Request to do online survey that comes by mail
The other day a request with login instructions and a $2 token of appreciation for the participation arrived. Even when the financial incentive is small, there is something psychologically powerful about accepting the money that is offered in connection with a request (legal or illegal); a sort of implicit contract: quid pro quo. Since the 1990s the field of "behavioral economics" has developed greatly in order to understand attention focus, decision frame, and net gain or loss to the society when problems big or small are overcomes well or poorly. See also, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_economics
Unfortunately, the record of protecting survey data privacy (superficially "anonymized," but re-personalized without too much trouble) online has not been very successful. The author interview for July 2021 in the Protonmail.com newsletter featured Carissa Veliz and her 2021 book, Privacy is Power. She documents over and over the abuses and lack of safeguards to use of the Internet and personal devices for sharing information. So unless privacy is better handled, survey requests like this one perhaps will no longer be possible to persuade participants to do.
Press L for lightbox (large) view; click the image or press Z for full image display.
Request to do online survey that comes by mail
The other day a request with login instructions and a $2 token of appreciation for the participation arrived. Even when the financial incentive is small, there is something psychologically powerful about accepting the money that is offered in connection with a request (legal or illegal); a sort of implicit contract: quid pro quo. Since the 1990s the field of "behavioral economics" has developed greatly in order to understand attention focus, decision frame, and net gain or loss to the society when problems big or small are overcomes well or poorly. See also, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_economics
Unfortunately, the record of protecting survey data privacy (superficially "anonymized," but re-personalized without too much trouble) online has not been very successful. The author interview for July 2021 in the Protonmail.com newsletter featured Carissa Veliz and her 2021 book, Privacy is Power. She documents over and over the abuses and lack of safeguards to use of the Internet and personal devices for sharing information. So unless privacy is better handled, survey requests like this one perhaps will no longer be possible to persuade participants to do.
Press L for lightbox (large) view; click the image or press Z for full image display.