Effect of Incentives on Web-Based Surveys

Investigators seek ways to effectively raise the response rate of surveys. Incentives have a great influence on response rate, retention rate, and response quality in traditional surveys. The purpose of this paper is to investigate what kinds of incentives are effective in web-based surveys. This study summarizes the research framework of previous studies on the effect of incentives in web-based surveys to show that material incentives have a significant effect on web-based surveys with prepaid incentives having a moderate influence on raising the response rate. Contingent incentives significantly reduce the response rate. These findings provide guidance for web-based investigations. © 2008 Tsinghua University Press.