Abstract
This study investigated the combined effect on return rates of personalizing the cover letter and including precoded personal information on a mail questionnaire. The 2 × 2 factorial design allowed for the testing of an interaction effect as well as for main effects. The study found no interactive effect between the kind of cover letter sent and whether or not subjects were given the option of removing the precoded data. In addition, neither of the main effects was significant. The finding that the inclusion of precoded personal data on a questionnaire does not impair return rates may be welcome news to investigators in higher education conducting studies in which they have prior knowledge of respondent characteristics.
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An earlier version of this paper was given at the 1986 Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association held in San Francisco.
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Shale, D. The combined effect of personalized appeal and precoding of personal data on questionnaire returns. Res High Educ 26, 299–310 (1987). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00992242
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00992242