Today we had the seminar with Olle and this time the lecture were
constructed a bit different. We teamed up and had competition in finding
advantages/disadvantages with different kinds of surveys and methods. I think
this is a great way of learning things. You get all the people in the class
engage in the subject, you cooperate as a team and you also are forced to
listen to other people (due to the scoring system we had in the competition).
Also, have a competition is always fun and I personally think that this way of have a seminar is a good is good to mix with the more traditional “sit around a table and talk” kind.
In my bachelor thesis we used a questionnaire and thanks to that I know some tricks to think of when constructing one. But I realize that there is so much to learn about quantitative research and especially surveys and questionnaires. One of the biggest problems for me is that there is so much literature that covers these subjects but so little time to go trough it when doing a survey in a course. This makes this week’s theme really interesting and important because you get a good summary on what to think of from Olle. I just wished that I knew some of these things before the bachelor thesis course.
One thing that really surprised my during the lecture was that you are not supposed (at the most time) to have “middle answer-choice” to a question because. This is because the respondents may be upset over that there is no choice that fits their “in-the-middle opinion”, and therefore they do not complete the survey.
Another thing that also surprised me was how much a survey (in medical epidemiology) costs. Olle told us that due to the fact that people are sloppy, 80% of the surveys come back incomplete therefore make for a lot extra word and a cost at 500 SEK/respondent. This is quite a lot for just collecting the data, then you add costs for analyzing and constructing the survey and you realized how much money that needs to go into this kind of research.
Also, have a competition is always fun and I personally think that this way of have a seminar is a good is good to mix with the more traditional “sit around a table and talk” kind.
In my bachelor thesis we used a questionnaire and thanks to that I know some tricks to think of when constructing one. But I realize that there is so much to learn about quantitative research and especially surveys and questionnaires. One of the biggest problems for me is that there is so much literature that covers these subjects but so little time to go trough it when doing a survey in a course. This makes this week’s theme really interesting and important because you get a good summary on what to think of from Olle. I just wished that I knew some of these things before the bachelor thesis course.
One thing that really surprised my during the lecture was that you are not supposed (at the most time) to have “middle answer-choice” to a question because. This is because the respondents may be upset over that there is no choice that fits their “in-the-middle opinion”, and therefore they do not complete the survey.
Another thing that also surprised me was how much a survey (in medical epidemiology) costs. Olle told us that due to the fact that people are sloppy, 80% of the surveys come back incomplete therefore make for a lot extra word and a cost at 500 SEK/respondent. This is quite a lot for just collecting the data, then you add costs for analyzing and constructing the survey and you realized how much money that needs to go into this kind of research.
At the end at lecture Olle pointed out five things to
remember when doing a questionnaires:
·
Invitation via paper letter
·
Paper survey or url with
password
·
Remember via paper mail
·
Reminder via telephone
·
Reminder via paper mail
These things are something that I will try to come back to if I do
another survey (which I probably will do in my master thesis).
Hi Sofia,
SvaraRaderaI also think the structure of the seminar with Olle Bälter encourage deeper learning in a good way. I definitely got more engaged and more creative cooperating with other group members. Considering your thoughts about surveys and questionnaires I also got surprised over some rules. It feels that you cant be fully learned in survey and research methods.