HKU POP releases ratings of top 10 political groupsBack

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 mid-year 2011. 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 February 6 to 9. In that survey, respondents could name, unaided, up to 10 political groups whom they knew best. Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), Democratic Party (DP), Liberal Party (LP), Civic Party 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 February 20 to 22, 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. 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:

[6] All error figures in the table are calculated at 95% confidence level. "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 +/-2.2 at 95% confidence level" when quoting the above figures. The error margin of previous survey can be found at the POP Site.
[7] Ratings with recognition rates not reaching top 10 in either stage of survey are not available. { } Number in square brackets indicates rankings.
[8] 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.
[9]In late May 2011, the ratings of HKCTU and CP are 49.194 and 49.187 respectively in 3 decimal places. Therefore, HKCTU and CP ranked at 4th and 5th places respectively.

[10] Labour Party was founded on 18 December 2011.

Findings obtained in second half of February showed that, the best-known political group was Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions (FTU) which attained 50.7 marks. Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) scored 49.1 marks and ranked 2nd. The 3rd to 8th places were Democratic Party (DP), Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (HKCTU), New People’s Party (NPP), Hong Kong Association for Democracy and People’s Livelihood (ADPL), Civic Party (CP) and Liberal Party (LP) attaining 46.8, 46.2, 46.1, 45.3, 43.9 and 41.7 marks respectively. The 9th and 10th places fell to People Power and League of Social Democrats (LSD), with a respective score of 26.3 and 25.7. The mean score obtained by the top 5 political groups was 47.8 marks. For this latest survey, Neighbourhood and Worker’s Service Centre (NWS) and Labour Party obtained a support rating of 45.0 and 43.5 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:

The overall rankings in the past 12 months showed that, the top eight political groups were listed for four times. FTU was in the top rank, achieving an average rating of 51.1 marks. HKCTU and ADPL ranked 2nd to 3rd, attaining 48.8 and 47.7 marks respectively. Meanwhile, the 4th to 8th ranks fell to DAB, DP, CP, LP and LSD, with respective average ratings of 47.4, 47.2, 45.9, 43.7 and 29.2 marks. NWS was listed for three times while HKASPDMC and People Power were listed twice, People Power was listed twice and NPP was listed once, now ranked the 9th and 12th with 51.4, 50.3, 27.3 and 46.1 marks.

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 November 18 to 25, 2011 while this survey was conducted from February 20 to 22, 2012. 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.

Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, observed, “Our latest survey of ‘Top 10 Political Groups’ conducted in late February shows that New People’s Party enters the ‘top 10’ for the first time, replacing NWS. In terms of support ratings, compared to three months ago, DAB has gone up slightly, while all others have gone down. Among them, those with drops beyond sampling error include ADPL, NPP, LP, HKCTU and DP, down by 4.6, 3.7, 3.5, 3.1 and 2.0 marks respectively. Among the ‘top 10’ groups, only FTU scores more than 50 marks. In terms of relative rankings, FTU goes up 1 position to reach the top, DAB and DP up 4 and 2 positions to rank 2nd and 3rd, HKCTU remains 4th, NPP enters the list the first time and ranks the 5th. ADPL goes down 3 positions to rank 6th, CP and LP swap positions to rank 7th and 8th, while People Power and LSD continue to rank 9th and 10th. 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’.”

• March 13, 2012 (Tuesday) 1pm to 2pm: Popularity of CE and Principal Officials