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SRA Training

Cognitive Interviewing for Testing Survey Questions
Summary: This one day course is designed to familiarise participants with this powerful and efficient method of piloting survey questions called Cognitive Interviewing. Cognitive Interviewing is a type of in-depth interviewing which focuses on respondents’ thought processes in answering survey questions and uses specialised techniques such as thinking aloud, probing, observation and paraphrasing. The course is about what cognitive interviewing is as well as how to do it. There are practical exercises as well as lecture time.
Objectives:

Course objectives: After this course, participants will

  • Have an understanding of the range of techniques which make up a cognitive interview
  • Have increased their own ability to do cognitive interviewing
  • Have a better awareness of the advantages and disadvantages of different aspects of cognitive interviewing
Course Requirements:

Participants should have a basic familiarity with surveys and questionnaires.
Who will benefit?

This course is suitable for people new to cognitive interviewing as well as those who have experience in cognitive interviewing, but would like to brush up on their knowledge and skills. It would be particularly appropriate for those who anticipate conducting a survey who wish to learn this powerful tool to pilot their questionnaires. The course stands alone, but participants will benefit from having had a course on questionnaire design.

Course tutor: Dr. Pamela Campanelli will lead the courses on all 4 days. Pamela is a Survey Methods Consultant, Chartered Statistician and Chartered Scientist. She received her Ph.D. in statistics from the London School of Economics, and an M.A. in applied social research and B.A. in psychology from the University of Michigan. Pamela has worked at the University of Michigan, the Center for Survey Methods Research at US Bureau of the Census and has been Chief Research Officer at the Institute for Social and Economic Research and a Research Director at the Survey Methods Centre at the National Centre for Social Research.

Her main interests are in the study of survey error and data quality issues, focusing on both the data collection and analysis side. In addition to her consultancy work, she regularly teaches short courses for the UK Centre for Applied Social Surveys (CASS), the Cathie Marsh Centre for Census and Survey Research (CCSR), UK government departments (e.g., the Home Office), the University of Essex, the University of Newcastle, the University of Kent, the University of Michigan Summer Institute (linked to the Joint Program in Survey Methodology), and the University of Hong Kong, as well as for various other institutions and businesses.
Date & Location: 8th March 2012, Registration 09.00 - 09.30, Course 09.30 - 17.00

Location: London
Programme Download programme to follow, and booking form (doc)

 
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