Survey Research

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Survey Research

• Presented by Ani Kitiashvili
• Department of Psychology
• Tbilisi State University

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Private Eye political commentary and humor weekly
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Characteristics

• Survey is most widely used research technique in
  social sciences
• Data collected from surveys ranges from physical
  counts and frequencies to attitudes and
  opinions.

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Survey data is used to

• To answer questions
• To assess needs.
• To set goals.
• To analyze trends across time.
• To describe what exists, in what amount, and in
  what context and etc. . . . .

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Focus of survey research questions

• Behaviors
• Attitudes/beliefs/opinions
• Characteristics
• Expectations
• Self classification
• Knowledge

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Five kinds of measures

• What kind of information might be measured
• - What people say that they do (behaviors)
• What people think is true (beliefs)
• What people are (attributes)
• What people say they want (their attitudes)
• (Dillman, Don A. (1978). Mail and
  Telephone Survyes The Total Design Method. NYC
  John)

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Four stages of the survey research method

• 1. Design and Planning.
• 2. Data collection
• 3. Data Analysis
• 4. Write up and communication

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Stages

• Design and planning stage.
• Decide on type of survey to use and type of
  respondent.
• Type of survey method.
• Mail.
• Telephone.
• Face-to-face.
• E-mail
• Type of respondent.
• Adults over 18 years of age.
• Native speakers only or all languages.

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Stages

• Develop the survey instrument (questionnaire or
  interview schedule).
• Organize the question sequence.
• Design the questionnaire layout.
• Develop a system to record answers.
• Pilot test the questionnaire
• Train the interweavers

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Stages

• Drawing the sample.
• Define the population of your interest
• Decide on sample size and sample type
• Develop the sampling frame.
• Select the sample.
• Data collection stage.
• Contact the respondents.
• Ask the questions and record the answers.
• Thank the respondent for cooperating.
• End data collection.

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Stages

• Data analysis
• Code data.
• Enter data into a computer.
• Statistical analysis.
• Draw conclusions.
• Write up and communication
• Summarize your results and incorporate them into
  the results section of your report/thesis/paper.

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Main Survey instruments features
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Survey instruments features
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Survey instruments featuresSources of bias
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Guidelines to conducting a survey

• Define the purpose and scope of the survey in
  explicit terms.
• Avoid using an existing survey instrument.
• designing a survey instrument
• Field test the survey instrument to spot
  ambiguous or redundant items and to arrive at a
  format leading to ease of data tabulation and
  analysis.

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Guidelines

• Use structured questions as possible as many as
  opposed to unstructured and open-ended ones for
  uniformity of results and ease of analysis.
• Avoid questions that are redundant or have
  obvious answers.
• Avoid loaded or biased questions by field testing
  and involving others in the wording process.
• Keep the final product as brief, simple, clear as
  possible.
• Think out the analysis needs to insure the
  clarity and comprehensiveness of the instrument.

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Limitations of the survey method

• May only tap respondents who are accessible and
  cooperative.
• Surveys arouse response sets such as
  acquiescence or a proneness to agree with
  positive statements or questions.
• Over-rater or under-rater bias - the tendency for
  some respondents to give consistently high or low
  ratings.