Our ‘old’ process of collecting the data via PAPI (Paper and Pen Interviewing) provided security in that you always had a written record of the respondent’s answers that you could reference. The problem with PAPI is that it requires a lot of time at the back end building and entering data into a database and then cleaning it for use in analysis. At this point you are hundreds of miles away from your respondents, and months down the road from the interview, so any inconsistencies needed europe rcs data to be checked using the memory of the fieldworkers and supervisors. With CAPI you have the luxury of preloaded data (i.e. household rosters), consistency checks built in to the programme, validation checks and immediate access for preliminary analysis and key findings; as well as saving time in the field by building in skip patterns to the questionnaire program. This resulted in a much cleaner data set that was available shortly after collection.
Introducing Fieldworkers to CAPI
We are fortunate in Young Lives to have a number of dedicated field staff in each country. Many of these fieldworkers have been with us from the first round in 2002 and have formed solid relationships with ’our’ children and families. It was key that the technology support and add to the existing skills of our fieldworkers. Through trial and error we have found that it is best to spend time first training our fieldworkers on the content and meaning of each section using a paper copy of the questionnaire. Then after they have an understanding of the section we move on to the program where they can focus on the skips, codes, answer types and screen/question layouts. In many instances, they were able to suggest meaningful and valuable changes to the program based off their local knowledge of the questionnaires and the context of our children. The user interface of the CAPI software we used meant we could replicate the look of the paper questionnaire and replicate it in a screen format which meant the migration from paper to tablets was relatively seamless for many of our fieldworkers.