Survey Question Best Practices | Week Three | Explore My Social Pinpoint

Asking the Right Questions

Now that we've explored some page navigation ideas, let's add content to them. Move through each of the following tabs as we try some new engagement tools together.

We will get into the various uses and customizations to ensure you know which tools and settings can give you the feedback you’re looking to assemble.

Tips for better question wording:

Be intentional: only ask questions that you are interested in and can use the answer to! This is the golden rule of surveying.
Use simple wording: do not use abbreviations, jargon, foreign words, technical terms, words with double meanings
Be specific and clear: avoid words like most, numerous, many, often several; instead try terms like almost all, a majority of, almost none, a few
Avoid bias and making assumptions: avoid words with strong positive or negative emotional appeal; do not ask leading questions
Avoid double-barreled questions: don't ask two questions in one or assume that things are necessarily linked
Offer an "out" if a question does not apply: do not force an answer if the respondent does not have that experience or knowledge; provide options such as: does not apply, don't know, prefer not to answer
Balanced question and response: include an adequate range of response categories (ex. weekly or monthly isn't enough options, include once per week, once per month, twice per year, once per year, never)
Avoid negative-form questions: this can be confusing to respondents and it assumes a negative connotation (ex. Do you typically avoid biking to work when there is a lot of traffic? Would you not visit this park if there was loud music?)

CONVERSATION: Let's come up with some survey questions.

Consider the engagement scenarios described below and offer ideas for questions you might ask the community to fulfill the needs of the scenario while incorporating survey-writing best practices. When conducting hybrid engagements, you can use this tool to take live, synchronous notes, and then leave this tool live for asynchronous participation in the group discussion.

Let's Build a Survey!

Help people navigate to another activity with a Call to Action at the bottom of page.

Survey Sub-Page Here