Asking Questions - The Definitive Guide To Questionnaire Design ...

ASKING THREATENING QUESTIONS ABOUT BEHAVIOR 101
Use Card Sorting and Randomized Response
Card sorting is a procedure that has been used in Great Britain in
face-to-face interviews to measure crime and juvenile delinquency
(Belson, Millerson, and Didcott, 1968). Here the interviewer hands
respondents a set of cards that list various behaviors, including
threatening ones. Respondents are asked to place each card into a
“yes” or “no” box. During later points in the interview, the interviewer
can ask the respondent to reconsider the cards in the “no”
box and to resort the cards if necessary. The thought behind card
sorts is that it might be easier for some respondents to admit a
socially undesirable behavior (or not to claim a socially desirable
behavior) when performing a nonverbal task. As far as we know,
however, card sorting has not been empirically validated or compared
with alternative procedures.
The randomized response technique is really a randomized
questioning technique. It is a method that ensures respondents’
anonymity by making it impossible for either the interviewer or
researcher to know what question the respondent was answering
(Greenberg and others, 1969; Horvitz, Shaw, and Simmons, 1967;
Warner, 1965). Specifically, the interviewer asks two questions, one
threatening and the other completely innocuous. For example,
Question A contains a very threatening question, such as “During
the last 12 months have you been charged by a policeman for
driving under the influence of liquor?” Question B is a nonthreatening
question, such as “Is your birthday in the month of September?”
Both of these questions have the same possible answers, “yes”
and “no.” Which question the respondent answers is determined by
a probability mechanism. We and others have used a plastic box
containing fifty beads, 70 percent red and 30 percent blue. The
box was designed so that, when it was shaken by the respondent, a
red or blue bead seen only by the respondent would appear in the
window of the box. If the bead is red, the threatening question is
answered; if blue, the innocuous question is answered.