A group conducted a poll of 2083 likely voters just prior to an election. The re

Question

A group conducted a poll of 2083 likely voters just prior to an election. The results of the survey indicated that candidate A would receive 49% of the popular vote and candidate B would receive 4 7% of the popular vote. The margin of error was reported to be 4%. The group reported that the race was too close to call. Use the concept of a confidence interval to explain what this means. What does it mean to say the race was too close to call? Since it is within the margin of error for candidate A to receive 45% of the popular vote and or candidate B to receive 51%, or for candidate A to receive 53 % of the popular vote and for and candidate B to receive 43%, the poll cannot predict the winner. Since the estimated proportions depend on the level of confidence, the candidate predicted to receive the greater percentage of the popular vote changes for different levels of confidence, so the poll cannot predict the winner. Since the poll results do not show that one of the candidates has more than 50% of the popular vote, the poll cannot predict the winner. Since the difference between the percentages of the popular vote for the candidates is less than the 4% of voters that are undecided the poll cannot predict the winner.

Explanation / Answer

We are given that the 2 proportions are 49% and 47% and that the margin or error is 4%.

Since these 4% can vote in favour of either candidate A in case of which A would win OR these 4% can vote in favour of either candidate B in case of which B would win. So the poll cannot effictively predict the winner. Hence it is said the race was too close to call.

Hence option A is correct.

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