Online Panel Research: A Data Quality Perspective

Provides new insights into the accuracy and value of online panels for completing surveys

Over the last decade, there has been a major global shift in survey and market research towards data collection, using samples selected from online panels. Yet despite their widespread use, remarkably little is known about the quality of the resulting data.

This edited volume is one of the first attempts to carefully examine the quality of the survey data being generated by online samples. It describes some of the best empirically-based research on what has become a very important yet controversial method of collecting data. Online Panel Research presents 19 chapters of previously unpublished work addressing a wide range of topics, including coverage bias, nonresponse, measurement error, adjustment techniques, the relationship between nonresponse and measurement error, impact of smartphone adoption on data collection, Internet rating panels, and operational issues.

The datasets used to prepare the analyses reported in the chapters are available on the accompanying website: www.wiley.com/go/online_panel

• Covers controversial topics such as professional respondents, speeders, and respondent validation.
• Addresses cutting-edge topics such as the challenge of smartphone survey completion, software to manage online panels, and Internet and mobile ratings panels.
• Discusses and provides examples of comparison studies between online panels and other surveys or benchmarks.
• Describes adjustment techniques to improve sample representativeness.
• Addresses coverage, nonresponse, attrition, and the relationship between nonresponse and measurement error with examples using data from the United States and Europe.
• Addresses practical questions such as motivations for joining an online panel and best practices for managing communications with panelists.
• Presents a meta-analysis of determinants of response quantity.
• Features contributions from 50 international authors with a wide variety of backgrounds and expertise.

This book will be an invaluable resource for opinion and market researchers, academic researchers relying on web-based data collection, governmental researchers, statisticians, psychologists, sociologists, and other research practitioners.