The Effects of Anonymity Versus Identified But Confidential Response Conditions In Organizational Research

Abstract

An important consideration when using questionnaires in organizational research is whether or not they should be administered under anonymous or identified but confidential response conditions. If the responses are to be used with other data (e.g., that obtainable from personnel files), respondent identification is mandatory. Research findings in the literature on the anonymity question suffer from two main inadequacies. First the research subjects may be students, thereby making inferences for research using employees impractical. Second, the research using employees as subjects does not deal with issues of high risk (e.g., a subordinate's perception of the technical expertise of his supervisor). The present study recognized these limitations by (1) using employees of a public agency as subjects and (2) dealing with high risk issues. The researchers concluded that under the anonymous condition, responses will be significantly more negative than under the IBC condition.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

1. Butler, Richard , "Effects of Signed and Unsigned Questionnaires for Both Sensitive and Nonsensitive Items," Journal of Applied Psychology Vol. 57, 1973, pp. 348-349.

2. Corey, S. M. , "Signed vs. Unsigned Attitude Questionnaires," Journal of Educational Psychology Vol. 28 (February, 1937), pp. 144-148.

3. Fischer, R. P. , "Signed Versus Unsigned Personal Questionnaires," Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 30 (June, 1946), pp. 220-225.

4. Gerberich, J. B. , and J. M. Mason , "Signed Versus Unsigned Questionnaires," Journal of Educational Research, Vol. 42 (October, 1948), No. 2, pp. 122-126.

5. Gordon, Michael E. , and M. M. Petty , "A Note on the Effectiveness of Research Conditions in Reducing the Magnitude of Dissimulation on a Self-Report Criterion," Personnel Psychology Vol. 24 (Spring, 1971), pp. 53-61.

6. Hamel, La Verne , and Hans G. Reif , "Should Attitude Questionnaires Be Signed?" Personnel Psychology Vol. 5 (Summer, 1952), pp. 87-91.

7. Pearlin, Leonard I. , "The Appeals of Anonymity in Questionnaire Response," Public Opinion Quarterly Vol. 25 (1961), pp. 640-647.

8. Pelz, Donald , "The Influence of Anonymity on Expressed Attitudes," Human Organization Vol. 18 (Summer, 1959), pp. 88-91.

9. Rosen, Ned A. , "Anonymity and Attitude Measurement," Public Opinion Quarterly Vol. 24 (1960), pp. 675-679.

10.

10. Weiss, D. J. , R. V. Dawis , G. W. England , and L. H. Lofquist , Manual for the Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, Work Adjustment Project, Industrial Relations Center, 1967).