Election polls elicit from individuals forecasts of
their prospective voting behavior. Standard verbal polling questions
do not enable respondents to adequately express uncertainty about
whether they will vote and, if so, for whom. This paper puts forward
the idea of probabilistic polling, which elicits from respondents
numerical subjective probabilities of voting. The probability scale
enables respondents to fully express uncertainty about their future
voting behavior and enables analysts to aggregate voting expectations
into predictions of election outcomes. Empirical experience with
probabilistic elicitation of many types of expectations suggests
that probabilistic polling is practical.
Charles F. Manski, Department
of Economics, Northwestern University
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