Overview (of carrying out a survey)

Gillian Raab, Professor of Applied Statistics at Napier University, shows the process of carrying out surveys as viewed by a statistician (roughly):

Process of carrying out a survey
Process of carrying out a survey

Adapted from the figure on his slide 7 in “Background to P|E|A|S project”, 9 September 2004, http://www2.napier.ac.uk/depts/fhls/peas/workshops/workshop1presentationGR.ppt Links to an external site.

[Raab2004] Gillian Raab, ‘Background to P|E|A|S project’, Napier University, 09-Sep-2004 [Online]. Available: http://www2.napier.ac.uk/depts/fhls/peas/workshops/workshop1presentationGR.ppt Links to an external site.

Transcript

So, now we will talk about quantitative analysis of survey data.

The first thing we have to think about as Gillian Raab, Professor of Applied Statistics at Napier University, says, "What's the process of carrying out the survey?"  Now, this is his view as a statistician.  It begins by we designed the survey, then we conduct the survey, we collect the data, we analyze the results, and now we evaluate bias and precision, and then we repeat the process.  Right. It's relatively straightforward, except- we need to think about another element.  And that is: "Why are we doing this?" The reason we're doing it is: We want to be able to gain insight.  And therefore, we have to convey the insight to decision-makers are going to make some decisions based upon the analysis of the results of the survey. So, it isn't that we just say, "Ah! Let's conduct a survey."  In the end, we wanted to have some effect.