Readings

Fall 2026 required and recommended readings

Readings are listed by class session. Complete the Required readings before class. Recommended readings are optional references for students who want additional depth or need them for the semester project.

Access

• Open access links lead directly to material available without a subscription.
• UT Libraries links lead to the publisher or DOI record. Sign in through UT Libraries when prompted. A course copy will also be posted on Canvas when permitted.
• Copyrighted course PDFs are distributed through Canvas and are not linked from the public website.
• Page ranges refer to the editions listed below. You are responsible only for the chapters, pages, or named sections specified.

Core books

• Groves, Robert M., Floyd J. Fowler Jr., Mick P. Couper, James M. Lepkowski, Eleanor Singer, and Roger Tourangeau. 2009. Survey Methodology. 2nd ed. Wiley. Book information. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Dillman, Don A., Jolene D. Smyth, and Leah Melani Christian. 2014. Internet, Phone, Mail, and Mixed-Mode Surveys: The Tailored Design Method. 4th ed. Wiley. Book information. UT Libraries.
• Marsden, Peter V., and James D. Wright, eds. 2010. Handbook of Survey Research. 2nd ed. Emerald. Course PDF on Canvas.
• Asher, Herbert. 2017. Polling and the Public: What Every Citizen Should Know. 9th ed. CQ Press. Course PDF on Canvas.
• Tourangeau, Roger, Lance J. Rips, and Kenneth Rasinski. 2000. The Psychology of Survey Response. Cambridge University Press. Book information. UT Libraries/Canvas.

Students are not expected to read these books cover to cover. Only the chapters or sections identified below are assigned.

Session 1 · Polls, evidence, and error

Required

• American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR). 2025. “2024 Pre-Election Polling: An Evaluation of the 2024 General Election Polls,” Executive Summary. Read the complete executive summary. Open access.
• AAPOR. “Polling Accuracy.” Read the complete webpage. Open access.
• Groves et al. 2009. Chapter 2, “Inference and Error in Surveys,” pp. 39–64. UT Libraries/Canvas.

Recommended

• AAPOR. 2025. Full report on 2024 pre-election polling. Open access.
• Asher. 2017. Chapter 1, “Polling and the Public.” Course PDF on Canvas.

Session 2 · Research objectives, ethics, and total survey error

Required

• AAPOR. “Code of Professional Ethics and Practices.” Read sections I–III: Principles of Professional Responsibility, Principles of Professional Practice in the Conduct of Our Work, and Standards for Disclosure. Open access.
• AAPOR. “Best Practices for Survey Research.” Read the complete webpage. Open access.

Recommended

• AAPOR. “Disclosure Standards.” Open access.
• Groves et al. 2009. Re-read Chapter 2, pp. 48–64, focusing on Figure 2.5 and the individual components of total survey error. UT Libraries/Canvas.

Session 3 · Concepts, measurement, and questionnaire architecture

Required

• Groves et al. 2009. Chapter 7, “Questions and Answers in Surveys,” pp. 217–253. Focus on the relationship among constructs, measurements, responses, and response error. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Krosnick, Jon A., and Stanley Presser. 2010. “Question and Questionnaire Design.” In Handbook of Survey Research, 2nd ed., pp. 263–313. Read pp. 263–286, through the end of the section on open versus closed questions. Course PDF on Canvas.
• Pew Research Center. “Writing Survey Questions.” Read the sections “Question development,” “Measuring change over time,” and “Open- and closed-ended questions.” Open access.

Recommended

• Tourangeau, Rips, and Rasinski. 2000. Chapter 1, “The Psychology of Survey Response,” pp. 1–22. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Converse, Jean M., and Stanley Presser. 1986. Survey Questions: Handcrafting the Standardized Questionnaire, Chapter 2, “The Logic of Survey Questions,” pp. 9–30. UT Libraries.

Session 4 · Wording, response options, order, and sensitive questions

Required

• Schwarz, Norbert. 1999. “Self-Reports: How the Questions Shape the Answers.” American Psychologist 54(2): 93–105. Read the complete article. UT Libraries.
• Tourangeau, Roger, and Ting Yan. 2007. “Sensitive Questions in Surveys.” Psychological Bulletin 133(5): 859–883. Read pp. 859–870 and the conclusion on pp. 878–879. UT Libraries.
• Pew Research Center. 2018. “Methods 101: Survey Question Wording.” Watch the video and review the examples on the page. Open access.

Recommended

• Pew Research Center. 2019. “When Online Survey Respondents Only ‘Select Some That Apply.’” Open access.
• Asher. 2017. Chapters 2–3, “The Problem of Nonattitudes” and “Wording and Context of Questions.” Course PDF on Canvas.
• Krosnick and Presser. 2010. Complete the remainder of Chapter 9 in the Handbook of Survey Research, pp. 287–313. Course PDF on Canvas.

Session 5 · Cognitive testing and multilingual equivalence

Required

• Willis, Gordon B. 2005. Cognitive Interviewing: A Tool for Improving Questionnaire Design. Chapter 1, “An Introduction to Cognitive Interviewing,” pp. 1–15. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Survey Research Center. 2016. “Translation: Overview.” Read Guidelines 1–4 and their rationales. Open access.

Recommended

• Pan, Yuling, and Mandy Sha. 2019. The Sociolinguistics of Survey Translation, Chapter 2, “A Sociolinguistic Perspective on Survey Question Design and Translation,” pp. 21–39. UT Libraries.
• Willis, Gordon B. 2005. Chapter 4, “The Practice of Cognitive Interviewing,” pp. 42–65. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Survey Research Center. 2016. Guidelines for Best Practice in Cross-Cultural Surveys. Read “Pretesting: Cognitive Interviewing.” Open access.

Session 6 · Sampling and representation

Required

• Groves et al. 2009. Chapter 3, “Target Populations, Sampling Frames, and Coverage Error,” pp. 69–94. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Groves et al. 2009. Chapter 4, “Sample Design and Sampling Error,” pp. 97–118 only, stopping before “Systematic Sampling.” UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Pew Research Center. 2023. “Comparing Two Types of Online Survey Samples.” Read the overview and “How the probability and opt-in samples compare.” Open access.

Recommended

• AAPOR. 2013. “Report of the Task Force on Non-Probability Sampling.” Open the report from the AAPOR reports page and read the executive summary. Open access.
• Kennedy, Courtney, et al. 2016. “Evaluating Online Nonprobability Surveys.” Open access.
• Asher. 2017. Chapter 4, “Sampling Techniques.” Course PDF on Canvas.

Session 7 · Modes, recruitment, coverage, and nonresponse

Required

• Groves et al. 2009. Chapter 5, “Methods of Data Collection,” pp. 149–162, focusing on the comparison of survey modes. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Pew Research Center. 2015. “From Telephone to the Web: The Challenge of Mode-of-Interview Effects in Public Opinion Polls.” Read the overview and “Mode differences by question content.” Open access.

Recommended

• AAPOR. 2019. “Transitions from Telephone Surveys to Self-Administered and Mixed-Mode Surveys.” Open the report from the AAPOR reports page and read the executive summary. Open access.
• Groves, Robert M., and Emilia Peytcheva. 2008. “The Impact of Nonresponse Rates on Nonresponse Bias.” Public Opinion Quarterly 72(2): 167–189. Read pp. 167–181 and the conclusion on pp. 186–187. UT Libraries.
• Dillman, Smyth, and Christian. 2014. Chapter 11, “Mixed-Mode Questionnaires and Survey Implementation.” UT Libraries.
• Dillman and Benjamin Messer. 2010. Chapter 17, “Mixed-Mode Surveys,” in the Handbook of Survey Research, pp. 551–574. Course PDF on Canvas.

Session 8 · Programming, mobile design, randomization, and QA

Required

• Dillman, Smyth, and Christian. 2014. Chapter 9, “Web Questionnaires and Implementation.” UT Libraries.
• U.S. Census Bureau. 2026. Design Guidelines for U.S. Census Bureau Web Surveys and Censuses. Read “Overall Look and Feel,” “Screen Elements,” and the entries for single-select, multi-select, grids, and open-text questions under “Question Components.” Open access.
• Course instrument QA protocol. Read the complete checklist posted on Canvas and bring it to class. Canvas.

Recommended

• AAPOR. “Disclosure Standards.” Revisit as a design-stage audit tool. Open access.
• Martin, Elizabeth, et al. 2007. “Guidelines for Designing Questionnaires for Administration in Different Modes.” Read the introduction and Guidelines 1–12. Open access.
• Couper, Mick P., and Michael Bosnjak. 2010. Chapter 16, “Internet Surveys,” in the Handbook of Survey Research, pp. 527–550. Course PDF on Canvas.

Session 9 · Fieldwork, paradata, fraud, and respondent quality

Required

• Dillman, Smyth, and Christian. 2014. Chapter 2, “Reducing People’s Reluctance to Respond to Surveys,” pp. 19–55. UT Libraries.
• AAPOR. 2022. Data Quality Metrics for Online Samples: Considerations for Study Design and Analysis. Read Section 1, “Introduction and Scope,” pp. 1–2, and Section 6, “Summary and Recommendations,” pp. 49–51. Open access.
• Kennedy, Courtney, et al. 2020. Assessing the Risks to Online Polls From Bogus Respondents. Read the overview, pp. 2–8, and the report’s concluding recommendations. Open access.

Recommended

• Pew Research Center. 2020. “Answers That Did Not Match the Question Were Concentrated in Opt-In Polls.” Open access.
• AAPOR. 2020. “Falsification in Surveys.” Open the report from the AAPOR reports page and read the executive summary and recommendations. Open access.

Session 10 · Cleaning, coding, weighting, and documentation

Required

• Pew Research Center. 2018. “For Weighting Online Opt-In Samples, What Matters Most?” Read the overview and conclusion. Open access.
• Pew Research Center. 2018. “How Different Weighting Methods Work.” Read the complete methods explainer. Open access.

Recommended

• Lumley, Thomas. 2010. Complex Surveys: A Guide to Analysis Using R, Chapter 1, “Basic Tools,” pp. 1–14. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Groves et al. 2009. Chapter 10, “Postcollection Processing of Survey Data,” pp. 343–365. UT Libraries/Canvas.

Session 11 · Estimation, uncertainty, and subgroup analysis

Required

• Pew Research Center. 2021. “Why Pew Research Center Will Display Margins of Error in Some Graphics.” Read the complete explainer. Open access.
• Pew Research Center. 2018. “Variability of Survey Estimates.” Read the complete methods explainer. Open access.
• Wasserstein, Ronald L., Allen L. Schirm, and Nicole A. Lazar. 2019. “Moving to a World Beyond ‘p < 0.05.’” The American Statistician 73(sup1): 1–19. Read pp. 1–10. Open access.

Recommended

• Lumley, Thomas. 2010. Complex Surveys, Chapter 2, “Simple and Stratified Sampling,” pp. 15–31. UT Libraries/Canvas.

Session 12 · Visualization and public interpretation

Required

• Healy, Kieran. 2018. Data Visualization: A Practical Introduction. Read Chapter 1, “Look at Data.” Open access.

Recommended

• Cairo, Alberto. 2019. How Charts Lie, Chapter 2, “How Charts Lie: Poor Design,” pp. 23–49. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• Healy, Kieran. 2018. Chapter 2, “Get Started.” Open access.
• Schwabish, Jonathan A. 2021. Better Data Visualizations. Chapter 2, “Five Guidelines for Better Data Visualizations,” pp. 17–42. UT Libraries/Canvas.
• AAPOR. “Disclosure Standards.” Read sections 1–3. Open access.
• Applied comparison: The two polling releases named on Canvas. Canvas.

Session 13 · Reporting, peer review, and partner briefing

Required preparation: No new reading. Bring the complete team draft and apply the course report style guide and reproducibility checklist before class.

Recommended reference while revising

• AAPOR. “Transparency Initiative.” Review “What must be disclosed?” Open access.
• Pew Research Center. “Writing Survey Questions.” Review how the page documents question wording and order. Open access.
• Asher. 2017. Chapters 6 and 9, “The Media and the Polls” and “Polling and Democracy,” especially “How to Evaluate Polls: A Summary.” Course PDF on Canvas.

Session 14 · Presentation and retrospective

There is no new reading. Review the final report, peer feedback, decision log, and your individual contribution record before class.