Partnerships with respected market research firms

The Elon University Poll works with highly respected public opinion and market research firms to collect data for its surveys, including YouGov, Ipsos and others. These firms typically use web-based, self-administered online panels.

Reporting Information and Weighting

The respondents to Elon University Polls are matched to a sampling frame on gender, age, race and education. The sampling frame is designed to be a politically representative “modeled frame” of U.S. adults or North Carolina adults, depending on the survey. The matched cases are weighted to the sampling frame using propensity scores. The surveys include attention checks, with speeders and skippers removed from the data.

All crosstabs must have at least 60 unweighted respondents per column in order to report their results. Every crosstab result reported in the release appears in the crosstabs.

All information about the Elon University Poll that is released to the public conforms to reporting conventions recommended by the American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR). The raw datasets from the Elon University Poll are owned and maintained by Elon University.

Question Construction and Question Order

With every release, the Elon University Poll provides a detailed topline report listing the questions as worded and the order in which these questions are administered to respondents. In an effort to provide neutral, non-biased questions, we observe conventional question wording and question order protocols in all of our polls. Though not exhaustive by any means, examples of such protocols/practices include: avoiding the use of jargon and ambiguous terms; avoiding any priming or leading questions; wording questions succinctly and specifically; avoiding ‘double-barreled’ questions that ask about multiple topics in one question; ensuring reasonable response options that conform to topic/question.