ABSTRACT
Public opinion research in the Soviet Union underwent many changes in both theory and methodology. A survey of public opinion research affords an excellent opportunity of chronologically tracing changes in the field of social research in general. According to Soviet theory, a public opinion poll in and of itself constituted a means of activating opinion by focusing attention on important social problems. The Public Opinion Institute also directly interviewed some members of collectives of communist labour. In 1965, a major contribution to the debate over public opinion research was made by B. A. Grushin in an article which examined and outlined future possibilities of this type of research. As far as the Public Opinion Institute was concerned, noted Grushin, it 'continually had to take into consideration the absence of the necessary number of workers who would be fully qualified to study programming, conduct questionnaires and analyze the received material'.
