Book Review: Dasborough: Saris, W. E., & Gallhofer, I. N. (2007). Design, Evaluation, and Analysis of Questionnaires for Survey Research. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley

‘‘Designing a survey involves many more decisions than most researchers realize’’ (p. v). This first sentence is the exact reason why this book is necessary. Prior to data collection, decisions must be made and these decisions will affect data quality in terms of reliability and validity. Many readers of ORM will agree that it is frustrating to spend time and energy collecting survey data, only to find afterwards that the data collected cannot provide reliable and valid explanations of the relationships under investigation (not that we are likely to admit this ever occurs! ). Many organizational researchers discover that their questionnaire design suffers from serious flaws (reliability, validity, or method errors) after the data have been collected. Although this post hoc evaluation is often acknowledged in the ‘‘Discussion of Limitations’’ sections of manuscripts, it is not the ideal scenario. Preferably, it would be better for researchers to learn of these flaws prior to collecting the data so that their sample is not wasted. As part of the Wiley Series in Survey Methodology, the two general aims of the book are (a) to provide a more scientific approach to questionnaire design and, (b) to improve the quality of survey research. The overall purpose, which is achieved by the authors, is to provide a tool that enables the up-front measurement of questionnaire quality, prior to data collection. Given the educational nature of this book, the target audience is survey researchers and research students who require an introduction to questionnaire design. This book is particularly well suited to graduate and upper-level undergraduate students in the social sciences. Although not specifically designed for organizational research, this book is relevant and the examples are not too far left of field for those in business management. Students in the organizational sciences would definitely find this book helpful. I caution, however, that this is not suitable for anyone without some prior statistical knowledge, as the later chapters and the LISREL input may be overwhelming. Hence, this book is considered to be advanced rather than basic. This book makes questionnaire design more scientific by providing methods and procedures for researchers to follow. The book is divided into four separate parts. Part 1 focuses on the operationalization of complex concepts. These early chapters introduce concepts-by-postulation versus concepts-by-intuition and how to transform concepts-by-intuition into assertions (chap. 2), and then how to formulate requests for an answer (chap. 3). This section advises researchers on how to generate—with a high level of certainty—questions that measure the concepts defined by the researcher. I found the second chapter on linguistics helpful as a means to understand complex assertions. Most readers of ORM would be aware that survey items should not be ‘‘too complex’’ in nature; we should avoid too many words, too many syllables, and double-barreled questions. Furthermore, Organizational Research Methods 13(4) 834-837 a The Author(s) 2010 Reprints and permission: sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav http://orm.sagepub.com