DOI: 10.3886/icpsr30402
title: CBS News/Vanity Fair Monthly Poll, November 2009
title: Archival Version

description: This poll, fielded November 6-8, 2009, is a part of a continuing series of monthly surveys that solicits public opinion on the presidency and on a range of other political and social issues. Respondents were asked whether they spent more or less money and shopping time on extra nonessential items due to the recession, whether they could explain the "public option" in the healthcare debate, and who they thought was the most conservative voice of America. Respondents were also asked which president respondents would add to Mount Rushmore if they could, which event of 2009 surprised them most, and whether they thought it was sometimes justified for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to perform assassinations. Information was collected on how often respondents used the United States Postal Service, respondents' opinions about the domestic militias that are critical of the president and federal government, what country respondents would want to raise their children in, which lost artifact they would like to find, and what behavior they were most likely to display at their holiday party that year. Other questions addressed personal finances, job security, and respondents' opinions of gay marriage. Demographic information includes sex, age, race, education level, household income, military service, religious preference, reported social class, type of residential area (e.g., urban or rural), political party affiliation, political philosophy, voter registration status, and whether respondents thought of themselves as born again Christians.
description: The data contain weight variables that should be used in analyzing the data. According to the CBS News Web site, the data were weighted to match United States Census Bureau breakdowns on age, sex, race, education, and region of the country. The data were also adjusted for the fact that people who share a telephone with others have less chance to be contacted than people who live alone and have their own telephones, and that households with more than one telephone number have more chances to be called than households with only one telephone number.
description: A variation of random-digit dialing (RDD) using primary sampling units (PSUs) was employed, consisting of blocks of 100 telephone numbers identical through the eighth digit and stratified by geographic region, area code, and size of place. Phone numbers were dialed from RDD samples of both standard land-lines and cell phones. Within households, respondents were selected using a method developed by Leslie Kish and modified by Charles Backstrom and Gerald Hursh (see Backstrom and Hursh, SURVEY RESEARCH. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1963).
description: Datasets: 
DS1: CBS News/Vanity Fair Monthly Poll, November 2009
description: Persons aged 18 years and older living in households with telephones in the United States.
description: computer-assisted telephone interview (CATI)The data available for download are not weighted and users will need to weight the data prior to analysis.The CASEID variable was reformatted in order to make it a unique identifier.Truncated value label in variable EDUC were corrected.This data collection was produced by Vanity Fair and CBS News, New York, NY.