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A journalist with the Huffington Post reported on some of the findings of this study here . The journalist says the results were released Wednesday, so this morning, but I gather that it must have been only released to journalists at that time.
The results will be released to the public tonight just after midnight. The following quotes from the announcement can be found here:
Quote:
the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life will discuss the findings from a major new comprehensive survey, Mormons in America: Certain in Their Beliefs but Uncertain of Their Place in Society. Conducted between Oct. 25 and Nov. 16, 2011, among a national sample of 1,019 respondents who currently describe their religion as “Mormon,” the survey examines Mormons’ beliefs and practices, political ideology, views on moral and social issues, and attitudes toward their faith, family life, the media and society. It is the first nationally representative survey of Mormons ever undertaken by a non-LDS research organization...The online presentation of Mormons in America: Certain in Their Beliefs but Uncertain of Their Place in Society will be made available to the public at pewforum.org at 12:01 a.m. EST on Jan. 12.
There should be a law against quoting surveys. They come right out and tell you that they only surveyed 1,019 people (how they came up with such a number is another adventure in psychology I prefer not to think about!)
If someone quoted the responses of 1,019 people who call themselves Christians/Jews/Muslims/fill in the blank, and implied that those people are speaking for all the other millions, would you accept that as legitimate (or even reasonable?)
I know, I know...you're supposed to extrapolate when you're talking about a poll. But that's just a word with a lot of syllables. It doesn't confer legitimacy.
There should be a law against quoting surveys. They come right out and tell you that they only surveyed 1,019 people (how they came up with such a number is another adventure in psychology I prefer not to think about!)
If someone quoted the responses of 1,019 people who call themselves Christians/Jews/Muslims/fill in the blank, and implied that those people are speaking for all the other millions, would you accept that as legitimate (or even reasonable?)
I know, I know...you're supposed to extrapolate when you're talking about a poll. But that's just a word with a lot of syllables. It doesn't confer legitimacy.
That is why statistics are necessary whenever you are taking a sample of a larger population. 1019 respondents are not inherently a bad sample size, but it just means you have to have less variability in the answers to derive any meaning from them.
It is the first nationally representative survey of Mormons ever undertaken by a non-LDS research organization.
I'm just curious about one thing. If a research organization were truly reputable, wouldn't accurate results be pretty high on their list of priorities? It seems to me that it really shouldn't make a difference whether the survey was conducted by an LDS or a non-group. Possibly, the questions might be worded differently by an LDS organizations and than they would by a non-LDS organization but, if this is the case, who's to say which results were the most reliable?
There should be a law against quoting surveys. They come right out and tell you that they only surveyed 1,019 people (how they came up with such a number is another adventure in psychology I prefer not to think about!)
If someone quoted the responses of 1,019 people who call themselves Christians/Jews/Muslims/fill in the blank, and implied that those people are speaking for all the other millions, would you accept that as legitimate (or even reasonable?)
I know, I know...you're supposed to extrapolate when you're talking about a poll. But that's just a word with a lot of syllables. It doesn't confer legitimacy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lkb0714
That is why statistics are necessary whenever you are taking a sample of a larger population. 1019 respondents are not inherently a bad sample size, but it just means you have to have less variability in the answers to derive any meaning from them.
With such a large sample size . . . the variability would have to be very large to impact the significance of the findings. Statistical studies measure the variance and incorporate it into the probability that the results are significant.
I couldn't find the study at their site. Where is it?
It was not available to the public until after midnight last night. Here is the link to their webpage on it (Mormons in America - Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life ). On their page, you'll find a link to the full study report.
One thing that struck me was the self-reported high rate of church activity among those the Pew Research Center sampled, and the self-reported high rate of those who say they donate 10% of their earnings to the church.
Quote:
Three-quarters of Mormons (77%) say they attend church at least once a week, 79% say they donate 10% of their earnings to the church
I don't know about those of you who are Mormon or have been Mormon, but those numbers seem a lot higher than was my experience. Although there are no official activity rates published by the LDS Church, I did find the following statistics from 1992 (not sure how they were derived so take it for what it is worth) published in the Encyclopedia of Mormonism, "Attendance at sacrament meeting varies substantially. Canada, the South Pacific, and the United States average between 40 percent and 50 percent. Europe and Africa average about 35 percent. Asia and Latin America have weekly attendance rates of about 25 percent" (Heaton, Tim. "Vital Statistics." Encyclopedia of Mormonism. edited by Daniel H. Ludlow, 1992, 4:1527-28 ). Although the Encyclopedia of Mormonism is not online, the sentences I just quoted, were put online by a pro-Mormon website here: Member Activity and Convert Retention .
The disparity in activity rates might be due to Pew's reliance on respondents to self-identify as Mormon. Perhaps, a significant number of people the LDS Church has on its membership roles (because at one point they were baptized), and counts as less active/inactive, do not even consider themselves Mormon.
So, all of the statistics in this current study may not be reflective of those who the LDS Church consider as its members, but only reflective of only a subset who consider themselves Mormon.
So, for example, it may not be that 79% of the people the LDS Church considers members would say they donate 10% of their earnings to the church, but only that 79% of those who consider themselves Mormon (which is likely a smaller set than those who the LDS Church consider as Mormon) would say they donate 10% of their earnings to the church.
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