The 1951 Weinheim conference gathered over a hundred European opinion and market researchers.

Evidence

The Weinheim conferencedespite its general title `Empirical Social Research’, which Adorno, who helped to organize it, probably insisted onwas mainly concerned with the methods and problems of opinion and market research. Over a hundred people took part. They came from commercial opinion research institutes, from universities and university institutes, from statistics offices, broadcasting organizations, HICOG and other organizations. The conference had been suggested by the HICOG Reactions Analysis Staff, the US High Commissioner’s opinion research department. George Gallup, one of the pioneers of modern opinion research, who in 1936 had used a small but representative sample of 6000 voters to give an accurate prediction of the result of the American presidential election, thus making the sampling method famous virtually overnight, sent a telegram of greetings to the German pioneers who followed in his wake. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1925

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the general history of opinion polling and Gallup’s 1936 sampling-method breakthrough, relevant to media/communication theory.