Survey research is a widely used data collection method that involves getting information from people, typically by asking them questions and collecting and analyzing the answers. Such data can then be used to understand individuals’ views, attitudes, and behaviors in a variety of areas, including political issues, quality of life at both the community and the individual levels, and satisfaction with services and products. Decision makers in both the public and the private sectors use survey results to understand past efforts and guide future direction. Yet there are many misperceptions about what is required to conduct a good survey. Poorly conceived, designed, and executed surveys often produce results that are meaningless, at best, and misleading or inaccurate, at worst. The resultant costs in both economic and human terms are enormous.
Our purpose of writing this two-volume edition is to provide an introduction to and overview of survey research. In Volume I, we introduced key elements of information gathering, specifically, identifying the information needed and the best way to get that information. We then explored the importance of representative sampling and identifying and minimizing survey errors that can distort results. The remainder of the first volume was focused on the practical issues to consider when developing, building, and carrying out a survey, including the various modes that can be used to deliver a survey.
This volume (Volume II) focuses on carrying out the survey. We introduce survey implementation by first looking at the importance of research questions in the research design. We also discuss key elements in writing good questions for various types of surveys. We next take the reader through the key steps that researchers must go through when conducting the survey. We then highlight some of the major factors that are influencing the way today’s surveys are being delivered such as the rapidly changing technology that is rapidly transforming the construction and presentation of surveys. The rapidly changing landscape of mobile communication, including online access to web-based surveys, the creation of survey panels, and the use of “Big Data,” presents exciting new opportunities for survey research, but also new obstacles and challenges to its validity and reliability. We conclude with an important, but often neglected, chapter dealing with the presentation of results in different formats appropriate to different audiences. As with the previous edition, each chapter concludes with a summary of important points contained in the chapter and an annotated set of references indicating where readers can find more information on chapter topics.