The 2005/06 British Election Study David Sanders Paul Whiteley Harold Clarke Marianne Stewart

BES Objectives Overview of proposed study design Continuity Substantive innovation Methodological innovation Why internet surveys are necessary now Increasing response rates Outline

BES Objectives Study long-term trends in British voting behaviour Explain the election outcome Explain party choice Explain turnout Examine election effects on British politics

Continuity With Previous BES Core survey uses national face-to-face probability sample Primary instrument is post-election face-to-face survey Significant over-samples in Scotland and Wales Retain all key questions that are part of long-run series since Retain long-standing questions on ideology, economic perceptions and issue positions, introduced after Retain questions added in 2001 to explain turnout and to explore attitudes towards elections, parties, and the democratic process.

Substantive Innovations Explaining party choice: enhanced measures of valence judgments (e.g., public service delivery), the sources of valence judgements (e.g., leader and party heuristics, role of emotions) and party campaigns Explaining turnout: enhanced measures of civic duty, efficacy and their sources Explaining attitudes towards British democracy: enhanced measures of political trust and orientations towards politics and democracy Results of Consultation Exercise

Methodological Innovations New steps (including modest financial incentives) to boost response rates and increase the representativeness of the face-to-face sample. Survey mode comparisons between face-to-face and internet surveys Sampling frame comparison between ‘conventional’ internet sample and internet users drawn from probability sample Internet experiments to develop better measures (e.g. feedback to respondents) and ways of assessing media effects.

Why an Internet Survey? Advantages: Cost, Speed, Experiments Weaknesses: Demography, Sampling bias Low response in RDD samples No theory of low response sample bias Empirical record basis for evaluation No significant differences in RDD vs Internet marginals or models (vote, protest, Iraq War)

Increasing Response Rates BES response rates to 63% in 1997 and 53% in 2001 with postcode address file rather than electoral register. BES response rates strongly correlated with turnout (r=.75). Both may rise in 2005 but we cannot afford to be complacent. Experiments and evidence from PSID and BHPS indicates that financial and other incentives boost response rates. We will use a mix of incentives, devised in close consultation with fieldwork agency.

Conclusion: Key Features Continuity with previous BES surveys Emphasis on theory-driven data collection Substantive innovations: valence, turnout, trust Methodological innovations: internet surveys, experiments, and testing the representativeness of internet instruments Effort to increase response rates Early delivery of data to user community