Survey Data Collection Using Complex Automated Questionnaires

Since the early 1980s, researchers in the federal statistical com-munity have been moving complex surveys from paper question-naires to computer-assisted interviewing (CAI). The data col-lected through such surveys cover a variety of needs, from critical information on the health of the economy to social issues as measured by statistics on health, crime, expenditures, and educa-tion. This paper covers some of the key issues involved in devel-oping applications used primarily by a middle-age, part-time workforce, which uses the software in a variety of situations, while interacting with an occasionally uncooperative public