Organizational Factors and Nonresponse in a Survey of Newspaper Editors

Abstract

Three mailings of a six-page survey questionnaire to a circulation-weighted newspaper sample group of 540 editors in 1987 resulted in a final response rate of 51.6%. Follow-up study with nonresponders did not find any regional variations in nonreponse, but did discover that editors from smaller, noncorporate newspapers were more likely to respond. Among reasons given for nonresponse were lack of time—especially from editors of larger newspapers—and complaints that the survey was too long. Some editors said they received too many mail questionnaires.