Survey Research Design

If you've ever been sitting at a train station, a particular lecturer's classroom, or in a public area and a person with a stack of papers in his hands comes up to you out of the blue and asks if you have a few minutes to talk, then you have likely been asked to take part in a survey.

There are a lot of ways to conduct research and collect information, but one way that makes it really easy is by doing a survey. A survey is defined as a brief interview or discussion with individuals about a specific topic. The term survey is, unfortunately, a little vague, so we need to define it better. The term survey is often used to mean 'collect information.' For instance, you may imagine a researcher or a television scientist saying, 'We need to do a survey!' (I know, riveting television).

So, besides our definition above, survey also means to collect information. We have our first definition of a brief interview, and we have a second definition of collecting data. There is a third definition for survey. This third definition of survey is a specific type of survey research. Here are the three specific techniques of survey research:

• Questionnaires - a series of written questions a participant answers. This method gathers responses to questions that are essay or agree/neutral/disagree style.
• Interviews - questions posed to an individual to obtain information about him or her. This type of survey is like a job interview, with one person asking another a load of questions.
• Surveys - brief interviews and discussions with individuals about a specific topic. Yes, survey is also a specific type of survey, to make things even more confusing. A survey is a quick interview, with the surveyor asking only a few questions.

Below are the notes that I made from the slideshow hand-outs given by my classmates.