AP-Petside.com Poll Methodology

The Associated Press-Petside.com Poll was conducted December 3rd – 8th, 2008, by GfK Roper Public Affairs & Media – a division of GfK Custom Research North America. This telephone poll is based on a nationally-representative probability sample of 1,129 pet owners age 18 or older. The interviews were conducted with respondents on landlines and cellular telephones. Both the landline and cell phone samples were provided by Survey Sampling International. The survey sample included the contiguous 48 states, Alaska and Hawaii. Interviews were conducted in both English and Spanish.

The combined landline and cell phone data were weighted to account for non-response differences on age, sex, education and race, using targets from the March 2008 supplement of the Current Population Survey.

The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 2.9 percentage points, for results based on the entire sample of pet owners. The margin of sampling error is higher and varies for results based on sub-samples. In our reporting of the findings, percentage points are rounded off to the nearest whole number. As a result, percentages in a given table column may total slightly higher or lower than 100%. In questions that permit multiple responses, columns may total significantly more than 100%, depending on the number of different responses offered by each respondent.

For more information, contact info@ap-gfkpoll.com.