Developing questionnaire instrument for the Collection of Valid Assessment Data

AQuestions on personality instrument might ask about certain situations, how a person feels about the situation or might handle the situation. These questions do not have right or wrong answers, and are not timed, as is the case with aptitude tests.

ssessment information vary wildly and is collected using various instruments. The measurement of aptitude such as skills, knowledge and abilities ( SKA) is measured using different instruments from those of personality, such as behaviours, attitudes, beliefs, or opinions.

Test instruments for measuring aptitude include multiple choice tests, structured question tests or performance tests. On the other hand, instruments for measuring personality include questionnaires, inventory, and interviews.

Questions on personality instrument might ask about certain situations, how a person feels about the situation or might handle the situation. These questions do not have right or wrong answers, and are not timed, as is the case with aptitude tests.

The answers that the person provides are analysed and compared to various personality traits, and the dominant traits are picked out and highlighted. A questionnaire is used a lot in the collection of personality data. Thus its development requires a specialised training, just like the aptitude test instruments.

The questionnaire design starts with the development of the blueprint, which should clearly describe what kind of data will be collected, the type of respondents, key variables to be addressed, the format of items, the kinds of response categories, and coding or scoring and administration, how the data will be analysed and reported, and how findings might contribute to improving the issue under investigation.

Understanding the purpose of the questionnaire is of paramount importance. You might have filled a questionnaire before, either at the end of a workshop, at the end of your stay in a hotel, after service at a particular organisation, at your work place, for a learner doing his/ her studies, or for a research from a research institute.

The questionnaire could have been a short objective one, or a one- question, or a reasonably long open- ended one. I hope you noticed that their purposes were not the same. It goes therefore that the purpose also determines to a larger extent the design of the questionnaire.

With regards to the type and number of items, several considerations are taken into account, including the amount of time available to answer questions, the resources available for analysis, and the type of respondents.

The questionnaire questions could be close ended single- select multiple choice question or multi- select multiple choice question responses from a given list of options.

The multiple choice questions could be rating scales, rank order, checklist, likert scales, or dichotomous response type. Multiple choice questions provide less information but easy to codify, enter, and analyse.

The open ended types of questions are also used and provide more information through qualitative responses. However, the information is difficult to codify, enter, and analyse. Normally, a short, limited, objective questionnaire provides useful information and is preferable to a long comprehensive one.

It is important to ask respondents questions within their capabilities. For example, if you want to know about farming techniques in a certain farming zone, its proper to ask farmers not everybody including pupils.

In developing items, do not use extreme absolutes words such as: all, any, anybody, best, ever, every, never, always, because they place respondents in a situation where they must either fully agree or they must completely disagree with the extreme position in the question. For example, this is not a good way of posing a question: ‘’ Do you always come on time to work?’’

To further ensure that the questionnaire yields valid data, it is pretested to establish the suitability of items and response categories. The pre- test data is analysed to help refine the questions.

Since the purpose of the questionnaire is to get quality information from the respondents, it is advisable that at the beginning of each section, there should be clear instructions on how to respond to the questions.

To enhance high response rate, simple items and those from interesting topics should be put early in the questionnaire to generate interest in the respondents.

Sensitive items and those that require a little bit of thinking such as classification should come later in the questionnaire.

Remember, the respondent does not get any immediate benefit by answering the questionnaire, and might never know if s/ he ever gets any, as such it is important that the questionnaire maintains the respondents’ interest to complete the questionnaire.

In that regard, developing a questionnaire that is able to do that requires expertise of a Psychometrician. Yes, It’s Possible!

The Author holds PhD in ‘ Assessment & Quality Assurance’ and writes in his personal capacity as a Psychometric Researcher. Contact/ WhatsApp: 71713446 or masoletm@ gmail. com or facebook page: Trust Mbako Masole