The Role of Qualitative Preliminary Studies in the Development of Standardized Survey Instruments An example from evaluation research in a military context

The article addresses the relevance and need for complex mixed methods designs when developing standardized measurement instruments for research in strictly hierarchical institutions. Using the evaluation of courses for officer's training in the army service of the German Bundeswehr, we demonstrate how a suitable questionnaire can be constructed by conducting an extensive qualitative preliminary study and using mixed methods for an iterative validation process. In addition, the specific nature of both the research field and evaluation studies are considered when addressing the problems of compliance with quality criteria of empirical social research in terms of field access and sample production.