Presentation on Questionnaire Design

Introduction • Information, everyone uses information to

make decisions about the future.• If our information is accurate, we have a

probability of making a good decision.• If it is incorrect, our ability to make a correct

decision is diminished.

“BETTER INFORMATION USUALLY LEADS TO BETTER DECISIONS “

• Therefore a crucial parts of good research is concerned with making sure that the QUESTIONNAIR design addresses the needs of research..

Meaning of QUESTIONNAIR

A set of printed or written questions with a choice of answers, devised for the purposes of a survey or statistical study.

Example: question sheet, set of questions, survey form, form.

Meaning of Questionnaire Design

• Designing a QUESTIONNAIR is not as simple and easy as at first sight.

• A marketing research, intending to collect primary data, is required to be extremely careful in deciding the following quarries:

–What type of information is to collected ?–What types of questions are to be formulated

?–What should be the wording of each question

?–What should be their sequence ?–What should be the layout of the

questionnaire ?–How to undertake pretesting of the

questionnaire?–How to finalize the QUESTIONNAIR ?

• All these aspects require considerable time and effort of the marketing researcher.

• If he is able to develop a questionnaire suitable for his purpose, he will find that his efforts of designing a questionnaire would be fruitful.

Designing A Questionnaire.(i.e. steps involved in questionnaire)

Decide the information requiredDefine the target respondent.Choose the methods(s) of

reaching your target respondent.Decide the question content

Develop the question wording.Put question into a meaningful order and

formatCheck the length of the questionnairePre-test the questionnaire.Develop the final survey form.

1. Decide the information required.

The first step is to decide’ what are the things one needs to know from the respondent in order to meet the survey’s objective?

2.Define the target respondent.

At the out set, the researcher must define the population about which he/she wishes to generalize from the sample data to be collected.

Choose the methods(s) of reaching your target respondent.

• Personal interviews

• Group or focus interviews

• Mailed questionnaires

• Telephone interview

4.Decide the question content

Researcher must always be prepared to ask,” is this question really needed??

There are only 2 occasions when seemingly ”redundant” might be included:

• Opening questions that are easy to answer.• “Dummy” question can disguise the purpose

of that survey and/or the sponsorship of the study

5.Develop the question wording.

• It provide the respondent with an easy method of indicating his answer- he does not have to think about how to articulate his answer.

• Responses can be easily classified, making analysis very straight forward

• It permits the respondent to specify the answer categories most suitable for their purpose.

6.Put question into a meaningful order and format.

• Opening questions.

• Question flow

• Question variety

• Closing question

7.Check the length of the questionnaire.

• In general it is best for a questionnaire to be as short as possible.

• A long questionnaire leads to a long interview and this is open to the dangers of boredom on the part of respondent.(and poor considered, hurried answers)

8.Pre-test the questionnaire.

• Test the questionnaire on a small sample of your subject first this is possible at least it on colleagues or friends.

• The aim here to detect any flaws in your question and correct these prior to main survey.

10.Develop the final survey form.

It means designed questionnaire will be administered among the selected sample respondents to the study.

The advantages of questionnaires

• Practical• Large amounts of information can be collected

from a large number of people in a short period of time and in a relatively cost effective way

• Can be carried out by the researcher or by any number of people with limited affect to its validity and reliability

• The results of the questionnaires can usually be quickly and easily quantified by either a researcher or through the use of a software package

• Can be analyzed more 'scientifically' and objectively than other forms of research

The disadvantages of questionnaires.

• Is argued to be inadequate to understand some forms of information - i.e. changes of emotions, behavior, feelings etc.

• There is no way to tell how truthful a respondent is being

• There is no way of telling how much thought a respondent has put in

• The respondent may be forgetful or not thinking within the full context of the situation

• People may read differently into each question and therefore reply based on their own interpretation of the question - i.e. what is 'good' to someone may be 'poor' to someone else, therefore there is a level of subjectivity that is not acknowledged

• There is a level of researcher imposition, meaning that when developing the questionnaire, the researcher is making their own decisions and assumptions as to what is and is not important...therefore they may be missing something that is of importance

Any Questions