IDAS/DPA at NCCU
2015
Survey Design & Implementation
Instructor: Dr. Hsiang-Kai (Dennis) Dong
Semester: 104 – 2nd
Time: Monday 567 (2pm-5pm)
Email: hkdong@nccu.edu.tw
Office hours: by appointment
Course Objectives
The purpose of this course is to provide in-depth views on the design of questionnaires used in
social science research. It is the objective of the instructor to enable the students to be familiar
with the theoretical literature related to questionnaire design as well as focusing on practical
issues on the survey implementation. Specifically, this course has two broad aims: 1) to give
students training in questionnaire building concepts and methods, and 2) to provide students with
the knowledge and tools needed to apply statistical techniques to analyze the collected data.
Course Description
This course is designed to enhance students’ ability to conduct survey research and to familiarize
students with required techniques. To that end, the structure of the course is combined with lecture,
practice, group discussions, and simulated academic forums. This class is practice oriented, so
students will be required to learn primary questionnaire building tools and platforms such as
Google Document, SurveyMonkey, and Qualtrics as well as basic statistics software such as Stata
and SPSS.
Teaching Approach:
Class meetings will be primarily lecture, discussion, and practice. Class attendance is required.
Demonstrations on the use of the aforementioned software and hands-on experience are the key to
the success of this course. Prior experience suggests that active participation usually leads to better
performance and, of course, better grades.
Textbooks
Bradburn, N. M., Sudman, S., & Wansink, B. (2004). Asking Questions: The Definitive Guide
to Questionnaire Design – For Market Research, Political Polls, and Social and Health
Questionnaires. John Wiley & Sons.
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Davino, C., & Fabbris, L. (2013). Survey Data Collection and Integration. Springer.
Dillman, D. A., Smyth, J. D., & Christian, L. M. (2009). Internet, Phone, Mail, and MixedMode Surveys: The Tailored Design Method, 3e. John Wiley & Sons.
Fink, A. (2012). How to Conduct Surveys: A Step-by-Step Guide. Sage Publications.
Scheaffer, R., Mendenhall III, W., Ott, R., & Gerow, K. (2012). Survey Sampling, 7e,
International Edition. Cengage Learning.
Other reading materials as designated.
Course Requirements & Grade Construction
1. Participation
2. Assignment 1
3. Assignment 2
4. Leading Discussions
5. Term Paper
(1) Proposal
(2) Proposal Presentation
(3) Final Term Paper
(4) Final Term Paper Presentation
(5) Discussant
15 points
10 points
10 points
20 points
10 points
5 points
15 points
5 points
10 points
1. Participation:
Students are expected to be fully prepared to the weekly meetings. Most of the class meetings
involve opportunities for you to participate in discussions. You should be prepared to incorporate
readings into discussions.
2. & 3. Assignments:
There are a total of 2 assignments. All of them are designed to build upon practical features of the
course work. All assignments are due at the beginning of the class as designated. You are expected
to submit the assignments on time. Late assignments are not acceptable and will receive a zero.
4. Leading Discussions:
Every member of the class has shared responsibilities to contribute to the interchange of
knowledge during this semester. Accordingly, each student will play the role of the discussion
leader. The responsibilities of the discussion leader include summarizing/reviewing the course
coverage, offering thoughts, asking questions to stimulate discussion, and helping to integrate
ideas of the class members. To ensure the development of a quality discussion, topics will be
identified well in advance for each student.
5. Term Paper:
You will have to develop your own survey based on the themes you choose. Your grades of the
term paper is constructed by the following portions:
(1) Proposal
You will need to address the following questions on your proposal: (1) What is your topic? (2)
Why is it important? (3) What does previous research say about your topic, especially how those
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topics/ideas/concepts were “measured”? (4) How does your own questionnaire look like? (5)
Who are the subjects for your research? (6) How do you plan to conduct your survey (your
research design)?
(2) Final Term Paper
Your goal is to provide a quality paper on the topic you choose. You will need to clearly review
the concepts and how they were measure, offer constructive critique on the measurements they
used, analyze the data you collected, and, finally, provide implications and future research
suggestions.
For standard paper style, you will have to follow the guidelines of American Psychological
Association (APA) citation and format style. And your term paper has a 7,000 word limit (text).
(3) Presentation
Everyone is expected to prepare a 20-minute presentation (PPT or other similar software required)
followed by a 15-minute Q&A session. (Changes may be required depends on the number of
enrolled students.)
(4) Discussant
You will need to play the role as a “discussant” for one of your colleague’s term paper. The
discussant is expected to prepare a 5-minute comment on the paper assigned (PPT presentation).
You should review and provide constructive suggestions for your colleague to improve the quality
of his/her research.
Simulated Forums:
The forums are designed to duplicate panels in real academic conferences. The goal is to provide
you a chance to familiarize yourself with academic research presentations and get feedback from
your colleagues.
Absence Policy:
Although your participation is expected, you do not have to come to class if you are sick or have
unexpected emergencies. However, you should always inform me (by email) before the class if
you will be absent. If you have a health or family emergency, you should inform me (by email)
within 24 hours of your absence.
Disabilities:
If you have any disabilities that may impede your performance in this class, please speak with me
and we will plan appropriate adjustments.
Ethics and Plagiarism
I insist on a zero tolerance policy for academic dishonesty. It is expected that you are familiar
with the policies for academic integrity. All students are responsible for maintaining the highest
standards of honesty and integrity in every phase of their academic careers. The penalties for
academic dishonesty are severe and ignorance is not an acceptable defense.
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Weekly Topics, Readings, and Assignments
Date
Topics / Readings
02/22
Introduction: An Overview of Survey Design and Implementation
Research Design – Causality and Correlation
02/29
No Class – 228 Peace Memorial Day
03/07
(Class begins at 1pm)
Survey Design Process & Types of Questions and Variables
Measure of Ideas and Concepts
Readings:
Book chapters assigned by the instructor
Schaeffer, N. C., & Presser, S. (2003). The science of asking questions. Annual
Review of Sociology, 29(1), 65-88.
03/14
(Class begins at 1pm)
The Basics of Crafting Good Questions
Item Wording & Context
Constructing Open- and Closed-Ended Questions
Readings:
Book chapters assigned by the instructor
Bradburn, N. M., & Miles, C. (1979). Vague quantifiers. Public Opinion
Quarterly, 43(1), 92-101.
Schwarz, N. (1999). Self-reports: How the questions shape the answers. American
Psychologist, 54(2), 93-105.
03/21
No Class – ASPA Conference
03/28
(Class begins at 1pm)
Constructing Attitude, Behavioral, Factual, and Non-Factual Questions
Validity and Reliability
Readings:
Book chapters assigned by the instructor
Winter, G. (2000). A comparative discussion of the notion of validity in
qualitative and quantitative research. The Qualitative Report, 4(3), 1-14.
04/04
No Class – Tomb Sweeping Festival
04/11
From Questions to a Questionnaire
Ordering and Formatting Surveys
Readings:
Book chapters assigned by the instructor
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Harrison, D. A., & McLaughlin, M. E. (1996). Structural properties and
psychometric qualities of organizational self-reports: Field tests of
connections predicted by cognitive theory. Journal of Management, 22(2),
313-338.
Tourangeau, R., Couper, M. P., & Conrad, F. (2004). Spacing, position, and
order: Interpretive heuristics for visual features of survey questions. Public
Opinion Quarterly, 68(3), 368-393.
04/18
Other Components of the Questionnaire & Bolstering Response Rates
Readings:
De Bruijne, M., & Wijnant, A. (2014). Improving Response Rates and
Questionnaire Design for Mobile Web Surveys. Public Opinion Quarterly,
78(4), 951-962.
Heerwegh, D. (2005). Effects of personal salutations in e-mail invitations to
participate in a web survey. Public Opinion Quarterly, 69(4), 588-598.
Herzog, A. R., & Bachman, J. G. (1981). Effects of questionnaire length on
response quality. Public Opinion Quarterly, 45(4), 549-559.
Krosnick, J. A. (1999). Survey research. Annual Review of Psychology, 50, 537567.
04/25
Paper-Based & Online Surveys – Theories, Tools, and Problems
Readings:
Couper, M.P., Traugott, M.W., & Lamais, M.J. (2001), Web Survey Design and
Administration, Public Opinion Quarterly, 65, 230-253.
Smyth, J.D., Dillman, D.A., Christian, L. M. and M. Stern (2006) “Comparing
Check All and Forced Choice Question Formats in Web Surveys,”Public
Opinion Quarterly, 70: 66-77.
05/02
Simulated Forums – Proposal Presentation
05/09
Common Method (Source) Bias & Solutions
Readings:
Doty, D. H., & Glick, W. H. (1998). Common methods bias: does common
methods variance really bias results?. Organizational Research Methods,
1(4), 374-406.
Meade, A. W., Watson, A. M., & Kroustalis, C. M. (2007). Assessing common
methods bias in organizational research. In 22nd annual meeting of the
Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, New York, 1-6.
Meier, K. J., & O’Toole, L. J. (2013). Subjective organizational performance and
measurement error: Common source bias and spurious relationships. Journal
of Public Administration Research and Theory, 23(2), 429-456.
05/16
Issues of Nonresponse Bias
Readings:
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Groves, R. M. (2006). Nonresponse rates and nonresponse bias in household
surveys. Public Opinion Quarterly, 70(5), 646-675.
Sax, L. J., Gilmartin, S. K., & Bryant, A. N. (2003). Assessing response rates and
nonresponse bias in web and paper surveys. Research in higher education,
44(4), 409-432.
05/23
Survey Sampling – Theories and Approaches
Readings:
Scheaffer, R., Mendenhall III, W., Ott, R., & Gerow, K. (2012). Survey Sampling,
7e, International Edition. Cengage Learning. (Chapters 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9)
05/30
Basic Statistics and Analytic Tools (Part 1)
06/06
Basic Statistics and Analytic Tools (Part 2)
06/13
Issues of Self-Selection Bias
Readings:
Hudson, D., Seah, L. H., Hite, D., & Haab, T. (2004). Telephone presurveys, selfselection, and non-response bias to mail and internet surveys in economic
research. Applied Economics Letters, 11(4), 237-240.
Søgaard, A. J., Selmer, R., Bjertness, E., & Thelle, D. (2004). The Oslo Health
Study: The impact of self-selection in a large, population-based survey.
International journal for equity in health, 3(1), 3.
Whitehead, J. C. (1991). Environmental Interest Group Behavior and Self‐
Selection Bias in Contingent Valuation Mail Surveys. Growth and Change,
22(1), 10-20.
06/20
Simulated Forums (Part 1) – Final Paper Presentation
Draft term paper due in Class

Revised term paper due at 5pm on 06/27 (Monday). Please email your
revised term paper to me (hkdong@nccu.edu.tw) and mark the changes you
made in red.
NOTE: The above schedule is a general plan for the course; changes may be required as the
semester progresses to accommodate speed of learning or student interests. Changes will be
announced well in advance by the instructor.
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