It’s easy to manipulate survey data and results. Take the recent article California needs to look again at Asian stance on affirmative action in the Los Angeles Times. In it, the author, Karthick Ramakrishnan, argues that 2/3 of Asian Americans in California support affirmative action based on some highly flawed statistical data he collected. He goes onto conclude that the vocal Asian American opposition to SCA-5 is not representative of the general population of Asian Americans.
I question the validity of Ramakrishnan’s results. I used to work as a Senior Manager of Strategy and Planning at J.D. Power and Associates, a major market research firm, famous for its highly regarded awards. I understand the limitations of statistical survey techniques, which leads me to be skeptical of Ramakrishnan’s conclusions. Ramakrishnan did a survey of Asian American voter opinions on affirmative action as part of the Field Survey. The survey included a broad range of questions and didn’t really explain what affirmative action was or how it impacted the Asian Americans. You cannot underscore the importance of question phrasing in biasing survey results. For instance, take the following two survey questions about the voters support for affirmative action in education.
Are you in favor of policies to help underprivileged minorities to gain greater access to education?
-
A) Yes
-
B) No
Would you be ok with it if your child were rejected from the college of his or her dreams so that the spot could go to a less qualified minority or female applicant?
-
A) Yes
-
B) No
Both of the above questions about affirmative action would have very different survey results. Ramakrishnan asked a question in his survey that was biased in favor of affirmative action, “Do you favor or oppose affirmative action programs designed to help blacks, women and other minorities get better jobs and education?” Affirmative action is a form of discrimination and the question DOES not mention the discriminatory aspect of affirmative action. Better wording would have been: “Do you favor or oppose affirmative action programs designed to help blacks, women and other minorities get better jobs and education by discriminating against male, white, and Asian American applicants?
Moreover, I think that Ramakrishnan is dead wrong about Asian American opinions about affirmative action. Asian American people in general care a great deal about the academic and professional success of their children. As an Indian, I can safely say that THERE IS NOTHING IN THIS WORLD THAT AN INDIAN CARES ABOUT MORE THAN THE SUCCESS OF HIS OR HER CHILDREN. I suspect the same can be said about other Asian American groups as well. For this reason, I am highly skeptical of claims that Asian Americans support educational admissions policies such as Affirmative Action that could be detrimental to their children.
Sadly, Ramakrishnan’ article reflects the inherent weaknesses of reading too deeply into survey results. California is a liberal state and yet Proposition 209 passed by a wide margin (54.55%). Don’t underestimate the depth of voter opposition to affirmative action, especially among Asian Americans.
