Designing and testing questionnaires for children
- 1 September 2007
- journal article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Journal of Research in Nursing
- Vol. 12 (5), 461-469
- https://doi.org/10.1177/1744987107079616
Abstract
Only in the last 10—15 years have social researchers acknowledged the importance of conducting survey research with children directly, rather than relying on qualitative findings plus prevalence data collected by proxy from adults. With reference to the question—answer model, I here present and consider a number of guiding principles for the design of appropriate and effective questions for younger respondents. Pretesting of questions is especially important when researching populations about which relatively little is known, or who are likely to be especially sensitive to failings of questionnaire design. Children fall into this category because relatively little is known about how the question—answer model applies to them, and because their cognitive, memory, communicative and social faculties are still developing. With this in mind, I describe two key methods of question-testing, namely review by expert panel and in-depth cognitive interviewing.Keywords
This publication has 10 references indexed in Scilit:
- Pretesting Questionnaires for Children and AdolescentsPublished by Wiley ,2004
- Response Quality in Survey Research with Children and Adolescents: The Effect of Labeled Response Options and Vague QuantifiersInternational Journal for Quality in Health Care, 2003
- Children as Respondents in Survey Research: Cognitive Development and Response Quality 1Bulletin of Sociological Methodology/Bulletin de Méthodologie Sociologique, 2000
- The Psychology of Survey ResponsePublished by Cambridge University Press (CUP) ,2000
- Children as Respondents: Methods for Improving Data QualityPublished by Wiley ,1997
- Response strategies for coping with the cognitive demands of attitude measures in surveysApplied Cognitive Psychology, 1991
- Development of Processing Speed in Childhood and AdolescenceAdvances in Child Development and Behavior, 1991
- Interviewing Children about Their Families: A Note on Data QualityJournal of Marriage and Family, 1987
- An Evaluation of a Cognitive Theory of Response-Order Effects in Survey MeasurementPublic Opinion Quarterly, 1987
- Stability of Children's Survey ResponsesPublic Opinion Quarterly, 1973