Do surveys correctly cover voters who are over 80 years old?
Résumé
Our paper questions the quality of electoral studies’ sampling design, focusing on age. We show that the oldest category of the actual electorate is often under-represented in such quota-based surveys. It’s crucial since those over 80 years old now account for 10% of French registered voters. The data reviewed comes from 5 electoral panels fielded between 2002 and 2012 and a barometer tracking opinions in 2012. The studies include between 4,000 and 40,000 respondents, enabling a refinement of age sub-categories. We also analyse how these representativity biases may affect the quality of the answers