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Longitudinal survey with a demographic item that needs to change

Forum|Forum|1 year ago
January 11, 2024
3 replies
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scoulter

I have a longitudinal survey that gathers data from over 50 educational institutions. We are in the 5th year of data collection and 2 of the institutions have combined. How do I make a change to an existing survey item (Institution Name) so that people now see their new institution’s name and not the names of the 2 previous institutions without disrupting anything with the survey’s longitudinal data?

Best answer by bgooldfed

Hi @scoulter,

We have a similar behaviour in our surveys, which presents a student with their teacher and unit names for feedback. The solution is very easy; you’ll need to use embedded data to store the correct institution name for each student, and then add that embedded data field to the relevant question.

eg:

Add a new embedded data field to your survey called institutionName. Leave the value blank, as this will allow it to populate dynamically based on what we do next.

Add a new column to your population called institutionName, containing the correct values for each participant:

Upload the file to your mailing list to update it with the new data
Adjust the survey question to pipe in the institutionName field:

Test and publish your survey

With that done, the survey should now present whatever you’ve specified for institutionName to each participant.

eg: for John Smith

eg: for Jane Doe

I hope that helps!

Ron_Brown
Forum|Forum|1 year ago
January 11, 2024

Depending on where you are looking at the data you can recode the “answer” choices on a dashboard for the old institutions both to be the new one, which will combine the information. You would lose that historical data. If the historical data is critical, then you could leave it and add the new institution and the old data wouldn’t be there.

If you are wanting to change at the survey data level, you can do a filter in Data and Analysis and edit the fields for all the old data to the new name.

There are a few different ways and you are welcome to reach out to me if you want me to show you how to approach imo.

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bgooldfed
Level 4 ●●●●
Answer
Forum|Forum|1 year ago
January 11, 2024

Hi @scoulter,

We have a similar behaviour in our surveys, which presents a student with their teacher and unit names for feedback. The solution is very easy; you’ll need to use embedded data to store the correct institution name for each student, and then add that embedded data field to the relevant question.

eg:

Add a new embedded data field to your survey called institutionName. Leave the value blank, as this will allow it to populate dynamically based on what we do next.