By Mario Canseco, VP of Angus Reid Public Opinion – Vision Critical

Measuring the views of the population on ethical issues has been a challenge since the early days of public opinion research. In the 1960s, the street interviewer may have had an easy time engaging in a conversation about the weather and politics, but would have faced a frightening task trying to discuss contraception.

The telephone, used extensively in the last two decades of the past century, also provided a complicated predicament. The presence of a voice on the other end may have modified the way people reacted to specific behaviours. A respondent may have felt compelled to say that some things were “wrong”, even if he or she truly felt they were “acceptable.”

This year, Angus Reid Public Opinion partnered with Maclean’s Magazine to find out how Canadians feel about 21 ethical issues. The results show a country divided by age and gender on some dilemmas, and universally integrated on others.

The fact that Angus Reid Public Opinion conducted this survey online, relying on Sparq—Vision Critical’s widely adopted online research platform—allowed respondents to ponder each issue carefully, without being prompted by a voice or hurried to make a decision. In some instances, Canadians simply chose not to take sides. On others, responses were overwhelmingly positive, or decidedly negative.

Thanks to online technology, researchers can get closer to the true opinions of people than ever before. The success of this survey shows that some of the barriers that may have affected responses in the past can be effectively removed.

Learn More

This issue of Maclean’s was published on Thursday Nov 19th. To learn more about the results pick up an issue from a newsstand or read more from the official Press Release.