I got the full report from Zogby on the recent pop culture survey. In this survey, people were asked to name only two justices, not all nine. Sixty-one percent of people could not name any justices, whereas 15% named one and 24% named two. The press release characterizes Thomas as the “most recognized justice,” and while prior surveys support this characterization (now that O’Connor is gone), the Zogby survey on its own probably supports calling him only the “most top-of-mind justice.”
Here are the percentages indicating how often each justice was named:
| Thomas | 20% |
| Scalia | 11% |
| Roberts | 9% |
| Ginsburg | 9% |
| Alito | 5% |
| Kennedy | 4% |
| Souter | 3% |
| Stevens | 2% |
| Breyer | 1% |
Another relevant question was asking people to name the three branches of government. Forty-two percent named all three, 17% gave an incorrect “other” answer, and 41% were “not sure.” Unfortunately, it’s not clear what exactly counted as a correct answer to this question, e.g., did “President” count for the “executive” or the “courts” for the “judiciary”? Without this information, this question is not as interesting.
n = 1213
error: +/- 2.9%
Source: Zogby International, “Pop Culture/Political Survey: Nationwide and in Ten Metropolitan Areas” (Aug. 10, 2006).
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