Willingness to participate in in-the-moment surveys triggered by online behaviors

Abstract

Surveys are a fundamental tool of empirical research, but they suffer from errors: in particular, respondents can have difficulties recalling information of interest to researchers. Recent technological developments offer new opportunities to collect data passively (i.e., without participant's intervention), avoiding recall errors. One of these opportunities is registering online behaviors (e.g., visited URLs) through tracking software ("meter") voluntarily installed by a sample of individuals on their browsing devices. Nevertheless, metered data are also affected by errors and only cover part of the objective information, while subjective information is not directly observable. Asking participants about such missing information by means of web surveys conducted in the moment an event of interest is detected by the meter has the potential to fill the gap. However, this method requires participants to be willing to participate. This paper explores the willingness to participate in in-the-moment web surveys triggered by online activities recorded by a participant-installed meter. A conjoint experiment implemented in an opt-in metered panel in Spain reveals overall high levels of willingness to participate among panelists already sharing metered data, ranging from 69% to 95%. The main aspects affecting this willingness are related to the incentive levels offered. Limited differences across participants are observed, except for household size and education. Answers to open questions also confirm that the incentive is the key driver of the decision to participate, whereas other potential problematic aspects such as the limited time to participate, privacy concerns, and discomfort caused by being interrupted play a limited role.

Keywords: In-the-moment surveys; Meter; Online behavioral data; Passive data collection; Web surveys; Willingness to participate.

Fig. 1

Example of a conjoint question

Fig. 2

Mean utilities per attribute level and 95% credibility intervals. Note: Grey ribbons represent 95% credible intervals. The acronyms used for the triggering activities are the following: Soc = Using social media, Cont = Reading online content, Vid = Watching online videos, Inf = Looking for information, Shop = Shopping online