Strangers in the Field: A Methodological Experiment on Interviewer-Respondent Familiarity.

Area of Science:

• Social Sciences
• Survey Methodology
• Sociology

Background:

• The established norm in survey research is to use interviewers with no prior social relationship to respondents.
• This methodological norm aims to ensure objectivity and minimize bias in survey responses.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the impact of interviewer-respondent familiarity on survey response patterns.
• To compare data quality collected by interviewers with varying degrees of social connection to respondents.

Main Methods:

• A methodological experiment was conducted in the Dominican Republic.
• Three levels of interviewer-respondent familiarity were defined: direct acquaintance, acquaintance with the research setting, and outsider.
• Effects on respondent effort, trust, and situational factors were analyzed across different familiarity levels.

Main Results:

• Respondents exhibited marginally higher effort when interviewed by familiar, or "insider," interviewers.
• Respondents were found to lie less to insider interviewers.
• Survey responses related to "trust" also showed a preference for insider interviewers.

Conclusions:

• Local interviewers, including those with pre-existing relationships, can collect superior data on certain survey items.
• The stranger-interviewer norm may not consistently yield the highest quality data.
• Violating the stranger-interviewer norm by using local, familiar interviewers can lead to measurably better data on many items.