People Aren’t Robots: A Practical Guide to the Psychology and Technique of Questionnaire Design

by F. Annie Pettit

People Aren't Robots is a short and easy to read book that will help marketers, brand managers, and advertising executives who may have less experience in the research industry create great questionnaires and collect high quality data.It will also help academic and experienced researchers write questionnaires that are better suited for the general population, particularly when using research panels and customer lists.Dr. Pettit is an experienced researcher with more than fifteen years of practical experience who realized that many questionnaire guides continue to treat the people who answer questionnaires as robots rather than as fallible, imperfect people. Her book deals with the issue head on and provides many examples to illustrate how traditional questions can be converted to more modern and friendly, yet still accurately collect data.Topics include general considerations related to the questionnaire process, how to write screener questions, how to write data quality questions, and how to tackle specific types of questions from single-selects, grids, scales, and more.

Genres: Nonfiction, Research, Design

ebook

Published October 27, 2016

About the author

Annie Pettit, PhD CAIP FCRIC is a consumer, customer, and marketing researcher who specializes in survey research, data quality, and standards.

She has more than twenty years of experience in the research industry, having worked as VP Research Standards at Research Now (now Dynata), Chief Research Officer at Conversition Strategies, and VP Panel Analytics at Ipsos Interactive Services.

Annie is heavily involved in the marketing research industry. She served on the founding board of Canada’s CAIP-PAIM (Certified Analytics and Insights Professional) for six years, and chaired the Canadian Mirror Committee for ISO/TC 225 Market, Opinion, and Social Research for ten years.

She has spoken at hundreds of conferences around the world, including ARF, CASRO, ESOMAR, IIeX, MRA, MRIA, NetGain, NewMR, Quirks, QRCA, IIR, and many others. She has appeared on numerous podcasts, and written hundreds of blog posts and articles in both professional and refereed magazines and journals.

Annie also firmly believes that research should be fun. That’s why she created the Research Robot Books series of word puzzle books. 🧩 🧠

Reviews

[F. Pettit · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book helps marketers, brand managers, and advertising executives who may have less experience in the research industry create great questionnaires and collect high quality data. It also helps academic and experienced researchers write questionnaires that are better suited for the general population, particularly when using research panels and customer lists.This book was conceived by experienced researcher with more than twenty years of practical experience who realized that many questionnaire guides continue to treat the people who answer questionnaires as robots rather than as fallible, imperfect people. Topics include general considerations related to the process, how to write screener questions, how to write data quality questions, and how to tackle specific types of questions from single-selects, grids, scales, and more. And, it does it from an empathetic and respectful point of view which points people first and researchers second.

[Nick Galaida · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great short read. Straight to the point with best practices for questionnaire design. Exactly as advertised.

Highly recommend if looking for a quick refresher/cheat sheet. If this is your first exposure to questionnaire design, I would look elsewhere for something that goes into more depth.