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

ASKING QUESTIONS THAT EVALUATE PERFORMANCE 235
ated or tested the questionnaire accordingly. A second way to generate
a questionnaire draft is to use a commercially available questionnaire.
Commercial forms usually avoid the potential problems
noted above but still need to be carefully matched to the requirements
of the institution. Carefully analyze each question and other
items before adapting the questionnaire for the institution.
If an institution has generated or obtained a pool of items rather
than adopted an entire instrument, care must be taken when selecting
items on a piecemeal basis. Use logical and empirical analysis
to select individual items from a pool. Logical analysis requires
form developers to make subjective judgments in selecting appropriate
items, whereas an empirical analysis requires that studies be
conducted to determine the usability of the items.
The last step in the design and construction of the items and
the questionnaire is organizing the items in the questionnaire.
Although there can be a fear of halo effects (favorably inflated
responses) when putting such a questionnaire together, it is nonetheless
best to make the questionnaire as simple and as easy-tocomplete
as possible. If you must choose between possible halo
effects and simplicity, choose simplicity. For instance, although frequently
reversing the endpoints on a scale might help reduce halo
effects, it can sometimes lead to errors because it makes the questionnaire
needlessly complex.
Questions need to be grouped, labeled, and organized for easy
reading and answering, and according to how and where the responses
should be placed. There should be some negatively worded
questions, and they should begin to appear early in the questionnaire
to avoid mistakes that might be due to a positive response-set
bias. (That is, varying the wording keeps respondents from simply
selecting the same response for every question.) Negatively stated
items can be useful, but only if they can be stated negatively in a
coherent manner. Most questionnaire items can be grouped into
subscales. If the original grouping was done on a logical basis, then
a statistical technique such as factor analysis can be used to confirm
whether the grouped items represent a common construct. If you