I know, I'm a pollster, so why don't I know? Well I don't but I have suspicions. It seems to me that what we are seeing in polls is more and more a reflection of mood rather than intention. So Newspoll today has a 4% swing away from the government on a two-party preferred basis over a similar time period to the Gippsland by-election which saw a 7% swing away.

Gippsland was about intentions, but either it was an aberrant result, or the pollsters are measuring something other than intention. That's what I'm calling mood.

I noticed this disjunct during the election campaign when the polls had Labor on anywhere up to 60%, but come election day it was only 52.7%. Very creditable, but nowhere near the same figure.

Now in Queensland I'm seeing similar volatility, and I don't trust it. If you've got any theories, or have recently answered an opinion poll, I'd like to know what you think, or why you answered the way that you did.

Perhaps its "civilisation tiredness" thats making us moody?
Ive got a theory that civilisation is getting towards some kind of use-by date where everything slows to a halt...maybe a fall, like other civilisations went through.
Where things no longer function as they did when they were young and fresh.

Most of us whove been around some decades are getting a bit tired of things like polls...and politics.
I guess we are getting moody; and most youngsters dont care about such things.
Im sure us baby boomers are tired.
I think we are on the backside of the hill.
When we were building up a civilisation, we seemd to have cared...but now we are on the shadow side, mostly through declining morlaity and high crime maybe we dont care much.
From Adam and Eve to the end of Revelation...maybe theres an invisible time limit on mankind and all he does?

Dear Graham,

I've always felt that opinion polls were rather limited in their
accuracy. That is, they're only valid for the time and place in which they were made.

People often change their minds on many issues
or they give an opinion
on something that they know nothing about.

I think by-elections are more difficult to guage than general elections. The economy does not look good. Even though it is probably not the Rudd Government's fault, it still does not look good. That is all people can see: the current outcome.

Also, Australians have also traditionally been suspicious of Governments getting too much power. It makes sense for some people to have a few "watch dogs" there just to give any opposition some teeth. Esecially when the economy doesn't look good now.

I know the Morgan Gallop poll is interesting taking information from various methodologies and techniques in a mix to try to be more accurate. Somewhere between the heart, the hands and the mind lies the pillars of civilization. Perhaps it is instinctual to try and balance something that could have gone too far one direction.

Another theory. hmm.

I wonder how much of the uncertainty in polls is due to the fickleness of those being polled, who don’t know who to support, because they really feel that neither party is worth supporting. They have to choose the least bad of two disliked entities. They could support different parties/leaders depending on the most minute differences in what they hear in the media, or how they happen to be feeling at the moment that they are being polled…..and they may very well express the opposite view the next time they are polled or when they vote.

There is such a tiny and intangible difference between Liberal and Labor. What is amazing to me is that there is consistently a big difference in the level of support for them, with KRudd and Labor being way out in front for an extended period of time. I don’t find the relatively small fluctuations or lack of reliability in the exact figures to be of any consequence at all.

The polls most definitely reflect the mood of the moment rather than intent.

I think some polls are mood not intention, some say one thing to let of heat but vote other way.
I do polls almost every week but have seen results that are unlikely to be true in an election.
I feel high fuel prices the shambolic mess of NSW and such is unlikely to see most want a change of government, polling however lets them let of steam.