DOI: 10.3886/icpsr03706.v3
title: CBS News/New York Times Monthly Poll #1, October 2002
title: Version 3

description: This poll, fielded October 3-6, 2002, is 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.
Those surveyed were asked to give their approval rating of President
George W. Bush and his handling of the presidency, foreign policy,
and the economy. Questions were posed regarding respondents'
perception of the status of the economy and whether they thought that
the economy was getting better, worse, or staying the same. Those
surveyed were asked about the attention they paid to the current
congressional elections, whether they followed the individual
campaigns, the likelihood that they would vote, what party they were
most likely to vote for, voter registration status, whether their
local congressperson(s) deserved to be re-elected, and what issues
would motivate the respondent to vote for a particular
candidate. Questions pertaining to the federal government included
whether the respondents believed that government functions better when
Congress is controlled by the same party that controls the presidency,
and the amount that Congress had accomplished in the past two years
compared to previous congressional sessions. Respondents were also
asked whether they believed the federal government paid attention to
issues concerning the economy, the environment, Social Security, and
welfare. Questions concerning foreign relations focused on the United
States' relations with its European allies and whether the United
States had less respect from other countries compared to two years
prior. Those surveyed were asked their opinion of the Bush
administration's handling of international problems, and whether the
administration had a clear plan for its campaign against
terrorism. Opinions were also gathered regarding the attention
President Bush had paid to the economy, the impact of the Iraq War on
the economy, and foreign policy problems. Respondents were asked
whether President Bush had really tried to compromise with Democrats
in Congress, or whether the Democrats had tried to work with President
Bush. Additional questions asked whether President Bush and/or the
Bush administration was more interested in protecting the rights of
citizens or big corporations, how respondents felt about national
defense and pre-emptive strikes, and whether criticism of the
President's policy on military and economic decisions should be voiced
publicly. Those surveyed were asked whether they approved of military
action against Iraq, whether the Bush administration had a clear plan,
when the United States should take military action against Iraq,
whether Iraq presented a clear danger, whether respondents would favor
or oppose the war in light of heavy United States and Iraqi civilian
casualties, and the possibility of a long war. Respondents were asked
to speculate on the effects of a war with Iraq, particularly with
regard to the United States economy and future terrorist
attacks. There were also questions posed about the Democratic and
Republican parties, whether respondents had favorable or unfavorable
opinions of each, whether they thought the parties were interested in
protecting the rights of average citizens or protecting big
corporations, and which party would be more likely to make the best
decisions on issues concerning education, Social Security, national
defense, terrorism, health care, the environment, and
taxation. Personal finance questions included employment status, and
whether or not the respondent had a 401k plan. Background information
on respondents includes voting record, voter registration status,
party identification, marital status, education level, religious
preference, age, Hispanic nationality, ethnicity, years lived at
current address, other phone lines available, and willingness to
accept a callback.
description: A variation of random-digit dialing using primary sampling
units (PSU) 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. 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 #1, October 2002
description: Adult population of the United States aged 18 and
over having a telephone at home.
description: This collection has not been processed by ICPSR
staff. ICPSR is distributing the data and documentation for this
collection in essentially the same form in which they were
received. When appropriate, documentation has been converted to
Portable Document Format (PDF), data files have been converted to
non-platform-specific formats, and variables have been recorded to
ensure respondents' anonymity.The ASCII data file may have been replaced if the previous version was formatted with multiple records per case. A frequency file, which contains the authoritative column locations, has been added to the collection.