What should i do questionnaire

McLeod, S. Questionnaire: definition, examples, design and types. Simply Psychology. Fraley, R. An item-response theory analysis of self-report measures of adult attachment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78, Friedman, M. Type A behavior and your heart. New York: Knopf. Holmes, T. The social readjustment rating scale. Journal of psychosomatic research, 11 2 , Smith, C.

Motivation and personality: Handbook of thematic content analysis. Cambridge University Press. Toggle navigation. Make sure that all questions asked address the aims of the research. However, use only one feature of the construct you are investigating in per item. The longer the questionnaire, the less likely people will complete it. Pilot Study. Run a small scale practice study to ensure people understand the questions. People will also be able to give detailed honest feedback on the questionnaire design.

Question Order. Questions should progress logically from the least sensitive to the most sensitive, from the factual and behavioral to the cognitive, and from the more general to the more specific. There should be a minimum of technical jargon.

Questions should be simple, to the point and easy to understand. If you haven't, you can do it when you get it back, although having the analysis you want to do in mind helps when you plan the questionnaire and the coding list.

Thus, knowing roughly what statistics you want to use is helpful. Coding is the application of labels usually numbers to the answers. For example, a questionnaire could ask how people travel to work. The answer options you give would have a number applied to each of them. You may have to code for missing data when participants don't give an answer. Typically, such missing data is often coded as '99' because that exceeds the numbers likely to be used for other codes. You would assign each questionnaire a number too, and then add the data from each questionnaire in number form to a programme such as Excel, SPSS or Access, thus giving you the chance to generate charts and graphs to better illustrate your answers.

Find your personal contacts including your tutor and student support team:. Help with accessing the online library, referencing and using libraries near you:. Skip to content. Scan to view online. Help Centre. Postgraduate study skills Postgraduate study skills Reading skills for postgraduate study Finding appropriate academic material Comparing academic sources Reading efficiently Critical reading Gathering and processing evidence Problem solving Conducting a literature review Using a questionnaire , current page Conducting an interview Using statistics Presenting your findings Assessed writing Referencing skills for postgraduates Giving a presentation Using a questionnaire Questionnaires provide quantitative and qualitative methods of data gathering - the evidence, data or information you find can be expressed in numerical or descriptive terms.

When preparing a questionnaire you also need to keep in mind the following points. Make sure you introduce yourself and explain what the aim of the questionnaire is. Also, make sure the respondent is aware of the ethical implications of the research Devise your questions so they help to answer your research question, that way, all the questions will be relevant Try and have a sequence to your questions or topics - group them in themes and make sure they follow on logically from each other Make sure your questions are clear and easy to understand - only use technical or academic language if you are sure the respondent will understand what you mean Do not ask leading questions.

Make sure people are free to give their own, honest answer Always run a pilot of your questionnaire. You can ask colleagues, fellow students or family members to fill it in.

This helps you to test the technical aspect of the questionnaire, such as whether you have given the correct answer options or whether you have left anything out. Sampling When you design your research you need to take into account how many people you need to include to make the research valid.

Preparing a questionnaire The most common type of questionnaire is a self-completion questionnaire. You also need to give clear information on the following. I once designed a survey that was going to be completed by garment factory workers in another province.

Try to get a range of different people who are representative of your target group. For example, if your target group is young people aged , try to include some who are younger, some who are older, boys and girls with different socioeconomic backgrounds. Although people might not sound like many, you will usually find that most of them have the same problems with the survey.

So even with this small number of people you should be able to identify most of the major issues. Adding more people might identify some additional smaller issues, but it also makes pretesting more time consuming and costly. The testers should complete the survey the same way that it will be completed in the actual project.

While they are completing the survey ask them to think out loud. Each time they read and answer a question they should tell you exactly what comes into their mind. Take notes on everything they say. You should also observe them completing the survey. Look for places where they hesitate or make mistakes, such as the example below.