Questionnaire

Questionnaire Construction

When questionnaires are constructed, four primary requirements must be met:

• 1.
  Theoretical knowledge of the topic of research, achieved through the reconnaissance of the relevant literature (if such exists) and/or in-depth interviews or other qualitative methods of research (ethnographies, focus groups, brainstorming, etc.) that may serve as pilot studies.
• 2.
  Valid and reliable operationalization of concepts and hypotheses of research. Most questionnaire items, in fact, originate from the operationalization phase. To check the validity (the degree to which an item or scale measures what it was designed to measure) and reliability (the consistency or replica-bility of measurements) of a set of items, various techniques can be used: external, construct, and face validity, among others, in the first case; and parallel forms, test-retest, split-half, intercoder techniques, in the case of reliability.
• 3.
  Experience in writing a questionnaire, or at least the availability of good repertoires of published questionnaires.
• 4.
  A knowledge of the target population. This is crucial information: The target population must be able to answer to the questions accurately.

Questionnaires are usually composed of three main parts: the cover letter (or introduction), the instructions, and the main body. Usually, they finish with thanking the respondents for their valuable collaboration.

The cover letter (or its equivalent in interviewer-administered surveys) introduces the research and [Page 653]tries to motivate the respondents to cooperate with the survey task. It also explains the aims of the research, informs about its contractors and sponsors, and, above all, guarantees the anonymity or at least the confidentiality of the respondents. It is a sort of “contract,” where the costs and benefits for collaboration between the respondent and the researcher are defined. The cover letter is one of the key elements in improving the response rate.

Instructions are especially important when the questionnaire is self-administered. Instructions contain all the rules the respondents must follow to answer the questions (e.g. how to check the boxes, which part of the questionnaire has to be skipped in certain cases, etc.). These rules should be as simple as possible. They can be categorized as (a) general instructions, (b) section introductions, (c) question instructions, and (d) “go to” instructions for contingency questions.

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