Course Description and Objectives

This course instructs students in the aspects of survey research. Lectures and exercises take the student from the original formulation of a researchable idea, to correct research designs and data collection, to the analysis of data and substantive interpretations. Personal computers will be used during all aspects of the survey research, from the construction of a bibliography to the preparation of a final report. The course uses the Conceptual Modeling approach to the design of a survey questionnaire. A Conceptual Path Modeling approach is used where each substantive area investigated is first modeled; with operational definitions incorporated into the questionnarie.

SASPC will be used to analyze survey data that the class will design and collect. Students will be trained in a computer-aided telephone interviewing system [CATI] used at NIU's Public Opinion Laboratory [POL], where the interviewing will be done under professional training and supervision.

Each student develops hypotheses that can be tested using questions from the class's omnibus survey. This semester, the survey will focus on several dimensions of the quality of suburban life, such as the sociology of the family and multiculturalism in the suburbs. Previous Collar County Surveys will be used as a guide; students will adopt & modify questions from previous surveys:

1] Quality of family life;

2] Quality of work;

3] Quality of community life - including criminal victimization;

4] Quality of individual well-being & health;

5] Multiculturalism: ethnic inter-group relations; and

6] Health & Well-being.

Residents of the Chicago Collar Counties will be interviewed by telephone. This semester, the survey will be a large-scale effort with over 750 respondents. Most of the interviewing will be done by trained POL interviewers. As part of the course requirements, all students will be trained as professional interviewers by POL staff and will work one full interviewing shift. Additional interviewing work will be voluntary, and students will be paid at the same rate as POL interviewers.

At the completion of this course, students should be able to recognize substantive problems amenable to survey research, to design and draw a scientific sample, to write sound survey questions, to interview respondents, and to analyze and report results.