It's how you ask the question that matters

[andrewducker]

The New York Times took a poll.  They asked half the people whether they thought that gay men and lesbians should be allowed to serve openly in the US army.  60% said yes.  They asked the other half whether they thought that homosexuals should be allowed to serve openly in the US army.  44% said yes.

One can only assume that people are made of crazy.  And stupid.

From

Comments

[meihua.livejournal.com]

No, you should assume that their views are lightly held, so that a small difference in phrasing will change them.

[andrewducker]

If their views are so lightly held that a change in phrasing with identical meaning causes them to change them then they are crazy. And stupid.

[meihua.livejournal.com]

No, they are not insane, and they are not idiots. They are selfish and disinterested.

[andrewducker]

Clearly insane. Clearly idiots.

(How long do you think we can keep this up for? Think we can get anyone else to join in?)

[meihua.livejournal.com]

This comment makes no sense to me, sorry.

[akicif.livejournal.com]

Uninterested, surely. To be disinterested is a positive quality, akin to being impartial....

(Sorry to nitpick, but that one drives me up the wall)

[hawkida.livejournal.com]

Are they identical? If you believe that men should be able to serve and women shouldn't, then you'd answer no to the first and yes to the second, wouldn't you? Although I'd expect the figures to skew in the opposite direction based on that.

How big was the answering sample? If there were 100 people in each then it could be simple differences of opinion that only average out as the sample size increases massively.

[andrewducker]

The national telephone poll was conducted with 1,084 adults Feb. 5-10 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus four percentage points for each half sample. Complete poll results and article will be available this evening at www.nytimes.com.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

Semiotics. They're interesting and important. No, two apparently equivalent words do not, in real world terms, mean the same thing.

[andrewducker]

Of course not - "gay man" includes the word "man", which has a humanising effect on the people you're talking to, priming them to respond in a more empathic manner towards the subject you're asking them about.

I still despair though.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

Above certainly wasn't meant to imply that you didn't already know that, of course!

There are vast applications of semiotics to all sorts of humanities fields. F'rex, the semiotics of academic gender studies jargon are virtually guaranteed to get them exactly the audience, positive and negative, that they indeed gain.

[andrewducker]

Yup - when people use in-group language with out-groups and expect the same reaction then both sides tend to get a nasty shock.

[andrewducker]

Oh, and I don't mind people assuming I don't know stuff - my knowledge of semiotics comes almost entirely from a copy of "semiotics for beginners" that I picked up a few years back. Same with critical theory and postmodernism :->

[ahsirakh.livejournal.com]

Also, "homosexual" draws attention to the act of sex more than "gay men and lesbians" does.

[badbookworm.livejournal.com]

That's what I came here to say. The phrasing of the first question was humanising.

It is still depressing, though, that people's opinions are so easily manipulated. Not to mention a but worrying.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

Well, the fast-in-fast-out of a poll is the ideal forum to show dramatic results.

What worries me is that the various gay activism groups haven't done such thorough research that this is old news. Control the dialogue, people.

[meaningrequired.livejournal.com]

I saw something in the BPS digest, suggesting how you frame something can change a person's thought processes toward it. I think we all make (unconscious) associations and the word "homosexuals" might be triggering to some people but "gay men and lesbians" don't seem to hold the same impact.

http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2010/02/how-framing-affects-our-thought.html

[meaningrequired.livejournal.com]

Ah, I see you're already discussing that kind of angle with cairmen :)

[andrewducker]

Always nice to have you commenting though!

[meaningrequired.livejournal.com]

I know, but I hate commenting the obvious unless I have something interesting to add :)

[andrewducker]

Isn't that one of the founding concepts used in CBT? That how you frame something strongly affects how you think about it?

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

"68% think we spend too much on foreign aid. 59% think it should be cut"

(Yeah, the semiotics comments are more relevant, but this is funnier!)

[andrewducker]

On a similar note, there was a recent poll put together by The Metro (owned by The Mail), which said "We spend X amount on foreign aid - is this enough?"

Because most people said "Yes" they led with a headline of "We're spending enough - stop now!". If most people had answered no then they could have led with "We're not spending enough! Spend more!" and either way round the government looks bad...

[badbookworm.livejournal.com]

Then you get headlines like "Is Andrew Ducker Corrupt?" or even "Andrew Ducker Not Corrupt, Claims Government Spokesman", which immediately make people think Andrew Ducker is corrupt even if it has never previously crossed their minds.

I'm sure you're not corrupt, btw.

[andrewducker]

Well, not _very_.