Research Methods in Tourism, Hospitality and Events Management

5.7 Summary

Designing a questionnaire is clearly a crucial part of the market research process.

Questionnaires are used in different types of survey, from the highly structured

commonly used in-street and postal surveys to the informal, where interviewers may

ask open questions requiring in-depth answers. Whatever the purpose of the survey,

the main aims of the questionnaire are to:

obtain accurate information from the respondent

provide a structure and format to an interview

facilitate data analysis.

The chapter has demonstrated important considerations to be remembered when

framing questions and laying out the questionnaire. Of particular importance in

asking questions is the need to be clear and simple and to avoid bias which occurs

when questions are leading, hypothetical or ambiguous.

It should also be stressed that the testing of questions within pilot surveys is critical.

This will show up problems of understanding and misinterpretation and give some

indications of the likely results. On this latter point, it should be borne in mind that it

is possible (and probable) that you will achieve different results when asking the

same question but using open rather than closed techniques. For example, an open

question asking ‘What did you like about your last holiday?’ would probably provide

a wide range of answers which reflected that respondent’s own particular

circumstances and experiences. If, however, the question is asked in a closed way –

such as ‘The following list shows things which people often like about their

holidays. Which are true about your last holiday?’ – we may be trying to achieve the

same objective but the responses will be quite dissimilar. The open question may

provide a wider range but will be more difficult to analyse, whereas the closed

question may provide a narrower range of responses (depending on how many items

are on the list) but will be easier to analyse. What could be lost in the closed question

are items that respondents would have stated were important but are not on the list.

Equally, with the open question, respondents may not remember things which were

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important at the time (which a checklist might prompt) but are forgotten when

interviewed.

Unfortunately for the researcher, there is necessarily no absolute right or wrong

approach. The best solution, perhaps, is to reflect on the objectives of the survey and

include more than one questioning technique for each specific research objective.

This way the pros and cons of question types will be compensated for and a full

response will be provided overall.

Further reading

Brace, I. (2008). Questionnaire Design: How to plan, structure and write

survey material for effective market research. London; Philadelphia:

Kogan Page.

Although this book is aimed at the general market researcher, you will

find some helpful tips in here in terms of design wording and the

planning of effective surveys.

Czaja, R. and Blair, J. (2005). Designing Surveys: A guide to decisions

and procedures. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.

This book provides a comprehensive guide to the planning, design and

implementation of effective surveys. It will be helpful to you as a general

text.

Oppenheim, A.N. (2000). Questionnaire Design and Attitude

Measurement. New edition. London: Continuum.

The first edition of this book was published in 1996 and it has been in

print since that time. It is a general book on questionnaire design and uses

a wide-ranging set of examples from different fields. You will find some

useful ideas in this book, including chapters devoted to the wording of

questions, checklists, attitude questions and other types of questioning

techniques.