How to Design Polling Questions
The first and most important step in polling is deciding upon the specific information that is desired. Having a clear goal is the foundation for structuring polling questions. There are several strategies for designing polling questions that will get clear results.
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Instructions
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Define a clear goal. Start with a broad-ranged goal, such as product or services ratings or opinions about political candidates or political issues. Such general goals must then be narrowed down to more specific and targeted goals. The more specificity in the goal, the simpler it is to acquire useful answers.
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Determine the target population for polling. If you don’t poll the right target population, you won’t reach a successful goal. Decide on the number of people that you are going to poll. The larger the target sample, the more realistically the poll will reflect the target population.
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Decide on your method for collecting information for your poll. Common methods include personal surveys, telephone surveys, postal mail surveys, email surveys, Internet or webpage surveys, and questionnaires for scanning. Each method has pros and cons.
If sensitive questions are involved, people respond better when being questioned directly by a computer or the Internet. Postal mail surveys aren’t as effective for less educated individuals as they don’t generally respond to them. If speed is important, email and web page surveys are the fastest method, but pollsters may not be able to generalize the results as effectively to the population as a whole.
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Design your polling questionnaire to fit the chosen survey technique. Lengthy questionnaires will make those being polled give up before they finish or, worse yet, not even begin. Keep questionnaires simple and short.
To design effective questions, ask yourself what you intend to do with the answer to each question. If you don’t have a use for the answer to the question, the question is unnecessary. A good technique is to divide your questions into three categories--must know, useful to know, and nice to know. If some questions must be eliminated, cut the last category.
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Include a "Not Applicable" or "Don’t Know" option among the answer choices. If "Other" or "None" could be a logical response, those options should be included in the questionnaire as well. However, "Not Applicable," "Don’t Know," "Other," and "None" options are rarely used in telephone questioning.
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Choose one of the three types of questionnaires most commonly used by pollsters and researchers. Those types include multiple choice, rating scales, and question and answer choice order.
An example of a multiple choice question would be something like the following:
1. To what political party do you belong?
A. Democrat
B. Republican
C. Independent
D. OtherAn example of a rating scales question would be something like the following:
1. If 10 meant you have a strong interest and 1 meant you have no interest, how would you rate your interest in the following topics?
Foreign affairs _____
Domestic politics _____
Environmental issues _____
Immigration issues _____Question and answer choice order questions are questions directly asked in the questionnaire. The answer choices may have a natural order, such as,” Yes”, followed by "No” or “Excellent - Good - Fair - Poor”. Some question and answer choice order questions have answers that are obvious to the respondent, such as “What brand of computer do you own?” In such cases, the order in which the answer choices are presented is unimportant. Some question and answer choice order questions involve preference or recall with fairly long answer choices that express an idea or opinion. For such questions, the choice order can possibly affect which choice is picked.
Design question and answer choice order questions so that the easiest questions are first. This will encourage respondents to continue with the polling questionnaire. Save sensitive or difficult questions until the end. Group questions on the same topic together as this makes it easier for respondents to answer the questions. Use a logical order to answer choices whenever possible, especially in Agree or Disagree choices, and in Positive to Negative and Excellent to Poor answer choices.
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Use wording carefully. Unless you can be certain that interviewees know what they mean, avoid using technical terms or acronyms. The phrasing of a question can change the answers received. Make certain the phrasing doesn’t favor one particular answer choice over another. Avoid using emotionally charged or leading questions that point toward a certain answer. You don’t want to create bias in your polling questionnaire.
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