National Irag Survey

ABC News, in conjuction with BBC and ARD TV (Germany) has conducted another opinion survey in Iraq using a random sample. Here is how they selected respondents (see http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=2954886&page=1 for complete details):

"Four hundred and fifty-eight sampling points were distributed proportionate to population size in each of Iraq's 18 provinces, then in each of the 102 districts within the provinces, then by simple random sampling among Iraq's nearly 11,000 villages or neighborhoods, with urban/rural stratification at each stage."

"Maps or grids were used to select random starting points within each sampling point, with household selection by random interval and within-household selection by the 'next-birthday' method. An average of five interviews were conducted per sampling point. Three of the 458 sampling points were inaccessible for security reasons and were substituted with randomly selected replacements."

One measure of the success of the survey was that none of the interviewers were killed or injured during the course of the research. Comments from the pollsters can be viewed at:

http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=2954867&page=1

Some of the main results are summarized below:

• My own life is going well: 2005/71% said yes and in 2007/39% said yes
• I expect my life to get better: 2005/64% said yes and in 2007/35% said yes
• My own neighborhood is not safe: 2005/36% said yes and in 2007/74% said yes

The survey was conducted by D3 Systems of Vienna, VA, USA.