Quantitative Techniques: Surveys & Questionnaires
Quantitative Techniques
Survey Techniques
Techniques based upon the use of structured questionnaires given to a sample of a population. It is a method based on structured data collection. They can tackle several issues:
- Behavior
- Attitudes
- Awareness
- Motivation (reasons for purchase)
- Demographics (age, life stage, income level)
- Lifestyle (values important to them)
There are four main types of questionnaires that can be applied. All of them have the same purpose (gather structured data) but the methodology to apply them can be different:
- Telephone Interviews: Very cheap, very simple questions, it’s useful. Represent 20% of the total expenditure on research. They are short in time, and with a few options to answer. It can be two types; traditional and computer-assisted (CATI).
- Personal Interviews: We can go directly to the person’s environment. Constitute 31% of the total. Three categories.
- Mail Interviews (using the past in panels): Constitute 7% of the total. You give them a lot of time to respond, no pressure. It can be traditional (cross-section) or panel (same group many times).
- Electronic Interviews (more using nowadays): Constitute 11% of total. They are very cheap. There are email (you identify better the sample) and internet-based (more difficult to identify the sample).
Observation Types
- Personal Observation: One person goes and directly observes. The researchers go directly to capture the phenomena that they are interested in; the only tool is their own eyes.
- Electronic Observation: More objective, more complex.
- Audit: Part of indirect observation. The idea is to observe physical records, count them directly.
- Trace Analysis: Indirect observation. Data collection is based on traces, or evidence, of past behavior.
Questionnaire Design
Questionnaire – A structured technique for data collection consisting of a series of questions, written or verbal, that a respondent answers. It requires a procedure for standardizing the data so it can be comparable across different regions or interviewers. It is complemented with other elements of the data collections package:
Questionnaire has three main objectives:
- Translate the information needed into a set of specific questions.
- Motivate the participants to cooperate and fulfill the task correctly.
- Minimize response error.
What respondents may want from the researcher:
- Tangible reward
- Confidentiality
- Interesting subject and experience
- Personal benefits from seeing the research completed
- Being “chosen” as a respondent
What the researcher wants from respondents:
- Honesty
- Takes in the reasons for the study
- Follows the instructions in completing the study
- Thinks about the issues before forming an answer
Questionnaire Design Process
There is a lack of theoretical support. It requires creativity and understanding the target group of research. (You need to motivate people, they can react, think about the quality and the consequences…). The experience is fundamental, but there exists a series of guidelines that can help to avoid major mistakes. Trade-offs of the questionnaire designer. (The circular process: 1. The idea, 2. The purpose, 3. The actual questions, 4. You analyze the questions.)
Questionnaire design process:
- Specify the information needed.
- Specify the interviewing method.
- The context of the individual questions.
- Overcoming the respondents’ inability or unwillingness to answer.
- Choose question structure: yes/no, multiple-choice, scale, etc.
- Choose questions wording.
- Arrange the questions in proper order.
- Identify the form and layout.
- Reproduce the questionnaire.
- Pilot testing.