News - BES Resources
Here you will find a range of resources that we think may be helpful in analysing BES data.
The following links may be helpful in accessing statistical software commonly used to analyse social science data:
• stata
• SPSS
• Installing R
• RStudio
The Benefits of Random Probability Sampling: The 2015 BES Face-to-Face
This post reveals the BES 2015 reported vote figures for the face-to-face survey and discusses them in the context of representativeness achieved via random probability sampling and efforts to interview hard-to-reach respondents. The face-to-face survey is an address-based random probability sample of eligible voters living in 600 wards…
Why the polls got it wrong and the British Election Study face-to-face...
The release of the British Election Study post-election face-to-face survey allows us to revisit the question of why the polls went wrong before the 2015 General Election. Based on our internet panel, we previously examined five possible explanations for why the polls went wrong and…
British Election Study 2015 Face-to-face survey v1.0: Release note
This note accompanies the release of the British Election Study face to face survey (version 1.0). Dataset and documentation The dataset and additional documentation are available to download here. Citation Fieldhouse, E., J. Green., G. Evans., H. Schmitt, C. van der Eijk, J. Mellon and…
PhD study with the British Election Study
Are you an undergraduate or Masters student interested in studying for a PhD in electoral politics? If so then you need to come along to an information session at The University of Manchester on October 28 to learn more about all the exciting topics you…
Release! Updated 2015 General Election Results File
Today we are releasing an updated version of our 2015 General Election results file (version 2.0). The file comprises the 2015 election results for each constituency (winning party, vote share, number of votes, turnout, majority and changes in vote share since 2010), the 2010 results (winning party,…
Why did the polls go wrong? By Jon Mellon and Chris Prosser
The post-election wave of the British Election Study (BES) Internet panel allows us to take a closer look at possible causes of the polling miss during the recent General Election. We previously identified five possible explanations: 1) “don’t knows” shifting, 2) a late swing among…
Post-Election Wave of the BES Internet Panel Released
The British Election Study is pleased to announce the release of the sixth wave of the Internet Panel, conducted immediately after the British General Election. In total 30,027 respondents took wave 6 of the British Election Study. 27,926 of these also took wave 5, an…
Using the British Election Study to Understand the Great Polling Miss
Using the British Election Study to Understand the Great Polling Miss Competing explanations have been put forward for the large polling errors on May 7th. In this post, we examine five relatively plausible explanations of the polling errors, looking at the existing evidence for each…
Coding the ‘single most important issue’
The very first question on each wave of the British Election Study asks respondents “what is the SINGLE MOST important issue facing the country at the present time?” Variants of this question have a long history and are the most widely used measures of which…
BES Internet Panel Campaign Wave Data and W1-5 Panel Released
The British Election Study is pleased to announce the release of the fifth wave of the Internet Panel. You can download the data here. In total 30,725 respondents took wave 5 of the British Election Study. 28,073 of these also took wave 4, an overall…