Question

When surveying subjects about sensitive or self-incriminating topics, what technique might be used to help ensure that individuals answer sensitive or self-incriminating questions honestly?

Answer 1

The RR technique or the Randomized Response can be used to help ensure that individuals answer sensitive or self-incriminating questions honestly. It is developed by Warner (1965), which aims to eliminate or at least minimize non-response and dishonest answering by survey respondents. This is accomplished by separating the response from the respondent by introducing a controlled measure of chance or uncertainty, which amounts to randomization of the answering process. This protects the identity of the respondents, at the cost of introducing a degree of uncertainty into the responses.