Tourangeau, Rips & Rasinski absoloutely. I would also recommend Thinking about answers - work by Sudman, Bradburn & Schwarz (1996) - concernig CASM (cognitive aspects of survey methodology). Best regards.

Kai: Theories of the survey response process tend to focus on cognitive factors (Tourangeau four-stage cognitive model) or motivational ones (Krosnick's application of 'satisficing' to the survey domain). I believe that The Psychology of Survey Response (Tourangeau, Rips, Rasinski, 2000) covers this pretty well.

Tourangeau, Rips & Rasinski absoloutely. I would also recommend Thinking about answers - work by Sudman, Bradburn & Schwarz (1996) - concernig CASM (cognitive aspects of survey methodology). Best regards.

A good introduction is in a paper by Norbert Schwarz "How the questions shape the answers" published in "American Psychologist" in 1999. Norbert has a rich webpage (University of Michigan) with many of his more recent works.

This book may be useful: http://www.amazon.com/Cognitive-Interviewing-Improving-Questionnaire-Design/dp/0761928049/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1375447963&sr=8-1&keywords=cognitive+interviewing#_

You may also want to take a look at a chapter by Lenny Martin and myself, titled:

"Thinking, judging, and communicating: A process account of context effects in attitude surveys." Social information processing and survey methodology. Springer New York, 1987. 123-148.

Hola:

These papers might be of help:

Jobe, J.B. & Mingay, D.J. (1991). Cognition and Survey Measurement: History and Overview. Applied cognitive psychology, 5, 175-192.

Jobe, J.B. (2003). Cognitive psychology and self-reports: Models and Methods. Quality of Life Research, 12, 219-227.

Tourangeau, R. (1984). Cognitive sciences and survey methods. In Jabine T.B.; Straf, M.L.; Tanur, J.M.& Tourangeau, R (eds). Cognitive Aspects of Survey Methodology: Building a Bridge between Disciplines (pp. 73-101). Washington, DC: NacionalAcademy Press.

Tourangeau, R., Rips L.J. & Rasinski, K. (2004). The Psychology of Survey Report. Cambridge: University Press.

Thanks everyone. These citations do seem quite useful! I didn't want to bias the conversation, but would add Feldman and Lynch (1988) to the list.

Hi!

Maybe of help: a few referenecs on opinions/attitudes and non-opinions/non-attitudes. I usually find it interesting to look at don't knows and other non-substantive responses.

Anderson, Christopher J. 1998. “When in Doubt, Use Proxies: Attitudes toward Domestic Politics and Support for European Integration.” Comparative Political Studies 31: 569-601.

Bishop, George F., Robert W. Oldenick and Alfred Tuchfarber. 1984. “What Must My Interest in Politics Be If I Just Told You ‘I Don't Know’?” The Public Opinion Quarterly 48 (2): 510-519.

Eagly, Alice H. and Shelly Chaiken. 1993. The psychology of attitudes. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich.

Francis, Joe D. and Busch, Lawrence. 1975. “What we don't know about ‘I don't knows.’” Public Opinion Quarterly 34: 207-218.

Krosnick, Jon. A. and Michael A. Milburn. 1990. “Psychological Determinants of Political Opinionation.” Social Cognition 8: 49-72.

Rokeach, Milton. 1966. "Attitude Change and Behavioral Change." Public Opinion Quarterly XXX 4 (Winter): 529-50.

Sicinski, Andrzej. 1970. "’Don't know’ answers in cross-national surveys.” Public Opinion Quarterly 34 (1): 126-129.

Sinnott, Richard. 1997. “European Public Opinion and the European Union: The Knowledge Gap.” Working Paper n. 126. Barcelona: Institut de Ciències Politiques i Socials. Available at http://ddd.uab.cat/pub/worpap/1997/hdl_2072_1340/ICPS126.pdf (accessed on February 2nd, 2012).

Smith, M. Brewster, Jerome S. Bruner and Robert W. White. 1956. Opinions and personality. New York: John Wiley.

Sniderman, Paul M., Richard A. Brody and Philip E. Tetlock. 1991. Reasoning and Choice: Explorations in Political Psychology. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Turgeon, Mathieu. 2009. “‘Just Thinking:’ Attitude Development, Public Opinion, and Political Representation.” Political Behavior 31(3): 353-378.

Watson, Jeanne. 1950. “Some Social and Psychological Situations Related to Change in Attitude.” Human Relations 3:15-56.

Wiebe, G. D. 1953. “Some Implications of Separating Opinions from Attitudes.” Public. Opinion Quarterly 17 (3): 328-352.

Wilson, Timothy D., Samuel Lindsey, and Tonya Y. Schooler. 2000. “A model of dual attitudes.” Psychological Review 107: 101-126.

Many survey Q's are for recall of detailed information from one's memory. Many (most?) respondents aren't willing, or even able, to do that level of cognitive work. As a result they examine the response alternatives provided with the Q and pick one that reflects what they think is an appropriate &/or approximately correct answer. For ex. if I were asked how many hours I spend doing email and I think of myself as an average user, I'm likely to mark the middle of the alternatives presented, likely regardless of whether it says 1 hour/day or 2.5hours/day. The quant result saying more about Q wording than actual behavior.

Next to the work of Tourangeau, Sudman, Schwartz that is already mentioned, I want to refer to Zaller, 1992, "The nature and origins of mass opinion"

The work of Norbert Schwarz is relevant. I'd be happy to introduce you via email if that would be helpful. (He was my grad school advisor.) Email [email protected] to arrange.

I can also recommend the chapter on survey items in Bickman, L., & Rog, D. J. (Eds.). (2010). Sage Handbook of Social Research Methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

This is a really simple introduction that leads you onto further research.

Hope it helps!

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