Phrasing questions

1. What is the make and model of your car?

The questionnaire aims to explore attitudes towards motoring offences. As such, it is not really relevant what car a participant drives. However, if you have a theory that drivers of high performance cars will be more likely to commit offences such as speeding and more tolerant of reckless road behaviour then the question does have relevance. It is not badly worded as it is clear and unambiguous. However, it does presuppose that all participants own a car so perhaps it could be broken down into two questions:

• Do you own a car? [If yes, go to Q2 otherwise move to Q3]
• What is the make and model of your car?

2. Do you drive regularly?

This question is problematic in a number of ways. Firstly, it assumes that all participants are drivers when this may not be the case if the questionnaire is administered to a random selection of the public. Of course, this objection does not stand if you are using a targeted sample of car driers. Secondly, it is an ambiguous question which could have any of the following meanings:

• Do you drive your car often?
• Do you drive your car at regular intervals?
• Is your manner of driving your car regular in the sense that you drive in the same way as most other people?

It is most likely that this question is trying to find out how frequently participants drive in which case it could be reworded to make this meaning much clearer:

• How many times a week do you drive your car?

This could be a question in which it would be useful to indicate a range of answers from which participants could select the most appropriate:

• At least once a day
• Most days
• A couple of times a week
• At least once a week
• Less frequently

This would give you an idea of the frequency with which participants use their cars without the risk that they will write their own response which might be unhelpful such as ‘quite a lot’ or ‘it varies’.

3. Are you a good driver?

Would anyone really answer ‘no’ to this question? Even people who are aware of their faults as a driver tend to believe that these do not render them a bad driver. And what exactly does it mean to be a good driver? Do you mean someone who always obeys all the road traffic laws or someone who has never had an accident?

The way to improve this question depends upon what it is that you want it to achieve. If you are interested to find out whether people who break the speed limit regularly are more tolerant of others who do the same then the question needs to tackle this issue more specifically:

• Do you ever break the speed limit?

But this raises its own problems. Almost everybody would have to say ‘yes’ to this question because it is almost inevitable that drivers will do so at some point in their driving history. If all answers are the same, the question becomes meaningless. Perhaps other questions about driving behaviour would be more useful:

• Have you ever had an accident that was your fault whilst driving?
• Have you ever been convicted of a motoring offence?
• Have you ever been disqualified from driving?

In essence, one way of obtaining an answer to the question ‘are you a good driver?’ is to identify the characteristics of a good (or bad) driver and ask questions that enable you to make an evaluation on the basis of the information provided.

4. Do you agree that speeding is dangerous?

Any question that starts with the words ‘do you agree…’ is a leading question as it invites agreement. The question could be made more neutral by asking instead:

• Do you believe that speeding is dangerous?
• Is speeding dangerous?

However, even with rewording, it is a problematic question as it will be obvious to most participants that the ‘right’ (i.e. socially acceptable) answer is ‘yes’ so you cannot be sure that the responses are a true reflection of the views of the participant. Perhaps an open question that invites participants to enter their own words would be a way to obtain a clearer insight into their views:

• Write a sentence that sums up your feelings about drivers who break the speed limit.

5. How many times in the past year have you exceeded the speed limit?

This presupposes that all participants will have exceeded the speed limit. Even thought this is a reasonable supposition, it could create hostility in your participants as it does make it clear that you assume that they have committed a criminal offence. Moreover, it is also an unrealistic question to ask as it would be impossible for anyone to answer accurately – most drivers would not be able to tell you how frequently they broke the speed limit on a single journey let alone how often they had done so in a whole year.

Perhaps you could ask question to explore frequency in a different way:

• Are you usually aware of the speed limit when you are driving?
• Do you ever find that you have inadvertently exceeded the speed limit?
• Do you ever make a conscious decision to exceed the speed limit?

6. Have you ever driven after consuming large quantities of alcohol or recreational drugs?

Imagine you received a response to this question that said ‘yes’. What does this tell you? Has your participant driven after consuming alcohol, taking drugs or after doing both? If it was both, was this on separate occasions or did s/he take recreational drugs and alcohol together before taking to the road? It is impossible to tell as this is several questions rolled into one. It is also problematic as it refers to ‘large quantities’ of alcohol. What is a large quantity? For some people this would be a large glass of wine but for others it would be ten pints of beer.

• Have you ever driven a vehicle whilst under the influence of recreational drugs?
• Have you ever driven a vehicle knowing that you have consumed more than the legal limit of alcohol permitted?

7. Do you believe that it is not acceptable for drivers not to be required to retake a driving test after a period of disqualification?

This tangle of words is hard to follow but can be simplified without difficulty:

• Should drivers who are disqualified from driving have to take a test in order to drive again at the end of the period of disqualification?

8. What  would your priorities be if you were Minister for Road Safety?

It is never a good idea to place people in a hypothetical situation as it will not be clear to them what it is they are supposed to do in response to the question. Think about why the question has been asked and what sort of data you are trying to elicit and then ask it in the simplest way possible:

• What do you consider to be the greatest threat to safety on the roads?