Hunt for real surveyors continues

Posted by Tim Lambert on December 17, 2005
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Stephen Dubner reports that Freakonomics is the 7th best-selling book for 2005. According to Nielsen BookScan, it is has sold 584,000 copies so far this year.

Freakonomics discusses the survey that Lott claims to have conducted in 1997, but that he appears to have fabricated. Lott says that eight Chicago university students made the phone calls for him. So why hasn’t one of these students read Freakonomics and come forward to prove that Lott conducted a survey? You would think that students (or former students) from Chicago would be particularly likely to have read the book since Levitt is a professor there.

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Comments

  1. #1 No Nym
    December 19, 2005

    “reakonomics discusses the survey that Lott claims to have conducted in 1997, but that he appears to have fabricated.”

    Does the book talk about the controversy?

    Your wording is kind of ambiguous. Appears to whom? The author or you? I agree it’s a bogus survey, but if the book doesn’t mention the controversy no one would call in. Just asking.

  2. #2 Tim Lambert
    December 20, 2005

    Yes, the book discusses the controversy over whether the survey was ever conducted.