Put your theories to the test. Sound survey data makes your research conclusions stronger and more compelling, providing direct evidence to support or refute your claims.
Academics can use surveys to test hypotheses about attitudes and behaviors in a range of domains: business, politics, health, and more! Have a new program of research? Pretest your intuitions with open-ended questions first and get rich qualitative data. For longitudinal research, repeated survey measures can help you establish a baseline and track changes over time.
Moreover, the online medium allows you to survey people around the world instead of having to bring them in. It also eliminates the hassle of entering data from a pencil and paper survey, saving you time and money. When you use SurveyMonkey, your data downloads directly to Excel or SPSS.
How to use surveys in academic research
Pretesting
Going to launch a large-scale or costly project? Make sure you’ve worked all the kinks out of your survey first before you take the plunge. Testing your methodology with an online survey and a convenience sample first can help you catch any errors or confusion early on, saving you time and money.
Sample smarter
Before you test your hypothesis, hone your method for outreach to your target population. What’s the best way to reach them? By mail or email? Are they regular Internet users? Do they use smartphones? Are they on social networks? With this information, you can get your sample quicker, cheaper, and easier.
Longitudinal studies
Want to research the long-term impact of public health awareness programs, economic policy, energy practices, and more on specific groups of people? Use surveying to obtain baseline data and regular updates.
Field training and development
Use surveys to obtain feedback and assessments at places where you intern or train to gain valuable insight on the “way you show up” in the professional world. Use the feedback you receive on your practicum, internship, graduate student research, lab work, or student teaching to guide your continued skills development.
Sample academic research survey templates
Here are some ways in which you can use surveys to support specific areas of study and academic research.
Healthcare and medical research
Explore patient demographics, behaviors, access to healthcare, gender health issues, community outreach programs, and more. SurveyMonkey has an extensive selection of Healthcare questionnaire and Medical Research survey templates for you to drag and drop into your survey, including the PHQ-9, the standard means of evaluating depressive tendencies.
Healthy lifestyles and behavioral studies
Use health and lifestyle surveys to gather information from research subjects about health and lifestyle habits.
Child development and education studies
Use templates from SurveyMonkey’s collection of Education, School, and Academic Online survey templates for research projects on family and school relationships, educational outcomes, school climate, online learning programs, student satisfaction, and more. Leverage templates such as the Harvard Graduate School of Education Pre K-12 Parent survey for parents’ detailed feedback on their children’s education experience.
Psychology and political science
Correlate attitudes and approaches of specific population groups with perspectives on a range of experiences and issues—from social networking to media consumption, political views to social identity, and more.
Demographic data
Use SurveyMonkey Audience for help in reaching the target audiences for your research, and build relevant, real-world data into your research proposals or business plans. SurveyMonkey has a ready-to-use template of demographics verified by our staff methodologists that you can add to any survey to make sure you know who you’re looking at.
Discover more resources
Toolkits Directory
Discover our toolkits, designed to help you leverage feedback in your role or industry.
Create employee exit interview forms to know where to improve
Ask the right questions on your exit interview survey to reduce employee attrition. Get started today with our employee form builder tools and templates.
Receive the necessary permissions with online consent forms
Get the permissions you need with a custom consent form. Sign up for free today to create forms with our consent form templates.
Receive requests easily with online request forms
Create and customise request forms easily to receive requests from employees, customers and more. Use our expert-built templates to get started in minutes.