here, this survey has showed us many different things. It has showed
us that society can change and has changed. And it shows us that most people today
aren’t racist like they used to be and that they are more interested in the person and
what they have accomplished rather than the color of their skin. We can also draw the
conclusion that, at least from my experience, that most people don’t really care about
politics and who is in charge. Most people I surveyed could have almost have cared less,
and only took the time to do it because I needed valid data for this essay. This makes
me wonder if most people who go vote if they really take any time at all to see what
makes the candidate stand apart, or what makes them qualified for the job. I sure hope
this is not the case as people need to understand how important their vote and their
voice is, and how we need to be educated on the differing candidates just as we need to
be ready for any test we have to take at school. If I had any advice for future groups
going to do this type of research I would just say to make sure you keep the data
organized and to come up with the question you are going to add right from the get go
as you’ll never quite know exactly when you’re going to need those surveys ready, and
that you want to make sure you are on the same page as your fellow team members.
Overall, I enjoyed this project.