Research in a Time of Financial Constraints: Carrying Out Representative Postal Surveys

In Ireland funding for research, especially in the social sciences, has declined considerably. Consequently some data collection methods, particularly face-to-face interviews, have become financially impractical. Postal surveys offer a less expensive alternative but the use of postal methods is hampered in Ireland by restrictions on the use of the electoral register - the only national database which matches citizens' names and addresses. The electoral register was the most common sampling frame used by researchers to generate representative samples of the Irish population until the Electoral (Amendment) Act 2001 (Section 32) prohibited its use for general research purposes. Basing a sample on addresses only is problematic in the absence of a national postcode system and the fact that a large percentage of Irish houses have non-unique addresses (i.e. lack numbers). Adapted from the source document.