Different Survey Question Types and their Applications – Part Two
In the previous installment of this blog, we told you about the broad classification of survey questions and explained one of these categories with their applications. In part two, we will explore the other category of survey question types and their applications.
As mentioned before, survey question types are classified broadly as open-ended or closed-ended. While open-ended questions give respondents the freedom to express themselves without being given any choices or options, closed ended questions do just the opposite, as they restrict the respondent’s answers and limit them to just the choices or options provided.
These options could start from a simple yes/no to a bunch of options from which the respondents have to pick one. These are most useful when you know exactly what you want from your respondent and when you seek some specific kind of information. The most common application comes when you have questions in your survey about gender, demographics, or specific individual preferences. Closed-ended questions can be of many types. Here are some of these question types:
Multiple choice (single option) – These are the questions that have only one answer and the respondent has to pick that one from any number of options. Yes/No answers, dates, ratings, locations, etc… are generally the options for these questions.
Multiple choice (multiple options) – These questions are the same as above except that the respondents are supposed to select multiple options from their choice of options. The response field is generally of square shape against the round shape of the radio response field.
Matrix Radio/Matrix multiple choice (single response per row) – These are the questions where the respondents have a matrix of choices with the same set of responses being displayed against each choice. In other words, against each item in the row, there will be multiple choices in the column, with the respondent having to pick just one response per row. These are generally used when comparing one set of items with another.
Matrix multiple choice (multiple responses per row) – This is the same as above except that the respondents have the option to choose more than one response per row. Used when multiple items in the column are being judged against multiple items in the row.
The other types of closed-ended questions are rating questions, drop downs menus, and image choices. To know more about survey questions and create impressive surveys using pre-defined templates, click on the link.
