Using the Internet for Survey Research

Abstract

The Internet and electronic mail increasingly offer the research community opportunities that it did not previously have. Access to information has increased as has access to and discussion with those working in similar areas. One other aspect of ‘cyberspace’ which presents enormous possibilities to the research community, currently in its infancy, is the use of the Internet to reach individuals as research subjects. In particular, there may be significant research benefits to be gleaned where the group being researched is normally difficult to reach and/or the issues being researched are of a particularly sensitive nature. This paper outlines some recent survey research using the Internet as the interface between researcher and researched. The target group, illicit ‘drug dealers’, are difficult to access under normal conditions and contacting a spread of such individuals across international borders was previously prohibitive. A discussion of sampling issues is undertaken which concludes that the Internet can be a valuable source of indicative as opposed to easily generalizable data. A practical guide to undertaking research via the Internet is also included.

Measuring health beliefs on the Internet: A comparison of paper and Internet administrations of the Multidimensional Health Locus of Control Scale

“…However, different sampling approaches will almost certainly give rise to different types of samples (as may the same approaches administered at different times), and researchers must bear this in mind when deciding upon the most appropriate procedures for any given study. One successful approach to date has been to target specialist newsgroups in order to reach difficult-to-access populations (e.g., Birnbaum, 2001;Coomber, 1997). Unfortunately, however, at this stage still relatively little is known about the relationship between sampling approach and sample composition in IMR, and this issue requires further investigation.…”

“…One of the key appeals of IMR is the ability to reach a large number of potential participants cost and time effectively, using procedures such as posting participation requests to newsgroups, to mailing lists, and on Web pages (Barbeite & Weiss, 2004;Musch & Reips, 2000). In psychological IMR at least, these approaches (we include those that involve sending requests to e-mail addresses obtained from Internet databases, such as mailing lists) have prevailed (e.g., Birnbaum, 2001;Browndyke, Santa Maria, Pinkston, & Gouvier, 1998;Buchanan, 2000;Buchanan & Smith, 1999;Coomber, 1997;Corley & Scheepers, 2002;Eichstaedt, 2002;Im & Chee, 2004;Kaye & Johnson, 1999;Krantz et al, 1997;Laugwitz, 2001;Riva et al, 2003;Smith & Leigh, 1997;Szabo, Frenkl, & Caputo, 1996). 1 Interestingly (but perhaps not surprisingly), these studies provide evidence that Internet samples accessed using these methods tend to differ in systematic ways from the undergraduate student samples often encountered in psychological research (for evidence that traditional psychological research relies heavily on undergraduate student samples, see Buchanan & Smith, 1999;Smart, 1966).…”

Online methods in geography educational research

“…The type of data yielded is quantitative and with a web-based questionnaire data can be loaded automatically into a spreadsheet or database increasing the speed and accuracy of data collection. Numerous examples of web-based questionnaires and electronic surveys exist in the literature (Coomber, 1997;Hampton and Wellman, 1999;Kaye and Johnson, 1999;Litvin and Kar, 2001;Madge and O'Connor, 2002;Roberts and Parks, 2001;Schaefer and Dillman, 1998;Selwyn and Robson, 1998;Smith, 1997;Witmer et al, 1999). More recent references compare online and onsite surveys (McDonald and Adam, 2003;Riva et al, 2003).…”

“…Thus the issue of access to online communities and website providers is crucial when conducting online research. As Coomber (1997) has highlighted, there is little point in having a web page and setting up an online survey and passively `waiting' for eligible respondents to find the site: more active enrolment is needed to encourage users to complete an online survey. In this case the significance of having the site providers `on our side' cannot be underestimated.…”

Changing Gendered Dynamics: Mixed Social Movements Activists Proposals

“…Como muestra la bibliografía (AAVV, 1999;Coomber, 1997;de Zárraga, 1998;Estallo, 2001;Gordo y Macauley, 1996;Jones, 1998;Lohan, 2000;Paccagnella, 1997) no hay un acuerdo certero sobre la validez de los resultado recolectados on-line pero, parece ser, que el margen de falsificaciones no sea superior al de los datos recolectados a través de métodos más tradicionales. Esto, también es debido al hecho de que hay una cantidad de informaciones extremadamente alta en la red y es difícil que las personas lleguen a la página en cuestión de manera casual.…”