What are the advantages and disadvantages of using surveys to conduct research?

Question

What are the advantages and disadvantages of using surveys to conduct research?

Answer 1

It can be made to say whatever you like - may be an advantage or disadvantage depending on your agenda. My Sr. yr of college several of us were suppose to do a project that involved, among other things, having Jr. High teachers fill out a survey. We were very careful to try to word the questions in a way in which we didn't influence the answers. We became great friends working together (and 2 of us ended up with a romance), but had no positive educational results from our survey. In the end, only one teacher answered the questions.  In desperation, we wrote up our entire project - and also used the resulting paper in 2 other classes, based on the one survey (and other research we had done). We just conveniently "forgot" to put down how many people were surveyed. Believe it or not, no one questioned it and we all ended up with "A"s in all our classes with this research project.  That was a great lesson to all of us, and I haven't given any respect to surveys ever since.

On the other hand, people are often more willing to answer the questions on a survey than to give an opinion that they feel might require defending when talking to a stranger. And that willingness can be used. A friend worked for a local mental hospital in a certain kind of job. She and her co-workers wanted to have a surprise birthday party for one of their co-workers but couldn't find out her actual birth date. So I called the mystery birthday girl, pretending I was a student at a local college. I told her I was doing research on whether or not zodiac signs had a correlation with the career you choose. I told her I had a list of people with various professions. I was calling to double check - her job was such and such, wasn't it? And what was her birthdate. She never did find out how her friends discovered her birthday. I was simply taking advantage of someone's willingness to answer surveys.

By the way, in general I'm a very honest person. I fear this puts me in a bad light. I prefer to think of it as surveys themselves having problems.

Answer 2

survey questions can be asked in a certain way as to influence a certain answer out of the person filling it out.

its a psychology trick its all in the wording..  that's why surveys have become a lesser reliable source of information

Answer 3

Advantages: you get paid

Disadvantages: sometimes it takes a while.

Good Luck!!

Answer 4

Disadvantage : One radical opinion throws the whole survey off.

Answer 5

Advantage: It's quick and can pool a variety of randomly selected individuals.

Disadvantage: The individual knows it's a questionaire and may not be completely honest. Especially if someone is asking the questions.