The conference aims at bringing together national and foreign researchers and companies interested in sharing knowledge on up-to-date best practices in survey methodology and new scientific results, form bridges between the academic world and companies using and doing surveys, strengthen international cooperation and expertise transfers.

Given the international nature of the conference, sessions will be organized either in Spanish or in English. Deadline for abstract submission is 20 May, 2013.

Find complete information at the Conference's website.

Call for abstracts (English) (.pdf)

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Best regards,

Research and Expertise Centre for Survey Methodology - RECSM
Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona
www.upf.edu/survey

We are pleased to announce the seventh MESS workshop on innovative aspects of Internet interviewing, and on research conducted in the LISS panel and Immigrant panel. We kindly invite you to submit a paper to be presented at this workshop. Please indicate in which of the following themes your presentation can be categorized:
1. Response behaviour and representativity in web surveys, Internet panels and mobile surveys
Examples would be: Attrition effects specific for Internet panels, weights for Internet panels, models for longitudinal analysis, stimulating online response over time, special groups for Internet surveys (e.g. visually impaired), etc.
2. Questionnaire design for online datacollection, including mobile questionnaires
Examples would be: visual design of online questionnaires, experiments with apps and mobile questionnaires, comparison of response effects in computer-based and
mobile questionnaires
3. Challenges in linking Internet survey data to administrative data
What are the challenges in linking (Internet) survey data to administrative data? What does linking bring us in addition to the analysis of the separate data sets.
4. Biomarker measures and innovative health measures
The use of advanced measures of weight, blood pressure, activity, heart rate, the collecting of traditional biomarkers in online panels or in combination with online surveys. Also: The analysis of the high frequency data resulting from innovative health measures: How can we handle such large amount of data, what are appropriate models, etc.
5. New technology: smartphones, new devices, speech technology, GPS
Examples would be: Mobility research using GPS data, combinations of visual and voice mode, speech technology, innovative and new designs, special experimental set-ups. Also: The analysis of GPS data: How to handle these privacy-sensitive data, what are appropriate models for it, etc.
6. Studies resulting from the MESS project
Researches who have used the LISS panel or Immigrant panel to collect data, or who have used the data in the LISS data archive, are invited to present the results of their study.
Abstracts and papers can be submitted via email to Josette Janssen: jjanssen@uvt.nl, by June 15, 2013 at the latest. Submissions will be acknowledged by return email and acceptances will be communicated by July 1, 2013. For presenters of accepted papers travel and lodging costs associated with attending will be reimbursed.

The workshop will be held at a central location in The Netherlands.

Marcel Das
Arie Kapteyn
Annette Scherpenzeel
Arthur van Soest

The Social Science Computing Review calls for contributions to a special issue on "Quantifying Politics Using Online Data". This special issue focuses on the application of quantitative methods in political analysis of online data. The sources of such data include, but are not limited to Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, news comments, Wikipedia edits, discussion forums, blogs, etc. Interdisciplinary submissions are particularly encouraged and all submissions will be reviewed by experts both from political and computer sciences.

Important dates
June 1, 2013 -- Abstracts (1 page excluding references) due
June 7, 2013 -- Abstracts notifications sent out
July 7, 2013 -- Submission deadline (11h59pm Hawaii time)
August 20, 2013 -- Author notification sent out
September 1, 2013 -- Camera ready version due
November 1, 2013 -- Expected online publication date
February 15, 2014 -- Expected print publication date

Submission Instructions

Submitted papers should not be under review for any other conference or journal, and should be significantly different from previously published work, and should present original contributions. Duplicate submissions will be rejected.
The special edition will apply a two-step reviewing process. The 1-page abstract, due by June 1, will be reviewed by the editors and checked for (i) topical relevance, (ii) presentation quality, (iii) novelty, and (iv) at least one quantitative finding, meaning that there has to be at least one number in the abstract that quantifies some aspect of politics. Authors of abstracts that satisfy the conditions are then invited to submit a full paper by July 7. This paper will then undergo a conference style reviewing cycle to ensure timely publication. All submissions will be reviewed by at least three distinct experts. Additional external reviewers might be called upon depending on the submission volume. Authors will receive acceptance notification and detailed feedback from the reviewers on August 20.

Formatting:
Use this template, meaning submissions must be:

• Only OpenOffice or MS Word .doc or .docx file format
• 12 point font, double-spaced (including references)
• Target page count: 25 pages, maximum: 40 pages, including citations and figures

For more formatting information see Submission Details.
Submission website: https://www.easychair.org/conferences/?c

About SSCR
Social Science Computer Review (SSCR) is an interdisciplinary journal covering social science instructional and research applications of computing, as well as societal impacts of information technology. It was ranked 26 out of 89 journals in Social Sciences, Interdisciplinary by Thomson Reuters' 2011 Journal Citation Reports with an impact factor of 1.1.

About the Editors
Yelena Mejova is a post-doctoral researcher at Yahoo! Research in Barcelona, Spain. Specializing in text retrieval and mining, she created and analyzed multiple web-based datasets, including webpages, blogs, reviews, and Twitter. This analysis included sentiment detection, political opinion extraction, and topic tracking, and in particular the political support classification and evaluation.

Ingmar Weber is a Senior Scientist at Qatar Computing Research Institute. His research covers a wide subject area from classical information retrieval, to sponsored search, with recent work focussing on computational political science and interdisciplinary studies in web science. He has studied the polarization in US politics in web search and on Twitter, and is currently investigating Arab politics in social media.

Call for Papers Homepage

Across domains of science and technology studies, increased attention is being focused on the material dimensions of digital media. Indeed, scholars convened around social studies of materiality are seeking out new methods to study the stuff of "big data," "information infrastructures," and the "internet of things." Moreover, these new phenomena are understood as hybrids, merging digital and non-digital practices that resist simple analysis. We see productive means of engaging with hybrid forms of materiality in the interpretive, collaborative, and interventionist approaches pioneered by designers including codesign, participatory design, design fiction, speculative design, and critical making. Design is particularly relevant to digital studies; through making, it is possible to become a participant in the otherwise opaque technical work of constructing data and other digital artifacts.

The workshop will be staged at Harvard University's Arnold Arboretum, one of the most comprehensive and best-documented living collections of trees, shrubs, and vines in the world. The Arboretum is equal parts urban forest, museum, and open laboratory. It is a venerable and sprawling site for the public display of scientific objects and knowledge. Workshop participants will take part in hands-on, team-based design projects that leverage the collection's digital data as well as their woody referents in the landscape. Please join us at this second digitalSTS workshop to explore new tools for taking apart technoscience.

To apply for a spot in the digitalSTS Workshop, please submit the following materials to digitalsts@zoho.com
1. A 1-paragraph biography
2. A 1-2 paragraph statement of interest in design methods and digital STS
3. A link to your online presence
The application deadline is APRIL 8th, 2013. Participants will be notified soon after the deadline as to the status of their application. We encourage submissions by anyone engaged in digital studies of science and technology. Support for travel and accommodations may be available to graduate students.

This workshop is hosted in cooperation with metaLAB(at)Harvard and the Arnold Arboretum, and supported by funds and in-kind contributions from metaLAB, the Arboretum, NSF's Office for Cyberinfrastructure, and Microsoft Research. More information is available at: http://digitalsts.wordpress.com.

Kind regards,
Yanni Loukissas, metaLAB/Graduate School of Design, Harvard University
Laura Forlano, Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology
David Ribes, Communication, Culture and Technology, Georgetown University
Janet Vertesi, Sociology, Princeton University

The Innovation Panel is a unique resource for innovative longitudinal experimental and methodological research with international impact. Its purpose is to develop key innovations in survey methods and content that will ensure the future success of the Understanding Society survey, to generate important new knowledge disseminated through publications in leading international journals, and to provide a base for associated studies using new and innovative mixed method approaches.
This call is for proposals for experiments and methodological studies. These may relate to questionnaire content, to methods of data collection (for example, measurement instruments or questionnaire design), or to survey procedures (for example, ways of reducing non-response or reducing field costs). The criteria for eligible proposals are detailed below.
More information is available at https://www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/r.

Further information about the Conference programme and invited speakers will be provided here soon.

Download the detailed call for papers here: Call for Papers

Registration will be possible from May 2nd, 2013 on this site.

For participation - which is free of charge - please respond to this email as soon as possible but no later than April 16. If you do not plan to participate but know other colleagues interested in the topic, please feel free to forward this call for participation.

About the workshop

The workshop's goal is to bring together experienced survey researchers from different countries and surveys to present and discuss their work on several methodological issues related to longitudinal online research (probability-based as well as convenience samples).

Confirmed speakers include:
- Michael Bosnjak (GESIS and Free University of Bozen/Bolzano)
- Anne Cornilleau (SciencesPo)
- Mick P. Couper (Michigan)
- Marcel Das (CentERdata)
- Jon A. Krosnick (Stanford)
- Oliver Lipps (FORS)
- Peter Lugtig (Utrecht University)
- Gerry Nicolaas (NetCen)
- Vera Toepoel (Utrecht University)

Topics include:
- probability-based online panels
- patterns of attrition and countermeasures
- mode comparisons
- offline populations
- incentives, measurement, nonresponse, and other topics

We would be highly delighted if you joined the workshop and we look forward to meeting you in Mannheim in May!

Best regards,

Annelies Blom, Dayana Bossert, and Frederik Funke
--
Dayana Bossert
German Internet Panel
SFB 884 - Political Economy of Reforms
University of Mannheim
68131 Mannheim
Tel: 0621/181-2231
Office: L13, 15-17, room 508

1. CONFERENCE PROGRAMME AND FULL PAPERS ONLINE
The conference programme and the full conference papers are available online under the following link: http://www.cros-portal.eu/content/ntts-2

2. REGISTRATION FACILITY OPEN
There is no registration fee. The registration interface is still open: http://www.cros-portal.eu/content/regist. The deadline for registrations is 15 February 2013 - but if maximum capacity is reached before that date, the interface may be taken offline earlier! Please note that registration is mandatory if you wish to participate to the event – and the only way to register is by means of the online registration interface.

Please also be advised that registering as a user to the CROS portal is a necessary but not a sufficient condition – once your CROS account has been validated (please allow one working day for this), you must log in to register to the NTTS 2013 conference using the registration form on http://www.cros-portal.eu/content/regist.

3. CALL FOR HORIZON 2020 IDEAS – PITCH YOUR RESEARCH IDEA AT NTTS 2013!
The NTTS 2013 Scientific Committee has set up a special evening session on Horizon 2020. The session will follow a “speed-dating” format, with a large number of researchers presenting their early-stage Official Statistics research project ideas in rapid succession. The presenters would then meet up with interested colleagues to exchange ideas and contact details, with the objective to start formulating project ideas and prepare the grounds for project consortia ready to submit Official Statistics research project proposals for Horizon 2020.

The deadline for submitting ideas is Monday 11 February 2013; a brief submission form and more details on the special session are available on: http://www.cros-portal.eu/content/invita

4. SATELLITE EVENTS ORGANISED BACK-TO BACK WITH NTTS 2013
The NTTS 2013 Scientific Committee is pleased to announce that three satellite events will be organised (by research projects having a high relevance to Official Statistics) on the day before the conference (Monday 4 March 2013) and on the day after the conference (Friday 8 March 2013). The topics are:

• Access for researchers to European microdata (DwB workshop)
• Improving enterprise and trade statistics (BLUE-ETS final conference)
• New technologies for transport surveys (COST/Shanti final meeting)

The programmes of the respective events are available via http://www.cros-portal.eu/content/ntts-2

Please note that if you wish to attend these events, you must register to them separately; see http://www.cros-portal.eu/content/ntts-2 for registration forms and registration details. The deadline for registering to the satellite events is 15 February 2013.

Best regards,
_____________________
NTTS 2013 Secretariat
Eurostat - Unit B1
Tel: +352 4301-38327
Fax: +352 4301-34149
E-mail: ESTAT-NTTS@ec.europa.eu

Postal address:
European Commission
Eurostat Unit B1
BECH A2/163
L-2920 LUXEMBOURG

The ITSEW is an annual workshop to discuss emerging research on multiple survey errors. The theme of the 2013 workshop is “Total Survey Error: The Art of Balancing and the Science of Measuring”. Topics include presentations of research that explore or analyze the trade-offs of two or more sources of survey error within the context of relatively recent methodological or statistical approaches.

Topics in the scope of the 7th ITSEW include (but are not limited to):

• Design for and methods of estimating relationships between different sources of nonsampling error
• Monitoring and reducing survey errors (e.g., paradata applications, adaptive/responsive survey designs accounting for multiple errors)
• Errors induced in combining survey data with other data sources (e.g., imputation, estimation or disclosure limitation)
• Survey errors in longitudinal panels (e.g., panel attrition, conditional)
• TSE in natural resource and agricultural surveys
• Design of and analysis of data from questionnaires given in multiple survey modes
• Errors induced in processing (e.g., editing, imputation)

If you would like to attend the workshop and/or present a paper or poster, please complete and email the proposal form - word / pdf (attached and available at at http://www.stat.iastate.edu/itsew2013) by February 15, 2013 to itsew2013@iastate.edu. Abstracts should not exceed 1000 words. Proposals for panel or other forms of discussion are also very welcome.

We will also provide a limited number of travel awards for presentations submitted by students or by international researchers who are new to the workshop, with special emphasis on communities that have not been presented at previous ITSEWs. You will be notified of abstract acceptance and travel awards by March 1, 2013. Emerging information about the conference will be posted at: http://www.stat.iastate.edu/itsew2013.

We are looking forward to welcoming you to Iowa!

The local organizers:
Sarah Nusser (nusser@iastate.edu)
Jae-kwang Kim (jkim@iastate.edu)
Emily Berg (emilyb@iastate.edu)
Sandie Smith (sandie@iastate.edu)

The course deals with the challenge of using the World Wide Web for survey data collection. Although Web surveys are sometimes perceived as a questionable survey mode, the experiences over the 15 years of their usage show that they can be used in a valid and reliable way for many research purposes. They offer not only fast and cost-effective survey data collection, but also a wide range of possibilities for designing advanced dynamic questionnaires, reaching diverse populations and ensuring high quality of collected data. While Web surveys are technically easy to implement, the understanding of underlying methodological principles is crucial for successful application in practice. The instructors will provide students with the basic principles of implementing Web surveys in order to collect high-quality survey data.

In the introduction the students will obtain knowledge necesseary to make informed decisions on choosing a web survey among alternative survey modes for specific research purposes. They will be presented with the history of computer-assisted survey data collection and its varieties, the typology of Web surveys as one of the recently developed computer-assisted modes, and the advantages and disadvantages of Web surveys in the context of their usage. In addition, cost and organizational aspects of implementing web surveys will be evaluated.

Then, principles of implementing Web surveys will be presented through the steps of the Internet survey process. This will begin with an overview of all error sources that can compromise the quality of data in web surveys: coverage and sampling, nonresponse, measurement and data processing. The main part of the course will focus on procedures for minimizing such errors and ensuring adequate data quality. Special attention will be given to presentation of appropriate sampling techniques, principles of web questionnaire design and strategies for stimulating participation of respondents. The presented material will be illustrated with empirical results from experiments and practical experience.

Students will also be introduced to a variety of survey packages for implementing Web surveys and will have the opportunity to conduct their own survey project using one of these packages. The course will conclude by addressing ethical issues in conducting surveys on the Web.

For more information visit Course Homepage.