Since the reader survey is topping out in response, I though I’d report some of the results. Since I’ve been doing these surveys my readership has exhibited a few patterns, and I was curious as to any changes since moving to Discover. Not too much has shifted. Instead of 15% female, as was the case for years, the readers are now 25% female. It looks like ~10% of the readers know this website only through Discover. Feel free to browse the results yourself.
I think the most interesting aspect for many is the political diversity. Generally the readership is split between Left liberals and libertarians. Though there are a small number of conventional conservatives, it is very rare to find those who are socially conservative and fiscally liberal. These “populists” tend not to be as intelligent as the other combinations, and so I suspect that’s why they’re not well represented on the web, among my readership, or the political elite of the United States in general (for what it’s worth, I’ve been moving in a more populist direction over the years, starting from a libertarian stance).
First, a few summary statistics. I asked readers their index of liberalism, with 0 being as conservative as possible, 10 as liberal, and 5 in the middle. I asked on two dimensions, social and economic.
Social:
Median – 8
Mean -7.4
Standard Deviation – 2.48
Economic:
Median – 5
Mean -5.01
Standard Deviation – 2.74
The correlation between social and economic liberalism was 0.37. Here is a chart which illustrates the different distributions:
I’ve smoothed a bit, but it’s clear that while there’s several modes in the economic liberalism distribution, there’s a strong liberal slant on social issues. Not that surprising. But I wanted to look at the combinations, so I created some bubble plots. The size of the circle is proportional to the weight of the particular political combination within the set (or subset).
First, the whole data set.
You see four quadrants. The plural majority of readers are liberal, followed by libertarians, then conservatives, then populists. Remove the centrists (those who selected 5 on either social or economic responses) and summing up the numbers in the quadrants, here are the percentages:
Liberals – 40%
Libertarian – 28%
Conservative – 11%
Populist – 3%
(the rest are in the borderline zones)
Now let’s look at the subsamples and how that impacts distribution.
Female readers tend to be more liberal.
I’ll just leave you with the rest of the bubble charts with minimal comment. But if you want to know something about the data, ask in the comments. Doing the analysis isn’t usually that hard, but I don’t know what people want to know (virgins are young, but not different than the rest of the readership).
Razib Khan’s degrees are in biochemistry and biology. He has blogged about genetics since 2002, previously worked in software development, is an Unz Foundation Junior Fellow and lives in the western US. He loves habaneros.
July 30th, 2010 at 12:47 am
I can’t browse the results. This is what it says:
The survey creator has elected to maintain privacy for the results of this survey. If you believe that this survey’s results should be openly shared, please refer the survey owner to the Help Center: How do I share the results of my survey?
July 30th, 2010 at 12:47 am
@Razib said…
“[I]f you want to know something about the data, ask in the comments.”
How about seeing graphs for:
- muscularity against math skills
- muscularity against knowing a programming language
- muscularity against socioeconomic status
- muscularity against household income in relation to the national mean
(Feel free to say “no” of course
)
July 30th, 2010 at 1:15 am
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by razib khan, Cary D Conover, Mark Davids, World Amazing Things, Sains & Teknologi and others. Sains & Teknologi said: Reader survey results: politics | Gene Expression: Since the reader survey is topping out in response, I though I’… http://bit.ly/cWN8lP [...]
July 30th, 2010 at 2:16 am
You could have taken into consideration different conceptions of liberty; from less-narrowly-defined libertarian freedom as non-interference, which makes it compatible with various forms of dependence (eg. poverty and even benevolent non-interfering dictatorship) to the more demanding Jeffersonian freedom as non-dependence, which requires freedom from arbitrary power not just from actual interference.
The fact that the latter is completely off the radar is itself an ideological bias and shows a wonderfully naive historical (in)sensibility.
July 30th, 2010 at 3:57 am
Most of your readership seems happiest with 7, 8 or 9. The chart doesn’t go up to 11, so it misses the Spinal Tap sector.
July 30th, 2010 at 4:44 am
Outliers, please identify yourselves for ridicule and shunning.
July 30th, 2010 at 8:31 am
I would like to see number of sexual partners vs. education.
July 30th, 2010 at 8:57 am
JL, fixed.
daniel, you’re such a fucking nerd
July 30th, 2010 at 10:26 am
Looks like there is a strong correlation between selecting an even or odd number to define oneself on one scale and selecting the same (even or odd) on the other. (Who are these odd people?)
July 30th, 2010 at 3:27 pm
I’m confused by the labels. By “economic liberalism” do you mean more free market (10 being Libertarian Utopia) or less free market (10 being Socialist Utopia)?
July 30th, 2010 at 3:29 pm
“How liberal on economic issues are you? (as in favoring redistribution and/or state intervention in the economy. 10 = extreme liberal, 5 = at the national median, 0 = extreme conservative)”
clear enough?
July 30th, 2010 at 3:37 pm
Yep, that was my assumption given the readership, but I’m used to ‘economic liberalism’ as a standard free market term.
I’d like to know sex partner numbers as a function of highest level of math (prediction: more math, less sex), and math intensity of college major (prediction: more math less sex. Higher numbers for arts and humanities).
July 30th, 2010 at 3:41 pm
yeah, that’s what i was so specific with the definition. in the USA that’s a specialized usage, but outside of the USA that’s arguably the more common usage.
July 31st, 2010 at 4:19 am
Never willing to forgo a good session of ridicule and shunning, Miko got me to bother to turn on my computer in order to comment here (comments sent from my phone never appear, dunno why, maybe the shunning began earlier than expected?).
First a confession, at Razib’s invitation to do so (I seem to recollect such an invitation) I declined to answer all of the questions because I suspect that he has the technical ability to identify me by my IP address and some of the questions request that I expose more personal information than I’m willing to provide at the moment. My present policy preferences however I don’t consider to be too personal and they are pretty proudly populist by the definition provided above. Within the current american spectrum of stated preferences and beliefs I would likely be considered somewhat socially conservative (I think there are 1950s-esque beliefs about gender, race, sexual orientation, civil society and the like that are unreasonably dismissed) as well as fiscally liberal (I would like to see single-payer healthcare the law of the land and guaranteed food and housing available to everyone on more than a de facto basis [unlike section 8, footstamps and the like] ).
I would imagine that I’m also an outlier in being a long-time reader who lacks a standard-issue college degree. I do however have an advanced degree of a different sort that is (almost always) socially and (reasonably often) academically considered more or less the equivalent of a doctorate so my response in Razib’s polls over the years have likely jumped between the two poles of “some college” and “post-graduate degree”. Unfortunately in any reasonably short poll it’s somewhat difficult to call out all of the fine nuances that would appear were there separate questions for the religion of most of your grandparents vs. your religion (Jewish/Agnostic) or personal social preferences vs. what you believe would be most beneficial for most people (Liberal/Conservative).
Oh, and I’m likely within a rather small minority of commenters here who has taken calculus courses despite not being a college grad. I wish I could say I was a virgin too but, alas, the sirens hath overcome me with their feminine wiles and I must join the damned but happy who have known the sin of the serpent’s flesh.
Anyhow, I hope this thread isn’t sufficiently dry so as to preclude the promised ridicule and shunning
Bring it on you Libertarian retards and Liberal ostriches! I’m kidding, I love ya all. Let a thousand flowers bloom and assume the “airplane” position (Maoist references, for the unfamiliar).
July 31st, 2010 at 10:09 am
fwiw, i can’t track IPs for the polls since it is offsite.
August 1st, 2010 at 8:18 am
Short question regarding the graphs – what application were these done in? R? With the standard package?
Very nice job on them, by the way.
August 1st, 2010 at 10:21 am
no special package in R. like this:
with(allCount,
symbols(SocialNum,EconNum,circles=CombCount,inches=1/5,bg=”blue”,xlab=”Social Liberalism”,ylab=”Economic Liberalism”, main=TheAnswer)
)