Gallup's 7-day average is revealing something about Polling

[cthulu2016]

You know how it is always said that tracking polls jump around, and not to take their short-term twists and turns too seriously?

Gallup managed to make their tracking poll a national footnote simply by taking the responsible step of expanding the rolling sample from 3 days to 7 days.

And now nobody talks about it because there's nothing to talk about. It never changes! It's always between 45-47 one way way or another... for a month.

There's a real lesson here. A tracking poll is valued because it is exciting. And smoothing it out with a 7-day sample defeats its real purpose, which is to be entertaining. To give people something to discuss, worry over, exult about, and to provide some hook for requisite daily election news stories.


http://www.gallup.com/poll/150743/Obama-Romney.aspx

[fugop]

1. What a great point

And absolutely on target.

[Drunken Irishman]

2. Very good point...

The media hangs on these flash polls that show the race moving on direction or the other. They eat it up. Gallup has been remarkably stable for a while now and I think they're more closely realistic than Gallup.

[RandySF]

3. I thought a poll is supposed to be a snapshot.

A seven-day average defeats the purpose.