With respect to situations where people are complaining or being critical of a policy or a behavior, one should bear in mind that a compliant is more likely to be voiced than a neutral or positive attitude about the same thing. As a TV writer, I can tell you that the amount of critical ‘hate-mail’ I receive about an episode often conflicts with the audience polling results for the episode. My ‘hate-mail’ might outpace other messages by two to one for an episode which polls in the overwhelmingly positive range. I suspect that this comes down to how much more likely a person is to act on a negative opinion than on a positive one.
With respect to situations where people are complaining or being critical of a policy or a behavior, one should bear in mind that a compliant is more likely to be voiced than a neutral or positive attitude about the same thing. As a TV writer, I can tell you that the amount of critical ‘hate-mail’ I receive about an episode often conflicts with the audience polling results for the episode. My ‘hate-mail’ might outpace other messages by two to one for an episode which polls in the overwhelmingly positive range. I suspect that this comes down to how much more likely a person is to act on a negative opinion than on a positive one.