University of Cincinnati (Ohio Poll)
Graded against the actual result across 14 races (from 52 polls, through 2012).
Every race (14)
Each race University of Cincinnati (Ohio Poll) polled, scored on its final poll — the call right before the vote — against the actual Dem−Rep result. Click a race for its full detail.
| Race | Their call | Result | Miss | Call |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 OH President | D+1.5 | D+3.0 | 1.5 | ✓ |
| 2012 OH Senate | D+3.8 | D+6.0 | 2.2 | ✓ |
| 2010 OH Governor | R+4.0 | R+2.0 | 2.0 | ✓ |
| 2010 OH Senate | R+21.0 | R+17.4 | 3.6 | ✓ |
| 2008 OH President | D+6.0 | D+4.6 | 1.4 | ✓ |
| 2006 OH Governor | D+22.0 | D+23.9 | 1.9 | ✓ |
| 2006 OH Senate | D+12.0 | D+12.3 | 0.3 | ✓ |
| 2004 OH President | R+1.0 | R+2.1 | 1.1 | ✓ |
| 2004 OH Senate | R+30.0 | R+27.7 | 2.3 | ✓ |
| 2002 OH Governor | R+18.7 | R+19.5 | 0.8 | ✓ |
| 2000 OH President | R+10.0 | R+3.5 | 6.5 | ✓ |
| 2000 OH Senate | R+28.9 | R+24.1 | 4.8 | ✓ |
| 1998 OH Governor | R+11.0 | R+5.4 | 5.6 | ✓ |
| 1998 OH Senate | R+24.0 | R+12.9 | 11.1 | ✓ |
Accuracy by time to election
Lower is better. Time to election runs right (election week) to left (~2 months out).
By the numbers
| Time to election | Polls | Avg miss | vs field | Called right |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ≤1 wk | 12 | 2.36 | -1.92 | 100% |
| 1–3 wk | 15 | 4.18 | -0.89 | 87% |
| 3–6 wk | 10 | 7.43 | +1.69 | 90% |
| 6–9 wk | 15 | 6.04 | -0.11 | 87% |
vs field is this pollster's average miss minus all pollsters' at the same lead time — green beats the field, redtrails it. Our historical polls reach ~2 months out; earlier polling isn't in the record.
Track record by cycle — getting better?
| Year | Polls | Avg miss | Lean (house effect) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1998 | 10 | 10.4 | R+10.4 |
| 2000 | 6 | 4.2 | R+4.2 |
| 2002 | 3 | 1.9 | D+1.9 |
| 2004 | 6 | 3.2 | R+1.3 |
| 2006 | 6 | 6.3 | R+6.3 |
| 2008 | 5 | 5.8 | R+5.2 |
| 2010 | 8 | 2.8 | R+2.1 |
| 2012 | 8 | 1.7 | R+0.9 |
Do we credit a pollster for fixing its bias? Each cycle, the model re-estimates every pollster's lean from all its earlier polls (walk-forward) and subtracts it before using the poll. We tested weighting recent cycles more — it doesn't help: a pollster's lean in one cycle barely predicts the next (correlation 0.28), so the swings above are mostly noise, and averaging over more history beats chasing the latest cycle. The all-time estimate we use came out within ~0.5% of the best option.