2020 Democratic Debates: Stats on Open, Closed, and Follow-Up Questions
7th Democratic Presidential Debate Moderators Stoked the Fire Resulting in a Spat
January 15, 2020
Top 5 Most Popular Powerful Panel Blogs
January 30, 2020
Panel moderators use open-ended questions to incite conversation and closed questions to summarize or exact a short answer from a panelist. But it doesn’t always work that way. We all know the person who can take a closed question and ramble on and on OR the teenager who can take an open-ended question and turn it into a closed question:
“Hi honey! How was your day?” (open)
“Fine” (closed)
A skilled moderator will rephrase the question to illicit a more extensive response:
“What was the best thing about your day today?” (open)
“Nothing.” (closed)
Ahhhh, the joys of parenting! Well, the same thing can happen on a panel. Be thoughtful about the phrasing of your question. Are you trying to open up the discussion or pinpoint a position?
For the 2019-2020 Democratic Debates, (which I have been commenting on), it’s been a 65/35 split: 65% open-ended questions and 35% closed questions:
| Type | # | % | Debate 1a | Debate 1b | Debate 2a | Debate 2b | Debate 3 | Debate 4 | Debate 5 | Debate 6 | Debate 7 | |
| Open | 298 | 65% | 40 | 34 | 45 | 31 | 36 | 50 | 28 | 22 | 29 | |
| Closed | 162 | 35% | 20 | 18 | 12 | 9 | 16 | 26 | 17 | 21 | 23 | |
| Total # of questions | 477 | 60 | 52 | 57 | 40 | 52 | 76 | 45 | 43 | 52 |
That seems pretty reasonable to me. However, that’s not the interesting part. Of those closed questions (35% of the questions on average), the candidates could respond in three ways:
- Answer the question right away
- Answer the question within the allotted timeframe
- Not answer the question at all
On average, the candidates didn’t answer the closed question about a third of the time!
| 1a | 1b | 2a | 2b | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | ||||
| Answered Right Away | 11 | 11 | 7 | 4 | 8 | 15 | 8 | 12 | 17 | |||
| Answered After Explanation | 3 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 2 | |||
| Didn’t Answer | 6 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 7 | 8 | 5 | 6 | 4 | |||
| Repeated Question/Follow Up | 2 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 2 | |||
| % of Closed Questions didn’t answer | 30% | 17% | 33% | 44% | 44% | 31% | 29% | 29% | 17% |
Ahhh. But here’s the really interesting part: If the candidate didn’t answer the closed question at all, the moderator would only follow up on those questions 40% of the time (on average). Some debate moderators are better at this than others!
| % of Closed Questions not answered – but followed up | 33% | 100% | 50% | 25% | 29% | 38% | 20% | 50% | 50% |
So I gotta ask: Why should you answer a direct, tough question when the moderator will follow up less than half the time?
For more information, check out my website at www.RulesAnalyst.com. Book me now to comment (live , Zoom, or pre-recorded interviews) on the next debate by calling me at 480.399.8489 or set up a time to talk here.
Related Articles:
12 Moderator Mishaps that Derail a Presidential Debate
A Feeding Frenzy: The Second Night of the First Democratic Primary Debate
First Democratic Presidential Primary: The Beto & Booker Show!
