Social research services

Description

The European Social Survey (“ESS”) is a large-scale cross-national survey conducted in around 25 European countries every 2 years. In order to devise optimal, functionally equivalent and methodologically sound questions, omnibus surveys will be used to test draft questions. The key aim of carrying out these tests is to provide empirical evidence about question performance. We require questions to be tested in Great Britain and 2 other EU/EEA countries. Potential contractors who bid to carry out this work must have the capacity to conduct face-to-face omnibus surveys in Great Britain and at least 2 of the European countries from a list. The final selection of countries will be made in consultation with the appointed agency. We require 50 questions to be tested in Great Britain and 2 other EU/EEA countries. Potential contractors who bid to carry out this work must have the capacity to conduct face-to-face omnibus surveys in Great Britain and at least 2 of the European countries. Proposals should specify in which countries agencies have face-to-face omnibus surveys in which the questions may be tested. ESS participating countries where testing may take place: Austria; Bulgaria; Czechia; Estonia; France; Germany; Hungary; Italy; Lithuania; Latvia; The Netherlands; Poland; Portugal; Slovakia; Slovenia. The final selection of countries will be made in consultation with the appointed agency. Sample: Quota sampling methods are expected to be used for omnibus testing possibly mixed with random selection of sample points and addresses. The quotas used should broadly reflect the general population living in each country. Ideally the omnibus sample would cover adults aged 18+. The ESS ERIC team require samples of either 500 or 1 000 per country and you are invited to submit your pricing based on those 2 models. Mode: all interviewing must be face-to-face as in the main stage ESS. The omnibus testing should ideally be conducted by CAPI methods. This will allow split sample tests of different question formulations to be carried out, the order of some questionnaire items to be rotated, and timing data to be recorded. If agencies can only offer PAPI methods in specific countries this should be stated and may still be considered. Some CASI questions may need to be included. Test items: we envisage that 50 items will be tested in each country based on the testing requirements identified during the questionnaire development process. (The decision on whether items are tested in a single omnibus or 2 omnibus surveys will be agreed between the contractor and ESS ERIC HQ team.) Questionnaire and translation: All questions to be fielded will be made available to the successful survey agency in the main language spoken in that country by the ESS ERIC team (including in Great Britain in British English). The translations generated will use ESS translation procedures. The questions must be administered using the formulations provided by the ESS ERIC team. Potential contractors should therefore ensure that translation costs are not included in their price schedule. The final choice of countries used will depend on the availability of ESS national teams to undertake the translation. Interviewer feedback form: We would like to receive interviewer feedback on the questions fielded to help us understand more about how they were understood by respondents. The ESS ERIC will provide an interviewer questionnaire. This questionnaire will ask for feedback on up to 10 of the ESS items fielded and we anticipate it to take no longer than 20 minutes to complete Timetable: In order to adhere to the ESS pre-testing timetable, we would like to have the flexibility to test items on omnibus surveys throughout the period of the contract. Contractors are asked to specify their omnibus schedules for the whole of 2019. Contractors are also asked to indicate the “turn-around” time from receipt of questions to data delivery and specify how far in advance of fieldwork the test questions need to be provided. Items may be tested in a single survey or, if not, within 2 surveys that are at least three months apart. The number of items tested in each survey will be subject to agreement. Outputs: The following outputs will be required: 1) A short technical report outlining testing procedures/methodology used; 2) Topline tables of data; 3) A fully anonymised respondent dataset in SPSS format according to a specification provided by the ESS ERIC team; 4) A short summary report of key findings from interviewer questionnaire (in English) plus an excel file giving verbatim responses of interviewers (in original language).