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George Mason University | University Libraries
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Collect Data with a Survey

Resources for learning about and conducting public opinion and other research surveys, including recruitment, questionnaire design, and online survey software.

Mason currently has a site license for Qualtrics, a research-grade software that is also easy-to-use. Students should be able to have their own accounts--contact the administrator for your department to determine what instructions you should give. For small classes, have the students add you as a collaborator. For large, recurring classes, you may want to request administrator permissions yourself. 

Online Software Options

Best for the Mason Community

These are available to everybody.  

Software What for Tutorial
Qualtrics  Best for almost all projects, see Tab. Support
RedCap For more complex projects or those with special needs, may be better. See Tab. Help & FAQ
Microsoft Forms For brief surveys needing SSO authentication, this may be easiest.  Support

If you have reviewed the information linked above and have questions about what software to use, contact Data & Digital Scholarship Services at datahelp@gmu.edu to get additional advice. 

Other Options

Zapier's list of the 20 Best Online Survey Builder Tools with links to reviews.

Software Availability / Cost Tutorial
Google Forms Free with Google Account, some features like skipping  Lynda.com
Questionpro Students can get a Free Pro account for advertising Help Center
SurveyMonkey Popular and relatively easy-to-use, can get expensive  Lynda.com
LimeSurvey Install on your own server for FREE, or use the hosted version which gives 25 responses free and not too expensive for small studies Manual