Upload
jennifer-horton
View
215
Download
1
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
THE ZEN OF SURVEYS
Heather Morrison
Communication 801, February 2010
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/ca/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105,.USA
WHY SURVEYS?
Data about groups of people Opinions Factual information Attitudes, values
Classroom tool (online polls) Secondary analysis Known method / advocacy tool
FRED HORNE, ALBERTA MLA ON CONSULTATION SESSIONS RE RECENT 39% INCREASE IN FUNDING FOR PUBLIC LIBRARIES:
“Through our consultation we encountered so many Albertans who are passionate and committed to providing quality library services. They recognized that libraries are a fundamental and tremendously important part of community life. They acknowledged that their lives as citizens and collectively as a community are enhanced because of the programs and services they access at their library. Their dedication is both remarkable and infectious. We hope we captured their passion in our report”.
POPULATION AND SAMPLE
Census – full population Sampling frame: everyone who could
respond Probability sampling
Random numbers table Systematic Multi-stage cluster
Non-probability sampling
UNIT OF ANALYSIS
Individual, family, journal, newspaper You
Singular Plural: family, social group, community
BC ELN Office / network Individual / department / library Functional groups
FROM CONCEPT TO INDICATOR (DE VAUS)
Clarify concepts BC ELN communications: website, listservs,
quarterly newsletter, budget document, annual Year in Review
Effective: key stakeholders have the information they need (but not unwanted information)
Develop indicators Importance, satisfaction, perceived gaps
Evaluate initial indicators
DECIDE ON APPROACH
Questionnaire Web-based Mail Telephone
Focus group Interview (structured or semi-structured)
Telephone In-person Consumer society / agonistic (Brinkmann, Kvale)
Content analysis
DESIGNING A QUESTIONNAIRE
Length Introduction: purpose of questionnaire Question order
Easy to hard Logical
Thank you & follow-up Pretesting
TO ANSWER A QUESTION…
Decoding the question How often do you watch television? Memory Analysis Opinion. Do I have one? Social desirability bias
CREATING QUESTIONS
Clear, unambiguous wording Neutral non-leading questions (??) Easy response options
Preselected How often do you watch television
1-2 hours / month 1-2 hours / day
Right amount Includes the responses people want to give
(don’t know) Sensitive questions
Leading?
TYPES OF QUESTIONS
Agree / disagree Scales / Likert
Strongly agree to strongly disagree Ranking Open versus closed Filtering questions
ANALYSIS & INTERPRETATION
Response rate Differences between responders and non-
responders A tale of two surveys
Reliability Opinion / multi-question checking
Generalizability (sample) Validity Coding (open-ended questions)
CRITICAL EVALUATION
Bias: funders?
Introduction and question wording
Given the current tough economic climate, how much funding should be given to the arts?
Versus: Given how much the arts enhance our lives,
how much funding should this area receive?
CRITICAL EVALUATION: RESPONSES
Self-selection bias Open web surveys Waltham study
Who was included? Who was excluded?
Marginalized groups Homeless Illegal immigrants
Response rates
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Consumer versus agonistic interviews Experiences with surveys Video: Ask a Silly Question
REFERENCES
Brinkmann, S. (2007). Could interviews be epistemic? an alternative to qualitative opinion polling. Qualitative Inquiry, 13(8), 1116-1138. doi:10.1177/1077800407308222
De Vaus, D. A. (1995). Surveys in social research (4th ed. ed.). North Sydney, NSW, Australia : Allen & Unwin.
Kvale, S. (2006). Dominance through interviews and dialogues. Qualitative Inquiry, 12(3), 480-500. doi:10.1177/1077800406286235
REFERENCES
Waltham, M. 2009. The future of scholarly journal publishing among social sciences and humanities journals. Princeton, New Jersey. Retrieved from: http://www.nhalliance.org/bm~doc/hssreport.pdf
- critique of Waltham study: Morrison, H. 2009. Humanities and social sciences: thoughts towards transition to OA. The Imaginary Journal of Poetic Economics. Retrieved from: http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com/2009/09/humanities-and-social-sciences-thoughts.html