Survey Research

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Not only do survey researchers have to be concerned about nonresponse rate errors, but they also have to be concerned about the following potential response rate errors:

• Response bias occurs when respondents deliberately falsify their responses. This error greatly jeopardizes the validity of a survey's measurements.
• Response order bias occurs when a respondent loses track of all options and picks one that comes easily to mind rather than the most accurate.
• Response set bias occurs when respondents do not consider each question and just answer all the questions with the same response. For example, they answer "disagree" or "no" to all questions.

These response errors can seriously distort a survey's results. Unfortunately, according to Fox and Tracy (1986), response bias is difficult to eliminate; even if the same respondent is questionned repeatedly, he or she may continue to falsify responses. Response order bias and response set errors, however, can be reduced through careful development of the survey questionnaire.