The Stupid Surveys
Posted on Monday 1 February 2016
The
Stupid Surveys
By Apolinario Villalobos
Nowadays, there are so many surveys
conducted by various survey firms which are of course paid for by parties that will
benefit from the “expected” favorable results. Big companies, political units
and even nations spend so much money for the flattering and self-serving
favorable results. Surveys can be effective only if the whole targeted
responders are captured, but if not even 1% of the total has been interviewed
for their views…then, the survey results should better be told to the Marines!
How can for instance a survey, give
assurance that a certain candidate will surely win during an election when the
majority of the voting population has not been interviewed? To top it all, their
assurance is based on a further confusing mathematical formula. So, there’s the
trick – the more confused the ordinary citizens become, the better for these
survey firms to insist that they are right, and the more that they make their
clients happy. They want the ordinary citizens to believe that the results are
products of “highly intelligent” surveys…conducted by “intelligent” people! While some surveys are based on personal views
and opinions, others are on perception which make the results more “imagined”….unrealistic.
Simply stated, how can a personal view become representative of the rest,
opinions as truthful, and perception as generally realistic?
The way I see it, these surveys are the
workings of “research” firms that have run out of anything to do and clients
who trust them. They have come up with this novel idea that can flatter
egoistic groups that we call business firms, political groups, educational
institutions, and governments. These surveys are also the result of the
marketing strategies that need to be updated to make them attractive to
clients. Schools want to attract enrollees, business firms want more clients,
political groups want more donors and followers, and governments want a “third
opinion” that would qualify their claim for success in their administration…all
selfish objectives which at the end are supposed to be satisfied with
self-serving survey results, that would later find their way in advertising
spaces!
What the clients should do, instead of
squandering millions in surveys for self-serving results, is require their
advertising agencies to gather hard data from records that are available, to
support their contentions. The truthful and realistic information shall no
longer cause a single eyebrow to be raised every time the reports are splashed
on the front pages of dailies, as well as, broadcasted on air lane and TV
screen….at least, the doubting Thomas can be directed to the records on file.
Discussion