Peruse the history of survey research and the essential concepts for data quality. With an emphasis on total survey error, the authors review principles and concepts in the field and examine important unresolved issues in survey methods. Spanning a range of topics dealing with the quality of data collected through the survey process, they focus on such key issues as: Major sources of survey error, examining the origins of each error source most successful methods for reducing errors from those sources Methods most often used in practice for evaluating the effects of the source on total survey error Implications of improving survey quality for organizational management and costs

PAUL P. BIEMER, PhD, is a distinguished Fellow at RTI International, and Assistant Director for Survey Research at the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

LARS E. LYBERG, PhD, is Chief Scientist at Statistics Sweden. They both have co-edited, with others, Measurement Errors in Surveys, Survey Measurement and Process Quality, and Telephone Survey Methodology (all published by Wiley).