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- Textbooks for Research Methods and Data Analysis
- 1: Survey Analysis Workshop (SPSS)
- 1a: Statistical concepts and methods
- 1b: Teaching with Survey Data
- 1c: Developing research projects using survey data
- 1d: Workshop and presentations for ASSESS (SPSS users in Europe)
- 2: Survey Research Practice
- 2a: Survey Research Methodology, Practice and Training
- 2b: Major survey series
- 3: Subjective Social Indicators (Quality of Life)
- 4: Survey Unit, Social Science Research Council (UK)
- 5a: Polytechnic of North London (1976-1992)
- 5b: Survey Research Unit (1978-1992)
- Village life in Normandy
- Contact
- Origins of the British Crime Survey
- British Crime Survey
Survey methods textbooks
[Page last updated 4 September 2017]
Readers interested in the history of surveys should see Fifty Books That Have Significantly Shaped
Public Opinion Research
[NB: Where authors are marked in red the links for titles are to other pages on this site containing my reviews and/or detailed comments and (where available) links to author profiles. Some links are to publishers' sites or Google Books and allow you to view extracts of the text. Some books have their own associated websites. See also Survey methods guides and tutorials on this site]
Survey methods books abound, (some in earlier editions) but I found the most useful for my students
David Phillips
Do-It-Yourself Social Surveys: a handbook for beginners [searchable pdf, 115 pp, scanned 12 Jan 2018]
(Survey Research Unit, Polytechnic of North London, 1980)
[Specially commissioned for students and community groups. Out of print, but scanned my last remaining copy, made searchable by Mario Callegaro]
Classic texts:
Hoinville G, Jowell R and associates
Survey Research Practice
(Heinemann 1977, but a new edition is in the pipeline)
Roger Jowell, Roger Thomas and Peter Lynn [Eds]
Survey Research in Practice
(Sage, promised for 2104 but still waiting
Sunny Crouch
Marketing Research for Managers
(Heinemann 1984, Pan 1985)
There is a new edition, with foreword by Professor Robert Worcester)
Sunny Crouch and Matthew Housden
Marketing Research for Managers
(Butterworth-Heinemann Limited, 2003)
Catherine Marsh
The survey method : the contribution of surveys to sociological explanation
(Allen and Unwin, 1982)
Claus Moser and Graham Kalton
Survey Methods in Social Investigation
(Ashgate Dartmouth 1985 [1958, 1971])
A N Oppenheim
Questionnaire design, interviewing and attitude measurement
Continuum, 2000 [1992]
More recent highly recommended books
(See also Statistics: Power from Data!,Statistics: Power from Data! a superb site from Statistics Canada)
SPSS in 60 pages
This handy little booklet covers the whole process of designing and running a survey. Although it's a plug for SPSS products, it's a useful prelude to the more detailed approaches in textbooks, and is clearly derived from intensive and prolonged experience of conducting and analysing surveys.
Johnny Blair, Ronald F. Czaja, Edward A. Blair
Designing Surveys: A Guide to Decisions and Procedures (full review on this site)
(Sage 2014)
Whereas some books tend to be more academic (and sometimes based on limited, if any, serious experience of actually doing surveys) this book is written by people who do surveys for a living, one of them for forty years. With its combination of accumulated wisdom and narrative skill, it’s easy (and fulfilling) to read, and you can barely see the joins. It has been written by very experienced fellow professionals used to dealing with operational practicalities, spiced with (just enough, but not too much) theory and thankfully few equations (formulae are immediately off-putting for students in sociology and similar areas).
I have no hesitation in recommending this book as a course text at post-graduate level or for in-house training. If you are serious about learning or doing survey research, buy your own copy now.
.Lesley Andres
Designing and Doing Survey Research (full review on this site)
(Sage 2012)
Designing and Doing Survey Research definitely belongs on my recommended list for Survey Methods Textbooks and should certainly be on student reading lists. In it Lesley Andres has distilled more than twenty years of experience designing and running surveys, in particular the longitudinal survey Paths on Life’s Way. You can read the first chapter on-line:
Postgraduates and research managers should think of having their own copies, but libraries should have multiple copies, as it discusses survey research in the context of methodology in general. Much of the content is relevant to methodological debates covered in undergraduate courses and still raging in certain social science disciplines.
David de Vaus
Surveys in Social Research
(6th edition, Routledge, 2014)
The first edition was published in 1985 and definitely belongs on the recommended list. It's suitable for both under- and post-graduate courses and covers much the same ground as Andres (2012) and Blair et al (2014) but from a different perspective, and includes more detailed sections on preparation, management and statistical analysis. There are sets of exercises for each chapter. I only have the 3rd edition (1991) in which some of the sections and references are now outdated (eg to SPSS-X) but David has kindly sent me a copy of the 6th Australian edition (Allen & Unwin) which I shall review shortly.
Peter V Marsden & James D Wright [Eds]
Handbook of Survey Research
(2nd edition, Emerald, 2010, £67.95)
ISBN: 978-1-84855-224-1 Hardback
This huge (886 pages) and invaluable tome should be in the library of every social science department, every university and every serious research organisation.
Alan Buckingham and Peter Saunders
The survey methods workbook: from design to analysis
(Polity Press, 2004)
Judith Bell
Doing your Research Project: A guide for first-time researchers in education, health and social science
( 5th edition, Open University Press, 2010)
Erik Mooi and Marko Sarstedt
A Concise Guide to Market Research: The process, data and methods using IBM SPSS Statisitics
(Springer-Verlag, 2011)
. . is a new book I've only just received, but it's very practice- and skill-oriented.
Worth a look
Know your Audience - A Practical Guide to Media Research
(Audience Dialogue, 2007)
provides a comprehensive and usable guide to all aspects of audience research. This book is available as a 384 page PDF document. An extract How to write a survey report is a short guide for (nearly) beginners, based on audience research, but applicable to other areas. The site is worth exploring for its many knowledgable, useful and easy to understand explanations of the practical side of survey research, including software for survey analysis.
If you can find this pamphlet:
Guide to Good Coding Practice (Foreword by Martin Collins)
(Market Research Society, 1983)
Readers interested in the history of surveys should see Fifty Books That Have Significantly Shaped
Public Opinion Research
[NB: Where authors are marked in red the links for titles are to other pages on this site containing my reviews and/or detailed comments and (where available) links to author profiles. Some links are to publishers' sites or Google Books and allow you to view extracts of the text. Some books have their own associated websites. See also Survey methods guides and tutorials on this site]
Survey methods books abound, (some in earlier editions) but I found the most useful for my students
David Phillips
Do-It-Yourself Social Surveys: a handbook for beginners [searchable pdf, 115 pp, scanned 12 Jan 2018]
(Survey Research Unit, Polytechnic of North London, 1980)
[Specially commissioned for students and community groups. Out of print, but scanned my last remaining copy, made searchable by Mario Callegaro]
Classic texts:
Hoinville G, Jowell R and associates
Survey Research Practice
(Heinemann 1977, but a new edition is in the pipeline)
Roger Jowell, Roger Thomas and Peter Lynn [Eds]
Survey Research in Practice
(Sage, promised for 2104 but still waiting
Sunny Crouch
Marketing Research for Managers
(Heinemann 1984, Pan 1985)
There is a new edition, with foreword by Professor Robert Worcester)
Sunny Crouch and Matthew Housden
Marketing Research for Managers
(Butterworth-Heinemann Limited, 2003)
Catherine Marsh
The survey method : the contribution of surveys to sociological explanation
(Allen and Unwin, 1982)
Claus Moser and Graham Kalton
Survey Methods in Social Investigation
(Ashgate Dartmouth 1985 [1958, 1971])
A N Oppenheim
Questionnaire design, interviewing and attitude measurement
Continuum, 2000 [1992]
More recent highly recommended books
(See also Statistics: Power from Data!,Statistics: Power from Data! a superb site from Statistics Canada)
SPSS in 60 pages
This handy little booklet covers the whole process of designing and running a survey. Although it's a plug for SPSS products, it's a useful prelude to the more detailed approaches in textbooks, and is clearly derived from intensive and prolonged experience of conducting and analysing surveys.
Johnny Blair, Ronald F. Czaja, Edward A. Blair
Designing Surveys: A Guide to Decisions and Procedures (full review on this site)
(Sage 2014)
Whereas some books tend to be more academic (and sometimes based on limited, if any, serious experience of actually doing surveys) this book is written by people who do surveys for a living, one of them for forty years. With its combination of accumulated wisdom and narrative skill, it’s easy (and fulfilling) to read, and you can barely see the joins. It has been written by very experienced fellow professionals used to dealing with operational practicalities, spiced with (just enough, but not too much) theory and thankfully few equations (formulae are immediately off-putting for students in sociology and similar areas).
I have no hesitation in recommending this book as a course text at post-graduate level or for in-house training. If you are serious about learning or doing survey research, buy your own copy now.
.Lesley Andres
Designing and Doing Survey Research (full review on this site)
(Sage 2012)
Designing and Doing Survey Research definitely belongs on my recommended list for Survey Methods Textbooks and should certainly be on student reading lists. In it Lesley Andres has distilled more than twenty years of experience designing and running surveys, in particular the longitudinal survey Paths on Life’s Way. You can read the first chapter on-line:
Postgraduates and research managers should think of having their own copies, but libraries should have multiple copies, as it discusses survey research in the context of methodology in general. Much of the content is relevant to methodological debates covered in undergraduate courses and still raging in certain social science disciplines.
David de Vaus
Surveys in Social Research
(6th edition, Routledge, 2014)
The first edition was published in 1985 and definitely belongs on the recommended list. It's suitable for both under- and post-graduate courses and covers much the same ground as Andres (2012) and Blair et al (2014) but from a different perspective, and includes more detailed sections on preparation, management and statistical analysis. There are sets of exercises for each chapter. I only have the 3rd edition (1991) in which some of the sections and references are now outdated (eg to SPSS-X) but David has kindly sent me a copy of the 6th Australian edition (Allen & Unwin) which I shall review shortly.
Peter V Marsden & James D Wright [Eds]
Handbook of Survey Research
(2nd edition, Emerald, 2010, £67.95)
ISBN: 978-1-84855-224-1 Hardback
This huge (886 pages) and invaluable tome should be in the library of every social science department, every university and every serious research organisation.
Alan Buckingham and Peter Saunders
The survey methods workbook: from design to analysis
(Polity Press, 2004)
Judith Bell
Doing your Research Project: A guide for first-time researchers in education, health and social science
( 5th edition, Open University Press, 2010)
Erik Mooi and Marko Sarstedt
A Concise Guide to Market Research: The process, data and methods using IBM SPSS Statisitics
(Springer-Verlag, 2011)
. . is a new book I've only just received, but it's very practice- and skill-oriented.
Worth a look
Know your Audience - A Practical Guide to Media Research
(Audience Dialogue, 2007)
provides a comprehensive and usable guide to all aspects of audience research. This book is available as a 384 page PDF document. An extract How to write a survey report is a short guide for (nearly) beginners, based on audience research, but applicable to other areas. The site is worth exploring for its many knowledgable, useful and easy to understand explanations of the practical side of survey research, including software for survey analysis.
If you can find this pamphlet:
Guide to Good Coding Practice (Foreword by Martin Collins)
(Market Research Society, 1983)