A comparison of reliability between telephone and web-based surveys (original) (raw)
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Web surveys potentially cost less to administer and are more convenient for participants than either telephone or paper-based surveys, but concern remains about the representativeness of the respondents to the population. This research investigates the effectiveness of using Webbased survey methods by comparing response rates and demographic characteristics of the telephone-based and web-based survey respondents. The paper first reviews survey research methodologies, including recent trends in web-based surveys that take advantage of the power of modern computing and telecommunications technology. The issue of respondent characteristics in web-based surveys is then explored by comparing respondent demographics of an ongoing telephone survey to those of a subsequent Web survey of the same population. Exploratory and confirmatory statistical analyses are used to triangulate the findings and test the hypotheses. The data suggests that demographics of the respondents of the two methods are similar across race and age, but differ significantly across income and education levels, implying a converging digital divide.
Evidence on the comparison of telephone and internet surveys for respondent recruitment
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Internet surveys have a potential use for survey research when compared against costs and declining response rates of traditional modes as they form a powerful tool for reducing respondents' burden in complex questionnaires. On the other hand, there exists scepticism about the reliability and robustness of the collected data. Arenze et al. (2005) argue that case studies involving Internet surveys cannot be generalised to other countries and have recommended systematic collection and reporting of experiences worldwide. Such studies have had limited exposure in the transport literature. This paper provides empirical evidence on the comparison between telephone and Internet surveys in the context of a car ownership study. The comparison between telephone and Internet modes focuses on performance measures such as response speed, response rates, survey costs, demographic profiles and geographical representation of the sample. The results indicate the cost effectiveness of Internet surveys. Moreover, they show that the time and cost for data collection significantly vary by sampling and recruitment method. Finally, Internet survey response rates are lower than those in the telephone interview, which implies that Internet surveys can only be used to complement traditional data collection methods.