Survey rating literacy

THE LAST Social Weather Stations survey of public trust in Rodrigo Duterte was on May 1-3, 2016. It was not immediately published, since SWS prioritized voting intentions over public trust in its releases.

The SWS figures on trust in Mr. Duterte first appeared in BusinessWorld on Friday (6/10/16), below the fold, mildly titled “Pre-election survey bares varied trust in Duterte.” Then came Saturday’s erroneous banner headline in the Philippine Star (6/11/16), “SWS: 26% trust rating for Rody, 45% for Leni,” against which Duterte partisans ranted in social media.

[The original report, “SWS May 1-3, 2016 National Survey: Net trust in Rody Duterte a Moderate +26; Net trust in Leni Robredo a Good +45” was posted on Monday (6/13/16). SWS has an agreement with its media partner BW to post the original reports only after the release appears in BW.]

Understand arithmetical symbols. The symbols + and % are not equivalent. They are not interchangeable. They are learned in elementary school arithmetic.

The true proportion trusting Duterte is in the body of the Star item itself: 54 percent. By distorting the true SWS report, the Star’s headline, “26% trust rating for Rody,” was incompetent.

Whoever took the Star’s headline to mean that the trust for Rody was only 26 percent was likewise incompetent. A potential Cabinet member who demonstrates incompetence only jeopardizes his own trust rating.

Understand the scale of net trust. A net trust is the excess of gross trust over gross distrust. It is not a percentage of anything. It goes up to +100 if everyone trusts the personality, and down to -100 if everyone distrusts her/him. From -100 to +100 is a wide range of 200 points.

The larger the absolute value, the more the unanimity; the smaller it is, the more the diversity. A plus-value is a favorable consensus; a minus-value is the opposite. Writing + before a positive number is not optional, since it immediately labels a rating as net rather than gross. Replacing + with % is simply dumb.

Accept all results of a survey, not just the parts one likes.  The trust rating for Duterte came from the final SWS preelection survey, done on May 1-3, 2016. This means that the question on trust and the question on voting were answered by the same sample of respondents.

The May 1-3 survey found intended votes for Duterte outnumbering those for Grace Poe by 11 points, and those for Mar Roxas by 13 points (BW, 5/6/16). Whoever believed its findings about intended votes should also believe its findings about trust.

The question on voting is answered by choosing one candidate over others. But the question on trust is answered by saying whether one has “much” or “little” trust in someone, without any comparison with others.

Evaluation of a rating should use historical experience. My piece, “Baseline trust ratings of Duterte and Robredo” (Opinion, 6/11/16) compared the May 1-3, 2016, trust ratings of the two winners with those of the past four winning candidates for president and vice president in the surveys done just before their elections.

It discovered the net trust in Duterte to be the lowest of all presidential winners in 1992-2010, rated just before their election. The next SWS rating of trust in him will likewise be compared with trust in past winners, rated soon after their election.

In the SWS archive, the record highest trust rating is Pope Francis’ net +81 in March 2015. SWS uses Excellent for ratings of +70 and up. The record lowest trust rating was Saddam Hussein’s -76 in May-June 2003. SWS uses Execrable for ratings of -70 and below.

Trust ratings of presidents. SWS surveys satisfaction with presidents quarterly, but surveys trust in them without any schedule. Corazon Aquino’s final trust rating as president was net +24 (Moderate, +10 to +29). Afterwards it was mostly Good (+30 to +49), but fell in November 2000 to -5 (Neutral, -9 to +9), perhaps because she supported the anti-Estrada activists. Her low point was -8 in January 2001. From 2003 onward, her trust ratings were Moderate to Very Good (+50 to +69). Her last was +38 in February 2009.

Fidel Ramos’ final trust rating as president was a Good +33 in April 1992. Then it was Moderate or else Good up to September 2000, and mostly Neutral later. In January 2002 it was -30 (Bad, -30 to -49); I don’t recall why. His latest was a Neutral +6 in September 2011.

Joseph Estrada’s trust rating was a Moderate +11 in January 6-9, 2001, in his impeachment trial, but by January 27-29 it collapsed to his low point of -21 (Poor, -10 to -29), after the “second envelope” fiasco. Despite his detention for plunder from April 2001 to October 2007, Estrada’s trust rating was back to Moderate by mid-2005. His latest was a Good +41 in August 2012.

The SWS archive’s nine trust ratings for Gloria Macapagal Arroyo start from September 2010. All nine were either Bad (-30 to -49) or Very Bad (-50 to -69). Her -62 in December 2011 is the record worst of all presidents. Her latest was -53 in August 2012.

Benigno S. Aquino III’s trust rating rose from a Very Good +64 just before his election to an Excellent +83 on June 25-28, 2010, just before his inauguration. It ranged from +67 to +79 in 2011-12; it was not surveyed in 2013-15. It was a Moderate +29 on March 30-April 2, 2016; this column is its first publication.

Trust ratings are reliable indicators of public goodwill. They should not be treated carelessly.

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