CHAPTER 5
Public Opinion and Political Socialization
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After reading this chapter, students should be able to do the following:
1.
Define the key terms at the end of the chapter
2.
List three factors affecting sample accuracy
3.
Contrast the majoritarian and pluralist models in their assumptions about public opinion
4.
Explain what is meant by the shape and stability of the distribution of public opinion
5.
List the agents of both early and continuing political socialization and describe their impact
6.
Show how social or demographic characteristics (such as education, income, ethnicity, region,
religion, and so forth) are linked to political values
7.
Outline and explain important factors that shape issue positions of nonideologues
8.
Analyze how the two-dimensional typology of political ideology presented in Chapter 1 applies to
the actual distribution of political opinions among Americans
CHAPTER SYNOPSIS
The history of capital punishment in the United States demonstrates several characteristics of public
opinion: (1) The public’s attitudes toward a given government policy vary over time. (2) Public opinion
places boundaries on allowable types of public policy. (3) Citizens are willing to register opinions on
matters outside their expertise. (4) Governments tend to react to public opinion. (5) The government
sometimes does not do what the people want. If the government does not do what the people want, can
it properly be called a democracy? This chapter compares the majoritarian and pluralist models of
democracy (introduced in Chapter 2) by focusing on their assumptions about public opinion and
examining the validity of those assumptions.
Before the development of opinion polling, there was no reliable way to know what the people wanted.
Sampling theory, combined with computer technology, has enabled researchers to study public opinion
much more accurately. The statistical theory of sampling is accurate if (1) the sample is selected
randomly; (2) the larger the sample, the more accurately it represents the population; (3) the greater the
variation within the population, the greater the chance one random sample will differ from another.
Two important characteristics of the distribution of public opinion are its shape (skewed, bimodal, and
normal or bell-shaped) and its stability over time.
The process of political socialization—how people acquire their values through the interplay of cultural
factors, knowledge, and ideology—underlies the formation of public opinion. The family, schools, and
the community and peers are early agents of political socialization. Later influences include neighbors,
fellow workers, club members, the mass media, and the voting experience. Political values, the
foundation of public opinion, are shaped differently for each individual through the political
socialization process. Still, people with similar social backgrounds tend to share similar political
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Chapter 5: Public Opinion and Political Socialization
55
opinions. Education, income, region, religion and religiosity, race, and ethnicity are all factors that
affect values. Of these, the latter three produce greater opinion divergence today on issues that
compromise freedom at the expense of either order or equality.
Most people will classify themselves along a liberal-conservative continuum, but few will reflect true
ideological thinking in public opinion surveys. A two-dimensional framework for assessing the values
of order and equality yields four ideological categories of comparable size. Liberals favor equality, but
not order. Conservatives want government to enforce order, but not equality. Libertarians oppose
government actions for either purpose. Communitarians want more government action to promote
both order and equality. Liberals and conservatives have less difficulty placing themselves on a
traditional liberal-conservative scale than do communitarians or libertarians.
People who lack a consistent set of political attitudes and beliefs rely on four factors to form political
opinion: self-interest, information processing, opinion schemas—or preexisting knowledge and
opinions that are applied to specific issues—and political leadership. Despite the complexities of
individual opinion formation, strong correlations have been found between people’s social background
and general values and their specific opinions.
In some instances, public opinion appears to be stable and well defined and thus in conformity with the
majoritarian model of government decision making. More often, public opinion is sharply divided,
inconsistent, and based on relatively superficial knowledge. Politically powerful groups frequently are
at odds over what policies government should adopt. Division and disagreement among influential,
competing interests allow leeway for political decision makers to rely less on disparate public opinion
and more on bargaining and compromise, a pattern more characteristic of the pluralist model. Public
opinion is viewed as a force that rarely casts the decisive vote, but one that helps set broad parameters
for government policy.
PARALLEL LECTURE 5.1
This lecture parallels the treatment of public opinion and political socialization in the text.
I.
II.
Introduction
A. Public opinion: the collected attitudes of the citizens concerning a given issue or question.
B. Characteristics of public opinion
1. The public’s attitudes toward a given government policy can vary over time, often
dramatically.
2. Public opinion places boundaries on allowable types of public policy.
3. If asked by pollsters, citizens are willing to register opinions on matters outside their
expertise.
4. Governments tend to respond to public opinion.
5. The government sometimes does not do what people want.
Public opinion and the models of democracy
A. Opinion polling
1. Involves interviewing a sample of citizens to estimate public opinion as a whole
2. A reliable way to measure public opinion
B. Sampling a few, predicting to many
1. Statistical theory of sampling: a sample of individuals selected by chance from any
population is representative of that population.
2. Factors determining the accuracy of a sample
a) How the sample is selected: randomly
b) Size of the sample: larger is more accurate.
c) Amount of variation in the population: greater population variation leads to
differing random samples.
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56
Chapter 5: Public Opinion and Political Socialization
3.
Most national polls survey about fifteen hundred people and are accurate 95 percent of
the time within 3 percent.
4. Polls can still be wrong because of other factors, such as question wording.
C. The models of democracy make different assumptions about public opinion.
1. Majoritarian model: assumes that a majority of the people holds clear consistent
opinions on government policy
2. Pluralist model: assumes the public is often uninformed and ambivalent about specific
issues
III. The distribution of public opinion
A. Shape of the distribution
1. The shape of the distribution refers to the pattern or physical form of the responses
when counted and plotted. (See text Figure 5.2.)
a) Skewed distribution: an asymmetrical but generally bell-shaped distribution of
opinion; its mode, or most frequent response, lies off to one side.
b) Bimodal distribution: a distribution of opinions that shows two responses being
chosen about as frequently as each other.
c) Normal distribution: a symmetrical bell-shaped distribution centered on a single
mode, or around the most frequent response.
2. Implications of the distributions
a) When public opinion is normally distribution, the public tends to support
moderate policy on an issue.
b) When opinion is bimodal (sharply divided), there is great potential for political
conflict.
c) When opinion is skewed, most respondents share the same opinion, and those
with a minority opinion risk social ostracism.
B. Stability of the distribution
1. Stable distribution: a distribution of opinions that shows little change over time.
a) Some political attitudes change very little over time.
(1) Capital punishment
(2) Ideological orientations
b) Sometimes attitudes shift within sub-groups, but are not reflected in over-all
public opinion (e.g., college students were much more liberal in the 1970s).
c) Political attitudes can change dramatically (e.g., racial integration of public
education).
IV. Political socialization
A. Political socialization: the complex process by which people acquire their political values
B. The agents of early socialization
1. Two principles characterize early learning:
a) The primacy principle: what is learned first is learned best.
b) The structuring principle: what is learned first structures what is learned later.
2. Influence of any socialization agent depends on:
a) Extent of one’s exposure to it
b) One’s communication with it
c) One’s receptivity to it
C. Agents of early socialization
1. Family
a) Children learn a wide range of values—including political values—from their
parents.
b) Children learn party identification in much the same way they learn religion.
(1) If both parents strongly identify with the same party, children are likely to
adopt that identification.
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Chapter 5: Public Opinion and Political Socialization
(2)
V.
57
Those who change their partisanship are more likely to shift to being
independent than to shift to the other party.
c) Children are socialized more reliably into religion than political party because
(1) Most parents care more about religion than politics.
(2) Religious institutions recognize the value of socialization.
2. School
a) Elementary schools (not higher education)
(1) Introduce authority figures outside the family
(2) Teach the nation’s slogans and symbols
(3) Stress the norms of group behavior and democratic decision making
(4) Children generally leave primary school with a sense of national pride and
an idealized notion of government.
b) Secondary schools
(1) Often teach civic responsibility
(2) Offer more explicitly political content
(3) Create greater awareness of the political process and its most prominent
participants
(4) End up learning much more about the politics of your era than previous era
c) College level
(1) Can be like high school, or very different: depends on encouragement to
question authority
(2) Attitude change is more likely to come from sustained interactions with
peers than from particular courses.
3. The community and peers
a) Community: people of all ages with who you come in contact because they live
or work near you.
(1) Homogeneous communities exert strong pressure to conform.
(2) Schools may introduce conflicting values.
b) Peers: your friends, classmates and coworkers; usually your age
(1) Groups may offer protection against community pressures.
(2) Allow individuals to develop political attitudes that may be substantially
different from their parents and other community authority figures
D. Continuing socialization
1. Peers assume greater importance in adulthood.
2. Mass media emerge as socialization agents.
a) Older Americans tend to rely on newspaper and television.
b) Younger American tend to turn to radio, magazines, and the Internet.
3. Memory, self-interest, and exposure becoming increasingly important
Social groups and political values
A. People with similar backgrounds share similar experiences and tend to develop similar
political opinions.
B. Two National Election Study questions illustrate commonalities and differences:
1. Under what conditions, if any, should abortion be permitted? (freedom versus order)
2. Do you think the government should guarantee a job to everyone willing to work?
(freedom versus equality)
3. Responses to these questions were analyzed according to education, income, region,
race and ethnicity, religion, and gender. (See text Figure 5.4.)
C. Education
1. College-educated individuals are likely to choose freedom over social order (believing,
for example, that abortion is a woman’s choice).
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58
Chapter 5: Public Opinion and Political Socialization
2.
People with more education also tend to favor freedom over equality (less likely to
support government guaranteed jobs and living standards).
D. Income
1. Wealth is consistently linked to opinions favoring limited government role in
promoting order and equality.
2. Has the same effect as education
E. Region
1. Regional differences have declined in importance.
2. Movement of people and wealth to the South and Southwest has equalized income in
the various regions.
3. Greater regional difference on social issues than on economic issues
F. Race and ethnicity
1. Ethnic minority groups
a) European ethnics: Irish, Italians, Germans, Poles—largely Catholics and Jews—
who came in the late 1800s and early 1900s
b) African Americans
c) Hispanics
(1) Largest minority group in the United States
(2) Consist of both whites and nonwhites
(3) People of Latin American origin called Latinos/Latinas; people who speak
Spanish called Hispanics (Haitians and Brazilians are Latino but generally
not Hispanic)
d) Asians and Native Americans
2. African Americans and other minorities display similar political attitudes on questions
about equality.
a) Racial minorities tend to have low socio-economic status: position in society,
based on a combination of education, occupational status, and income.
b) Minorities have benefited from government actions in support of equality.
3. The abortion issue produces less difference from whites.
G. Religion
1. Religious makeup of the United States
a) 53 percent Protestant
b) 25 percent Catholic
c) 2.6 percent Jewish
d) 19 percent No affiliation or other
2. Religiosity has little effect on attitudes about economic equality.
3. Religiosity has a powerful influence on attitudes about social order.
a) Evangelicals and Jews strongly differ on abortion.
b) Evangelicals and Jews both support Israel.
H. Gender
1. Women are more likely than men to support social equality.
2. Less difference between men and women on the abortion issue
VI. From values to ideology
A. The degree of ideological thinking in public opinion
1. There is little evidence that voters have ever used ideological labels with facility.
2. Most people use the terms “liberal” and “conservative” in generic ways.
3. The tendency to use appropriate ideological terms grows with education.
4. Ideologues hold a consistent set of values and beliefs about the purpose and scope of
government and tend to evaluate candidates in ideological terms.
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Chapter 5: Public Opinion and Political Socialization
a)
59
Although most Americans readily place themselves along a simple liberalconservative continuum, few understand what those words mean in an explicitly
political sense.
b) Many seem to choose the easy response and locate themselves in the center, or
“moderate,” category because they do not clearly understand the alternatives.
B. The quality of ideological thinking in public
1. People describe themselves as liberal or conservative for symbolic value as much for
reasons of ideology.
2. Two themes emerge in people’s descriptions of liberal and conservative.
a) People associate liberals with change and conservatives with tradition (the
freedom-order continuum).
b) People feel liberals support intervention to promote economic equality and
conservatives favor more individual economic freedom (the freedom-equality
continuum).
C. Ideological types in the United States (See Figure 5.5.)
1. Liberals, 23 percent of respondents
2. Conservatives, 32 percent
3. Libertarians, 22 percent
4. Communitarians, 24 percent
D. People do not decide about government activity according to a one-dimensional ideological
stand
E. Differences between social groups
1. Communitarians
a) Prominent among minorities and people with little education and low income
b) Tend to be concentrated in southern states
2. Libertarians
a) Concentrated among people with more education and higher income
b) Tend to live in the western states and a few northeastern states
3. Midwesterners tend to be conservative.
4. Northeasterners tend to be liberal.
5. Men are more likely to be conservative or libertarian than are women.
6. Women are more likely to be liberal or communitarian than are men.
VII. Forming political opinions
A. Political Knowledge
1. Americans may be ideologically unsophisticated but still well-informed.
2. More than half of the public knows basic political information.
a) Education is the strongest single predictor of political knowledge.
b) Other cultural and structural factors may keep minorities and women from
developing the same level of knowledge as white males.
3. Political knowledge is unrelated to ideological self-placement.
4. Individuals with strong belief in certain causes may be impervious to information that
questions their beliefs.
5. Some researchers hold that collective opinion is stable and meaningful, balancing
ignorance on both sides of issues.
B. Costs, benefits, and cues
1. The self-interest principle: the implication that people choose what benefits them
personally.
a) Plays an obvious role in how people form opinions about policies with clear costs
and benefits
b) Group leaders may cue group members on costs and benefits.
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Chapter 5: Public Opinion and Political Socialization
2.
C.
Individuals may be unable to determine personal costs or benefits regarding some
policy issues (e.g., foreign policy).
3. Individuals may use heuristics (mental shortcuts that require hardly any information) to
make fairly reliable political judgments.
Political leadership
1. Opinion is molded by political leaders, journalists, and policy experts.
2. Citizens with favorable views of a politician may be more likely to support his or her
values and agenda.
a) Issue framing: the way that politicians or interest group leaders define an issue
when presenting it to others; it is also called “spin.”
b) Framing can change or reinforce public opinion.
3. Ability of political leaders to influence opinion has been enhanced by growth of the
broadcast media
INTERACTIVE MEDIA LECTURE 5.1: “VOTE FOR PEDRO”
Napoleon Dynamite and the Political Socialization Process
The process of running for and electing a class or school president is considered to be an integral part of
the political socialization process. This process is normally regarded as a chance for students to
experience the highs and lows of the political process and to make real choices that have implications
for themselves and their peers. The movie Napoleon Dynamite dramatizes this process and gives
students the opportunity to consider the values we attach to the democratic process.
The movie is set in the town of Preston, Idaho. The main character, Napoleon Dynamite, befriends the
new kid at school, Pedro Sanchez. Pedro and his family have recently immigrated to the United States
from Juarez, Mexico. Pedro decides to run for school president; his competition is the most popular girl
in the school, Summer Wheatley. There is very mild tension between the candidates, mostly because
Pedro’s candidacy seems absolutely ridiculous. The candidates are given a chance to make speeches
and present short skits before the vote is taken, and it is here that the impossible happens.
Begin the class by showing the video. If you have minimal time, begin your video at the 1 hour 16
minute mark; if using a DVD, begin it at Chapter 17 (Candidate Speeches). You will show a 10 minute
clip (to the movie’s end).
If you have more time, begin your video at the 53 minute mark; if using a DVD, begin it at Chapter 14
(Pedro for President). You will show a 35 minute clip. (This provides much more material for
discussion, and is highly recommended because it provides more examples of the socialization process.)
I.
II.
Aspects of the socialization process
A. Ask students to list what types of political socialization activities they saw in the video.
B. Discuss the relevance of class elections as a socialization activity.
1. What does going through the class election process (in real life) teach students about
democracy?
2. How does what they saw in the video compare to their own experience?
The impossible happens
A. Why is Pedro’s victory considered a triumph?
B. What are the possible lessons the students of Preston High School could take away from this
election?
1. Lessons about the role of the citizen in the political process
2. Lessons about the role of underdogs in the political process
3. Other lessons
C. What lessons might movie viewers take away?
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Chapter 5: Public Opinion and Political Socialization
61
III. Napoleon Dynamite as a form of political socialization
A. Discuss whether or not this really would be likely to happen in a typical American high
school.
1. If so, what does that say about democracy—do the masses rule?
2. If not, what does that say about elites—are the masses afraid not to follow?
B. Napoleon Dynamite has been very popular with young people since it was released in 2004.
1. What message does this movie send to viewers about the democratic process?
2. Is that a realistic message—or are viewers destined to be disappointed by the
difference between this message and the realities of adult electoral politics?
FOCUS LECTURE 5.1: AN INTERACTIVE LECTURE
Attitudes Toward Government
The purpose of this interactive lecture is to involve students in evaluating their views of government.
Depending on the degree of diversity among your students, you can help American-born students gain a
fresh perspective as they hear from their foreign-born classmates, or you can help your more privileged
students hear the perspectives of those from a lower socioeconomic status or racial minority. Remember
to inform students in advance that they must read the material and come to class prepared to discuss it.
I.
Begin with a brainstorming session. Write the questions on the board and let each student write
his or her own answers, stream-of-consciousness style. Tell students that they will not be graded
on this assignment, but that everyone must participate by writing and thinking. You can circulate
to peek at their work and offer supportive comments. Use the following questions, and if
necessary, get things started by suggesting some examples, like those inside the parentheses.
A. Which government leaders do I feel are trustworthy?
B. What government services do I find dependable?
C. What government agencies do I use in a consistent manner? (Motor Vehicle Department or
public college or university)
D. Which government leaders do I feel are not trustworthy?
E. What government services do I find unreliable?
F. What government agencies do I avoid? (Selective Service, perhaps, or welfare)
II. After most students have finished, ask them to share their answers. (Some may never finish, and
you won’t have time to wait for them.) Lead a discussion in which you point out interesting
parallels, contradictions, or conflicts in their answers. You might want to ask the following
questions:
A. How many of you indicated trust in [fill in the names of politicians frequently mentioned by
your students]?
B. How many of you indicated mistrust of [name of politicians in question A]?
C. How many of you agreed on the dependable government agencies? Which ones were they?
Why?
D. How many of you agreed on the unreliable services? Which ones? Why?
III. Ask students to evaluate their attitudes toward government leaders, services, and agencies in terms
of their general political labels (conservative or liberal).
A. How many conservative students had the expected antigovernment attitudes?
B. How many liberals had the expected pro-government attitudes?
C. What inconsistencies or contradictions could students identify between their labels and their
actual attitudes?
IV. Ask students to evaluate the role that income, race, religion, gender, and other such characteristics
play in their attitudes.
A. Is there an observable gender gap among students?
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Chapter 5: Public Opinion and Political Socialization
B. Is there a noticeable difference in attitude based on race or ethnicity?
C. Is there an observable difference in attitude based on income or socioeconomic status?
V. Ask students to poll their parents and friends on the same questions and to report their findings to
the class at a later meeting (or on the course website, if you maintain one).
VI. Remind students that this type of polling is unscientific and is not appropriate for gathering data,
except for anecdotal and personal purposes. Discuss the differences between this type of polling
and random sampling, if time permits. What type of biases might your students expect in their
“mini-poll”?
PROJECTS AND ACTIVITIES
1.
Have students write out a demographic profile of themselves that would be relevant to any poll or
survey. They should use the text to determine the relevant factors (such as gender, race, religion,
age, location, income, and so on). Then have students share their profiles and discuss whether
your classroom is representative of the nation as a whole, explaining why it is or is not.
2.
Select a recent national poll on a topic of interest to students that is related to the course. (Good
sources include the New York Times, U.S. News & World Report, and, on the World Wide Web,
<www.ropercenter.uconn.edu> and <www.gallup.com/>.) Administer some of the poll questions
to your students, and then discuss their answers in view of the national poll results. What factors
would account for any differences? Let students comment freely on the questions and on any
concerns they have about polling techniques and conclusions.
3.
Use feature 5.1 to generate class discussion. Why were the students’ parents, as a whole, more
liberal than college students today? What events influenced their parents’ political views? Were
any socioeconomic factors particularly relevant? What cultural and technological factors should
be considered? Help students to discuss how factors such as the Vietnam War, relative national
prosperity, the Cold War, the beginnings of Watergate, and television influenced their parents’
political beliefs. What factors (economic, cultural, technological, and political) are relevant to the
political beliefs of college students today?
4.
Ask students to think about their first political memories. Did they arise from overtly political
events, or did apolitical incidents or events affect their political outlook? At what age did they first
become aware of politics? Which agent(s) of political socialization were involved? What effects
did students’ earliest political experiences have on them? Have their opinions changed since then?
Why? Also use this discussion as an opportunity for students to learn from individuals who grew
up in other countries or are from different socioeconomic backgrounds, religions, regions, and so
on.
INTERNET RESOURCES
Pew Research Center for the People & the Press www.people-press.org
See many surveys and access research material on a host of topics of interest.
General Social Survey www.icpsr.umich.edu/GSS
Gain access to over twenty-five hundred questions answered by more than thirty-five thousand
respondents.
Select Smart www.selectsmart.com/FREE/select.php?client=zeron
Take a poll to see where you fit politically in the United States.
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