Questionnaires

Today our primary focus was on questionnaires as a form of research technique. We analysed some of the pro's and  cons of using questionnaires. We realised that the only way a questionaire would be accurate and reliable as a source of information is if its structured properly and has a balance. We looked at a very bad structured questionnaire and realised that if we were to use that questionnaire, we wouldnt be able to get the information we needed. Questionnaires need a balance between open and closed questions. If a questionnaire if just primarily filled with closed questions (yes or no questions) we as a researcher wouldnt be able to draw conclusions from our findings because the answeres doesnt have any detail to it. For example, did you walk your dog today would be a closed question but if you were to ask 'on average how many times do you walk your dog a day' you would get a more in depth answer there for allowing you to either compare or relate one persons findings to another. Balance is very important, as well as not having too much closed questions a questionnaire shouldnt have too much open questions because having too many open questions could cause inconvenience to the interviwee. No one really wants to do a questionaire where they have to write a detailed answer to every question.

Another important thing that Ive realised whilst viewing this bad questionairre is that the l;ayout is also crucial in getting what you want out of a questionnaire. If your asking a open question you must have enough space for the question to be fully answered in detail. However you must have the righ amount of space because you dont want peoplpe to ramble on or donot say enough.

Your questions must be relevant to your aim. A lot of questionnaires has questions which tends to go off topic therefore loosing interesest in your interviewee. You must keep the questions relevant to your subject as well as sufficent.

Pro's: questionaires is a very cheap way to find information from a wide audiece. It gets to a lot more people at one time with having any extra cost.
According to layout and content, questionnaires are very easy to understand and get your opinion across in a very simple structure

Cons: if structured wrongly you may not get the information you were aiming for.
People may just throw away questionnaire because they are not forced to do it, its strictly an optional thing.

In a nutshell, questionnaires can be reliable if the structure and content are right.