What are Loaded Questions, and How to Avoid them in Online Surveys?
Loaded questions in an online survey taint users’ opinions with hidden opinions
You can’t expect genuine responses when bias creeps into your online survey. And that mars the purpose and investment of your market research processes. Sometimes, you aren’t even aware, and your questions subtly prompt your users to lean in one direction or suggest to choose options you connect well with. Your questions might even frustrate them by exuding ideas they don’t favor or follow
As a market research consultant, if you aren’t aware of your mistakes by inducing such biases even if unknowingly you would invite responses that offer little to none for your product or brand research to improve and grow
Let’s help you understand loaded questions today that carry hidden opinions
What are Loaded Questions?
Questions with words that your respondents may not relate to take the final data in a different direction. And whichever way users reply negatively or positively the assumption may look correct from the answer. That’s why they are called “loaded”; these survey questions have intrinsic assumptions that affect the answer despite changing the selection of choices
For instance, “Which recent policy reform by the people’s favorite ruling party do you most connect with?”. Irrespective of your users’ choices, you’re still forcing them to accept the governing party as “people’s favorite”
Another example of a loaded question could be: “Which color did you opt for your wedding gown?”. Assuming this is a part of a survey directed at married women and your question has all sorts of possible colors to choose from, it still is flawed. What if your respondents have not worn a gown? If a user chooses red but has no option to tell you that theirs was a saree and not a gown, your survey data might get distorted. Again, what if your respondents have wedded more than once?
Issues like this haunt even the best paid online surveys in India and other countries. So, avoid questions that are loaded with assumptions
Difference Between Leading and Loaded Questions
We have discussed leading questions relying on biasing tricks. Some words in the questions veer users in a designated direction and hence, are called leading questions. For instance, “How did you like our customer service?”. Although subtle, the word “like” creates a diversion for the user to choose a positive answer
What if users didn’t like the service at all? They might get frustrated with the questions, and their mood might drive the next responses in the survey. Or they might simply abandon the form, skewing your completion rate a nightmare for every market research consultant
Leading and loaded questions are harmful to the survey outcome. They also taint your users’ feelings towards your brand.
While a leading question forces users to choose an option that favors your brand, a loaded question usually makes wrong assumptions and hurts users’ sentiments about the topic or product. No matter how your respondents select their choices in a loaded question, your assumption still binds to their answers, whether they want to
For a witty user, a leading question may not be a problem. They might be smart enough to ignore your biased sentiment in the question. But with a loaded question, they can’t disassociate the intrinsic assumption from their choice
“How do you feel after stopping narcotics consumption with our aid?”. This question assumes your users were an addict, they have stopped them now, and your aid has facilitated them. Although this question isn’t wrong contextually if asked with skip logic (discussed below), the assumption that your product was used to curb the addiction is completely wrong.
How to Avoid Loaded Questions in Your Online Surveys?
1. Comprehensive Review
Answer every question with all the available options and observe if the positive and negative ends of the answers still have some hidden biases. For the question, “How do you feel after
stopping narcotics consumption with our aid?”, if someone answers with better, worse, or no change, the assumption of your product being the aid remains associated with all outcomes. The bias stays even after assuming that the users you’re surveying were or are addicts.
2. Skip Logic
The question, “How do you feel after stopping narcotics consumption with our aid?”, should appear in the form only after your users confirm that they have opted for your help. If users select no, this question shouldn’t appear in the form.
Such a logical flow in the survey is called skip logic and is useful for avoiding flaws in the submitted data
Also, read how to frame the survey questions for successful market research
3. Words Choice
Scrutinize your questions for words that represent assumptions. From the question, “Which recent policy reform by the people’s favorite ruling party do you most connect with?”, once “people’s favorite” is removed, the question is still worth asking. You only need to add none so that if people don’t like any of the ruling party’s latest programs, they can still have a possible option to choose.
4. Know Your Audience
Sometimes, a survey may be circulated to the wrong user segments. Their demographics don’t match the form’s requirement, leading to survey abandonment and skewed responses. Perhaps, most users abandon your surveys in the middle. Some might abandon after spending some time. A few users might skip all the optional questions or might fill wrong data if mandatory. All such responses taint your survey and drain the investment.
Remove Biases from Your Online Surveys with Opinionest
If you’re not seasoned with survey designs, your questions may have hidden opinions. Creating a form without leading and loaded questions is a challenge. But worry not if you think opinions might mar your survey’s outcome. Opinionest, one of the best online survey sites in India, can lend its experts to help you design proper surveys. Please contact our team here and make your studies more user-friendly.
