Polling In The Referendum

[DTCwordfan]

Not a point about the politics of being In or Out but the polls.

Why is it in all the recent polls that the telephone surveys show a strong IN preference and lead over the Brexiters, some variance on the Don't Knows....and then all the online votes show it being fairly even-stevens and a few with the OUTs marginally ahead, again with a fairly good spread of DKs but thinner.....?????

We need some statistical analysis, my suspicion being that the telephones are more random in selection..... Question for Mikey if he is around?

[New Judge]

"The AB Poll is similar (if at least restricted to one person, one vote),.."

I can confirm that the AB poll is restricted to one vote per person. If you access the question having already voted you are presented with the results and cannot see the "voting form".

I think Ab Editor should provide a "postal voting" option so that I can get a wheelbarrow full of blank voting papers for the "occupants" of an empty house near me !!!

[jim360]

In more serious surveys there is still a real effect, and one I find slightly surprising, eg at the most recent polls reported the methods and results are as follows:

Survation -- Telephone -- Remain +8 ;
ICM -- online -- Leave +2 ;
ComRes -- Telephone -- Remain + 11;
ORB -- Telephone -- Remain + 8;
Ipsos MORI -- Telephone -- Remain + 10;
YouGov -- online -- Leave/ remain tied;
Opinium -- online -- Leave +4;

These patterns generally hold through all polls, although there are some cases where Leave wins over Remain in phone polls; but they are, or appear to be, rarer.

How odd. In both cases the sample is, in principle, random. Perhaps the catch is that YouGov, for example, only conducts surveys among people who have signed up for YouGov, so you had to be interested enough in wanting to take polls to join in... will that skew things so much? No idea.

See also https://ig.ft.com/sites/brexit-polling/ , which helpfully distinguishes online v. telephone polls graphically.

[Togo]

http://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/eu-referendum-poll-shows-britain-split-50-50-but-higher-turnout-among-older-voters-could-tip-country-into-brexit/ar-BBsr2jy?li=BBoPWjQ&;ocid=edgsp

Interesting poll.