American Trends Panel

A new evaluation of the Center's national American Trends Panel finds little evidence that panel estimates are affected by errors associated with panel conditioning, a phenomenon that occurs when survey participation changes respondents’ true or reported behavior over time.

Looking at final estimates of the outcome of the 2020 U.S. presidential race, 93% of national polls overstated the Democratic candidate’s support among voters, while nearly as many (88%) did so in 2016.

Given the errors in 2016 and 2020 election polling, how much should we trust polls that attempt to measure opinions on issues?

Since the establishment of the ATP, the Center has gradually migrated away from telephone polling and toward online survey administration, and since early 2019, the Center has conducted most of its U.S. polling on the ATP. This shift has major implications for the way the Center measures trends in American religion – including those from the Center’s flagship Religious Landscape Studies, which were conducted by phone in 2007 and 2014.

The rise of internet polling makes it more feasible to publish estimates for Asian Americans. But these estimates offer a limited view.

Our director of journalism studies explains how we determined what media outlets Americans turn to and trust for their political news.

Nick Bertoni, manager of the American Trends Panel, explains how the panel works and what its recent expansion means for our future survey work.

What does the migration to online polling mean for the country's trove of public opinion data gathered over the past four decades?

We surveyed non-Web panel members by mail and assessed how much, if at all, their non-participation would affect the outcome in a poll conducted exclusively online.