Use of mobile devices to answer online surveys: implications for research

BMC Research Notes

Christian S Hendershot¹  Nicolas Bertholet³  Clayton Neighbors²  John A Cunningham¹ 

[1] Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, 33 Russell St, Toronto M5S 2S1, Canada;Department of Psychology, University of Houston, 126 Heyne Bldg, Houston 77204-5022, USA;Alcohol Treatment Center, Department of Community Medicine and Health, Lausanne University Hospital, Lausanne, Switzerland

关键词: Mobile device;    University;    College;    Alcohol;    Brief intervention;    Internet;   

Others  :  1142253
DOI  :  10.1186/1756-0500-6-258

 received in 2012-12-29, accepted in 2013-07-03,  发布年份 2013

【 摘 要 】

Background

There is a growing use of mobile devices to access the Internet. We examined whether participants who used a mobile device to access a brief online survey were quicker to respond to the survey but also, less likely to complete it than participants using a traditional web browser.

Findings

Using data from a recently completed online intervention trial, we found that participants using mobile devices were quicker to access the survey but less likely to complete it compared to participants using a traditional web browser. More concerning, mobile device users were also less likely to respond to a request to complete a six week follow-up survey compared to those using traditional web browsers.

Conclusions

With roughly a third of participants using mobile devices to answer an online survey in this study, the impact of mobile device usage on survey completion rates is a concern.

Trial registration

ClinicalTrials.gov:NCT01521078

【 授权许可】

   
2013 Cunningham et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

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