| Statistical surveys are used to collect
quantitative information about items in a population. Surveys of
human populations and institutions are common in political polling
and government, health, social science and marketing research. A
survey may focus on opinions or factual information depending on its
purpose, and many surveys involve administering questions to
individuals. When the questions are administered by a researcher,
the survey is called a structured interview or a
researcher-administered survey. When the questions are administered
by the respondent, the survey is referred to as a questionnaire or a
self-administered survey.
The questions are usually structured and standardized. The
structure is intended to reduce bias (see questionnaire
construction). For example, questions should be ordered in such a
way that a question does not influence the response to subsequent
questions. Surveys are standardized to ensure reliability,
generalization, and validity (see quantitative marketing research).
Every respondent should be presented with the same questions and in
the same order as other respondents.
In organizational development, carefully constructed survey
instruments are often used as the basis for data gathering,
organizational diagnosis, and subsequent action planning. Some OD
practitioners (e.g. Fred Nickols) even consider survey guided
development as the sine qua non of OD.
Serial surveys are those which repeat the same questions at
different points in time, producing time-series data. They typically
fall into two types:
* Cross-sectional surveys which draw a new sample each time. In a
sense any one-off survey will also be cross-sectional.
* Longitudinal surveys where the sample from the initial survey is
recontacted at a later date to be asked the same questions.
The advantages of survey techniques include:
* It is an efficient way of collecting information from a large
number of respondents. Very large samples are possible. Statistical
techniques can be used to determine validity, reliability, and
statistical significance.
* Surveys are flexible in the sense that a wide range of information
can be collected. They can be used to study attitudes, values,
beliefs, and past behaviours.
* Because they are standardized, they are relatively free from
several types of errors.
* They are relatively easy to administer.
* There is an economy in data collection due to the focus provided
by standardized questions. Only questions of interest to the
researcher are asked, recorded, codified, and analyzed. Time and
money is not spent on tangential questions.
Disadvantages of survey techniques include:
* They depend on subjects’ motivation, honesty, memory, and ability
to respond. Subjects may not be aware of their reasons for any given
action. They may have forgotten their reasons. They may not be
motivated to give accurate answers, in fact, they may be motivated
to give answers that present themselves in a favorable light.
* Structured surveys, particularly those with closed ended
questions, may have low validity when researching affective
variables.
* Although the chosen survey individuals are often a random sample,
errors due to nonresponse may exist. That is, people who choose to
respond on the survey may be different from those who do not
respond, thus biasing the estimates.
* Survey question answer-choices could lead to vague data sets
because at times they are relative only to a personal abstract
notion concerning "strength of choice". For instance the choice
"moderately agree" may mean different things to different subjects,
and to anyone interpreting the data for correlation. Even yes or no
answers are problematic because subjects may for instance put "no"
if the choice "only once" is not available.
Advantages of self-administered questionnaires include:
* They are less expensive than interviews.
* They do not require a large staff of skilled interviewers.
* They can be administered in large numbers all at one place and
time.
* Anonymity and privacy encourage more candid and honest responses.
* Lack of interviewer bias.
* Speed of administration and analysis.
* Suitable for computer based research methods.
* Less pressure on respondents
# Respondents are more likely to stop participating mid-way
through the survey (drop-offs)
# Respondents cannot ask for clarification
# Low response rate in some modes
# No interviewer intervention available for probing or explanation
# Often respondents returning survey represent extremes of the
population - skewed responses
Advantages of researcher administered interviews include:
* Fewer misunderstood questions and inappropriate responses.
* Fewer incomplete responses.
* Higher response rates.
* Greater control over the environment that the survey is
administered in.
There are several ways of administering a survey, including:
* Telephone
o response rate typically 25% - 50%[citation needed], depending on
audience and topic
o fairly cost efficient, depending on local call charge structure
o good for large national (or international) sampling frames
o cannot be used for non-audio information (graphics,
demonstrations, taste/smell samples)
o three types:
+ traditional telephone interviews
+ computer assisted telephone dialing
+ computer assisted telephone interviewing
Online surveys
* can use web or e-mail
o web is preferred over e-mail because interactive HTML forms can be
used
* response rates sometimes 90% before 2000, but have been dropping
fast since then (now 2% - 30%)
* often inexpensive to administer
* very fast results
* easy to modify
* response rates can be improved by using panels - members of the
panel have agreed to participate
* if not password-protected, easy to manipulate by completing
multiple times to skew results
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