Surveys

Survey (or questionnaire) tools are used frequently to collect physiotherapy research data. Surveys collect information directly from subjects, and are administered either in a written format (email, post, Internet) or orally (face-to-face, videolink, telephone). They often use standard questions (items), which provide self-reported information. This information may be interval data (e.g. age, height), ordinal or nominal categorical data using pre-established known categories (e.g. Yes/No, or None/Some/Many, or country of birth), or free text where respondents write about experiences in their own words. This latter information is synthesised into themes. Like any defensible research tool, a survey should provide valid and reliable data which can be used to answer the research question. Thus surveys should be the research tool of choice only when they offer the most appropriate data collection method relevant to the research question. As with all research tools, there are advantages and disadvantages to surveys (Gillham 2004). Advantages include that they are relatively inexpensive to produce and provide high volume, time-efficient data collection. Disadvantages include the cost of data distribution and collection (such as cost of postage or telephone calls, data entry), inaccurate, incomplete or mischievous responses, and low response rates.