Campus Tech
How can Nigerian students create a research questionnaire…
GOSPELTRADER Research Desk · 5 November 2026 · 5 min read
Learn how to build a research questionnaire in Google Forms, add consent, protect respondents and export responses for your Nigerian student project.
You can create a research questionnaire for free by signing into Google Forms, adding your approved questions and sharing the responder link with your target participants. Before collecting data, include informed consent, check your privacy settings and test the form on a phone.
1. Prepare your questions and obtain approval
Start with your research objectives, not the form builder. Each question should collect information you need to answer your research questions or test your hypotheses.
Follow your department’s requirements for supervisor approval and ethics review before recruiting participants. Using Google Forms does not replace these requirements.
- • Define who can participate, such as undergraduate students at a particular university.
- • Use clear, neutral wording and ask about one issue at a time.
- • Avoid collecting names, matriculation numbers or phone numbers unless your approved research genuinely needs them.
- • If you use an established questionnaire or scale, check its permissions and avoid changing its wording without methodological justification.
2. Create your form and add informed consent
Open forms.google.com in your browser, sign into your Google account and choose a blank form. Give it a descriptive title and explain the study’s purpose in language your participants can understand.
Add an introductory section covering participation requirements, what respondents will do, any relevant risks, how you will use their data, who can access it and whom they can contact. Explain that participation is voluntary and state any limits on withdrawing an anonymous response after submission.
- • Add a required multiple-choice consent question with options such as “I agree to participate” and “I do not agree to participate”.
- • Place the questionnaire itself in a separate section.
- • Use “Go to section based on answer” to send consenting participants to the questionnaire and non-consenting participants to the end without answering research questions.
- • Check the branching in preview mode before sharing the form.
3. Choose question types that are easy to answer
Use the plus button to add questions. Match each question type to the information you need, and group related questions into sections so the form is manageable on a phone.
For agreement or satisfaction questions, keep your response labels and their order consistent. A small pilot with people similar to your intended participants can reveal confusing wording or awkward mobile layouts.
- • Use multiple choice when respondents should select one answer.
- • Use checkboxes when respondents may select several answers.
- • Use short answer for brief text and paragraph for longer explanations.
- • Use a linear scale for numbered ratings, with clear endpoint labels.
- • Use response validation where helpful, such as restricting an age field to an appropriate numerical range.
- • Only mark essential questions as required; provide a “Prefer not to say” option for sensitive items where appropriate.
4. Check privacy and access before sharing
Review Settings before collecting responses. If your approved study requires anonymous responses, turn off email address collection and remove questions that identify people directly or through a distinctive combination of details. Do not promise anonymity if your questionnaire still makes respondents identifiable.
The “Limit to 1 response” setting requires respondents to sign into a Google account. Google Forms does not record their username unless email collection is enabled, but the sign-in requirement can still discourage participation or exclude people without an account.
- • Check whether your university account restricts access to people within its organisation.
- • Keep any setting that lets respondents view response summaries switched off if it could expose research data.
- • Avoid file-upload questions unless necessary: they require Google sign-in and can introduce identifying information.
- • Restrict editing access to authorised researchers and follow your institution’s data-protection requirements.
- • Use the publishing or sharing controls shown in your interface, then copy the responder link—not the editing link.
- • Test that link in a private browser window and on a phone to confirm your intended participants can open it.
5. Collect, export and store responses safely
Share the responder link through channels allowed by your recruitment plan, such as approved class WhatsApp groups or departmental mailing lists. Explain who should respond and the closing date. Avoid relying only on convenient contacts if your sampling method requires a different approach.
Open the Responses tab to monitor submissions. You can link responses to Google Sheets or download a CSV file for analysis in software such as Excel, SPSS or R.
When collection ends, stop accepting responses. Keep an untouched copy of the original dataset and clean a separate working copy. Store both with restricted access, document any exclusions and retain or delete the data according to your approved plan.
- • Remove clearly labelled pilot submissions before your main analysis, where your research plan requires this.
- • Check missing values, inconsistent entries and possible duplicates without assuming every similar response is fraudulent.
- • Keep a codebook explaining your variables and any numerical coding.
- • Do not post raw participant responses in public groups or upload identifiable data to AI tools without appropriate authorisation and safeguards.
Frequently asked questions
Is Google Forms free for Nigerian students? You can create forms and collect responses with a free personal Google account. You still need internet access, and university-managed accounts may have additional access restrictions.
Can respondents complete a Google Forms questionnaire without a Gmail account? Yes, if you allow access without sign-in. Settings such as limiting respondents to one response, requiring verified email collection, restricting organisational access or adding file-upload questions can require a Google account.
Can you collect Google Forms responses offline? Google Forms is not designed for offline response collection; respondents need an internet connection to submit. If your fieldwork involves unreliable connectivity, consider an offline-capable tool such as KoboToolbox with KoboCollect, subject to your institution’s approval.