DOI: 10.3886/icpsr31564
title: CBS News/New York Times Monthly Poll, February 2010
title: Archival Version

description: This poll, fielded February 5-10, 2010, is a part of a continuing series of monthly surveys that solicit public opinion on the presidency and on a range of other political and social issues. Respondents were asked whether they approved of the way Barack Obama was handling his job as president, whether things in the country were going in the right direction, to rate the condition of the national economy, and what they thought was the most important problem facing the nation. Opinions were solicited on how respondents felt about the current administration, health care reform, the federal budget deficit, and terrorism. Respondents were asked whether they approved or disapproved of the current Congress, the chance they would re-elect members of Congress, whether there was a need for a third party to be formed, how well Congress represents the general population compared to special interests, whether the stimulus package created a substantial number of new jobs or not, whether government programs do enough or too much for the people, new regulations and proposed taxes on financial institutions, the amount of influence the Tea Party has, gays and lesbians in the military, and personal finances. Demographic information includes sex, age, race, education level, household income, marital status, religious preference, type of residential area (e.g., urban or rural), political party affiliation, political philosophy, and voter registration status and participation history.
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/New York Times Monthly Poll, February 2010
description: Persons aged 18 years and over living in households with telephones in the contiguous 48 United States.
description: telephone interviewThe 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.A truncated value label in variable EDUC was corrected.To protect respondent confidentiality, the variable CNTY were replaced with blank codes.This data collection was produced by CBS News, New York, NY.