Web Survey Bibliography
Web surveys have become increasingly central to innovation research but often suffer from low response rates. Based on a cost-benefits framework and the explicit consideration of heterogeneity across respondents, we consider the effects of key contact design features such as personalization, incentives, and the exact timing of survey contacts on web survey response rates. We also consider the benefits of a “dynamic strategy”, i.e., the approach to change features of survey contacts over the survey life cycle. We explore these effects experimentally using a career survey sent to over 24,000 junior scientists and engineers. The results show that personalization increases the odds of responding by as much as 48%, while lottery incentives with a high payoff and a low chance of winning increase the odds of responding by 30%. Furthermore, changing the wording of reminders over the survey life cycle increases the odds of a response by over 30%, while changes in contact timing (day of the week or hour of the day) did not have significant benefits. Improvements in response rates did not come at the expense of lower data quality. Our results provide novel insights into web survey response behavior and suggest useful tools for innovation researchers seeking to increase survey participation.
Keywords: web surveys, response rates, experimental method, scientists, dynamic strategy, incentives, personalization, timing
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Web survey bibliography - 2013 (465)
- The role of gamification in better accessing reality and hence increasing data validity ; 2015; Bailey, P.; Kernohan, H.; Pritchard, G.
- Rewarding the Truth; 2015; Puleston, J.
- Tailored fieldwork design to increase representative household survey response: an experiment in the...; 2015; Luiten, A.; Schouten, B.
- Challenges with Online Research for Couples and Families: Evaluating Nonrespondents and the Differential...; 2015; Busby, D. M.; Yoshida, Ke.
- Do Incentives Commoditize Surveys Or Reinforce The Relationship Economy?; 2014; Murphy, L.
- Is it what you say, or how you say It? An experimental analysis of the effects of invitation wording...; 2014; Fazekas, Z., Wall, M. T., Krouwel, A.
- Asking Sensitive Questions: An Evaluation of the Randomized Response Technique Versus Direct Questioning...; 2013; Wolter, F.; Preisendoerfer, P.
- Developing an Inclusive Web Survey Design for Respondents with Disabilities; 2013; Jagger, J.; Schaad, A.; Davis, As.; Falcone, A. E.
- The Impact of Survey Communications on Response Rates and Response Quality; 2013; Barlas, F. M.; Falcone, A. E.; Bellamy, N. D.; Mack, A. R.
- The Smartphone Way to Collect Survey Data; 2013; Stapleton, C.
- A Glimpse Inside the Mind of a Respondent: Using Paradata to Improve Online Surveys; 2013; Pape, T.; Barron, S.
- Respondent Choice of Survey Mode; 2013; Fuchs, M.
- Mobile-Mostly Internet Users and Noncoverage in Traditional Web Surveys ; 2013; Antoun, C.; Couper, M. P.
- Pret met panels [Fun online]; 2013; Roberts, A., de Leeuw, E. D., Hox, J., Klausch, L. T., de Jongh, A.
- Leuker kunnen wij het wel maken. Online vragenlijst design: standaard matrix of scrollmatrix (We can...; 2013; Roberts, A., de Leeuw, E. D., Hox, J., Klausch, L. T., de Jongh, A.
- Development and validation of a single- item scale for the relative assessment of physical attractiveness...; 2013; Lutz, J.; Kemper, C. J.; Beierlein, C.; etc.
- Accounting for the Effects of Data Collection Method Application to the International Tobacco Control...; 2013; Thompson, M. E.; Huang, Y. C.; Boudreau, C.; Fong, G. T.; van den Putte, B.; Nagelhout, G. E.; Willemsen...
- A dual-frame sampling methodology to address landline replacement in tobacco control research..; 2013; McMillen, R. C.; Winickoff, J. P.; Wilson, K.; Tanski, S.; Klein, J. D.
- User Modeling via Machine Learning and Rule-Based Reasoning to Understand and Predict Errors in Survey...; 2013; Stuart, L. C.
- Measuring Mobile Phone Use: Self-Report Versus Log Data; 2013; Boase, J., Ling, R.
- How Sliders Bias Survey Data; 2013; Sellers, R.
- Does the first impression count? Examining the effect of the welcome screen design on the response rate...; 2013; Haer, R., Meidert, N.
- Survey Research Response Rates: Internet Technology vs. Snail Mail ; 2013; Lanier, P. A., Tanner, J. R., Totaro, M. W., Gradnigo, G.
- The impact of New Zealand's 2008 prohibition of piperazine-based party pills on young people'...; 2013; Sheridan, J., Dong, C. Y., Butler, R., Barnes, J.
- PRM144 – An adaptable methodology for the design, implementation and conduct of a web-based survey...; 2013; Yeomans, K., Kawata, A. K., Bassel, M., Burk, C. T., Daniels, S. R., Wilcox, T. K.
- The relationships among nurses' job characteristics and attitudes toward web-based continuing learning...; 2013; Chiu, Y.-L., Tsai, C.-C., Fan Chiang, C.-Y.
- Surveillance of patients post-endovascular abdominal aortic aneurysm repair (EVAR). A web-based survey...; 2013; Patel, A., Edwards, R., Chandramohan, S.
- How well do volunteer web panel surveys measure sensitive behaviours in the general population, and...; 2013; Erens, B., Burkill, S., Copas, A., Couper, M. P., Conrad, F.
- Tailoring mode of data collection in longitudinal studies; 2013; Kaminska, O., Lynn, P.
- Comparison of Three Modes for a Crime Victimization Survey; 2013; Laaksonen, S., Heiskanen, M.
- Community Life Survey: Summary of web experiment findings; 2013
- Does Stress Increase the Risk of Atopic Dermatitis in Adolescents? Results of the Korea Youth Risk Behavior...; 2013; Kwon, J. A., Lee, M., Park, E.-C., Park, S., Yoo, K.-B.
- The Short-term Campaign Panel of the German Longitudinal Election Study 2009. Design, Implementation...; 2013; Steinbrecher, M., Rossmann, J.
- Understanding Society Innovation Panel Wave 5: results from methodological experiments; 2013; Auspurg, K., Burton, J., Cullinane, C., Delavande, A., Fumagalli, L., Iacovou, M., Jaeckle, A., Kaminska...
- Bringing usability to pretesting of Business Survey Web Forms in Statistics Finland; 2013; Rouhunkoski, J.
- How do we Know Cognitive Interviewing is Any Good?; 2013; Willis, G. B.
- Survey optimisation considerations for Android, Apple and Windows 8 mobile devices; 2013; Owen, R.
- Speeding in Web Surveys: The tendency to answer very fast and its association with straightlining; 2013; Conrad, F. G.; Zhang, Che.
- About the Institute of Public Health - Data aspect; 2013; Zaletel, M.
- Analyzing Paradata to Investigate Measurement Error; 2013; Yan, T., Olson, K.
- Too Fast, Too Straight, Too Weird: Post Hoc Identification of Meaningless Data in Internet ; 2013; Leiner, D. J.
- Can timestamp analyses show the bottlenecks in web surveys?; 2013; Andreadis, I.
- Timing in a web based survey: an influential factor of the response rate; 2013; Paraschiv, D.-C.
- Achieving Synergy Across Survey Modes: Mail Contact and Web Responses from Address-Based Samples; 2013; Dillman, D. A.
- The Future of Social Media, Sociality, and Survey Research; 2013; Hill, C., Dever, J. A.
- Collecting Diary Data on Twitter; 2013; Richards, A., Dean, E., Cook, S.
- Second Life as a Survey Lab: Exploring the Randomized Response Technique in a Virtual Setting; 2013; Richards, A., Dean, E.
- Virtual Cognitive Interviewing Using Skype and Second Life; 2013; Dean, E., Head, B., Swicegood, J. E.
- Sentiment Analysis: Providing Categorical Insight into Unstructured Textual Data; 2013; Haney, C.
- Social Media, Sociality, and Survey Research; 2013; Hill, C., Dean, E., Murphy, J.