Respondents’ Preferred Survey Topics: Measurement and Prevalence

Abstract

The respondents’ interest in a survey’s topic is frequently used by survey researchers to explain and predict survey errors. Whether respondents are interested in a survey’s content relates to their participation and cognitive answering processes, consequently impacting nonresponse and measurement errors. The content of a survey is under control of the researchers who design and conduct the survey, thus, content could be varied to improve participation and answering behavior. Unfortunately, research is lacking on (i) the topic preferences in the general population, (ii) whether groups of respondents differ in their topic preferences, and (iii) how to measure these preferences. We address this research gap by presenting the findings of three experimental studies that we conducted. We found that topic preferences varied between samples and respondent subgroups. Moreover, we validated a measurement instrument to assess respondents’ topic interests. Based on our empirical findings, we derive practical recommendations for survey research and outline future research opportunities.