Academic Research Through IVR

IVR technology has been used widely for many purposes beyond customer service including automated opinion polling and market research questionnaires. Behavioral researchers at the University of Buffalo have taken it a step further and are currently applying the technology in two National Institute of Health funded studies. The research involves investigating the effects of alcohol, marijuana and the situational behaviors that are associated with their use. The IVR systems are configured to make random calls to subjects' cell phones and conduct surveys of their experiences with respect to their use of alcohol and marijuana.

In the past, these studies have relied on subjects taking surveys at scheduled times and giving their responses based on remembering what they were thinking and feeling at moments in the past. With the use of IVR technology, subjects can be inconspicuously surveyed over their cell phones while they are actually partaking in alcohol or marijuana and can give much more relevant responses. Not only does this give more pertinent data for the study, but it also increases the privacy of participants. The true test of this survey methodology and it's future will be to see how it compares with similar studies conducted in more traditional manners.