(02/05/13) -

British Columbians Assess Personal Attributes of Main Political Leaders

The top four emotions used to describe Christy Clark are negative, while Adrian Dix gets a more positive rating from respondents.

People in British Columbia use very different words to describe the two main political parties in the province, a new Angus Reid Public Opinion poll has found.

The online survey of a representative provincial sample of 802 British Columbian adults also shows that more than two-in-five respondents describe a recent government ad as useless and deceiving.

Personal Attributes

This exercise, which has been relied upon to gauge the emotional reaction of voters in the 2012 United States presidential election and the 2011 Canadian federal election, entails asking respondents to choose up to six words to describe their feelings about a person. In all, nine pairs of contradictory attributes are included as options.

The top four emotions used to describe Premier and BC Liberals leader Christy Clark are:

- Out of touch (41%), Arrogant (39%), Secretive (33%), Inefficient (33%)

Clark’s “top four” attributes are negative, and the differences with the contradictory emotion are sizeable:

Out of touch 41% – 10% In touch (-31)
Arrogant 39% – 16% Down to earth (-23)
Secretive 33% – 12% Open (-21)
Inefficient 33% – 9% Efficient (-24)

Clark’s best positive emotions are intelligent (31%, ranked 5th overall) and Strong (19%, ranked 9th overall). The gender gap is particularly noticeable on Weak (Men 27%, Women 16%).

Majorities of NDP voters in 2009 regard Clark as Out of touch (55%) and Arrogant (54%). But her numbers among BC Liberal voters in 2009 are also low. Three of the top four emotions for people who voted for the Gordon Campbell-led Liberals are negative: Intelligent (44%), Out of touch (33%), Arrogant (31%), Inefficient (29%).

The “top four” attributes for BC New Democratic Party (NDP) leader Adrian Dix are:

- Intelligent (36%), Down to earth (25%), In touch (22%), Open (21%)

Dix’s four emotions are positive, albeit in a lukewarm way (only one attribute is chosen by more than a third of respondents, compared with four for Clark). The difference with the conflicting emotions is in double-digits only once:

Intelligent 36% – 11% Foolish (+25)
Down to earth 25% – 20% Arrogant (+5)
In touch 22% – 14% Out of touch (+8)
Open 21% – 20% Secretive (+1)

A gender gap is noticeable on Dishonest (Men 24%, Women 15%). However, in stark contrast with the problems Clark has connecting with her base, at least two-in-five NDP voters see Dix as Intelligent (56%), Down to earth (42%) and In touch (41%). BC Liberal voters are not overly critical. The top four emotions for people who voted for the Gordon Campbell-led Liberals in 2009 are Arrogant (34%), Dishonest (32%), Intelligent (32%) and Boring (29%).

The Government Ad

For this part of the survey, respondents were shown the “domino ad”, and asked a follow up question that relies on pairs of words that deal with conflicting opinions. This methodology has been used to test political ads at the federal level in Canada, and in the 2010 Congressional election in the United States.

Among all BC respondents, the top four opinions expressed about the “domino ad” are:

- Useless (43%), Deceiving (42%), Untrue (31%), Informative (29%)

Men are more likely to find the ad Deceiving than women (46% to 39%). Women are more likely to regard the ad as Informative than men (32% to 27%). Both think it is Useless (Men 45%, Women 42%).

Once again, majorities of NDP voters believe the ad is Deceiving (59%), Useless (53%) and almost half deem it Untrue (46%). Equal proportions of BC Liberal voters in 2009 choose either of two conflicting opinions (Informative 39%, Useless 38%) to describe the ad.

Full Report, Detailed Tables and Methodology (PDF)

CONTACT:

Mario Canseco, Vice President, Angus Reid Public Opinion
+877 730 3570
mario.canseco@angus-reid.com

Methodology: From January 23 to January 24, 2013, Angus Reid Public Opinion conducted an online survey among 802 randomly selected British Columbian adults who are Angus Reid Forum panelists. The margin of error—which measures sampling variability—is +/- 3.5%. The results have been statistically weighted according to the most current education, age, gender and region data to ensure samples representative of the entire adult population of British Columbia. Discrepancies in or between totals are due to rounding.