| Abstract: | The 1930s saw the birth of mass survey research in America.Large public polling companies, such as Gallup and Roper, begansurveying the public about a variety of important issues ona monthly basis. These polls contain information on public opinionquestions of central importance to political scientists, historians,and policymakers, yet these data have been largely overlookedby modern researchers due to problems arising from the datacollection methods. In this article I provide a strategy toproperly analyze the public opinion data of the 1930s and 1940s.I first describe the quota-control methods of survey researchprevalent during this time. I then detail the problems introducedthrough the use of quota-control techniques. Next, I describespecific strategies that researchers can employ to amelioratethese problems in data analysis at both the aggregate and individuallevels. Finally, I use examples from several pubic opinion studiesin the early 1940s to show how the methods of analysis laidout in this article enable us to utilize historical public opiniondata. |
