ABSTRACT
The essence of self-administered surveys is that there is no interviewer to administer the survey, pose the questions, and record the answers. The respondent administers the questionnaire, reads the questions, and records the answers and there is no interviewer to assist or explain. The question-answer process (see Schwarz et al., Chapter 2) is totally self-administered. Selfadministered questionnaires can be used in an individual setting (such as a mail survey) or in a group setting (for example, surveys of pupils in classrooms). Computer-assisted equivalents are available for different types of selfadministered questionnaires. For example, in educational research the school computers and computer labs can be used to administer questionnaires and tests, whereas in establishment surveys web applications are becoming popular. Sometimes, for special topic surveys, a laptop is brought to respondents and the respondent answers the questions using this laptop without any interviewer interference. This form is called CASI or computer assisted self-interviewing. Finally, Internet surveys for population surveys and web panel research are the latest development. For an introduction and overview see de Leeuw, Hox, & Kef, 2003; de Leeuw, (2006), this book’s website Chapter 13.
