Survey agencies are moving towards self-completion data collection, as response rates have been declining and fieldwork costs have been rising. The COVID-19 pandemic provided an opportunity to move some surveys to self-administered modes with unprecedented speed and expedited existing transformation plans. However, not many social surveys made the transition, and several returned to face-to-face interviewing as soon as it became feasible to do so.
This workshop will present research conducted as part of Survey Futures’ Research Strand 4 (“Surveys without field interviewers”). The strand focused on reviewing recruitment practices for self-administered surveys, with the aim of identifying design characteristics that tend to achieve high cooperation rates and more representative samples of the general population.
In this workshop, we will summarise findings from an evidence review on methods used to recruit samples for self-completion surveys. This evidence is of two kinds: findings from the scientific literature on the effectiveness of different approaches and design features, and insights from technical reports on the approaches and design features used in practice on UK surveys. We will present our conclusions in the form of practical recommendations regarding recruitment for surveys without field interviewers.
Programme:
13:00 – 13:05: Welcome and Introductions (Olga Maslovskaya, University of Southampton, UK)
13:05 – 13:40: What works well when recruiting for self-completion surveys? (Nhlanhla Ndebele – European Social Survey / City St George’s, University of London, UK)
13:45 – 14:30: Good survey practices for recruitment in self-completion surveys (Cristian Domarchi – University of Southampton, UK and Nhlanhla Ndebele – European Social Survey / City St George’s, University of London, UK)
14:30 – 14:45: Q&A session and discussion
Please note that this is the first of two workshops being delivered by our Research Strand 4 colleagues on the afternoon of 16thMarch. Please sign up for either or both!