You’ll be unable to escape this topic in Research circles this week, this summer, this year. What happens if conduct research, yet aren’t open-minded to the outcome? As per my video ‘When To Do (and not do) New Primary Research’: if you’re NOT prepared for the consequences, don’t do Primary Research. The British government waived ‘representative democracy’ (we presumably elect qualified people to focus & thoroughly assess /investigate complex long term decisions), instead opting for ‘poll/plebiscite democracy’, wherein potentially uninformed masses cast their views and wherein every votes is an equal vote.
Now you need not be a dictionary devotee to see ‘democracy’ and ‘demon’ share a word root. Researchers saw it coming; we know everyday consumers don’t handle (understand, consider, evaluate) complex New Product/ Service proposals well in ‘impromptu’ research situations. When we seek consumer input on complex new ideas, we warm’em up, inform them, focus their attention ie get’em ‘zoned in’. Then we typically deploy an array of detailed response options, such as scales, rather than blunt polar opposite forced choice.
We ensure we have consumers’ undivided attention and we aim for maximum understanding in advance. We provide them complex audio-visual concept description tools before we ‘pop a question’. And we’d then STILL hesitate to used a forced choice ‘Buy or No Buy’ – there’s richness in asking an array of detailed response queries eg – identification, uniqueness, intent to buy within next X weeks, etc.
Wise to distrust the use of a straight-up ‘ Stay-Leave’ – surely a blunt instrument forced upon uninformed respondents. How uninformed? The day AFTER the vote, a 250% jump in Google search queries in BRITAIN for: “What’s the E.U.?”
Ouch.
Brexit by GDJ- CC 2016