Survey supporting same-sex marriage branded 'flawed' by Catholic Church

LOL love this so much because of how silly they are.

 

Ha, well to be fair, they are pretty much correct. As someone who just finished reading chapter one of elementary statistics (which makes me an expert) using the word "right" in the context of that poll question creates a biased question. You could replace the word right with abomination and get a different effect, because that descriptor elicits a certain subconcious response.

 

Yes perfectly trustworthy, seeing as how the Catholic church is such a renowed scientific institution.....

---------- Post added 21st Jun 2012 at 09:25 AM ----------

Right refers here to the right to do something, not right from right and wrong.

 

Well, you couldn't replace it with "abomonation", but you're right. The wording WAS carefully chosen so that people would tend to choose in favor of same-sex marriage. I hate to admit it, but to be fair, in this case the church is right to complain.

 

I realize what "right" refers to in the poll question. Right is a biased descriptor. If someone made a poll about the "right" of smokers to smoke in restaurants the results would probably be noticably different from a poll question asking simply if smokers should be able to smoke in restaurants.

---------- Post added 21st Jun 2012 at 10:50 AM ----------

Ya your right, you couldn't just swap the words. But you know what I mean.

 

I disagree, those two question are exactly the same: if you believe people have the right to smoke in restaurants they wouldn't say they shouldn't be allowed to smoke in restaurants.
It's perfectly valid question to ask if people think chruches have the right to preform ssm.

 

It's not a question of whether it's a valid question. The words used to ask a question can influence the response, that's why the survey's results are invalid. By using positive descriptors, you skew results in a positive direction regardless of whether the words are used positively in the questions (like which definition of "right" is actually in use).

Using the smoking example, if you had two different surveys one which asked "Should smokers have the right to smoke in restaurants?" and another that asked "Should smokers be able to smoke in restaurants?" you would find a higher positive response in the first survey than the second. It's a well studied phenomenom and one of the reasons surveys are usually very carfully constructed to avoid.

 

To compound matters further, someone has taken the skewed results and interpreted them as support for ssm. The question doesn't ask that at all. A person can be in favor of upholding organizations' 'rights' to perform same-sex marriages, without being personally in favor of it at all. (You go ahead if you want to, I won't be joining you.) For example, I could personally feel that a local exclusive club should be loosening their criteria for membership (They're too exclusive) but then defend their right to choose their members.