Survey sampling in the time of social distancing: experiences from a quantitative research in the wake of COVID‑19 pandemic

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 This paper explores the practical difficulties of conducting an online quantitative survey across the Maldives during the COVID‑19 pandemic response to study people’s values in the midst of a crisis, and addresses crisis experience and perception, value orientation, personality traits, social cohesion, and trust in relevant authorities. This paper reports on the methodological component and not on the survey findings. A stratified systematic random sampling approach was used, with stratification on urban‑rural clusters (cities and other islands), gender, and age of the population to recruit at least 400 from the urban and 600 participants from the rural communities. To overcome the practical difficulty of accessing households due to restrictive measures across the Maldives and lockdown status in the greater Male’ area, the latest voters’ registry was used to select every nth participant as the sample frame. Participants were recruited through phone calls, and survey instrument shared via social media, achieving a response rate of 87%.The practical difficulties with the sampling approach were different in urban‑rural clusters, ranging from securing the phone numbers for prospective participants, nonresponse to phone calls, discrepancies in internet access, and the lack of control on whether the intended participant was in fact the person completing the survey. To overcome these challenges, a mix of probability and non‑probability sampling was utilised ensuring not more than one participant was recruited from any household, while adhering to the stratification of gender and age. The statistical findings on the validity and reliability of the data show that the recruited sample is representative of the population. This outcome highlights the adaptability and applicability of established quantitative research methods to a geographically dispersed small island developing state, under nonconventional situations.