How it works
The science behind the shape.
Every design decision was made to avoid the biases that make most political quizzes subtly unfair. Here's exactly how the polygon is built.
Not a line. A shape.
Traditional political tests measure you on a single axis: left vs. right, liberal vs. conservative. Poligon measures ten independent dimensions, because political identity simply is not one-dimensional.
Why ten?
These dimensions are drawn from the framework used by the Pew Research Center in its Political Typology studies, one of the most-cited multi-axis frameworks in political science, mapping American political values since the 1980s.
Each dimension is largely independent: your views on healthcare funding tell us very little about your views on military spending. That independence is why a single axis falls short, and why a polygon with ten spokes captures something truer.
The balance rule
For each dimension, exactly two questions are written from a progressive framing and two from a conservative framing. A committed conservative who "Strongly Agrees" with conservative-framed questions scores just as high a conviction level as a committed progressive. Not lower.
This symmetry is informed by best-practice guidelines from American National Election Studies (ANES) methodology for avoiding acquiescence bias in attitude measurement: the tendency for respondents to agree with any statement regardless of content.
Balanced by design, not by accident.
Most political quizzes ask questions that are subtly easier to agree with if you lean progressive, because they were written by people who lean progressive. We deliberately designed around this.
Progressive-framed (P): 2 per dimension
"Asylum seekers should receive a full legal hearing before any deportation decision is made."
Conservative-framed (C): 2 per dimension
"A country has the right and responsibility to strictly control who crosses its borders."
Size = conviction. Shade = direction.
Your polygon encodes two things simultaneously: how strongly you feel, and which direction you lean. It uses visual language rather than numbers.
Spoke length = conviction strength
A short spoke means you're near-neutral on that axis. A full-length spoke means strong conviction, in either direction. An ultra-conservative and an ultra-progressive will both produce a full-size polygon. The difference is the colour, not the size.
Wedge shade = direction
Each dimension has its own colour family. A light pastel means progressive lean; a deep dark shade means conservative lean. Two extreme profiles look completely different even at identical size. One is a pastel rainbow, the other a rich jewel-tone palette.
Why this approach avoids bias
Most visualisations put "left" on one side and "right" on the other, making the larger side look dominant. Poligon avoids this entirely. There is no "bigger" or "better" polygon; only stronger or weaker conviction, and different shading.
This design is informed by the Nolan Chart (the first two-axis political map, 1969) and academic work on multi-dimensional scaling in political science, including the DW-NOMINATE scoring system developed at UCLA, used to score every U.S. Congress member since 1789.
There is no red vs. blue, no left vs. right label on the polygon. Two people with opposite views on every axis produce shapes that are the same physical size, just radically different in colour.
Conviction strength and lean direction.
Each dimension shows two pieces of information: how strongly you feel, and which direction you lean. Neither piece carries a value judgment on its own.
Why no negative numbers?
The app does not display scores like -0.93 or +0.50. A negative sign on a conservative score could be read as a value judgment. Internally, the math still uses signed values, but what you see is always neutral: a percentage and a direction.
A 95% Traditional and a 95% Reform score both reflect deeply held, consistent convictions. The percentage tells you how strongly; the label tells you which way. Neither is better or worse.
How we estimate politician shapes.
For each public figure, we score all 10 dimensions using the same scale you answer on — from −1 (strongly traditional) to +1 (strongly reform). The estimates draw on multiple public sources and are cross-checked wherever possible.
Important disclaimer
These scores are approximations for educational purposes only. A politician's position on any issue is nuanced, changes over time, and cannot be perfectly captured by a single number. Votes are influenced by party pressure, constituency, and tactical considerations that go beyond stated beliefs.
Poligon does not endorse any politician or political position. The scores exist purely to give you a rough comparison shape — not a verdict.
State politicians
For governors and state-level senators, DW-NOMINATE data is often unavailable or incomplete. We rely more heavily on signed legislation, state voting records, policy platforms, and cross-referenced news coverage. State-level estimates carry a wider margin of uncertainty than those for long-serving federal legislators.
How conviction % and lean labels are calculated.
Quite a few people have asked what the percentages actually mean, and how the Reform / Traditional / Mixed labels are assigned. Here's the honest answer — with one small thing kept close to the chest.
Conviction % — how strongly you hold a view
The conviction percentage runs from 0 % to 100 %. A score of 0 % means your answers on that dimension were balanced — they pointed in different directions and largely cancelled each other out. A score of 100 % means every answer on that dimension pointed the same way, at maximum intensity.
The key insight: two people can both score 92 % conviction on immigration and land on opposite ends of the spectrum. The percentage tells you how strongly; it says nothing about which way.
Reform · Traditional · Mixed — which way you lean
The lean label collapses the direction of your score into three readable categories:
The maths
Internally, each dimension is scored on a continuous numerical scale. The conviction percentage is derived from the magnitude of that score — the direction is stripped away before the percentage is computed. This is why a 95 % Traditional and a 95 % Reform score look identical in terms of spoke length, and only differ in shade.
We don't publish the full scoring formula. What we will say is that it is deliberately simple — no machine learning, no hidden weighting, no partisan calibration. The goal was a model that a student could reconstruct from the quiz questions alone, given enough time.
The neutrality threshold
A lean label of "Mixed" doesn't mean you have no opinion. It means your responses on that dimension were close enough to neutral that neither "Reform" nor "Traditional" would be an accurate description.
We use a small threshold to separate genuine leans from statistical noise — roughly the equivalent of "slightly agree" vs. "strongly agree" on a single question. Below that threshold, the shape speaks for itself: a short spoke with muted colouring.
No nudging, no normalisation to a population
Your scores are not adjusted relative to other users' answers. A 70 % Reform score means 70 % of the maximum possible conviction on that axis — not "70 % of people lean more traditional than you." The polygon reflects your answers, and only yours.
Research sources & methodology
Pew Research Center
Political Typology studies (1987–2023), the primary framework for the 10 dimensions.
DW-NOMINATE (UCLA)
Multi-dimensional political scoring system used to estimate politician positions.
ANES Methodology
Guidelines for balanced survey design and avoiding acquiescence bias in attitude measurement.
GovTrack / VoteSmart
Voting-record databases used to source politician profile estimates.
Nolan Chart (1969)
The original two-axis political map that pioneered multi-dimensional political thinking.
World Values Survey
Cross-national research on values underpinning the globally applicable dimension design.
Scores are educational approximations, not clinical assessments. Politician profiles are derived from public records and published for comparison purposes only.
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