Effects (and Defects) of the Telephone Survey in Polling Research: Are We Abusing the Telephone Survey?

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to evaluate the adaptation of telephone surveys to electoral forecasting to see if they show substantial improvements when compared to face-to-face surveys. To do so, two similar samples were used, one surveyed with face-to-face interviews and the other using telephone interviews. The objective is to compare the results in answering three questions concerning: 1) the important differences in results of the two methods which could notably affect their extrapolation; 2) telephone surveys’ higher evaluation of the intention to vote and more sincere responses (closer to the electoral results); 3) the important differences in the evaluation of the economic and political situation, definition of the most important social problems, and nationalist and regionalist sentiments.