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"Web surveys can be programmed to capture a variety of paradata regarding how respondents answer questions. These paradata provide great opportunities for researchers to assess response quality, specifically whether respondents engage in satisficing - not spending enough effort to provide accurate responses. In particular, speeding (i.e., giving answers very quickly) has increasingly been used as an indicator for satisficing and low response quality. However, few studies have examined whether speeding actually leads to compromised response quality. To address this gap in the literature, the current study investigates speeding behaviors among Web respondents from a probability-based panel. We first identify and characterize respondents who speed more frequently than others over the entire questionnaire. To explore the impact of speeding on response quality, we then examine whether respondents who speed more frequently also straightline in more grid questions. The results show that the tendency to speed is related to several respondent characteristics, particularly age (younger respondents are more likely to speed). This study also reveals that more speeding seems to be universally related to more straightlining, and this relationship is particularly strong among the less educated respondents." (author's abstract)

"This paper reports on a series of experiments to explore ways to use the technology of Web surveys to help respondents provide well-formed answers to questions that may be difficult to answer. Specifically, we focus on the use of drop-down or select lists and JavaScript lookup tables as alternatives to open text fields for the collection of information on prescription drugs. The first two experiments were conducted among members of opt-in panels in the U.S. The third experiment was conducted in the 2013 Health and Retirement Study Internet Survey. Respondents in each of the studies were randomly assigned to one of three input methods: text field, drop box, or JavaScript lookup, and asked to provide the names of prescription drugs they were taking. We compare both the quality of answers obtained using the three methods, and the effort (time) taken to provide such answers. We examine differences in performance on the three input format types by key respondent demographics and Internet experience. We discuss some of the technical challenges of implementing complex question types and offer some recommendations for the use of such tools in Web surveys." (author's abstract)

Abstract
Measuring the rate of religious non-affiliation is a difficult task in China, one of the least religious countries in the world, and elsewhere. This study evaluates the trend of religious non-affiliation in China using 22 surveys spanning three decades. We found that two surveys asking beliefs in a mix of gods and religions yielded dramatically lower estimates of non-affiliation compared to the others that measured affiliation explicitly. Among the latter, using a filter question (a yes/no question for religious affiliation) increased the reports of non-affiliation but allowing multiple choices and putting "no religion" toward the end of the lists of response options moderately decreased the reports of non-affiliation. After accounting for question design and demographic differences across the surveys, the decline in religious non-affiliation is reduced and becomes not significant during more recent years.

"It is well known that survey respondents reduce the effort they invest in answering questions by taking mental shortcuts - survey satisficing. This is a concern because such shortcuts can reduce the quality of responses and, potentially, the accuracy of survey estimates. This article explores 'speeding,' an extreme type of satisficing, which we define as answering so quickly that respondents cannot give much, if any, thought to their answers. We test an interactive prompting technique designed to reduce speeding among online respondents. When respondents answered faster than a minimal response time threshold, they received a message encouraging them to answer carefully and take their time. Across six web survey experiments, this prompting technique reduced speeding on subsequent questions compared to a no prompt control. Prompting slowed response times whether the speeding that triggered the prompt occurred early or late in the questionnaire, in the first or later waves of a longitudinal survey, among respondents recruited from non-probability or probability panels, or whether the prompt was delivered on only the first or on all speeding episodes. In addition to reducing speeding, the prompts increased response accuracy on simple arithmetic questions for a key subgroup. Prompting also reduced later straightlining in one experiment, suggesting the benefits may generalize to other types of mental shortcuts. Although the prompting could have annoyed respondents, it was not accompanied by a noticeable increase in breakoffs. As an alternative technique, respondents in one experiment were asked to explicitly commit to respond careful. This global technique complemented the more local, interactive prompting technique on several measures. Taken together, these results suggest that interactive interventions of this sort may be useful for increasing respondents' conscientiousness in online questionnaires, even though they are self-administered." (author's abstract)