UGC NET Questions (Paper – 1)

A questionnaire is a widely used research tool consisting of a series of written questions or statements to which respondents record their answers. It is especially suitable for collecting data from large samples in surveys where face-to-face interaction may be limited. Questionnaires can contain closed-ended, open-ended or mixed items and are designed to be completed in a standardised way. Hence, the structured written set of questions described in the stem is called a questionnaire.

Option A:
A questionnaire provides uniform questions to all respondents, making comparisons and statistical analysis more straightforward. When properly designed and pretested, it can achieve high reliability and efficiency in large-scale studies. This matches the stem, so this option is correct.

Option B:
A rating scale is a specific type of item within a questionnaire or schedule where respondents indicate their position along a continuum, such as strongly agree to strongly disagree. It is not the entire set of written questions.

Option C:
An interview guide is a list of points or questions used by an interviewer in face-to-face or telephone interviews, and responses are typically oral, not written by the respondent. Therefore, it does not fully match the description.

Option D:
An observation schedule is a checklist or coding scheme used to record behaviours or events observed by the researcher, not a set of written questions answered directly by respondents.