AAPOR 68th Annual Conference

Asking Critical Questions: Toward a Sustainable Future for Public Opinion and Social Research
68th Annual Conference
May 16-19, 2013
Seaport Boston Hotel & Seaport World Trade Center
Boston, Massachusetts

AAPOR's Annual Conference featured cutting-edge educational sessions, in-depth short courses, informal access to leaders in the field and an informative exhibit hall with representatives from key service and product providers. The meeting also saw record attendance, with more than 1,100 public opinion and survey research professionals gathering for education and networking. Join us in Anaheim, California next May for AAPOR 2014.

Save the Date for AAPOR 2014! May 15-18, Anaheim, CA

About the 2013 Conference:

• Download the Final Program (20 MB file; may take several minutes to download)   
• Committee meetings schedule
• Conference Abstracts
• Students, download the 2013 Student Guide 
• A First-Time Attendee's Guide to the AAPOR 2013 Annual Conference

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The American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) hosted a successful 68th Annual Conference at the Seaport Boston Hotel & Seaport World Trade Center, Boston in Massachusetts on May 16-19, 2013. More than 1,100 attendees enjoyed a robust program that included cutting-edge papers, methodological briefs, posters, panel sessions and demonstrations that addressed important research questions, increased AAPOR member knowledge, and promoted our profession. 

Our conference theme this year was: "Asking Critical Questions: Toward a Sustainable Future for Public Opinion and Social Research," which was embedded throughout the conference.

Public opinion and survey researchers are operating in a time of considerable challenge and change.  Securing respondent cooperation from an increasingly wary population has never been more difficult, and costs to produce comparable amounts of data have risen over time.  It has become clear that addressing such challenges requires researchers to be adaptable and innovative—for example, through increased flexibility in working with respondents in modes of their choice, and by designing correspondingly nimble data collection instruments.

Even with such innovation, some research questions require data beyond what surveys produce.  Researchers have long relied on a complementary qualitative or administrative data for various purposes.  Now, data from non-probabilistic panels, as well as data not originally generated for research purposes—from social media, Internet usage, and commercial transactions, among others—are also increasingly available.  It is not completely clear to what extent these data meet our research needs, but their proliferation certainly calls for continued evaluation.

Ensuring a sustainable future for public opinion and social research will require both continued innovation in traditional survey methods, and increased consideration of what emerging approaches do and do not contribute to our field. The 2013 AAPOR Annual Conference will serve as a forum to ask critical questions about both.  We particularly encourage submissions on approaches that provide new analytic utility, improve efficiency, reduce costs, and address current methodological limitations; or that demonstrate substantive or methodological insights gleaned from newer data sources or combinations of data.

The conference should also affirm our conviction that polls and surveys continue to ask critical questions, providing vital information about our health, economy, institutions, beliefs and aspirations, which as essential to the proper function of a free and just society.  As such, submissions on any topic of interest to public opinion and survey researchers are also encouraged, including but not limited to:

• Public opinion on social, economic and political issues

• Political polling and electoral decision-making

• Media influences on public opinion

• Racial, ethnic and gender issues

• Cross-national or comparative research

• Surveying and interviewing diverse populations

• Questionnaire design and evaluation

• Mixed-mode data collection and emerging methodologies

• Innovative sampling techniques

• Qualitative research techniques

• Nonresponse and response bias in surveys

• Administrative data and data mining

• Coverage and noncoverage in surveys

• Use of nonprobability and probability sampling designs

Proposal Submission

AAPOR's 68th Annual Conference proposal submission period has passed. Thank you for your interest. We hope to see you in Boston!