Founded in 1948, the Summer Institute in Survey Research Techniques is designed specifically to meet the needs of professionals and graduate students seeking to deepen their expertise in survey methodology and data collection. Offered through the Michigan Program in Survey and Data Science within the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan, the program provides a rigorous and flexible curriculum that blends theoretical foundations with practical application — entirely online.

Classes are open for registration.
You do not have to be affiliated with the University to attend.
Registration and payment are required a minimum of two weeks prior to the start of the class.

July 20-23, 2026 (M-Th)
12:00pm-4:00pm
Going Deeper into Questionnaire Design with Alternative Methods and Tools
Presented by Pamela Campanelli
Course Fee: $1,200

This course assumes you have some level of experience with questionnaire design. It goes beyond looking at question comprehension purely from a cognitive side. The linguistic side will be explored, including the use of online tools. Factual questions will be revisited but with the goal of exploring different types of respondent memory problems. Solutions include basic aids to improve memory and alternative methods: decomposition, calendars, event history calendars, internet enabled devices, wearables, apps and sensors, and additional tasks on mobile phones. Also covered are the effects of telescoping and quasi-facts. Subjective questions will be revisited to understand attitude inconsistency and to cover the popular topic of satisfaction and other customer experience metrics. Alternatives methods to attitude measurement will also be examined: factorial surveys and multi-item scales. The course concludes with multi-cultural issues raised by Rincón and a mini appendix on ways to translate survey questions and evaluate the translation.

The course will be interactive with the goal of making it as close to in-person training as possible. There also will be workshops throughout. Dr. Campanelli is happy to chat with participants about their own questionnaires.

Why take this course?

You will get to learn about:

The deeper issues that affect factual and subjective questions.
A broader set of resources available to solve these issues (including alternative methods and tools).
* Please note that AI is not included in the alternative tools that will be explored in this course's curriculum.

Prerequisite: An introductory course in questionnaire design or equivalent experience.

Pamela Campanelli is a survey methods specialist, chartered statistician, fellow of the academy of social sciences and an international trainer, researcher and consultant who runs her own business (http://www.thesurveycoach.com/). Her background is in social statistics, survey methodology, and psychology with a special interest in the study of survey error and data quality focusing on questionnaire design, question testing strategies, interviewing techniques, sampling and weighting, survey analysis, and mixed-mode designs. In addition to providing consultancy, conducting research, writing papers, reviewing for journals, advising committees, Dr. Campanelli’s focuses on providing training courses. She is committed to high quality learning. She believes in delivering courses that are lively and engaging, foster an informal and interactive atmosphere, communicate concepts in a straightforward and accessible way, illustrate the material through the use of ‘real life’ examples, and provide workshops to put theory into practice.