Established in 1947 at the Second International Conference on Public Opinion Research held in Williamstown, Massachusetts[2][3]
as the World Congress on Public Opinion Research, the association acquired its current name in 1948, at the Third International Conference on Public Opinion Research.[4]
In 1953, it became the sole nongovernment consultant organization to UNESCO in the field of polling.[2]
Over time, WAPOR's membership has grown and become more international. In 1956, roughly a decade after its founding, the association had 158 members from about 20 countries;[2] by 1962, these figures had risen to approximately 200 and more than 30, respectively.[7]
In 1970, WAPOR had more than 300 members from 41 countries.[8]
As of 2021, the association has approximately 500 members from research institutes and universities in over 60 countries on six continents.[9] On February 8, 2011, WAPOR Latinoamérica became the first recognized chapter, followed by WAPOR Asia Pacific (2016), WAPOR West Asia and North Africa (WANA) (2018), and WAPOR Sub-Saharan Africa (2022).[10]
Annual conference are held in a three-year cycle: with American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) in North America (Toronto 2019), in connection with either ESOMAR (European Society for Opinion and Marketing Research) or ESRA in Europe (Lisbon 2017), and in the third year somewhere else (Morocco 2018). This arrangement permits WAPOR members to meet with academic, commercial, and government researchers from the main centers of survey research around the globe. The annual conferences are held in different countries each year, and the 2020 and 2021 annual conferences were held virtually due to the pandemic.[12] AAPOR and ESOMAR are considered "allied associations."[13] In 2021, WAPOR published a joint task force report with AAPOR on quality in comparative surveys.[14]
Richard Morin, former polling director of The Washington Post, described WAPOR as "the leading professional association of pollsters working outside the United States".[25]Herbert Weisberg, a political scientistatOhio State University and former president of the Midwest Political Science Association,[26]
further credited WAPOR with contributing to the internationalization, and thereby the professionalization, of the field of survey research.[27]
