Setting Standards for Single Respondent Survey Design

• Author: Patricia J. Daugherty,Haozhe Chen,Frank Montabon
• Date: 01 January 2018
• Published date: 01 January 2018
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jscm.12158

SETTING STANDARDS FOR SINGLE RESPONDENT

SURVEY DESIGN

FRANK MONTABON , PATRICIA J. DAUGHERTY, AND HAOZHE CHEN

Iowa State University

We propose that single respondent surveys continue to be a viable supply

chain management research tool. However, necessary care must be taken

in research design and implementation. Articles published in leading sup-

ply chain management journals in the past 10 years were reviewed to

identify patterns and trends in the use of single respondent surveys. Based

on that analysis, several recommendations such as using multimethod

research design, careful informant selection, and better documentation are

presented for survey researchers to ensure and enhance the validity of sin-

gle respondent survey research.

Keywords: single respondent surveys; common method bias; key informants

INTRODUCTION

Critiques of contemporary research issues have seem-

ingly led some to conclude that single respondent sur-

veys are dead, that is, no longer of value as a research

tool. We do not agree; instead, we propose that they are

often the best approach. Single respondent surveys

remain a vital tool for supply chain researchers.

We argue that single respondent surveys are an

important research tool, while acknowledging that

researchers must take care in designing and using

them. However, such caution is necessary with any

research method. We develop a variety of arguments

for our position. At the core, though, our primary

concern is that eliminating a tool from the toolbox

will not be useful to the development of the field.

USE OF SURVEYS IN SCM LITERATURE

Supply chain management (SCM) researchers have

examined the extent and pattern of survey use. For

example, Mentzer and Kahn (1995) reviewed all arti-

cles published in the Journal of Business Logistics from

1978 to 1993. They reported that survey research

accounted for 54.3% of all articles published during

that period. More recently, Melnyk, Page, Wu and

Burns (2012) indicated survey use declined signifi-

cantly in five top supply chain management journals.

In the period 2000–2003, there were more than 40

surveys per year, while in the period 2005–2008, there

were less than 20 per year. However, the issue of

using single respondent surveys has not been specifi-

cally addressed in SCM literature, except for brief dis-

cussions in several editorials.

To understand SCM survey research trends and prac-

tices in recent years, we focused our efforts on the

four leading empirically focused journals used in the

Supply Chain Management Journal List

TM

—Decision

Sciences Journal (DSJ),Journal of Business Logistics

(JBL),Journal of Operations Management (JOM), and

Journal of Supply Chain Management (JSCM). These

four journals are appropriate target journals for our

assessment because they publish empirical-based

research across a broad spectrum of supply chain

topics and are considered top tier based on overall

reputation and impact. We examined 1,194 original

research articles published in these journals from

2007 to 2016, excluding nonresearch articles such as

editorials or book reviews. Among these articles, 391

were identified as survey based. Articles that used sur-

vey instruments as a part of experimental research

design were excluded from our review.

The 391 articles account for about 32.7% of the

total number of articles published. To make a longitu-

dinal comparison of survey-based research’s promi-

nence in these journals, we split the 10 years into two

5-year periods: 2007–2011 and 2012–2016. The per-

centages of survey-based research in DSJ and JSCM

remained relatively constant across the two periods at

about 23% and 32%, respectively, but those of JBL

and JOM dropped from 35.0% to 31.7% and from

41.7% to 37.4%, respectively. Overall survey usage

decreased from 34.8% to 30.7%. Although a slight

decline is noted, survey-based research is still a pri-

mary research method in the SCM field accounting

for nearly a third of the total published research.

Breakdowns of total research articles and survey-based

January 2018 35

Journal of Supply Chain Management

2018, 54(1), 35–41

©2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.