Answers
What is a synthetic panel?
A synthetic panel is a set of AI respondents built from census demographics, asked the same survey instrument, and aggregated into option shares the way a human panel is. It is not one chatbot answering in 500 voices. Lewsearch's published pool is 178,600 simulated respondents. The aggregate is scored against real polls.
How a study is assembled
You write a question and response options. You pick a market. The system draws respondents whose demographics match that market's margins, interviews them, and applies the same published calibrator every customer gets. 7.47% mean absolute error on 404 ex-electoral questions of a 460-question benchmark vs real polls (Pew, Gallup, UT/Texas Politics Project, PPIC). Geographic notes and live coverage (27 live panels · U.S. national · 4 census regions (32 audiences)) are on coverage.
Worked example: 500 Ohio adults, one question
A 500-respondent Ohio study is not 500 copies of "an Ohioan." Each row is a distinct age, education, income, and party draw. The output is a topline (say 41% / 37% / 22%) plus crosstabs. If the question is in a calibrated bucket, the report can point at that bucket's MAE. If it is not, Lewsearch's own methodology says to treat the read as directional. That distinction is the difference between a panel product and a demo that always sounds sure.
| Object | What you get | What you can score |
|---|---|---|
| Synthetic panel | Option shares, crosstabs, quotes | Aggregate vs a real poll (MAE) |
| Single LLM prompt | One paragraph | Usually nothing public |
| Synthetic interviews | Transcripts and themes | Thematic parity, if published |
| Human probability sample | A defensible survey | Sampling error, if designed |
FAQ
- What is a synthetic panel?
- A set of simulated respondents with census demographics, each answering the same instrument. Results are percentages, crosstabs, and quotes. Every Lewsearch report states the answers are AI-generated.
- How is that different from ChatGPT?
- One model gives one blended answer. A panel gives a distribution: who agrees, who does not, and how that split moves by age, place, or party.
- Are the people real?
- No. The demographics are drawn from census-style margins. The answers are generated by a model. Accuracy is checked by scoring the aggregate against real polls.
- How big is Lewsearch's panel?
- 178,600 simulated respondents in the published pool. A study samples from a market. Coverage: 27 live panels · U.S. national · 4 census regions (32 audiences).
Check the work
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Canonical: https://lewsearch.com/answers/what-is-a-synthetic-panel