A Methodological Study of Mail Surveys

这是一份探索性研究的小额资助申请 （SGER）进行邮件调查响应率和响应的研究 bias. 拟议的研究将与一项已排定的 底特律地区调查局（DAS）计划于2009年春季进行调查。 1992. 本研究将采用面对面访谈的方式收集 关于种族态度和相关问题的数据。 拟定研究 将从DAS样本中选择随机样本并发送这些 受访者的邮件调查，其中一些问题是 与个人访谈中的问题相同。 是 与DAS研究的联系， 申请SGER补助金而不是常规研究补助金。 拟议的研究将作出两项重要贡献， 对调查中的反应率和反应偏差的研究。 第一 它将提供一个衡量答复率的标准， 通过邮件调查获得， 面对面的调查 这是测量中的一个重要问题 研究，因为邮件调查比面对面调查便宜得多， 面对面的面试 本研究的第二个贡献是 为了验证这个假设， 受访者对敏感问题的态度比 在面对面的采访中。 1992年DAS研究的主题是 种族态度-一个众所周知的对种族主义非常敏感的话题， 社会期望因素的影响。 建议邮件 调查将包括一些相同的问题， 个人访谈，从而提供了比较的基础， 在两种不同的数据收集场景下的答案。 第二 研究的这一部分的组成部分将邮寄相同的 向最近捐款的个人发出的调查问卷 大卫杜克竞选路易斯安那州州长。 这 研究的一部分将侧重于样本的响应率 被认为是不同情的许多问题提出的， 关于种族态度的调查表， 与那些随机选择的样本。

This is a request for a Small Grant for Exploratory Research (SGER) to do a study of mail survey response rates and response bias. The proposed study would be linked to an already scheduled survey planned by the Detroit Area Survey (DAS) in the spring of 1992. This study will use face-to-face interviews to collect data on racial attitudes and related issues. The proposed study would select an random sample from the DAS sample and send these respondents a mail survey where some of the questions are identical to those asked in personal interviews. It is the linkage to the DAS study that provides the rationale for requesting a SGER grant rather than a regular research grant. The proposed study will make two important contributions to the study of response rates and response bias in surveys. First it will provide a measure of the response rates that can be obtained with mail surveys compared to a highly professional face-to-face survey. This is an important issue in survey research because mail surveys are much less expensive than face- to-face interviews. The second contribution of the study will be to test the hypothesis that with self-administered questionnaires respondents are more candid about sensitive issues than they are in face-to-face interviews. The topic of the 1992 DAS study is racial attitudes--a topic that is known to be quite sensitive to the influence of social desirability factors. The proposed mail survey would include some of the same questions asked in the personal interviews thus providing a basis for comparing the answers under two different data collections scenarios. A second component of this part of the study would mail out the same questionnaire to individuals who contributed money to the recent campaign of David Duke to become governor of Louisiana. This part of the study will focus on the response rate of a sample believed to be unsympathetic to many of the issues raised in the questionnaire on racial attitudes and on a comparison of their stated views with those of the randomly selected sample.