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The effect of incentives in web surveys: application and ethical considerations.

Article Excerpt
Although researchers use internet-based surveys more often than ever in their research, there is little research on the effect of incentives on response rate, speed and cost. This study attempts to fill in some of the blanks by comparing the different incentives offered to respondents of web-based surveys. The results indicate that offering a luggage tag to each respondent and including them in a draw for a bigger value prize (a personal digital assistant) yields the highest response rate. In terms of response speed, there are no significant differences among each incentive group. The most expensive group in terms of costs was the combination of luggage tag and prize draw.

Introduction

As the number of internet users in the world doubles every year, reaching nearly 500 million in 2001 (Internet User Numbers 2002), researchers are using internet tools such as email and web-based surveys more and more as methods of data collection. According to Dillman (1999), the most significant advances in the survey methodology during the twentieth century were the introduction of random sampling in the 1940s and telephone interviewing in the 1970s. However, researchers today are witnessing similar, if not bigger, significant advances in the field of survey methodology with the introduction of technology-based surveys.

Today, mail and telephone surveys have reached maturity (Dillman 1999). However, there is not much research focusing on technology-based survey methodologies, simply because they have only been introduced in the last decade. The analysis of past research on the use of the internet as a survey medium has shown that there is a wide variation in response rates, speed of response and response quality (Sheehan & McMillan 1999; Cobanoglu et al. 2001). Since the number of studies using these methodologies is limited and the populations and research topics they use are different, they may not give researchers a clear idea on the effects of the internet-based surveys.

The purpose of this study is to explore the effects of incentives on response rate, speed, and cost in online surveys. An experimental study was designed to measure the effect of different incentive options in online surveys.

Review of literature

Surveys are one of the most popular data collection methods for academic research in a variety of fields, such as business, marketing, economics, psychology and hospitality (Roztocki 2001). Although internet-based surveys are used extensively by researchers as a data collection method, there has been relatively limited published research on the specifics of this methodology (Zhang 2000; Cobanoglu et al. 2001; Roztocki 2001). Consequently, researchers intending to explore the potential of internet-based surveys for primary data collection are left with limited guidance (Roztocki 2001). This study focuses on the use of incentives in web-based surveys.

Why do people respond to surveys?

Albaum et al. (1998) suggested four theoretical perspectives that have been proposed as being applicable to the survey response decision process: social exchange, cognitive dissonance, self-perception and commitment/ involvement. Social exchange subsumes the features of self-perception, cognitive dissonance, and commitment/ involvement (Helgeson et al. 2002). Social exchange theory suggests that participation in an exchange is determined by value assessments based on cost--benefit analysis made by the parties of the exchange (Dillman 1978). Groves and Couper (1998) described these cost--benefit assessments as a bookkeeping system of debits and credits rooted in an individual's self-perception and commitment/ involvement with the object. Cognitive dissonance suggests that individuals will experience discordant feelings if their behaviour is not consistent with pre-existing attitudes. Self-perception refers to the idea that individuals are more likely to engage in behaviour when that behaviour is consistent with their view of themselves (Helgeson et al. 2002). Finally, commitment/involvement contends that an individual who is strongly committed to a behaviour or activity will be unlikely to terminate that behaviour or activity. Cobanoglu et al. (2001) suggest that use of incentives in surveys contributes mostly to the cost--benefit assessment by providing a solid benefit to the respondent. Helgeson et al. (2002) describe the response process in Figure 1. Incentive is a determinant in each level of the model.

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

Web-based surveys

Researchers have started to use internet-based surveys along with other media such as mail, telephone and fax (Cobanoglu et al. 2001). Table 1 shows the specifications of web-based surveys. The biggest advantages of web-based surveys compared with traditional mail and fax surveys are efficiency, speed and low cost (Cobanoglu et al....

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