HOW DO I CHANGE MY EMAIL ADDRESS?

In the future there will be a site where you can change/update your information. Until that is complete, please forward your old and new email addresses in the body of a message to us and we will make the change for you.

WHY DO YOU ASK RACE THE WAY YOU DO?

The Inter-Agency Committee for the Review of the Racial and Ethnic Standards spent four years on the problem of determining which racial and ethnic categories ought to be asked about in surveys. Nearly 60,000 respondents were involved in a test of seven variations on questions embedded in the Current Population survey. The objectives for this Committee included learning more about whether and HOW to ask about multi-racial self-identification and about categories. The Committee's recommendations based on this evidence resulted in a directive requiring standard use of five racial categories: Black or African American, American Indian or Alaskan, Asian, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, and White.

The question regarding Hispanic origin precedes this question because of the self-identification as "white" Hispanics and "black" Hispanics. For more information, please consult OMB Directive 15, 10/30/97 at http://www.access.gpo.gov

WHO IS HARRIS POLL ONLINE AND WHAT DO YOU DO?

Harris Poll Online conducts research by randomly selecting email addresses from our extensive database of over 5 million cooperative respondents.

Our results provide accurate and reliable data on public opinion and customer preferences. Policy makers, business leaders, and the media use this data.

WHY DO YOU ASK DEMOGRAPHICS IN EVERY SURVEY?

We collect demographic and "webographic" information in every survey so that we can properly generalize survey results to the greater population. In addition, this information helps us ensure that we have sufficient diversity among our respondents.

Individuals' data are summarized and individual answers are kept strictly confidential. Participation in the Harris Poll Online is completely confidential. We understand, however, some respondents would be hesitant to answer these questions, which is why we often give people the option to "decline to answer".

WHAT ARE MY RIGHTS?

The Respondent's Bill of Rights is now available online, so I have included the URL below for your information.

Respondent's Bill of Rights http://www.cmor.org/cmorresponde.htm

WHY DON’T YOU INCLUDE TEXTBOXES FOR RESPONSES?

We realize that many questions would be easier to answer if there were a text box to fill in your comments regarding that issue. Unfortunately, it would take us way too long to wade through thousands and thousands of text box answers to compile results for a given question. We try to have quick turn around time for the results, so this would delay getting back to our respondents in a timely fashion. We have set up an email account so that participants can expand on their answers and write us any comments or questions.

We hope you will use this medium for that purpose.

WHY IS THE SURVEY WORDED THIS WAY?

We apologize that the wording in our survey does not appeal to you. We are restricted as to wording questions in a certain way based on how Harris phrases them in the phone interviews. Unfortunately we need to maintain the same wording so that the answers are legitimate. This is good for accuracy, but we do realize that the wording might not be optimal in some cases. We are sorry about this issue!

WHY IS THERE ONLY ONE QUESTION PER PAGE?

The reason we have only one question per page is so the survey can be individualized as the respondent proceeds through the questions. If we didn't set it up this way, we would send some people through countless questions, which do not pertain to their current situation. This would actually make it longer for the majority of respondents.

We are in the process of looking at the future possibility of placing a few questions per screen until a major decision point is made.

CAN YOU MAIL RESULTS TO ME?

The client sponsoring the survey specifies the mailing of results.

If specified, we do mail results of the polls once the data has been compiled. The survey runs for about a month, then we need to check the data for scientific validity. At that point, after making sure that each race, gender, education level, etc. is represented so that it matches the census, we send out email messages with information about how to view the results.

In the future, you will have access to the results at our panel members’ site.

Until the process is complete, we have a very clear process that produces accurate results.

I’VE GOTTEN SEVERAL INVITATIONS FOR THIS SURVEY. WHAT’S UP?

We apologize for the reminder invitations to participate in the Harris Poll Online, which you have received. When the data is pulled for the "completers" off of our server, there is inevitably a lag between that time and the time the reminder is sent out.

We apologize if you have already taken or attempted to take this survey. We can appreciate that there would be some confusion and concern that responses are not being received.

We are making strides to reduce the number of reminder invitations we are sending out.

AM I GOING TO BE PAID FOR PARTICIPATING?

Currently the Harris Poll Online is voluntary. We are in the process of implementing new incentive programs in addition to our sweepstakes. At this time any incentive involved with a survey is specified by the client sponsoring the survey. If there is an incentive with a survey it is stated in the invitation.

WILL YOU BE SELLING OR GIVING OUT MY EMAIL ADDRESS OR PERSONAL INFORMATION?

We want to assure you that we are not giving your name out for any goods or products. Participation in the Harris Poll Online is completely confidential. Your participation in no way leaves you open to receiving any sort of mailings.

WHY DOES THE QUESTION KEEP REPEATING ITSELF?

Sometimes due to our system volume the forward arrow must be clicked several times before the answer will register.

If it seems that the next page will not come up, it can be due to an overload of participants on the server. The problem is caused by too many people logging in at the same time and our system is working to catch up.

HOW DO I SEND YOU THE SURVEY?

There is no "submit" button because we do not use standard CGI programming to process the questionnaires. Instead, we use an ISAPI DLL link to IIS which processes each question independently. The HTML to display the question is dynamically constructed on the basis of the next appropriate question and your previous answers. The returned answers are captured as each page is processed, rather than one big "submit" at the end.

HOW DO I EXIT THE SURVEY?

At this time there is no active exit function for our surveys.

Although this is true, you can override our address in your address bar with the address you would like to go to.

WHAT SHOULD I DO IF MY PASSWORD ISN’T WORKING?

The problem may have to do with the way your browser is reading the survey link address. Your browser may be dropping part of the address onto a second line, therefore when you click on the link, it is an incomplete address. You may need to cut and paste the link into the address bar and verify that you have the entire address before proceeding.