Aiding Respondent Recall Researchers should be made aware of the realities of memory and the many factors affecting it. In addition, researchers should also take into consideration that a non-response might be the result of some other factor besides poor memory or forgetfulness. In most cases, when a question goes unanswered, the researcher does not know if it is the result of poor memory recall, poor questionnaire design, confusion, or simply a decision by the respondent to skip the question due to the sensitive nature of the question.

Aiding Respondent Recall Significant issue for survey questions: the respondent’s ability to accurately recall past behavior and events Recalling events takes more time and effort The ability to recall accurately declines over time Most respondents can recall significant events that occurred in the past several week, for hospitalization and crime victimization studies, also, half are inaccurate a year later

Memory is less trustworthy than social scientists once assumed. It is affected by many factors: The topic (threatening or social desirable) Events occurring simultaneously and subsequently The significance of an event for a person Situational conditions (question wording and interview style) The respondent's need to have internal consistency.

Need to customize questions and interpret results cautiously Provide respondents with special instructions and extra thinking time

The complexity of respondent recall does not mean that survey researchers can not ask about past events rather, they need to customize questions and interpret results cautiously Researchers should provide respondents with (1) Special instructions and extra thinking time (2) Provide aids to respondent recall (fixed time frame, location references) Question: How often did you attend a sporting event last winter? Better question: I want to know how many sporting events you attended last winter. Let's go month by month. Think back to December. Did you attend any sporting events for which you paid admission in December? Now, think back to January. Did you attend any sporting events in January?

Mooney and Gramling (1991) asked students twom types of questions about drinking behavior Standard questions: On the average, how many days a month have you had something to drink? On the average, how many drinks do you have each of these times? Yielded much lower results than asking the same question about 12 locations (e.g., bar, relative’s home … etc) and summing the total

Many respondents will telescope compress time when asked about the frequency and over- report recent events Telescoping Two techniques to reduce telescoping (i) Situational Framing Ask a respondent to recall a specific situation and ask them about it (ii) Decomposition Ask several specifics and then add them up- such as how much one drank in a week then total for drinking in a year