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Web Survey Bibliography

Title Mobile Survey Participation Rates in Commercial Market Research: A Meta-Analysis
Year 2012
Access date 01.12.2012
Abstract

The diffusion of mobile devices such as tablet computers and smartphones enabling respondents to participate in self-administered online surveys create new challenges for survey methodology in terms of measurement (e.g., equivalence of mobile versus traditional online respondents) and nonresponse issues (e.g., response rates among mobile participants). By meta-analytically summarizing past data from eleven online panel studies conducted by the social and market research company LINK between March and May 2012, we have addressed three nonresponse-related research questions. First (a), how large is the share of mobile participants when conducting online panel surveys overall? Second (b), do mobile participants differ on participation parameters, such as the number of completed questions, and the length of entries to open-ended questions? Third (c), does mobile participation change as more advanced technological features (such as Flash) are being embedded? The preliminary results show that (a) a considerable share of online panel members did participate using a mobile device and (b) mobile respondents did not substantially differ from traditional online survey respondents on an array of participation rate indicators. However, when using Flash technology, (c) mobile participants showed extraordinarily high drop-out rates (about twice as much mobile drop-out rate when using Flash technology compared to traditional computers). Implications for survey methodology will be discussed, along with avenues for future research.

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Year of publication2012
Bibliographic typeConferences, workshops, tutorials, presentations
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