Questionnaire Design in Short Message Service (SMS) Surveys

Abstract

Short message service (SMS or text messaging) surveys can collect data quickly and inexpensively. However, SMS surveys have space constraints that pose difficulties to questionnaire designers: Questions can only be 160 characters or less, surveys must be short, and many respondents use phones with small screens. In this article, we compare SMS and benchmark face-to-face surveys across four African countries to address three common questions in SMS questionnaire design. First, are multiple response questions feasible? Second, is it necessary to randomize response option order? Third, should “don’t know” response options be included? Our results provide practical guidance about how to improve data quality with this emerging mode of data collection.

Representativeness of individual-level data in COVID-19 phone surveys: Findings from Sub-Saharan Africa

“…Our paper is part of a growing literature on methodology and best practices for designing and conducting phone surveys in low- and middle-income countries, covering a range of issues including sampling [ 21 , 24 ]; survey mode [ 14 , 20 , 25 ]; survey cost, non-response, attrition, and use of incentives [ 16 , 26 – 31 ]; and questionnaire design [ 19 , 32 , 33 ]. There are also several guidebooks and synthesis reports that summarize best practices and experiences with phone surveys from before the COVID-19 pandemic [ 16 , 26 , 29 ] as well as in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic [ 8 , 14 , 32 ].…”

Representativeness of Individual-Level Data in COVID-19 Phone Surveys: Findings from Sub-Saharan Africa

“…Larmarange et al (2016) and Velthausz et al (2016) find that mobile phone surveys represent a population that is younger, more urban, and more likely to be male and better educated. This is confirmed by Henderson and Rosenbaum (2020) who review 15 phone-based studies from 11 countries, and Lau et al (2019b), who document that sampling for an SMS-based phone survey favors more technologically savvy respondents. Moreover, significant sample selection biases compared to face-to-face data collection have been documented in phone surveys, irrespective of phone survey modes (CATI, IVR or SMS) (Lau et al 2019a).…”

“…Our paper is related to a growing literature on methodology and best practices for designing and conducting phone surveys in low-income countries (see L'Engle et al, 2018 on sampling;Greenleaf et al, 2020, Henderson and Rosenbaum, 2020, and Lau et al, 2019a on survey mode; Ballivian et al, 2015, Dabalen et al, 2016, Gibson et al, 2019, Lau and di Tada, 2018, Leo et al, 2015, McKenzie, 2012, Özler and Cuevas, 2019 on survey cost, non-response, attrition, and use of incentives; Glazerman et al, 2020, Lau et al, 2019b, and Palacios-Lopez et al, 2020 on questionnaire design, among others). 4 Closely related to our research are several studies focusing on the representativeness of phone survey data and the role of respondent selection.…”

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“…Our paper is part of a growing literature on methodology and best practices for designing and conducting phone surveys in low-and middle-income countries, covering a range of issues including sampling [21,24]; survey mode [14,20,25]; survey cost, non-response, attrition, and use of incentives [16,[26][27][28][29][30][31]; and questionnaire design [19,32,33]. There are also several guidebooks and synthesis reports that summarize best practices and experiences with phone surveys from before the COVID-19 pandemic [16,26,29] as well as in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic [8,14,32].…”