Coordinator: Jörg
Blasius,
Description:
This session will provide a series of
original investigations on data quality in both national and
international contexts.
The starting premise is that all survey data contain a mixture
of substantive
and methodologically-induced variation. Most current work
focuses primarily on
random measurement error, which is usually treated as normally
distributed.
However, there are a large number of different kinds of
systematic measurement
errors, or more precisely, there are many different sources of
methodologically-induced variation and all of them may have a
strong influence
on the “substantive” solutions. To the sources of
methodologically-induced variation belong response sets and
response styles,
misunderstandings of questions, translation and coding errors,
uneven standards
between the research institutes involved in the data
collection (especially in
cross-national research), item- and unit non-response, as well
as faked
interviews. We will consider data as of high quality in case
the
methodologically-induced variation is low, i.e. the
differences in responses
can be interpreted based on theoretical assumptions in the
given area of
research. The aim of the session is to discuss different
sources of
methodologically-induced variation in survey research, how to
detect them and
the effects they have on the substantive findings.
To submit a
presentation,
sign up or log in to the ESRA website. After logging in with
your account,
click "Propose a new presentation" to start submitting. To be
considered for inclusion in the scientific program of ESRA
2011, please submit
an abstract of your paper containing no more than 250 words
via the ESRA
Website.
http://surveymethodology.eu/conferences/
The closing
date for submission of paper proposals is 14
January 2011.