Cultural Variability in Survey Question Processing and Response Behaviors

虽然相当多的证据表明，文化，民族和种族背景可能有重要的影响调查测量误差，文化影响调查受访者的行为的过程仍然在很大程度上未被探索。 为了解决这一重要问题，这项研究有四个目标。 这些包括（1）调查受访者种族/民族和文化对受访者言语和非言语行为的影响，作为调查访谈中响应处理困难的指标，（2）种族/民族对调查响应风格的影响，（3）种族/民族对认知处理的影响在多大程度上受到问题设计特征（如主题和格式）的调节，以及（4）种族/民族效应在多大程度上可以由文化价值取向的个体差异来解释。 来自NSF资助的主要调查的问题，包括一般社会调查，全国选举调查和其他主要的国家社会调查，将用于检查这些目标。 调查访谈将在芝加哥大都市区进行，共有来自四个不同文化群体的800名成年人样本：非洲裔美国人、韩裔美国人、墨西哥裔美国人和非西班牙裔白人。 面试将以英语、韩语和西班牙语进行。 访谈将被录音和录像，随后进行行为编码，以识别认知处理困难的语言和非语言标记，包括问题理解、记忆检索、反应映射和社会期望反应的问题。 与每个答案相关的回复时间也将以电子方式记录。 分层线性模型将被用来分析这些数据，并解决每个研究objective.As美国.民族和种族结构继续多样化，了解这种人口结构的转变如何可能复杂的调查结果的解释将成为一个越来越优先考虑的问题。 这项研究将有助于了解受访者在回答调查问题时的心理过程。 这项研究还将提供关键的洞察种族/民族差异在这些过程中。 它将提供有关种族/民族变异的性质在各种常见类型的调查问题的问题理解的见解，以及种族/民族变异的响应风格。 它将通过文化价值观的透镜来处理种族/族裔的作用，通过将其与文化价值取向联系起来，来解开极端反应风格、默许、社会期望反应和其他此类差异中已知的种族/族裔差异。 这项研究还可能导致有关设计调查问题的最佳做法的建议，最大限度地减少理解和回答风格的文化差异。 这项研究得到了方法、测量和统计方案、政治学方案、社会学方案和联邦统计机构联盟的支持，作为支持调查和统计方法研究的联合活动的一部分。

Although considerable evidence suggests that cultural, ethnic, and racial background may have important effects on survey measurement error, the processes by which culture influences the survey respondents' behavior remain largely unexplored. To address this important problem, the study has four objectives. These include (1) investigating the effects of respondent race/ethnicity and culture on respondent verbal and nonverbal behaviors as indicators of response processing difficulties in survey interviews, (2) the effects of race/ethnicity on survey response styles, (3) the degree to which the effects of race/ethnicity on cognitive processing is moderated by question design features such as topic and format, and (4) the degree to which race/ethnicity effects can be accounted for by individual differences in cultural value orientations. Questions from major NSF-funded surveys, including the General Social Survey, the National Election Survey, and other major national social surveys, will be used to examine these objectives. Survey interviews will be conducted in the Chicago metropolitan area with a total sample of 800 adults from four distinct cultural groups: African Americans, Korean Americans, Mexican Americans and non-Hispanic Whites. Interviews will be conducted in English, Korean, and Spanish. Interviews will be audio and video recorded and subsequently behavior coded to identify verbal and nonverbal markers of cognitive processing difficulties, including problems with question comprehension, memory retrieval, response mapping, and socially desirable responding. The response latencies associated with each answer also will be electronically recorded. Hierarchical linear modeling will be used to analyze these data and address each study objective.As the U.S. ethnic and racial structure continues to diversify, understanding how this demographic transition may complicate the interpretation of survey results will become an increasing priority. This research will contribute to the understanding of the mental process respondents engage in as they answer survey questions. The study also will provide crucial insight into racial/ethnic differences in these processes. It will offer insights about the nature of racial/ ethnic variability in question comprehension across a variety of common types of survey questions, as well as racial/ethnic variability in response styles. It will address the role of race/ethnicity through the lens of cultural values, unpacking known racial/ethnic differences in extreme response style, acquiescence, socially desirable responding, and other such differences by linking them to cultural value orientations. The study also may lead to recommendations regarding best practices for the design of survey questions that minimize cultural differences in comprehension and response styles. The research is supported by the Methodology, Measurement, and Statistics Program, the Political Science Program, the Sociology Program, and a consortium of federal statistical agencies as part of a joint activity to support research on survey and statistical methodology.