Online Surveys

The tool you use depends upon your project’s needs. Use the guiding questions below or contact the technology training specialist to determine which software is best suited for your survey.

• Who is the audience for this survey?
• What is the purpose of this survey?
• What device will participates use to respond?
• Am I comfortable building my own data report?
• Is this form or survey time-sensitive or ongoing?

• Click here to contact Clark University’s technology training specialist
• Click here to view a LinkedIn Learning playlist on Microsoft Forms
  • Please note: you must activate your free LinkedIn Learning account prior to viewing this playlist

Clark University subscribes to Qualtrics support, which allows all members of the Clark community to get help from Qualtrics directly.

Qualtrics Support offers extensive videos, how-to guides, and survey best practices on their website (Qualtrics Support) and their YouTube Channel.  Additionally, you can log in to chat, email or talk to a representative over the phone.

1. Click here to visit the Qualtrics Support portal
2. Select the Sign in with SSO option
3. Enter “clarku” for the organization-ID

Well designed surveys can minimize complexity for participants and other sources of error. The resources below provide more information about constructing effective survey questions and minimizing measurement error:

Survey Questions 101: Do You Make any of These 7 Question Writing Mistakes?

The 10 Commandments For Writing Outstanding Survey Questions

Keep up with theoretical and methodological advances with the journal: Public Opinion Quarterly

Both Qualtrics and Microsoft Forms are web-based. All you need is web browser and an internet connection. Though not a requirement, it is best practice to develop a survey instrument in a text editor before creating a web survey.

Clark University is committed to ensuring that all human subjects research is conducted in accordance with the basic ethical principles widely adopted by professional societies and as prescribed in federal regulations. The Institutional Review Board (IRB) and Office of Sponsored Programs and Research (OSPR) at Clark must approve of research methods through an application and review process prior to any contact with potential subjects. For more information, visit the Sponsored Programs and Research IRB website.

Qualtrics Survey software is vendor hosted web service. It is installed on a public web server and hosts surveys that are public facing. Data is stored in a secured database and can be accessed only by authorized Clark University domain users (eg. faculty staff and students). Qualtrics is role and permission based, therefore only a researcher, and specified designees, can access a survey and the associated response data. Through a combination of software controls and standard practice, safe guards are in place to protect the safety of the survey participants:

• Qualtrics has the capacity to anonymize responses, this ensures that a participant’s IP address is not retained in the software database.
• Details about the security, reliability, and availability of data in Qualtrics are summarized in the linked pages:
  • Qualtrics & GDPR Compliance
  • Qualtrics Security & Compliance
• Survey controls exist to prevent cookies from being planted on a participant’s browser. This can minimize the possibility of a domestic partner, family member, or other computer user seeing a participant’s response.
• Researchers using the system agree to follow a standard protocol established by the Clark University IRB to ensure the overall safety of survey participants.
• As a IT industry standard practice, web servers have the capacity to — and do — log IP addresses of incoming internet traffic. All Clark Information Technology Staff operate under a confidentiality agreement. In addition, only IT staff with proper training have access to such logs. Finally, ITS staff do not make it a practice to view web server logs.