Being a research geek, I collect examples of how asking people their opinions doesn't always work: those times when what people say they like and what they actually like are completely different. Of course this happens all the time, which makes it scary how many decisions are still based on researching people's opinions.
There was a good example of this from an article on whether US voters value experience in the New York Times this weekend.
"In surveys, voters profess to value experience. For instance, the Pew Research Center reported last month that... one of the most important traits a candidate can possess is that he or she “has been an elected official in Washington for many years.” Only being Christian or having military service was more highly regarded...
But the picture becomes vastly more complicated when voters are asked about specific politicians. For instance, of the six major Democratic candidates, those with the most experience have the least appeal to voters... Experienced Washington Republicans face the same problem.
Dig deeper into the numbers, and experience seems to be even less important to voters, at least at this very early stage of the campaign. Pew asked poll respondents for snap impressions of the top six candidates (Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Obama, Mr. Edwards, Mr. Giuliani, Mr. McCain and Mr. Romney).
For five of those candidates, the overwhelming majority of impressions clustered around personal qualities rather than experience or ideology. The divide was particularly wide for Mr. Obama: 65 percent of the respondents talked about his personal traits (“good,” “intelligent,” “honest,” etc.) while only 14 percent were about his experience (mostly his lack of it). The spread was a whopping 75 percent to 8 percent for Mrs. Clinton and 39 percent to 17 percent for Mr. McCain. Voters consistently mentioned only one candidate’s experience — Mr. Giuliani’s."
It's also worth mentioning that "having military service," the claimed highest value in a candidate, didn't fare well in practice either. Out of the top six candidates, only John McCain has served in the military.
In case you're interested, the full Pew report is here.
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