This paper presents results from an experimental manipulation of one versus multiple-items per screen format in a Web survey.The purpose of the experiment was to find out if a questionnaire s format influences how respondents provide answers in online questionnaires and if this is depending on...

Over the past decades there has been an increasing use of panel surveys at the household or individual level, instead of using independent cross-sections. Panel data have important advantages, but there are also two potential drawbacks: attrition bias and panel conditioning effects. Attrition...

This article shows that respondents gain meaning from visual cues in a web survey as well as from verbal cues (words).We manipulated the layout of a five point rating scale using verbal, graphical, numerical, and symbolic language. This paper extends the existing literature in four directions:...

In interpreting questions, respondents extract meaning from how the information in a questionnaire is shaped, spaced, and shaded. This makes it important to pay close attention to the arrangement of visual information on a questionnaire. Respondents follow simple heuristics in interpreting the...

In this paper we investigate whether there are differences in design effects between trained and fresh respondents. In three experiments, we varied the number of items on a screen, the choice of response categories, and the layout of a five point rating scale. We find that trained respondents...

In this study we use an information-processing perspective to explore the impact of response scales on respondents answers in a web survey.This paper has four innovations compared to the existing literature: research is based on a different mode of administration (web), we use an open-ended...

Panel conditioning arises if respondents are influenced by participation in previous surveys, such that their answers differ significantly from the answers of individuals who are interviewed for the first time. Having two panels—a trained one and a completely fresh one—created a unique...

Pensioners have increasingly more control over their income streams as a result of<br/>pension reforms, which gives them more freedom to save for their old age. We devise an experiment where subjects face a life-cycle optimization task with lifetime uncertainty and a given lifetime income. The aims...

We examine an experimental gift exchange game in which the players can improve upon the unique no-gifts equilibrium through cooperative gift giving. The main feature of the study is that there are two different types of gift exchange, which we call simple and complex exchange, respectively....

In this paper we examine the impact of information on individual contributions in a public-bad experiment. We compare two experimental treatments. In the partial information treatment, subjects are only informed about the total contributions by their group, whereas in the full information...