I think questions about support for EA ideas in the general population would doubtless be interesting.
Unfortunately I think it is pretty difficult to ask questions about EA to the general public in an adequate manner. Since almost everyone is unfamiliar with EA ideas, statements of EA ideas are apt to be interpreted in line with more common folk ideas, rather than as expressing the EA ideas intended. For example, many statements of EA ideas ("We should only donate to the best effective charities" "We should do the most good we can do") can be interpreted completely platitudinously, so you find almost everyone agreeing with these statements even though almost no-one actually agrees with the ideas they are supposed to express. I think similar difficulties apply to asking whether people think those in the far future should be valued equally (see here and here)
Another specific problem is that almost no-one interprets "cost-effectiveness" correctly. I've run a number of studies examining how people think about thinking about cost-effectiveness in charitable decision-making, and I've found not only that most people naturally interpret "cost-effectiveness" to overhead ratios, but that even if you stipulate what cost-effectiveness means, and look at only those people who pass multiple comprehension checks putatively indicating correct understanding of the definition of cost-effectiveness, large percentages still cannot select which is the most "cost-effective charity" out of a pair of charities (A vs B) which save more lives with a given sum of money vs save fewer lives with the same sum of money but spend less on overhead costs.
I discuss this and some of the things I broadly think a good operationalization of EA should include here
That said, I'd be interested if you would ask people whether they agree or disagree with some statements along the lines of: "Some charitable causes are objectively better than others." "You can't compare whether different charitable causes are better or worse than each other."
Great that you're doing this, thanks so much for raising this here!
Not sure if you're already aware of this, but you might want to be aware of other studies that have looked at similar questions. In particular the Money For Good study in the US and the equivalent in the UK were interesting, albeit somewhat dated. (I have the raw data for the UK study). You might want to have a look so that you can use consistent question wording whether the questions overlap.
Some questions that we at SoGive would be interested to know more about:
Some researchers are doing some interesting work on how people give -- the names Beth Breeze and Cat Walker spring to mind, although there are others as well. But you may well be too time-constrained to wade through all their work, in which case I suggest you just take a look at the Money for Good studies mentioned earlier.
More generally, very happy to discuss further. If you are willing to have a chat, let me know: sanjay [at] sogive.org
Hi! Thanks a lot, these are all great!
I believe so, but let me try.
I am not confident I would be able to create high-quality survey questions though. Especially to distinguish between strong and moderate preferences. I have similar problems with the next bullet points. Maybe I am overthinking this though.
Yeah, I have about a week to do send some suggestions as the study should be launched by Jan 2. Nevertheless, I believe that even if I managed to establish only a handful of high-quality questions, it would be good groundwork for future additions.
Awesome, I would be really grateful for more help. Basically, they told me that if I put together some battery of questions in a doc, then they would incorporate it into the survey. My estimate is that they would put in at least 3 questions with 60% of probability, but I am having a really hard time to estimate this as there are a lot of factors in. But it seems to me that it's still worth to invest a few hours into this.
I created a document where I want to start summarizing this. Feel free to contribute directly.