Survey Research

Survey studies are usually used to find the fact by collecting the data directly from population or sample. It is the most commonly used descriptive method in educational researches. The researcher collects the data to describe the nature of existing condition or look forward the standards against existing condition or determine the relationships that exists between specific events.

Many a time survey study intends to understand and explain the phenomena in a natural setting or provide information to government / other organization or compare different demographic groups or see the cause and effect relationship to make predictions. For this it requires responses directly from respondents of large population in general. The kind of information requires decides the coverage of geographical area for data collection and whether it is a extensive or intensive one. Extensive survey carried out when researcher want to make generalization, whereas intensive survey is done for making estimation. Survey researches demands various tools to collect the data from samples. They are ranging from observation, interview to questionnaire. So the kind of survey study needed for any study is based on its purpose, nature of data and population and sample of the study.

The ability of the researcher lies in selecting the type of survey method suited to their study. The selection is based on the purpose of the study, method of data collection and time frame. The methods are given below.

General surveys generally involve collecting information about population, institutions or phenomena without any specific objective or hypothesis. These surveys are usually taken up by the government for providing regular data on socio – economic problems. Census is general survey. Specific surveys data collection based on certain specified objectives or hypothesis. These kind of surveys taken up by any institution specific to their problem, or individual surveys for their academic work.

We already mentioned census survey is a kind of general survey. But the unique characteristic of census survey is, it collects data from all the members of the population. Sample survey is just opposite to census survey. Here the data is collected from few samples from the population. It can be general or specific. Sample surveys saves time and money when compare to census survey if the samples are truly represent the population.

Regular survey by name indicates that it conducted in regular interval of time, but Ad hoc surveys are conducted once for all. Regular Surveys gives the longitudinal data / information about the core issues as well as special issues which are taken for research work. Ad hoc surveys limited to any one issue and deal it with a specific time point.

Preliminary Survey generally conducted before taking up a wide sample survey. By this, the tool can be improved based on the responded data. Generally in research work pilot study conducted for this purpose. The data collected from the improvised tool based on preliminary survey is the final survey.

In longitudinal survey the phenomena is observed or data collected in different period of time. In this survey the changes in the phenomena at different point of time is also been observed. Here the revisiting the population and posing similar kind of queries and getting data from the population gives the transitory state of the data. For example, the health condition of the people with respect to their environment of a particular place is observed over 2 to 3 year, the data collected in different period of time. The change in health condition with respect to change in environment over a period of time, help the researcher to see the casual relationship between these two.

In cross sectional survey observation of sample done one point in time and the data is collected provides the description of population feature. These studies focus the relationship between different variables at a point in time. For instance, the relationship between income, locality, and personal expenditure. The cross-sectional analysis relates to how variables affect each other at the same time.

In this survey, the status of two variable or instituition of same population is compared. For example two distance education study centres of the same region is compared with respect to its enrolment, achievement and other variables.

Evaluative surveys are usually conducted to evaluate any program or any implementation of scheme which is already done by the organisation or government. For example, an accrediation body allowed to start new institution throughout the nation, after a particular period, it intends to know the impact of these new new institutions with respect to the specific education, and the effectiveness of these institutions with respect to the expected outcome. The outcomes of the study help the accreditation body to formulate future policies for better output.

In documentary survey variety of information resources are used to answer the research question. These sources can be workshop material, books, official records, articles from the news paper, hand outs, brouchers, institutional reports, individual experiences etc. These surveys are used to analyse the present events based on the records available to the researcher.

Eventhough each survey type varies with respect to the mode of data collection and tools used, the steps involved in data collection is more or less similar form. The steps are 1.	Selection of the problem and defining objective 2.	Deciding the information needed 3.	Research Design 4.	Operationalisation of concepts and construction of measuring indexes and scales 5.	Sampling 6.	Construction of tools for collection of data and their pre – test 7.	Field work and collection of data 8.	Processing of data and tabulation 9.	Analysis of data 10.	Reporting

1.	It gives the opportunity to researcher to see the reality more closely, inference are not based on theory or dogma but it is based on facts. 2.	It leads greater objectivity. 3.	It leads to the introduction of new theory. For example, poverty was regarded as the cause of crime for fairly long time but increasing crime in advanced countries has falsified this theory. 4.	It helps to know the social situation. 5.	The important aspect of survey study is its versatility. It is the only practical way to collect many types of information from individuals, such as personal characteristics, socio-economic data, attitudes, opinions, experiences and expectations. 6.	Facilitates to draw generalisations about population on the basis of data from representative sample. 7.	It is flexible and allows various methods of collection of data. 8.	It sensitizes the researcher to unanticipated or unknown problems. 9.	It is useful in verifying theories.

1.	It requires training for those who collect information, which demands more financial source. 2.	It is time consuming process, if the universe is large. 3.	Its reliability and validity is based on the honesty and efficiency of the survey workers. 4.	Survey mostly based on samples, so always there is a possibility of sampling error. 5.	As data is collected from primary sources, the feasibility is depends upon the willingness and cooperation of the respondents. 6.	There is a possibility of response error, due to respondents’ untrue / misleading answers.