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Randomizing Survey Answers For Accuracy
Saint Aardvark writes: "The New York Times reports that two researchers at IBM have come up with a way to persuade people to give correct answers to survey questions: randomize the results. Strangely enough, they can get accurate information out of the aggregate of enough answers -- but it's completely anonymized. Since conservative estimates say nearly half of all survey answers are bogus, there's an interest in persuading people to be more truthful. As ever, you can use the Random NY Times Registration Generator to falsify your registration details and read the article..."
Did you lie when answering this question?
O Yes
O No
O Cowboy Neal told me the answer
Do they expect that people will enter real data on the mere promise that it will be stored in some randomized, aggregate, or other form that does not invade their privacy? If the coroporation could not be trusted in the first place, no statement they make will make them trustworthy.
I think there is something to be said about companies that ask for information as an option versus companies that ask for information as a requirement.
For example, company XYZ has released a program called Widget. In order to download Widget, users are asked to fill out a survey so that XYZ may guage the demographics of their target audience.
Some sites will allow you to bypass this step and proceed to download the software. Other sites require this information before revealing the download link. I think that the psychological difference between "required" and "optional" would heavily influence the honesty of the answers.
I know that I never honestly fill out required forms. I'll fill in a bunch of bogus details, get the link, and be on my way. However, if the form is optional, I may download first and, if I like the program, provide some details to the company. The difference? I'm not being forced to give anything up in advance.
Is this true in general? I don't know. But it makes sense to me.
I have an idea for something to replace the survey forms - an AI program to carry out a conversation with the user. Ah ha! We just have to watch out for users that say to the AI - "I am lying" - and hope the AI doesn't need therapy.
Price, Quality, Time. Pick none. What, you thought you had a choice?
Personally, if I don't trust them enough to tell them how much I make, I'm not going to trust them to randomize my results. I don't see how this will increase accuracy -- especially if I keep telling everyone I'm a 108 year old female in Uganda making $100,000+ per year year who works in the sales department of an Educational field and plans to make purchases of an suv, a house, a console gaming system, a optical mouse in the next six months and rates thier internet experience as very low. My e-mail address is sjobs@mac.com and I would like to apply for your quarterly, monthly, weekly, daily, and hourly newsletters and I do give permission to pass this information to your affiliates.
Karma: SELECT `karma` FROM `users` WHERE `userid`=138474;
Hey, it's me. The guy who put together and hosts the New York Times random login generator. First off, thanks for all your cards and letters - I originally just created that page to save myself some trouble, but I'm glad to see that everyone likes it so much.
I'd also like to remind anyone who wants to download, copy, and mirror the source of that page on their own servers, or even as an HTML page on your desktop or whatever. It's just javascript, so it's portable, and that way you'll still be able to use it when the NYT lawyers finally get around to noticing it or they start blocking requests from my page or something. (It will also help distribute my load, though I haven't had any real trouble yet...)