Title: RIOT - a tool for estimating the reliability of surveys

Authors: James Daniel Correa De Freitas; Henrique Rego Monteiro Da Hora; Dalessandro Soares Vianna; Helder Gomes Costa

Addresses: Instituto Federal Fluminense – 173, Dr. Siqueira st, Campos dos Goytacazes, Brazil ' Instituto Federal Fluminense – 235, Dário Borges Vieira Ave, Bom Jesus do Itabapoana, Brazil ' Universidade Cândido Mendes – 100, Anita Peçanha st., Campos dos Goytacazes, Brazil ' Universidade Federal Fluminense – 156, Passo da Pátria st., 156, Niterói, Brazil

Abstract: The constant search for quality in services by organisations requires a greater concern for the credibility and reliability of tools, such as the questionnaire, used to measure the satisfaction level of individuals about products and/or services provided. It is now known that the Cronbach's alpha coefficient is an estimate created to evaluate how reliable a questionnaire is. In this work, this coefficient becomes an important piece in the creation of a new tool, called rational inference over trust (RIOT), which through the implementation of a genetic algorithm and the idealisation of a new estimate adapted to a new reliability evaluation, will seek to optimise the same in a given questionnaire.

Keywords: alpha coefficient; questionnaire reliability; questionnaires; rational inference over trust; RIOT; genetic algorithms; surveys; survey reliability; reliability evaluation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJICT.2015.070324

International Journal of Information and Communication Technology, 2015 Vol.7 No.4/5, pp.481 - 494

Received: 16 May 2013
Accepted: 28 Apr 2014
Published online: 02 Jul 2015 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article