No protests this time over pre-election polls

All polling companies found key changes in political climate

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Opinion polls taken before Sunday’s municipal elections have not led to any protests.
     In the most recent Parliamentary elections last year, the National Coalition Party pointed out that a poll by the market research company Taloustutkimus had predicted a poorer result for the party, which actually made gains.
     This time, all pollsters were largely in agreement on political trends.
     
Political opinion surveys are not projections about the results of the elections, but professionals in the field nevertheless compare them with the outcomes of elections. The comparisons indicate whether or not the mood in public opinion has been on the right track.
     This time, Research International came closest to the actual result of the elections. The final figures in its last survey conducted by the organisation before the elections deviated from the result by a total of four percentage points, which experts consider a high degree of accuracy.
     Normal deviation is about five percentage points. In the latest election, the figure for Taloustutkimus was 4.8 per cent, and Suomen Gallup got a 5.4 per cent deviation.
     
All three polling groups put the National Coalition Party as the most popular, although with Suomen Gallup, the differences among the parties were very small. All of the research organisations also foresaw the rise of the True Finns, and the decline in support for the Social Democrats and the Centre.
     None of the pollsters were able to see that support for the Centre would be significantly lower than that for the SDP.
     Contrary to what was the case with the two other institutes, Suomen Gallup was not able to foresee the rise of the National Coalition Party to above 23 percent.
     Suomen Gallup also underestimated the support of the True Finns.
     Both Research International and Taloustutkimus gave better figures for the Greens than what ultimately turned out to be the case in the actual election.
     The last poll by Suomen Gallup gave the Greens a lower figure than what came out on election day. The discrepancy can be explained by differences in correction coefficients.
     
Taloustutkimus also came up with a new kind of research report that it called an “election forecast”. The Finnish Broadcasting Company (YLE) made it public in connection with its big election debate. The results of the poll were corrected according to what the interviewees stated as the degree of certainty with which they would vote.
     The results of the Taloustutkimus election forecast were closer to the actual election results for four parties than in its opinion poll. The deviation was higher with three parties, and one stayed the same. Overall, the “forecast” was closer than the poll, with a four point deviation from the election result.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Latest election poll shows National Coalition pulling away from closest rivals (24.10.2008)

Helsingin Sanomat