Where does StFX Stand Politically: Survey Results
/Over the first few weeks of February, I posted and circulated a survey around public spaces at StFX that asked students to anonymously indicate which party they’re most favourable towards, and to rank the most pressing issues Canadians face today according to their personal importance. My goal was to reach 200 replies so I would have a realistic sample size and therefore a good indication of how StFX really felt politically, and I achieved this goal. In this article, I will show you some interesting graphs I was able to compile using the demographic data volunteered by participants.
Before I get to the graphs, however, I have to make some caveats. First, certain demographics were too small to include in the demographic-based graphs while respecting the anonymity of the respondents and the meaningfulness of the data. There were only two students who selected “education” as their program, one who selected “graduate studies,” and only seven students who selected “other” as their gender. Data drawn from these numbers alone would not tell us anything conclusive. Nevertheless, everyone who participated in the survey is included in the “All Students” bar in the graph ranking political issues, and those who selected “other” are still included in the graph representing their major. One final caveat is that conservative hesitancy in polling is a real phenomenon. If you’ve never heard of this, look up the “shy tory factor” or “social desirability bias.” Anecdotally, I have already heard of conservative students not wanting to complete the survey because I might be a nefarious character who would expose them. That is unfortunate, but it is what it is. I don’t think it would change too much if this wasn’t the case, but just keep in mind that StFX students may be marginally more conservative than a poll could indicate.
With all that out of the way, here are the results of the survey. I’ll begin with the preferred parties of different majors, starting with Bachelor of Arts Students:
I don’t think this or any of the other first three graphs are too surprising. Canadian universities are known to be pretty left-leaning places, and I don’t think anyone, regardless of political leaning, would guess that Bachelor of Arts students would be the ones to buck this trend. Up next, we have Bachelor of Science students:
Almost identical. If you’re a Liberal or New Democrat, use this graph to epically own your Conservative friends by claiming that it is proof that Conservatives are anti-science. However, I will be collecting royalties if you choose to do so. On to Schwartz School of Business:
Another shocking twist. It is cool to see some diversity of thought among departments, however isolated they might be from each other. Sometimes I wonder, though, if there’s a divide between how Conservative business students are and how Conservative actual businesspeople are. Because if I was a Canadian businessman and for 10 years I watched Liberal insiders collect those cheeky little government contracts and bailouts, I might buy some lobbying time and become Trudeau’s next best friend myself!
These upcoming graphs are going to get far juicier than what we’ve already seen. Next, we have the differences in political preference between men and women on campus. Here are both graphs together:
This one actually did surprise me. I understand I may be missing out on some nuances from my personal position, but it seems weird that men are more likely to be Conservatives but equally likely to support the NDP. I know this isn’t reflective of the country as a whole, and a university campus is a pretty unique place. But I feel like if men are more conservative (“small c” on purpose here), then shouldn’t there be more Liberal men than NDP men, since the Liberal party is ostensibly less left-wing than the NDP? It seems like the Liberal party must have done something to seriously alienate men that did not affect women at all, but I can’t think of what they could have done that would be so different than the NDP. Alternatively, men could just be more radical if the Liberals are seen as centrist, but the next graph would seem to suggest otherwise.
This brings us to our finale. The juiciest graph of them all. Forthwith, I am about to expose the ideological divide between men and women on campus...prepare yourselves:
These numbers were found by averaging all responses to each question by men and by women, and the total average of all responses (including those who selected other) as well. The average difference between men and women only equaled 0.79 which is not that high considering each issue was ranked out of 10, so a big win for unity between the sexes.
I know that’s not what you care about, though, dear reader, so I have compiled the issues that men and women differed the most on.
The top 5 most divisive issues at StFX are:
Progressive social issues – 168% higher than the average difference (HTAD)
Childcare – 78% HTAD
Indigenous issues – 63% HTAD
Climate change – 54% HTAD
Provincial/language rights – 18% HTAD
Interestingly, women cared more about each of these issues.
Overall, men seem to be more socially centrist, only polling at an average 0.33 points more for progressive social issues than they did for conservative social issues. Women, on the other hand, poll as being much more left wing, with a difference of 2.83 between the average importance attributed to progressive social issues and conservative social issues. Outside of the social issues, men care more about affordability, housing, the economy, immigration, tax policy, foreign policy, and military spending, but the difference between men and women for these issues were all below average (0.79), except for military spending. Women care more about healthcare, climate change, poverty and social inequality, provincial/language rights, indigenous issues, and education.
In conclusion, I hope you all enjoyed this survey as much as I enjoyed chasing strangers down to get them to participate in it. Thank you to all of those who did, and if people like this kind of thing than maybe it can become something that happens every few years to see where StFX stands politically in the future.
