The four main ways to conduct surveys are through in-person interviews, by telephone, through the mail, and over the Internet. As with other aspects of survey design, the choice depends on both the researcher’s goals and the budget. In-person interviews have the highest response rates and provide the closest personal contact with respondents. Personal contact can be important, for example, when the interviewer must see and make judgments about respondents, as is the case with some mental health interviews. But in-person interviewing is by far the most costly approach. Telephone surveys have lower response rates and still provide some personal contact with respondents. They can also be costly but are generally less so than in-person interviews. Traditionally, telephone directories have provided fairly comprehensive sampling frames. Mail surveys are less costly still but generally have even lower response rates—making them most susceptible to nonresponse bias.
Not surprisingly, Internet surveys are becoming more common. They are increasingly easy to construct and use (see Online Survey Creation). Although initial contact can be made by mail with a link provided to the survey, this approach does not necessarily produce higher response rates than an ordinary mail survey. A better approach is to make initial contact by e-mail with a link directly to the survey. This can work well when the population consists of the members of an organization who have known e-mail addresses and regularly use them (e.g., a university community). For other populations, it can be difficult or impossible to find a comprehensive list of e-mail addresses to serve as a sampling frame. Alternatively, a request to participate in the survey with a link to it can be posted on websites known to be visited by members of the population. But again it is very difficult to get anything approaching a random sample this way because the members of the population who visit the websites are likely to be different from the population as a whole. However, Internet survey methods are in rapid development. Because of their low cost, and because more people are online than ever before, Internet surveys are likely to become the dominant approach to survey data collection in the near future.
Online Survey Creation
There are now several online tools for creating online questionnaires. After a questionnaire is created, a link to it can then be e-mailed to potential respondents or embedded in a web page. The following websites are among those that offer free accounts. Although the free accounts limit the number of questionnaire items and the number of respondents, they can be useful for doing small-scale surveys and for practicing the principles of good questionnaire construction.
- Polldaddy—http://www.polldaddy.com
- QuestionPro—http://www.questionpro.com
- SurveyGizmo—http://www.surveygizmo.com
- SurveyMonkey—http://www.surveymonkey.com
- Zoomerang—http://www.zoomerang.com
KEY TAKEAWAYS
- Survey research usually involves probability sampling, in which each member of the population has a known probability of being selected for the sample. Types of probability sampling include simple random sampling, stratified random sampling, and cluster sampling.
- Sampling bias occurs when a sample is selected in such a way that it is not representative of the population and therefore produces inaccurate results. The most pervasive form of sampling bias is nonresponse bias, which occurs when people who do not respond to the survey differ in important ways from people who do respond. The best way to minimize nonresponse bias is to maximize the response rate by prenotifying respondents, sending them reminders, constructing questionnaires that are short and easy to complete, and offering incentives.
- Surveys can be conducted in person, by telephone, through the mail, and on the Internet. In-person interviewing has the highest response rates but is the most expensive. Mail and Internet surveys are less expensive but have much lower response rates. Internet surveys are likely to become the dominant approach because of their low cost.
EXERCISES
- Discussion: If possible, identify an appropriate sampling frame for each of the following populations. If there is no appropriate sampling frame, explain why.
- students at a particular college or university
- adults living in the state of Nevada
- households in Little Rock, Arkansas
- people with low self-esteem
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