SBIR-STTR Award

Incorrect interviewing procedures are a major source of the total error in survey data. The purpose is to develop, implement, test, and document a Telephone Interviewer Monitoring and Evaluation System (TIMES) that will measure, analyze, and report the interviewer error. TIMES will assist in significantly reducing the interviewer error and increasing the quality of survey data. TIMES will be particularly useful in reducing the interviewer response effects that occur in sensitive questions concerning sexual practices, drug and alcohol use, and the incidence of disease. TIMES will provide a split-screen option so that the supervisor simultaneously can observe the actual administration of the questionnaire item and enter question-specific evaluation regarding the interviewer's behaviors. Mr. Trumble, MA, Principal Investigator, has eighteen years of experience in managing survey research projects and successfully managed two previous CATI development projects. Merrill Shanks, PhD, is a consultant for the project. He is the Director of the Computer-assisted survey Methods Program at Berkeley, the program that developed CASES. Times is applicable to all 61 CASES users. It will be of interest to all organizations conducting research for which total survey error is an important consideration, e. g., epidemiology, economic indicators, and agricultural forecasts.Awardee's statement of the potential commercial applications of the research: TIMES will be compatible with the Computer Assisted Survey Execution System developed by the University of , Berkeley. CASES users include many of the largest governmental, academic, and commercial survey organizations in the U. S. A system such as TIMES has been requested by CASES users and by researchers concerned with quality It will be of interest to all organizations conducting research for which total survey error is an important consideration, e. g., epidemiology, economic indicators, and agricultural forecasts.National Cancer Institute (NCI)

Incorrect interviewing procedures are a major source of survey error. The purpose of this research is to develop, test, and document a commercial-quality Telephone Interviewer Monitoring and Evaluation system (TIMES). TIMES will measure, evaluate, and report interviewer errors so that they may be reduced and the quality of survey data increased. TIMES will be particularly useful in reducing interviewer errors that occur during the administration of sensitive questions concerning sexual practices, drug and alcohol abuse, and the incidence of disease. The aim of Phase II is to expand the TIMES software prototype developed in Phase I into a fully functioning software system and to develop empirically-based interviewer evaluation computer screens. TIMES is an enhancement for CASES, the CATI system developed by the University of California, Berkeley under the direction of Dr. Merrill Shanks. He will serve as a Senior Research Associate. CASES is used by over 60 of the largest survey research organizations. Research to develop evaluation screens will be conducted under the direction of Dr. Floyd Fowler, at the University of Massachusetts, a leading researcher in interviewer error. Using TIMES the supervisor may simultaneously monitor the interviewer's administration of the interview and enter question-specific evaluation data.National Cancer Institute (NCI)