Surveys

Designing and Conducting Surveys 1. Surveys are a social-science form of research that dominates mainstream audience research. It can easily generate lots of statistically-valid data used as the basis for such decisions as new product design, political campaigns, TV programs, etc. Such predictions can be extremely close to final results, such as an election, because their efficacy has been refined and improved/increased over thousands of uses. The first “survey” was the Domesday Book in medieval England in the 1300s.

Public opinion research is a key use, since it can learn the attitudes of a representative sample. These can be political, audience/market research, or evaluation of organizational effectiveness.

Market Research is the general category of audience studies, and the best-paying form of audience research. It asks questions that help market products and services.

Readership surveys are used to see the audience size and use, as well as demographics—all of which helps set ad rates.

Editorial content research helps publishers see the value and interest in particular aspects of existing or potential content.

Broadcast audience surveys analyze the makeup of audiences, most well-known as ratings and share (Nielsens). Radio surveys are “call-out” studies that immediately assess audience responses and interests.

Secondary research examines existing data, especially U.S. Census, to learn more about audiences in a very cost-effective and fast (but untailored) way.

For example, Yum & Kendall (1995) interviewed 567 New Yorkers to learn how gender affected responses to political campaign ads.

2. Survey Design Sampling is usually a central issue because audiences tend to be large. A “sampling frame” is developed to identify the target audience and how to reach them.

This is the foundation of the data. Voter lists and driver’s license records are often used, with details that focus on the target sub-group’s characteristics.

Randomness is often attained with automatic dialing (in a phone survey) or similar selection from, say, mailing lists. Each approach has failings of nonrespondents, cost, time, etc. This is almost impossible in Kyrgyzstan.

“Cluster sampling” gathers lists within lists to progressively target the audience, while “stratified sampling” chooses a narrow characteristic across a larger population, such as income.

“Volunteer sampling” is when people respond to 800 phone numbers, etc.

Some studies do follow-up research to assess the quality of responses Problems: “contact rate” is the proportion of calls with success the first time “cooperation rate” is the percentage who help, often between 1% - 50% “survey rate” is the proportion that had been surveyed earlier “self-selection” is a problem when people with, say, time to answer questions might not be the target audience, and “response rate” is the overall number, which might not reach required sample size