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The purpose of this paper is to describe a methodology based on vignettes and its application to measure the consistency of railway delay attribution, in order to report on experiences of using the methodology in this context.

A survey is used to ask personnel performing delay attribution about how they would report the delays described in the vignettes of the survey. The development, application and analysis of the survey are thoroughly described here.

The methodology proved useful for measuring the consistency of delay attribution.

The methodology also supports a further investigation of the accuracy of delay attribution systems.

A survey similar to the one presented here can be used by railways to estimate the accuracy of their delay attribution systems, as well as to continuously improve them. Changes to computer software and training will improve the delay attribution system under study.

By investigating current delay attribution practices using surveys based on vignettes, drawbacks of the current delay attribution system can be identified and remedied. The methodology is applicable to a wide class of deviation attribution applications.

In the recent climate of consumerism and consumer focused care, health and social care needs to be more responsive than ever before. Consumer needs and preferences can be elicited with accepted validity and reliability only by strict methodological control, customerisation of the questionnaire and skilled interpretation. To construct, conduct, interpret and implement improved service provision, requires a trained work force and infrastructure. This article aims to appraise various aspects of consumer surveys and to assess their value as effective service improvement tools.

The customer is the sole reason organisations exist. Consumer surveys are used worldwide as service and quality of care improvement tools by all types of service providers including health service providers. The article critically appraises the value of consumer surveys as service improvement tools in health services tool and its future applications.

No one type of survey is the best or ideal. The key is the selection of the correct survey methodology, unique and customised for the particular type/aspect of care being evaluated. The method used should reflect the importance of the information required.

Methodological rigor is essential for the effectiveness of consumer surveys as service improvement tools. Unfortunately so far there is no universal consensus on superiority of one particular methodology over another or any benefit of one specific methodology in a given situation. More training and some dedicated resource allocation is required to develop consumer surveys. More research is needed to develop specific survey methodology and evaluation techniques for improved validity and reliability of the surveys as service improvement tools. Measurement of consumer preferences/priorities, evaluation of services and key performance scores, is not easy.

Consumer surveys seem impressive tools as they provide the customer a voice for change or modification. However, from a scientific point‐of‐view their credibility in service improvement in terms of reproducibility, reliability and validity, has remained debatable.

This artcile is a critical appraisal of the value of consumer surveys as a service improvement tool in health services – a lesson which needs to be learnt.

The purpose of this paper is to present a detailed and critical look at the evolution of online survey research since Evans and Mathur’s (2005) article on the value of online surveys. At that time, online survey research was in its early stages. Also covered are the present and future states of online research. Many conclusions and recommendations are presented.

The look back focuses on online surveys, strengths and weaknesses of online surveys, the literature on several aspects of online surveys and online survey best practices. The look ahead focuses on emerging survey technologies and methodologies, and new non-survey technologies and methodologies. Conclusions and recommendations are provided.

Online survey research is used more frequently and better accepted by researchers than in 2005. Yet, survey techniques are still regularly transformed by new technologies. Non-survey digital research is also more prominent than in 2005 and can better track actual behavior than surveys can. Hybrid surveys will be widespread in the future.

The paper aims to provide insights for researchers with different levels of online survey experience. And both academics and practitioners should gain insights.

Adhering to a strong ethics code is vital to gain respondents’ trust and to produce valid results.

Conclusions and recommendations are offered in these specific areas: defining concepts, understanding the future role of surveys, developing and implementing surveys and a survey code of ethics. The literature review cites more than 200 sources.

The real‐time response survey can be viewed as a dialectic elaboration of the focus group and the sample survey, incorporating some of the advantages of each and producing a program of research quickly. An evaluation of the methodology shows its predictive utility from: real‐time response purchase intentions to self‐reported actual purchases of common commodities seven days later (r = 0.97); real‐time response purchase intentions to self‐reported actual purchases of new products six months later (r = 0.94); and an index of three real‐time response ratings of a product (purchase intention, price, and extent to which product is new and different) by residents of Cincinnati to national sales data for the following year (r = 0.45). Considers some advantages and disadvantages of the methodology. It can be quite useful in new product development.

Recent tourism research has adopted social media analytics (SMA) to examine tourism destination image (TDI) and gain timely insights for marketing purposes. Comparing the methodologies of SMA and intercept surveys would provide a more in-depth understanding of both methodologies and a more holistic understanding of TDI than each method on their own. This study aims to investigate the unique merits and biases of SMA and a traditional visitor intercept survey.

This study collected and compared data for the same tourism destination from two sources: responses from a visitor intercept survey (n = 1,336) and Flickr social media photos and metadata (n = 11,775). Content analysis, machine learning and text analysis techniques were used to analyze and compare the destination image represented from both methods.

The results indicated that the survey data and social media data shared major similarities in the identified key image phrases. Social media data revealed more diverse and more specific aspects of the destination, whereas survey data provided more insights in specific local landmarks. Survey data also included additional subjective judgment and attachment towards the destination. Together, the data suggested that social media data should serve as an additional and complementary source of information to traditional survey data.

This study fills a research gap by comparing two methodologies in obtaining TDI: SMA and a traditional visitor intercept survey. Furthermore, within SMA, photo and metadata are compared to offer additional awareness of social media data’s underlying complexity. The results showed the limitations of text-based image questions in surveys. The findings provide meaningful insights for tourism marketers by having a more holistic understanding of TDI through multiple data sources.

The DIT-ACHIEV Model recognises that tourism is an important source of revenue, investment and employment throughout Ireland. It is particularly important in rural regions, given the unique selling point provided by the beauty and character of rural Ireland that must be managed correctly and in a sustainable manner to ensure its success and longevity. Tourism's impacts (direct and indirect) on areas such as the environment, transport, regional planning, business and trade mean that policies and plans must be coordinated and integrated to avoid one area of policy pressurising or hindering the success of another.

The main thrust of this chapter is on learnings from piloting the Model, which is an indicators-based tool for evaluating the state of tourism in a destination. In developing appropriate methodologies, a variety of innovative research approaches have been tested and the resultant efforts to reach appropriate and valid results in each instance are the focus of this chapter. All of the research tools require local participation in varying degrees from volunteers, residents, students, businesses, organisations, etc. In some instances, these processes have proven to be highly successful; in others, more challenging. One of the key outcomes of developing the methodologies is increased learning in the area of local agency empowerment/facilitation. These are lessons that can be transferred in a practical and real way to any local-level tourism research project.

Business research often requires use of survey‐based techniques for data acquisition. In the past, researchers had to rely on manual methodologies for survey distribution, data entry, and analysis. These approaches were generally characterized by uncertain (often low) response rates; batch processing of collected data; protracted time periods spanning survey distribution to processed statistical results; and inability to make “mid‐course corrections”. These deficiencies are exacerbated for research on global competitiveness issues which requires international data gathering activities; however, they can be mitigated, if not completely eliminated, by the use of dynamic web‐based survey methods. This paper discusses the advantages of web‐based survey technologies with direct back‐end database interfaces and analytical frameworks, and presents illustrative results from development and use of such a tool.

It is assumed that fieldwork experiential learning on constraints of survey and ethnography research orientations in investigating armed conflict in Africa can contribute to the body of knowledge and help practitioners as well as other researchers working in difficult situations, such as war zones. More importantly, this paper aims to understand significant problems in Southern Africa, further methodological debates and produce new frontiers of knowledge in Southern African research studies. This paper will help other researchers who will be planning to conduct research in ongoing war-torn zones to be flexible with mixed research methodologies and data collection techniques that can ensure not only reliability and validity of the data but also, and more importantly, greater generalizability of this study.

This research in Cabo was initially guided by survey and ethnographic approaches. After facing constraints in their use in investigating the complexity of new wars, the author developed and shifted to interpretivism methodology as an alternative. It is essential that researchers be sensitive to the tensions between survey and ethnography methodologies and how they can be a mismatch to the research purpose.

The fieldwork experiences, using standardised survey and ethnography research orientations in Gabo, show that there is no generally appropriate blueprint of how to conduct research in violent conflicts. The valorised survey and ethnographic research strategies were not closely matched to facilitate understanding of the complexity of hybrid armed actors, indiscriminate and targeted violence which combined to militate against data generation. In the face of these problems, the author developed a new methodology, interpretivism, which embedded the descriptive, explanatory and predictive approaches. In tumultuous contexts, the standardised methodologies prioritize data generation more than critical thinking.

It is essential to study the nature of African armed conflicts by combining creativity and flexibility in the selection of research strategies. The constraints on peace research in war-torn situations in Cabo Delgado, Mozambique, have laid out the weaknesses of peacetime research methodologies, including survey research and ethnographic approaches. Now is the time to reassess fieldwork-based research particularly in violent settings.

This paper examines the effectiveness of various business process improvement and benchmarking methodologies described in the literature and reported by survey respondents. As a result of this “benchmarking study” a new and potentially improved business process improvement methodology is developed.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate current approaches to assessing digitisation activities in memory institutions.

Qualitative and quantitative analysis of digitisation surveys were performed. Analysis concentrated on several themes: general methodological solutions, digitisation objectives, users and usage of digitised content, budgeting and costs of digitisation, and volume and growth of digitised collections.

Analysis revealed an absence of sound methodology solutions, issues of constructing a sample, the split between strategic and resource management approaches to digitisation, low visibility of user related evaluation criteria, and problems in developing quantitative measures.

Approaches to evaluating digitisation are not restricted to digitisation surveys and to provide a more comprehensive analysis these should be complemented by other data (e.g. interviews of digitisation experts). The identification of surveys was limited by subjective factors such as knowledge of national experts, visibility of reports on the web, and language of publication.

The paper assists in the development of digitisation surveys by highlighting previous gaps and achievements.

The paper is a first attempt to comprehend approaches to monitoring digitisation internationally. Gaps and issues identified in the research can guide studies on developing indicators and measures for specific digitisation activities.