Survey Design Features Influencing Response Rates in Web Surveys

In this paper we present an overview of several Web surveys. The aim of this research is to study Web survey design characteristics that may influence participation in Web surveys (Lozar Manfreda, 2001; Vehovar et al., 2002). Except for a few studies (whose results we present below), the previous research has mainly studied the effect of a single factor, or a group of related factors on the response rate, while attempting to hold all other potential factors constant. However, there may be interaction among the factors. In addition, authors rarely define which stage of the Web survey process (Lozar Manfreda, 2001; Vehovar et al., 2002) they refer to. However, different factors may have an impact at different stages. Here, we propose a review of several Web surveys where distinct stages of the Web survey process are identified. In addition, characteristics of the design of these surveys are studied simultaneously. First, we present previous studies which draw conclusions from reviews of several Web surveys. Then, we present the methodology used for this study, called the WebSM study. We continue by presenting results of the WebSM study. There, several outcome rates are modelled separately.