Respondent Mode Choice in a Smartphone Survey: 2012 [United States]

Now that people on mobile devices can easily choose their mode of communication (e.g., voice, text, video) survey designers can allow respondents to answer questions in whatever mode they find momentarily convenient given their circumstances or that they chronically prefer. We conducted an experiment to explore how mode choice affects response quality, participation and satisfaction in smartphone interviews. Respondents were interviewed on their iPhone in one of four modes: Human Voice, Human Text, Automated Voice, and Automated Text. Respondents were either assigned the mode of their interview (Assigned Mode) in which case the contact and interviewing mode were the same or they were required to choose the mode of their interview (Mode Choice) after being contacted in one of the four modes. 634 respondents completed the interview and a post-interview online debriefing questionnaire in the Assigned Mode group and 626 respondents completed the interview and online debriefing in the Assigned Mode group. This dataset contains 2691 cases, the 1260 respondents who completed the interview and debriefing as well as 1431 cases that were invited to participate but ended their participation somewhere shy of the last debriefing question: either they did not choose a mode, did not answer the first question, started but did not finish the interview, finished the interview but did not complete the debriefing. All respondents (who completed the interview) answered 32 questions from US social surveys. 13 interviewers from the University of Michigan Survey Research Center administered voice and text interviews (Five administered interviews in both experimental conditions, three conducted only Assigned Mode interviews, and five conducted interviews in just the Mode Choice condition. Automated systems launched parallel text and voice interviews at the same time as the human interviews were launched.<br><br>Respondents who chose their interview modes provided more conscientious (fewer rounded and non-differentiated) answers and they reported greater satisfaction with the interview. Although fewer respondents started the interview when given a choice of mode, a higher percentage of Mode Choice respondents who started the interview completed it. For certain mode transitions (e.g., from automated interview modes) there was no reduction in participation. The results demonstrate clear benefits and relatively few drawbacks resulting from mode choice, at least among these modes and with this sample of iPhone users, suggesting that further exploration of mode choice and the logistics of its implementation is warranted.<br>