What are the advantages and disadvantages of open and closed ended questions?

Advantages of Open-Ended Questions

• Open-ended questions allow respondents to include more information, including feelings, attitudes and understanding of the subject. This allows researchers to better access the respondents' true feelings on an issue. .

• Open-ended questions cut down on two types of response error; respondents are not likely to forget the answers they have to choose from if they are given the chance to respond freely, and open-ended questions simply do not allow respondents to disregard reading the questions and just "fill in" the survey with all the same answers (such as filling in the "no" box on every question).

• Because they allow for obtaining extra information from the respondent, such as demographic information (current employment, age, gender, etc.), surveys that use open-ended questions can be used more readily for secondary analysis by other researchers than can surveys that do not provide contextual information about the survey population.

Disadvantages of Open-Ended Questions

• If open-ended questions are analyzed quantitatively, the qualitative information is reduced to coding and answers tend to lose some of their initial meaning.

• Because open-ended questions allow respondents to use their own Words, it is difficult to compare the meanings of the responses.

• The response rate is lower with surveys that use open-ended question than with those that use closed-ended questions.

Advantages of Closed-Ended Questions

• Closed-ended questions are more easily analyzed. Every answer can be given a number or value so that a statistical interpretation can be assessed. Closed-ended questions are also better suited for computer analysis.

• Closed-ended questions can be more specific, thus more likely to communicate similar meanings.

• In large-scale surveys, closed-ended questions take less time from the interviewer, the participant and the researcher, and so is a less expensive survey method.

Diadvantages of Closed-Ended Questions

• Closed-ended questions, because of the simplicity and limit of the answers, may not offer the respondents choices that actually reflect their real feelings.

• Closed-ended questions also do not allow the respondent to explain that they do not understand the question or do not have an opinion on the issue.