Research-Specific Data Collection Tools

Designing a questionnaire for your PhD research is an important task which decides the fate of your research. Not only is the selection of type of questionnaire a tremendous task, but also creating appropriate questions, sections and subsections for the target audience entails a great deal of time (and knowledge). There are a list of questions that need to be answered before you can embark on the journey to designing that perfect questionnaire for data collection.

It requires a complete and thorough understanding of the attributes and framework necessary for an effective questionnaire development. In addition, one must possess in-depth knowledge about the topic and variables under study. For example, the researcher must decide and evaluate the research objectives. Then, identifying the measurements and questions by which you will collect data from respondents in the intended manner.

Some segregations to keep in mind

1. Type of Questionnaires

  • Quantitative
  • Qualitative
  • Mixed

2. Type of questions

  • Open ended
  • Closed ended

3. Sections

  • Demographic Profile
  • Objective 1
  • Objective 2
  • Objective 3

The questionnaire must be in line with the objectives of research. Each question mentioned must refer to some objective. It should only contain relevant questions which must not hurt the sentiments of the target respondents in any way to avoid bias. A well-framed questionnaire can help answer the research questions appropriately and contribute towards a concrete discussions chapter for deriving at research-worthy conclusions.

Crafting an effective questionnaire for research

Questionnaire Design is integral to correct data collection

Identifying the purpose of questionnaire

The purpose is to generalise from a sample to the population so that speculation can be made about some characteristic, attitude, or behavior of this population.

Choosing a suitable type of questionnaire

The advantages of the different questionnaires to be kept in mind which will suit your research objectives. For this purpose, the researcher must decide whether the survey is longitudinal or cross-sectional, will the data be collected over a period or at one point in time only.

A form of data collection

Identify through which medium the questionnaire to be distributed and the data gathered, such as the mail, telephone, the internet, and personal interviews. Its rationale, costs, data availability, strengths and weakness must be kept under scrutiny.

Identifying the population

The size of the sample population, if the size can be determined, and the means of identifying individuals in the population are necessary.

Identification of variables

The variables need to be specified in an experiment so that it is evident to readers what groups are receiving the experimental treatment and what outcomes are being measured.

Ensure compliance to the checklist above to draft a well-researched and well-designed PhD questionnaire for your research. Also, you may find attached PhD questionnaire samples prepared by our experts useful for reference.