From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishpollingpoll‧ing /ˈpəʊlɪŋ $ ˈpoʊ-/ noun [uncountable] 1 PPVVOTE/ELECTwhen people vote in a political election Polling started at 8.00 this morning.heavy/light polling (=with many or few people voting)2 when a person or an organization asks a lot of people the same questions in order to find out what they think about a subject
Examples from the Corpus
polling• Polling day is 30 May.• Polling has been going on since 9 am.• Polling will take place from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m.• Campaigning was seriously hampered by increasing political violence, however, and the election was cancelled shortly after polling had commenced.• The announcement of her resignation came just two days before polling was to begin.• The other important innovation was the rise of the professional opinion research agency offering its services and expertise in opinion polling.• I have never liked opinion polling or pollsters.• There are three important compendiums of opinion polling results.• Clinton aides claimed that their own polling showed their man winning comfortably, a steady seven points ahead of Bush.• Security was tight at the polling stations. 