Data Collection
Computer-Assisted Telephone Interviewing (CATI)
Opinion Research Northwest uses one of the most advanced computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) systems, WinCATI, in the world. Some of the specific data collection capabilities of WinCATI include:
- The ability to develop and administer a random sample of households to ensure expansion of the data to the target population
- The ability to program the questionnaire so that response scales can be delivered to the respondent in a random order, thereby eliminating any kind of order bias. The questionnaire may also contain complex skip and branching patterns for specific subgroups, incorporate answers from previous questions as part of a subsequent question, immediately perform mathematical computations, and incorporate information from the sample into the survey instrument
- The ability for trained interviewers to encourage respondents to complete long and complex surveys
- The ability for trained interviewers to enter data immediately, eliminating the potential for data entry error and increasing efficiencies and speed of administration
- The ability for the computer-assisted telephone system to handle callbacks – both random and scheduled callbacks. Appointments can be scheduled with interested respondents so that it can be completed at a mutually convenient time. Interviewers can also leave messages on answering machines, providing a toll-free number to which the appropriate householder can respond
- The ability to monitor the administration of the questionnaire by trained supervisors to ensure a consistency of delivery when interviewing many respondents
- The ability to record respondents’ answers to open-ended questions for later coding and/or transcription
ORC-NW is a member of the Council of Survey Research Organizations (CASRO), an association of survey research businesses, representing nearly 200 companies and research operations in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. As a member organization, we are committed to their Code of Ethics which clearly outlines our responsibilities to respondents participating in telephone and other surveys.