American Government Reflections

Chapter 16: Public Opinion

What is Public Opinion?
The public opinion of the government helps to influence many government issues and helps
voice the public's view on government policies. A person's personal opinion is based on their
personal life and experiences. Since the public opinion is made up of individual opinions, it is
crucial to examine the influences that help form these opinions. The first way that an opinion is
influenced is a person's ideology. Each person has a specific way that they believe the
government should run and basic ideas on concepts such as freedom, opportunity, and equality. I
think that these ideologies are formed relatively early in life and are greatly influenced by the
people that a person is associated with such as family, friends, and peers. This interaction with
others and their political beliefs is known as political socialization and it can greatly influence
the way that they will vote. I find it interesting that, even at an early age, children have political
party preferences and that they are frequently similar to their parents preferences. How great of a
role does the political preferences of family and friends affect the political preferences that
people develop? Do personal experiences or family opinion affect a person's political views
more? Then, the media also influences public opinion by providing information on government
issues and deciding how much coverage each issue gets. I think that the this influences the
strength of a person's opinion and influences how they perceive a topic. These influences on
public opinion can change how the public responds to government issues and elections.
Measuring Public Opinion
An issue surrounding public opinion is how to accurately measure what the public thinks
about the government and its policies. This is achieved by polling. However, polls must be
conducted in such a way that they produce accurate results and reflect the public opinion as a
whole. George Gallup, who founded modern polling, claimed that a random sample was needed
to provide accurate results rather than a larger sample. I believe that he is correct as as random
sample would help eliminate bias and would be more likely to represent the public collectively
rather than the opinions of one group. Additionally, question wording and order
must be carefully made to ensure more accurate results. I have taken surveys and tests where the
questions were worded strangely making it more confusing and harder to answer. This made it
difficult for me to determine what the survey wanted an answer to and affected the results. Then,
question order can affect the way in which I think about subjects. By placing some questions
before others, the poll may lead a person to think a certain way about a topic or draw connections
between two topic. Timing is also important as I am more likely to give more accurate results on
my opinion after events have unfold rather than before when I am still forming my opinions.
Several types of polls that are used today are: in-person interviews, telephone interviews, mail
questionnaires, and exit polls.
The Media and the Public Good
As stated previously, the media has a large influence on public opinion. Since government
censorship of the media is limited, the media acts as informants on government officials and
policies. This allows the media to help expose corruption and check the power of the
government. However, it also poses a problem as the media then decides what information they
will cover and how much time and importance to assign to them. This can give more importance
to issues that are of lesser importance. Then, many of the subjects that make the news have a

visual imagery associated with them and are almost always negative. I believe that the visual
imagery helps stories have more power and help people who learn through strong visual
communication. Also, I believe the news is usually negative because the negative aspects of
government are the subjects that are not functioning correctly or that may need reform and the
policies that are functioning correctly should not be news. I also think that it is difficult for the
media to remain objective as each reporter has their own political views that influence the easy
that they present the information. However, the media is only the informant and the public must
decide how to receive and use the information.