Questionnaires are designed to collect information for research studies. They are typically open or closed questions but some questionnaires use a mixture of both. Open questions allow the respondents to answer in their own language and closed questions offer a set of predetermined responses which they can choose from. Questionnaires can be administered in many ways, including face-to–face interviews, phone calls postal mail, or even online.
Online surveys using questionnaires are becoming frequent, but it’s essential to ensure that the information collected is accurate and reliable. In order to do this researchers must be able accurately gauge response rates and keep track of the number of people who take the survey. The researcher should also be able identify potential reasons why a person might not respond and address these issues (e.g. sampling bias).
Online questionnaires are also cheaper than traditional methods. This makes them an attractive alternative to traditional questionnaire based research. However, this method does not come without difficulties. Online questionnaires are difficult to analyze in terms of their reliability and validity as well as their an impact on the social esteem of the sample of respondents.
There are several strategies to reduce these limitations. This article discusses several specific methods that can help researchers improve the quality and reliability of their online questionnaires, such as: (i) paying participants when they are finished with the questionnaire results in an equivalence rate that is lower than waiting for all responses or a more complicated procedure; (iii) asking participants to fill in their names so that receipt preparation doesn’t reduce or improve the social acceptance of answers and (iv) framing the fixed portion of a participant’s payment as being “for completing the questionnaire” and giving progress feedback enhances the quality of the answers.