HKU POP SITE releases the latest ratings of the top 10 political groupsBack
| Press Release on June 2, 2009 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Special Announcement | Abstract | Latest Figures | Opinion Daily | Commentary | | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Special Announcement At the 18th anniversary of the Public Opinion Programme (POP) of the University of Hong Kong, in order to strengthen POP's anchorage to the world, and to construct a better China, the POP Site is gradually being revamped starting today. Robert Chung, the Director of POP, also issues an editor's note entitled "Nine plus Nine" for public consumption at http://hkupop.pori.hk. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Abstract POP conducted a double stage survey on the ranking of the top 10 political groups in May, by means of random telephone surveys conducted by real interviewers. The surveys find that compared to 3 months ago, HKASPDMC has re-entered the list this time after passing the recognition benchmark. It now ranks 7th with a record high rating since August 2002. On the other hand, AFA which ranked 10th last time has dropped out of the list due to relatively low recognition rate. The ratings of most groups on the list have increased, with CP and LP registering significant increases, and LSD and DAB registering significant drops. LSD's rating is now at record low since POP started to measure its rating since February 2007, probably due to the involvement of some members in the 'foul language incident'. In terms of relative rankings, FTU and HKCTU continue to occupy the 1st and 2nd places, while CP advances one position to become 3rd. Other than DAB dropping from the 3rd place to the 6th, the change in relative rankings of other groups is just within plus or minus 2 positions. The sampling errors of the ratings registered fall between +/-1.1 and 1.6 while the response rate of the rating survey is 68%. Points to note: * The address of the "HKU POP SITE" is http://hkupop.pori.hk, journalists can check out the details of the survey there. * The sample size of the first stage naming survey is 1,011 successful interviews, not 1,011 x 65.4% response rate, while the sample size of the second stage rating survey is 1,011 successful interviews, not 1,011 x 68.3% response rate. In the past, many media made this mistake. * "95% confidence level" means that if we were to repeat a certain survey 100 times, using the same questions each time but with different random samples, we would expect 95 times getting a figure within the error margins specified. Media can state " sampling error of various ratings not more than +/-1.6 at 95% confidence level" when quoting the rating figures. In view of the error margins, one decimal place can be used when quoting these rating figures. * The data of this survey is collected by means of random telephone interviews conducted by real interviewers, not by any interactive voice system (IVS). If a research organization uses "computerized random telephone survey" to camouflage its IVS operation, it should be considered unprofessional. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Latest Figures POP today releases on schedule via the POP Site the latest ratings of the top 10 political groups. As a general practice, all the figures have been weighted according to provisional figures obtained from the Census and Statistics Department regarding the gender-age distribution of the Hong Kong population in 2008 year-end. Herewith the contact information for the latest survey:
The research design of our "Top ten political groups" has been explained in detail under "Survey Method" in our corresponding web page. The top political groups listed in our latest survey were all those who obtained highest unprompted mentions in our first stage naming survey conducted from May 11 to 16, 2009. In that survey, respondents could name, unaided, up to 10 political groups whom they knew best. Democratic Alliance for Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), Democratic Party (DP), Liberal Party (LP), Civic Party (CP) and League of Social Democrats (LSD) were mentioned most frequently. Please refer to the relevant table in our website for the rest of the list. The 12 most frequently mentioned political groups then entered into the second stage rating survey. During that second stage survey conducted from May 19 to 22, 2009, respondents were asked to rate each political group in turn using a 0-100 scale. 0 indicates absolutely no support, 100 indicates absolute support, and 50 means half-half. After calculation, the bottom 2 political groups in terms of recognition rate were dropped, leaving behind the top 10. In case any group failed to reach the 50% benchmark recognition rate, it would also be dropped. It should, however, be noted that because political groups are not yet legal entities in Hong Kong, such definitions are rather vague, and so-called political groups are constantly evolving. As a result, strange names may appear in the list of groups mentioned by respondents in Stage One surveys. In order to avoid personal bias, our research team will eliminate groups which fall outside the popular definition only after the first stage of the survey. In the latest survey, our research team considered whether we should eliminate the Frontier from the list. However, since Frontier is still a legal entity, it has remained on our list. To facilitate readers follow our research process step by step, the POP Site has already displayed the results of all naming surveys conducted since July 1998. The latest ratings of the top 10 political groups, together with the previous ratings, are summarized below:
** Ratings with recognition rates not reaching top 10 in either stage of survey are not available. [ ] Number in square brackets indicates rankings. # Such changes have gone beyond the sampling errors at the 95% confidence level, meaning that they are statistically significant prima facie. However, whether numerical differences are statistically significant or not is not the same as whether they are practically useful or meaningful. Findings obtained in the second half of May showed that, the best-known political group was the Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions (FTU) which attained 52.6 marks. Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (HKCTU) and Civic Party (CP) ranked 2nd and 3rd, achieving 51.7 and 51.3 marks respectively. The 4th to 8th ranks fell to Hong Kong Association for Democracy & People's Livelihood (ADPL), Democratic Party (DP), Democratic Alliance for Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China (HKASPDMC) and Frontier with respective scores of 49.9, 48.8, 48.7, 48.0 and 47.6 marks. Liberal Party (LP) and League of Social Democrats (LSD) ranked the 9th and 10th, attaining 44.9 and 39.6 marks respectively. The mean score obtained by the top 5 political groups was 50.8 marks. For this latest survey, Neighbourhood and Worker's Service Centre (NWS) and Savantas Policy Institute obtained a support rating of 50.9 and 47.2 marks respectively, but they were dropped due to their relatively low recognition rates. The overall ratings ranked according to results obtained over the past 12 months are tabulated as follows:
** "Overall ranking" is first determined by their number of times on top 10, and then their average ratings. ^ Ratings with recognition rates not reaching top 10 in either stage of survey are not available. The overall rankings in the past 12 months showed that, the top 8 political groups were all listed for four times. FTU was in the top rank, achieving an average rating of 53.0 marks. HKCTU, CP and ADPL ranked 2nd to 4th, attaining 51.8, 51.1 and 50.3 marks respectively. Meanwhile, the 5th to 8th ranks fell to DAB, DP, Frontier and LP with respective scores of 49.0, 48.6, 46.7 and 44.2. LSD and AFA was listed for three times and ranked 9th and 10th, attaining 42.9 and 36.2 marks. HKASPDMC was listed for one time and ranked 11th. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Opinion Daily In January 2007, POP opened a feature page called "Opinion Daily" at the "POP Site", to record significant events and selected polling figures on a day-to-day basis, in order to let readers judge by themselves the reasons for the ups and downs of different opinion figures. In July 2007, POP collaborated with Wisers Information Limited whereby Wisers supplies to POP each day starting from July 24, a record of significant events of that day, according to the research method designed by POP. These daily entries would be uploaded to "Opinion Daily" as soon as they are verified by POP. For the polling items covered in this press release, the previous survey was conducted from February 16 to 18, 2009 while this survey was conducted from May 19 to 22, 2009. In between these two surveys, herewith the significant events selected from counting newspaper headlines and commentaries on a daily basis and covered by at least 25% of the local newspaper articles. Readers can make their own judgment if these significant events have any impacts to different polling figures.
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| Commentary Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, observed, "In our latest survey of 'Top 10 Political Groups', compared to 3 months ago, HKASPDMC has re-entered the list this time after passing the recognition benchmark. It now ranks 7th with a record high rating since August 2002. On the other hand, AFA which ranked 10th last time has dropped out of the list due to relatively low recognition rate. The ratings of most groups on the list have increased, with CP and LP registering significant increases, and LSD and DAB registering significant drops. LSD's rating is now at record low since POP started to measure its rating since February 2007, probably due to the involvement of some members in the 'foul language incident'. In terms of relative rankings, FTU and HKCTU continue to occupy the 1st and 2nd places, while CP advances one position to become 3rd. Other than DAB dropping from the 3rd place to the 6th, the change in relative rankings of other groups is just within plus or minus 2 positions. It should be noted, however, that our 'Top 10 Political Groups' only includes groups which are best known to the public, ranked according to their support ratings. Other political groups may well have very high or low support ratings, but because they are relatively less well-known, they are not included in our final list. As to what events have affected the ups and downs of the popularity of these groups, readers can make their own judgment after reading through detailed records placed in our 'Opinion Daily'."
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| Special Announcement | Abstract | Latest Figures | Opinion Daily | Commentary | | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
