Interviewing Changes Attitudes—Sometimes

DOES THE MERE asking of questions motivate a respondent to form attitudes which were previously absent or to change the direction or intensity of extant attitudes? The answer to this question is important in many applications of the survey method, but particularly in panel surveys in which respondents are asked the same questions on two or more occasions (waves). If interview effects exist, they pose important ethical and methodological problems for survey researchers. If, under certain conditions, interviewing changes attitudes and the behavior they mediate, the survey researcher assumes the role of an agent, as well as a reporter, of social change. For example, in the course of studying racial or intergroup attitudes, the researcher may make certain issues salient or may polarize socially undesirable attitudes merely by asking race-related questions.