How Question Wording Changes Opinions

I became interested in my topic while watching debates and news discussions in my living room. I noticed that politicians could discuss the same issue and topics but still seem to disagree and misunderstand each other. This topic made me start thinking about the importance of communication and how wording can influence opinions. I am also passionate about psychology and hope to pursue it one day, so I decided to learn more about psychological tricks used in the world around us.

I found it surprising how easily people can be influenced by bias in questions. I think it is important to understand how easily wording can affect people’s responses and to encourage people to pay closer attention to the way questions are asked.

The main goal of this project is to observe whether responses change when questions are worded differently, even though the meaning is similar. In my research, I discovered an experiment similar to this conducted by Elizabeth Coftus and John Palmer in 1974. Their car crash studied how wording affected people’s memory of events. Unlike their study, which focuses on memory recall, my experiment focuses on opinions. My goal is to test whether people’s answers are influenced by different question wording.

Experiment Number 1

To determine whether question wording changes opinions, I will ask 20 participants three questions. I have created three different versions of the survey. Each sheet contains the same questions but with alternate phrasing.

I researched the Car Crash Experiment conducted by Elizabeth Coftus and John Palmer to gain ideas and insight into how to carry out this experiment. I will select three students from grades 7 to 12 as well as two teachers.  I will go from class to class to look for volunteers.  Participants will complete this survey independently without help or influence so that their answers reflect their own opinion. After collecting the surveys, I will analyze the data.

To ensure the test is fair, participants will be selected randomly, and I will not choose which version of the survey they receive.  Participants will also not be told about the purpose of the experiment until after they complete the survey. This helps prevent them from being overly cautious or noticing biases in the questions unless they are paying very close attention.

Experiment Number 2

To dive deeper into my theory that question wording can change your opinions, I decided to do another experiment.

This experiment will have six participants from the following age groups: kids (10-13), teenagers (13-17), adults (18-59), and elders (60 and up). I will create three new surveys with different questions. I will compare data to see if the different age groups react differently. I broke my under 18 age group into two because that is a crucial developmental time and I wanted to see if there were any differences between age.

I also tracked genders. I wanted to see if gender affected any results. For example, women’s brains develop faster. I wanted to see if that woud impact the results.

Experiment 1

After analyzing my data, I can conclude that word choice affects responses. My questions used are below. The bolded words are used to make it easier to understand the attached graphs.

Should social media companies have the power to decide what information people are allowed to see?

Should social media companies be allowed to remove harmful or misleading information to protect users and keep their platforms safe?

Should social media companies do more to prevent misinformation online?

Do you support the Canadian government investing in clean energy programs to fight climate change?

Do you support the Canadian government increasing taxes to pay for clean energy programs?

Do you think the government should take stronger action to fight climate change in order to protect the planet and the future generations?

Should communities be allowed to continue the meaningful tradition of opening public events with prayer?

Should the government require religious prayer at public events?

Should the government force everyone at public events to listen to religious prayers?

After examining my results, I notice that words with positive connotations such as “meaningful tradition” or “remove harmful" or "protect users,” people almost unanimously agree. When you reword the question and make it sound like someone is deciding something for you or forcing you to do something, most people reject the idea.

Experiment 2

When making the plans for experiment two, I wanted to get more specific. I tracked age and gender to see if it would make a difference. I used different questions and different topics than the first experiment to see how the viewpoints may change with different ages. This second experiment backed up what I learned in the first experiment. I found that word choice in questions definitely changed answers. I also found that when collecting extra information like gender and age, answers were sometimes different amongst the groups. For instance, the women that took my survey were more in favour of more surveillance even if it was more invasive. Another thing I noticed is when asked if criminals should have stricter treatment to prevent crime, all age groups thought this was a great idea except the kids. To see more details from my research, please look at the attached graphs.

The purpose of this project was to demonstrate how different wording in questions can influence people’s opinions. The results showed that using positive wording or bias (such as words like “to protect” “to help” or “to save”) makes people more likely to agree. In contrast, wording a phrase in a way that makes it sound like a problem is out of your control or someone is deciding something for you (such as a phrase like “should the government have the power to...” or implying money will be taken) makes people less likely to agree, even if the outcome is for a good cause.

These findings suggest people can discuss the same topic many times without reaching an agreement simply because of the difference in wording. They also show that individuals   in positions of power can influence opinions through strategic word choice, even when people initially agree.

This project is important because it highlights how question wording can influence everyday decisions and opinions. It also demonstrates the importance of being aware of bias in communication and thinking critically about how information is presented.  I learned that bias plays a significant role in decision making and can have powerful effects.

If I were to repeat this project, I would include a wider variety of questions with stronger variations in wording to further examine how much people’s opinions change.

Throughout this project, I learned a great deal about how question wording changes opinions. If I were to conduct this experiment again, I would track how long it takes different age groups to come up with a response. I would also track each participants’ education status (ex: Elementary level; Highschool level: A form of higher education.) I think in doing this I will get a better understanding of how age and education effects responses. At the end of the day, I think there are hundreds of ways to repeat this experiment, and my learning on this topic has just begun.

I would like to thank the following people:

Jamie Mack for organizing science fair in my town.

Sharon Duffy for assigning the science fair project assignment in class and then pushing me to enter it in science fair.

Hannah Tran, from the department of psychology in York University, for answering my questions about the psychological part of how question wording changes opinions.

My mother, Tamara Putz, for keeping me focused, and supporting me in my science journey.

Websites:

University of Texas at Austin

labs.la.utexas.edu

Loftus_Palmer.pdf

Mozart Cultures

mozartcultures.com

The Car Accident Experiment: How Accurate We Remember? - MozartCultures

National Library of Medecine

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

A Catalog of Biases in Questionnaires - PMC

People:

Hannah Tran (PhD candidate in social & personality psychology Social Cognition Lab, department of psychology, York University)

Provincial Court Judge, Erin Layton