Questionnaires are not always the most accessible way to collect data from your audience. Here we share some tips to help you be as inclusive as possible.

‘An accessible survey is designed so that people with varying hearing, movement, sight, and cognitive abilities can complete it.’ Surveymonkey

Build an accessible questionnaire

Whether you intend to survey a large or small sample of your audience, you may need to put some additional time into making your questionnaire as accessible as possible. In some cases, your questionnaire software may help you use an accessible design.

Checklist

Here are some tips to improve your questionnaire, and hopefully, your questionnaire responses. 

  • Is your language clear?

  • Are your sentences short? 

  • Is your survey only as long as it needs to be, or rather, as short as possible? 

  • Is your text a good size? 

  • Are you using unexplained acronyms? Explain them first and don’t assume prior knowledge. 

  • Have you tested the order of your questions, so the question flow makes sense? 

  • Does the contrast between the colours in your questionnaire make your text as visible as possible? Think about how you use colour in the survey questions (e.g. star ratings). 

  • Have you added alternative text to any images or logos you are using? Do your videos have captions? 

  • Can you make complex questions, e.g. matrix tables, more accessible by breaking them up into shorter questions? 

  • Do you need to translate your survey and check how certain concepts might be understood in different contexts? 

The tips above have been drawn from Europeana’s advice for publications, Surveymonkey’s own tips and the University of California’s guidance for accessible surveys.

Next steps