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In recent years, web-push strategies have been developed in cross-sectional mixed-mode surveys to improve response rates and reduce the costs of data collection. However, pushing respondents into the more cost-efficient web mode has rarely been examined in the context of panel surveys. This study evaluates how a web-push intervention affects the willingness of panel members to switch survey modes from mail to web. We tested three web-push strategies in a German probability-based mixed-mode panel by randomly assigning 1,895 panelists of the mail mode to one of three conditions: (1) the web option was offered to panelists concurrently with the paper questionnaire including a promised €10 incentive for completing the survey on the web, (2) the web option was presented sequentially two weeks before sending the paper questionnaire and respondents were also promised an incentive of €10, or (3) same sequential web-first approach as for condition 2, but with a prepaid €10 incentive instead of a promised incentive. The study found that a sequential presentation of the web option significantly increases the web response in a single survey but may not motivate more panelists to switch to the web mode permanently. Contrary to our expectation, offering prepaid incentives neither improves the web response nor the proportion of mode switchers. Overall, all three web-push strategies show the potential to effectively reduce survey costs without causing differences in panel attrition after five consecutive waves. Condition 2, the sequential web-first design combined with a promised incentive was most effective in pushing respondents to switch to the web mode and in reducing costs.

Mail communications remain a prominent aspect of survey research, especially due to the increasing adoption of web-push surveys throughout the world. However, there is a lack of research on the effectiveness of comprehensive communication strategies for increasing response rates. This paper tests the influence of two communication theories—social exchange theory and pre-suasion theory—on response rates in a survey of residents of southern West Virginia. Social exchange theory has long been used as a strategy for encouraging response, but the theory of pre-suasion offers a new approach of tailoring and sequencing written and visual communications. We operationalized pre-suasion and social exchange communications techniques in the cover letter and questionnaire, then conducted a 2-by-2 experimental design to identify differences in response and data quality. The results show significant differences in response based on the communications in the letter, but no differences based on the questionnaire. The versions with social exchange letters received a response rate 5.5 percent higher than pre-suasion letters. Further, communication differences had no statistically significant effect on measures of data quality. These findings suggest future avenues for research on broad communication strategies in mail survey materials.

While completing my PhD in sociology, I did not anticipate spending most of my academic career researching ways to improve methods for doing sample surveys. At that time, I was dedicated to understanding community organization and how people adopt the use of new technologies. This article describes how becoming a new assistant professor just prior to a university crisis turned my academic interests away from organizational behavior toward more than five decades of research to advance survey methodology in step with technological changes transforming the world. This process also turned upside down my thoughts on how to do research. Increasingly I was inspired by the work of survey designers in government and private sector organizations who needed help with improving their survey designs. These experiences led to the creation of a series of innovations: telephone and mail data collection methods, mixed-mode surveying, tailored design for different survey situations, data collection over the internet, unified construction of questionnaires across survey modes, and understanding the differences between answers given to aurally vs. visually delivered survey questions. This sequence of research efforts led to the development and testing of web-push procedures that are now replacing the use of telephone survey methods throughout the world. Yet frequently and at unexpected times, my education in social organization and technology issues provided much needed guidance for thinking beyond the constraints of current survey methods and the possibilities that new methods could provide.

Latence de réponse comme indicateur d'optimisation de questionnaires sur le Web: En répondant aux questions, les répondants exécutent quatre étapes mentales : la compréhension, la recherche d'information, le jugement, et la sélection de réponse. Ceux qui suivent soigneusement toutes les étapes sont appelés optimizers, tandis que ceux qui font moins d'efforts et sautent des étapes sont appelés satisficers.Dans cette étude, nous comparons la latence de réponse des optimizerset des satisficersen répondant à des questions d'évaluation de la personnalité posées sur un site Web. L'utilisation de la régression spline et le contrôle des variables possibles nous fournissent la preuve que les optimizerspassent plus de temps que les satisficersen répondant à des questions dans la première section d'un questionnaire. On retrouve l'idée que des traitements cognitifs plus profond exigent plus d'efforts et prennent plus de temps. Nous montrons aussi que, à fure et à mesure qu'une passation progresse, les deux groupes passent moins de temps, jusqu'à ce qu'ils atteignent une vitesse maximale de réponse.

Changes in survey mode for conducting panel surveys may contribute significantly to survey error. This article explores the causes and consequences of such changes in survey mode. The authors describe how and why the choice of survey mode often causes changes to be made to the wording of questions, as well as the reasons that identically worded questions often produce different answers when administered through different modes. The authors provide evidence that answers may changeas a result of different visual layouts for otherwise identical questions and suggest ways to keep measurement the same despite changes in survey mode.

The expertise of behavioral survey methodologists is needed in national statistical agencies because of the necessity of using theory and research from the social sciences to reduce survey error. In this paper various social science based explanations for measurement error and nonresponse error are described in order to illustrate the conceptual foundations of such error reduction efforts. Three roles for behavioral survey methodologists in national statistical agencies are then discussed. They include: 1) bring an error reduction perspective to bear in an influential way for all aspects of designing and implementing agency surveys; 2) bring theoretical efficiency and effectiveness to experimental tests of alternative questionnaire designs and implementation procedures through the use of theories, concepts and pretests and findings of past behavioral science research; and 3) contribute to the expanding science of survey methodology.

Within the last decade concern for law and order has become a major domestic issue. Presidential candidates have campaigned on the issue. Opinion polls have charted the growing public concern. Crime statistics have reported startling growth in the number of serious crimes committed in the United States. This paper attempts to assess the ability of different variables to predict and explain this high concern. Two aspects of concern will be discussed: (1) awareness of and (2) willingness to do something about crime. Theoretically little is known about how awareness for a social problem can be translated into forms of action to deal with the perceived problem. Methodologically, a technique is needed for assessing the relative importance of different variables related to the problem area. Path analysis is discussed as a possible technique. The data was collected through a random sample of heads-of-households in the State of Washington during the summer of 1970 (N=3101; response rate=75%).