Selecting cases according to a third criterion

The previous page explained how interviewers are called upon to select a project to work on, and cases to access according to the project strata and the most recent call disposition.

Interviewers can also be offered a third criterion (beyond the strata and call dispositions) to select cases within a project. Interviewers could then select cases on the basis of, say, the respondent language or gender or any other (known or yet unknown) characteristic.

In order to activate this feature, the following steps must be taken:

  • the questionnaire must include a "# CATI selection 3" instruction which indicates which question in the questionnaire acts as the third selection criterion. The instruction syntax is as follows: # CATI selection 3 = question_name, YES|NO
    • the "question_name" must correspond to a question which exists in the questionnaire; its categories correspond to the relevant groupings of cases (e.g., a language question would contain all of the relevant language codes);
    • the YES|NO selection is called the "action field": if set to YES, it allows interviewers to modify the value of the datum from their call management window (e.g., it could allow them to enter a language code based on an answering machine message, where no language was known in advance).
  • the question indentified in the "# CATI selection 3" instruction must exist in the questionnaire; it should probably be of the STOCK type so that it is not displayed during the interview but this is not a requirement; if the action field is set to NO in the pound instruction, the question could be given an INFOCATI type so that the existing value is shown to interviewers.

Once this feature is activated, the following happens:

  • a third selection criterion box is displayed to interviewers in the login process; this box includes the categories of the target question in the questionnaire as well as an additional category representing the absence of data (e.g., no language information was available for the case);
  • interviewers select one or more of the third selection categories to draw cases from the call queue;
  • if the action field is set to YES, interviewers are shown a radio group (or a dropdown list if the SELECTION3 question bears the DROPDOWN type) of categories in their call management interface and they have the ability to change the existing data for the case they are managing.

Selecting cases according to a third criterion

The previous page explained how interviewers are called upon to select a project to work on, and cases to access according to the project strata and the most recent call disposition.

Interviewers can also be offered a third criterion (beyond the strata and call dispositions) to select cases within a project. Interviewers could then select cases on the basis of, say, the respondent language or gender or any other (known or yet unknown) characteristic.

In order to activate this feature, the following steps must be taken:

  • the questionnaire must include a "# CATI selection 3" instruction which indicates which question in the questionnaire acts as the third selection criterion. The instruction syntax is as follows: # CATI selection 3 = question_name, YES|NO
    • the "question_name" must correspond to a question which exists in the questionnaire; its categories correspond to the relevant groupings of cases (e.g., a language question would contain all of the relevant language codes);
    • the YES|NO selection is called the "action field": if set to YES, it allows interviewers to modify the value of the datum from their call management window (e.g., it could allow them to enter a language code based on an answering machine message, where no language was known in advance).
  • the question indentified in the "# CATI selection 3" instruction must exist in the questionnaire; it should probably be of the STOCK type so that it is not displayed during the interview but this is not a requirement; if the action field is set to NO in the pound instruction, the question could be given an INFOCATI type so that the existing value is shown to interviewers.

Once this feature is activated, the following happens:

  • a third selection criterion box is displayed to interviewers in the login process; this box includes the categories of the target question in the questionnaire as well as an additional category representing the absence of data (e.g., no language information was available for the case);
  • interviewers select one or more of the third selection categories to draw cases from the call queue;
  • if the action field is set to YES, interviewers are shown a radio group (or a dropdown list if the SELECTION3 question bears the DROPDOWN type) of categories in their call management interface and they have the ability to change the existing data for the case they are managing.