If you are a political junkie or a connoisseur of media programs, you’ve heard the term “Bradley Effect” many times during the long presidential campaign.
The Bradley Effect, less commonly called the Wilder Effect, is a theory proposed to explain observed discrepancies between voter opinion polls and election outcomes in some U.S. government elections where a white candidate and a non-white candidate run against each other. Instead of ascribing the results to flawed methodology on the part of the pollster, the theory proposes that some voters tend to tell pollsters that they are undecided or likely to vote for a black candidate, and yet, on election day, vote for his white opponent. It was named after Tom Bradley, an African-American who lost the 1982 California governor’s race despite being ahead in voter polls going into the elections.
The Bradley effect theorizes that the inaccurate polls were skewed by the phenomenon of social desirability bias. Specifically, some white voters give inaccurate polling responses for fear that, by stating their true preference they will open themselves to criticism of racial motivation. The reluctance to give accurate polling answers has sometimes extended to post-election exit polls as well. The race of the pollster conducting the interview may factor in to voters’ answers.
As most of the creditable pollsters were able to accurately predict the outcome of the 2008 presidential races both nationally and at the state level, the Bradley Effect has been (at least temporarily) put to bed. Although on second thought…as the 24-hour consumer- focused media require ample opiate to spoon feed the masses with “news” that creates controversy to further enhance the value of advertising dollars…we will see it again in 2012. See you soon Bradley!
-Tom
tspeaks@igpr.com