Question

Survey questions should
1. lead the respondent toward an answer.
2. address only one idea.
3. not have a double meaning.
4. not take much effort to answer.

Answer 1

Statements 2, 3 and 4 are good survey-question practices; statement 1 is not.

Brief explanations:
- 1 (lead the respondent toward an answer): bad — leading questions introduce bias and distort responses. Example (bad): "Don't you agree our service is excellent?" Neutral version: "How would you rate the quality of our service?"
- 2 (address only one idea): good — avoid double‑barreled questions that force one answer to two issues. Example (bad): "How satisfied are you with the price and quality?" Split into two questions: price and quality separately.
- 3 (not have a double meaning): good — avoid ambiguous wording; define timeframes and terms. Example (ambiguous): "Do you shop often?" Better: "In the past month, how many times did you shop online?"
- 4 (not take much effort to answer): good — keep questions simple and easy to answer to reduce fatigue and increase response accuracy; when detail is needed, provide ranges or prompts to help recall.

If you want, I can rewrite any sample questions you have to follow these rules.