Car trouble

Research is a profession that should be carried out by experts. The biggest threat to quick and cost-efficient research is that the quality is almost always suffering. DVJ wants research to remain good. Even when it is quick and against low cost. For this reason, we regularly share examples of mistakes and best practises in the market. We share our thoughts and possible solutions to improve research. By following these tips, we can make research better. This time the honour belonged to Research Expert Sasha Perozo Alberti.

Research is a profession where lots of mistakes can be made. My passion for research starts with making a questionnaire not only valid so we can give the right answer to a question, but also enable respondents to give their answers in a fun and easy way.

While filling in a questionnaire recently, I came across a commonly made mistake. I stumbled across the following question and found that I couldn’t give a satisfactory answer. The answer I wanted to give was that we have a leased company car. But I couldn’t provide that answer. The questions that followed were thereafter also difficult to answer in a meaningful way.

The following questions are about the car in the household that gets driven most. Are you the owner of this car or is this car leased or a company car?

Owner, Lease car, Company car (not leased), Other

The downfall of this mistake is that respondents are not able to answer this question. It leads to a different mindset where after the following questions are answered in this altered state. In some cases, this can lead to irritation. And if respondents get annoyed, it could lead to them answering more negatively. As a result, a brand, product or advertisement is judged more negatively than it actually is.

A mistake like this can easily be prevented though. My advice is to always check whether respondents can give every answer possible, before it gets send out to a big group of respondents. So, next time I’m asked if I’m the owner of a car or not, I want to be able to answer correctly.