Social Exchange Theory

Social exchange is the theoretical approach most frequently invoked by survey methodologists when interpreting the decisions people make about whether or not to participate in surveys. In essence, social exchange theory holds that many interactions proceed from the assessment of costs versus benefits. Exchanges occur in purest form in economic transactions, in which it is fully realized that the exchange of goods or services for money or for barter is rational and voluntary, with the respective values for each party understood. Because money is so liquid, little social relationship is required for economic exchanges, and the individual is as often exchanging with the market as with other individuals. Social exchange theory widens the focus to a broad social realm, which includes intangibles such as maintenance of tradition, conformity to group norms, and self-esteem. The nature of the relationship between those exchanging then becomes important.

Examples of a social exchange explanation of seemingly irrational behavior appear in print within long-ago anthropological accounts of tribal life, for example, Bronislaw Malinowski's 1920s analysis of Kula exchange (the circulation of necklaces and armlets among Trobriand Islanders). Social exchange became a more widely known school of thought in [Page 827]work in the United States with the late 1950s and 1960s contributions by figures such as George C. Homans, J. W. Thibault and Harold H. Kelly, and Peter Blau.

By the mid-1970s, explicit applications were appearing of social exchange ideas to the understanding of nonresponse on surveys. An important statement was in Mail and Telephone Surveys: The Total Design Method for Surveys by sociologist Don Dill-man in the late 1970s. Part of the total design was attending to several details of survey fieldwork likely to lower the cost and raise the rewards of participation for any sampled person. A stamped and addressed return envelope, for example, would lower the cost of responding to a mailed questionnaire, not just financially to a slight degree, but with a saving in time. Hand-signed cover letters on a questionnaire were a reward that acknowledged the importance of each individual drawn for the sample. Printing questionnaires in booklet form (in the pre-desktop publishing days of Gestetner machines) reduced the eyestrain costs of filling in a questionnaire while underscoring the importance of the research topic. Cash incentives drew their effectiveness primarily from social rather than economic exchange theory, when presented in prepaid form in small denominations. The money was symbolic, with high cultural resonance as a gift. Each item within the total design might seem slight, but the cumulative effect led to some highly respectable response rates on mailed surveys.

There is, however, a danger of overapplying social exchange theory as the explanation for why people do or do not respond to survey requests. Robert M. Groves and his colleagues have raised awareness of other factors not fitting so centrally into the social exchange framework. Especially on a telephone survey using unannounced calls, time does not exist for social exchange calculations to take place. Social exchange notions are most clearly valid where some degree of relationship exists between people, even if the relationship arises simply from the sequence of postal contacts in a mailed survey. When the telephone rings unexpectedly, and especially in a world of frequent beseeching telephone contacts from telemark-eters and charities, most of the mental effort goes into making an instantaneous decision of whether and/or how to say “No.” The decision making becomes heuristic, based on previous mental associations and rules of thumb. A “sing-song” voice, for example, instantly telegraphs that a call is not from a personal acquaintance.

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