Looking for research on seasonal bias in client satisfaction surveys in community health contexts. To what extent is seasonal bias a concern in surveys conducted annually during the same month every year? And have community health centres (or other healthcare organizations) had success in addressing seasonal bias by collecting data continuously/longitudinally/in real-time throughout the year?
Yes, of course, seasonal influences are a potentially spurious influence on any cross-sectional sample. In both industrial and agricultural populations, rich and poor, seasonal factors affect the morbidity rates of dozens of infectious diseases, injuries due to occupational hazards, and even monthly birth rates. Longitudinal studies are always better than single shot studies, but the seasonality of the data collection must be consistent too. A data set collected in northern Ghana in January should not be compared to one from the same population in August unless you are looking for seasonal differences; there will surely be some.
A longitudinal study, therefore, should either fully represent all seasons that affect the population, or limit data collection to the same season, over time.
I call this just one element of operational consistency. Without due regard to operational consistency you risk loosing the reliability of your data.
Indeed vitamin D levels show a lagged seasonal cycle and will affect feelings of depression and hence satisfaction. Suggest you do a search on the effects of vitamin D on depression, emotional state, etc.
yes the season influence on results are always there in cross sectional study. the solution is certainly the longitudinal study but for complete one year. another option may be the we have data on every season through cross sectional study to rule out any seasonal influence
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Methodology
- Research Methodology