Introduction/overview
Have you ever discovered too late that your survey questions did not deliver useful or useable data? This course highlights ways to avoid pitfalls in the wording of individual survey questions as well as for the questionnaire whole. It also points out questionnaire design differences between face-to-face and telephone interviews, web and mobile web surveys and paper self-completion. Drawing on 30 years of the instructor’s experience and research findings from questionnaire design experiments, this course is full of practical advice.
Topics
- Getting started with a new questionnaire
- Trade-offs – questions that are short and simple versus those that are clear and unambiguous; increasing clarity through breaking complex questions into a series of short simple questions versus a longer questionnaire
- Four cognitive steps a respondent takes when answering a survey question
- Key principles of design questions
- Solutions to ambiguous words and phrases
- Additional issues for factual versus subjective questions
- Appendix on memory and sensitive question solutions
- Why demographic questions are always the most difficult to write
- Certain question formats to beware of or avoid
- Mode of data collection differences
- The questionnaire as a whole with differences between face-to-face and telephone interviews, web and mobile web surveys and paper self-completion
- Workshops on critiquing survey questions, on writing new survey questions and on improving existing survey questions
Objectives
By the end of the course, participants will:
- Have a knowledge of the different aspects involved in writing good survey questions and questionnaires,
- Have the ability to write their own high quality questionnaires
- Have the tools to critique existing surveys
- Have awareness about the differences in questionnaire design between face-to-face and telephone surveys, web and mobile web surveys and paper self-completion.
Who will benefit?
The course will benefit anyone who wishes to conduct their own survey or commission a survey. The course is suitable for people new to questionnaire design as well as those who have experience, but would like to deepen their knowledge.
Learning outcomes
Participants will have a good awareness of the optimal ways to word individual questions and create the questionnaire as a whole.
Course tutor
Dr Pamela Campanelli is an international trainer, survey methods specialist and consultant. She is also a UK Chartered Statistician and Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences. Prior to creating her own business (thesurveycoach.com), she worked at the University of Michigan, the US Bureau of the Census, ISER at the University of Essex, and NatCen Social Research. She regularly teaches short courses on various survey related topics in the UK and abroad for government departments, survey research companies, universities, as well as for various other institutions and businesses.
She believes in delivering courses that are lively and engaging, foster an informal and interactive atmosphere, communicate concepts in a straightforward and accessible way, illustrate the material through the use of ‘real life’ examples, and provide workshops to put theory into practice.
This course contributes 6 hours to the MRS CPD programme.
Part 1 - 22 September - 9.30 am to 3.30 pm
Part 2 - 23 September - 9.30 am to 3.30 pm
Looking to book for six or more people from your organisation? Contact [email protected] to ask about our in-house courses.