A self-report study is a type of survey, questionnaire, or poll in which respondents read the question and select a response by themselves without any outside interference.
Questionnaires are a type of self-report method which consist of a set of questions usually in a highly structured written form.
Questionnaires and interviews are often able to study large samples of people fairly easy and quickly.
They are able to examine a large number of variables and can ask people to reveal behaviour and feelings which have been experienced in real situations.
Social desirability bias can be a big problem with self-report measures as participants often answer in a way to portray themselves in a good light.
Although these types of questions are more difficult to analyze, they can produce more in-depth responses and tell the researcher what the participant actually thinks, rather than being restricted by categories.
Importantly reliability of self-report measures, such as psychometric tests and questionnaires can be assessed using the split half method.
For example, results of prior self-reported outcomes were confirmed by studies involving smaller participant population using direct observation strategies.
"[4] In case, however, when there is a challenge to the validity of collected data, there are research tools that can be used to address the problem of respondent bias in self-report studies.
These include the construction of some inventories to minimize respondent distortions such as the use of scales to assess the attitude of the participant, measure personal bias, as well as identify the level of resistance, confusion, and insufficiency of self-reporting time, among others.
Self-report studies have many advantages, but they also suffer from specific disadvantages due to the way that subjects generally behave.
Self-report studies are inherently biased by the person's feelings at the time they filled out the questionnaire.
If a person feels bad at the time they fill out the questionnaire, for example, their answers will be more negative.