Wes Colley is a scientist. He is not a politician. He has not taken a single course in political science. Actually, he has little interest in political philosophy. But, his work in mathematics and statistics will lead many in the political world to watch his research closely.
Colley is a research scientist at The University of Alabama in Huntsville. He and his graduate thesis adviser, J. Richard Gott III at Princeton University, have devised what they describe as a very simple, but surprisingly effective means to predict the outcome of the U.S. Presidential election — median statistics.
The researchers have written a research paper on the subject for the journal Mathematical and Computer Modeling. They extol the virtues of employing median statistics in political polling.
"The median number is powerful because it throws away discrepant points automatically without bias," Colley explained. "Though it is slightly slower to converge to the true value than the mean (simple average), it avoids the mean's high susceptibility to bias in polling."
He said median statistics largely discount outlying polls, which may arise from political bias, or unintentional bias of particular polls.
Colley is nationally known for his use of a computer modeling system in predicting college football rankings. Colley's system is one of six that is used by the NCAA to determine rankings for the Bowl Championship Series poll.
The system being used to predict the presidential election uses simple statistics, according to Colley. "We're not arriving at these results with sophisticated trend analysis. This is very low-rent statistics," he said.
Their methodology uses the margins of victory for each candidate in each poll during the past month. Those margins are then ranked from the largest margin to the smallest. The middle number, or the median, is used as the candidate's score for the individual states.
The researchers began tracking polling results in May. At that point, Republican John McCain had a lead of 275 electoral votes to 263 for Democrat Barack Obama. By late June, Obama had a built a lead of 355 votes to 183 and maintained that lead until early August when the data showed Barack leading in states that provided 352 electoral votes to McCain's 186 votes.
However, since that time, the polling surveys show the race has tightened. The most recent data shows Barack Obama with a lead of 273-265.
"Some states have gone back and forth in their polling data," Colley said. "It's like the pundits have said all along. This is going to be a very, very close race."
The two scientists first used this method in the 2004 presidential election. They correctly predicted the results in 49 states, missing only Hawaii.
"Just as we had originally hoped, the method made it possible to predict successfully the results in the large close states (Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida) where there were a great many polls taken," Colley said. "States with only a few polls were generally not close, and so the median poll also predicted these states successfully."
Actually, Colley said a greater number of surveys adds to the validity of the results. He said the method appears particularly well adapted to U.S. Presidential elections where the candidates are chosen well in advance, and where outcomes in individual states determine the winner.
"As we get closer to the election, there are going to be a lot more polling that will take place, particularly among the swing states," he said.
Colley said those include the well-known states of Ohio and Florida, but also include Virginia and Colorado and some small states, such as Nevada and New Mexico.
He provides early insight to some of those states. "Florida may be perceived as a swing state, but John McCain has won eight polls, lost one and he has tied in one poll with Barack Obama. I think it would be tough to flip Florida into a state that Mr. Obama could win."
Colley said the same holds true for Obama in Pennsylvania. "He has won six polls to zero for John McCain (with one tie), so Pennsylvania seems to be pretty solid for Barack."
Meanwhile, other states are closer. The record is 3-3-1 in Virginia, and 2-2-0 in Nevada. Colley and Gott break the ties by referring to the most recent poll previous to their one-month window. Currently, both break McCain's way. "But, McCain should hardly feel confident about those states," Colley said.
Recently, Ohio was extremely close, vacillating back and forth from McCain to Obama several times during the last few weeks, but suddenly McCain has surged to a 10-3 lead in that state. "It appears that this is a very dynamic time for the election."
Colley summed up the election as it stands today: "John McCain needs several swing states to break his way, whereas Obama can afford to lose a couple and still win the election."
The system uses a one-month running tally for its results. The final tally will be the morning of the election, according to Colley.
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