NZES2017: New Zealand Election Study

This is the latest iteration of the New Zealand Election Study, capturing the opinions and experiences of New Zealanders around the General Election that took place Saturday 23 September 2017.

Sampling
We sampled from the Electoral Rolls with strata:
– General Roll <30 years old
– General Roll 30+ years old
– Māori Roll <30 years old
– Māori Roll 30+ years old
– Panel (completed 2014 survey and some also 2011).

Additional to the usual funding for the series, two researchers from Durham University provided funds to perform an experiment.

All up, 11,000 people were sampled from the Electoral Rolls, and questionnaires were sent out the Monday after the 2017 General Election. There was also the option to respond online through Qualtrics.

A reminder postcard was sent out two weeks later to those that had not yet responded, and then a second copy of the questionnaire was sent out after a further two weeks. A final postcard was sent out after another two weeks.

After six months we had received just over 3,500 completed questionnaires, along with around 600 not completed: refused, living overseas, incorrect address, unable to complete, deceased.

Checks were performed to make sure that the panel members were indeed the people we intended to send out to. The final data set reported on 3,455 respondents, around 500 of whom had responded online. This was up versus the 2014 survey as a percentage of the respondents, but the overall response rate was a lot lower at around 31%.