Screenout

A screenout happens when a survey ends early because your answers to the first qualifying questions show you are not in the audience the study needs. The survey thanks you and closes, usually after a minute or two, before the main questions.

For researchers, screenout is the filter that keeps people outside the target audience out of the data. A survey for dog owners that lets everyone through ends up with answers about dogs from people who don't have one.

Why surveys screen you out

• You don't match the criteria. The study needs a specific age group, region, job role or product user, and one of your answers fell outside it.
• The quota for your group is full. The study already has enough people like you (for example, women aged 25–34). Panels often record this separately as "quota full".
• You work in a related industry. Market research, advertising or the client's own industry are often excluded to keep answers unbiased and the topic confidential.
• Quality checks. Answering very fast, failing an attention check or giving contradictory answers can end the survey too.

A screenout only means you weren't the audience for that particular study. On paid panels, whether a screenout earns a small reward depends on the panel's rules.

Definition

Screenout is the early termination of a survey for a respondent who fails the qualification criteria at the screening stage, after one or more screening questions at the start of the questionnaire. The respondent sees a closing message and doesn't reach the main part of the survey.

The screener is the set of qualifying questions (the tool). The screenout is the event when a specific respondent fails it (the result).

How screenout works

Screenout is built with logic jumps: if the answer to a screening question doesn't meet the criterion, the respondent goes to a closing screen instead of the next question.

1. Question: "Do you have a dog at home?"
2. If "No", the respondent sees the screenout screen: "Thank you for your interest. This survey is meant for a different group of participants."
3. If "Yes", the next screening question or the main part starts.

Keep the closing message neutral. "You don't qualify" sounds like a judgment; "This survey is meant for a different group of participants. Thank you for your time" doesn't.

Screenout rate

Screenout rate = screened-out respondents ÷ respondents who started the survey × 100%

If 1,000 people started and 350 were screened out, the screenout rate is 35%. It is the mirror image of the incidence rate, the share of screened people who qualify (65% here, if no one dropped out during the screener). The incidence rate calculator works it out for your own numbers.

There is no universal "normal" screenout rate: it depends on how rare the audience is. A survey of all adult online shoppers screens out few people; a survey of IT directors who bought software this year screens out most of them. What matters is that the rate matches your estimate. A much lower rate than expected can mean the criteria are easy to guess and people are answering their way in.

How many invitations you need

Invitations = target completes ÷ (start rate × qualification rate × completion rate)

Example: you need 200 completes; 20% of invitees usually start, 40% of starters qualify, and 90% of qualified people finish. 200 ÷ (0.20 × 0.40 × 0.90) = 200 ÷ 0.072 ≈ 2,778 invitations. The survey invitations calculator does the same with a buffer.

Screenout vs dropout vs quota full

Example: a B2B screener

A study needs IT directors or heads of development at companies with 50+ employees who took part in choosing software in the past 12 months. The screener has three questions: company size, position, and involvement in software purchases. Of 2,000 people who started, 400 were screened out on company size, 800 on position and 200 on purchase involvement. 600 qualified, so the screenout rate is 70%. The team expected this and invited enough people.

Common mistakes

• Transparent questions. "Have you used Brand X in the past 3 months?" tells people what to answer. Ask about several brands in one list, and add a non-existent brand as a quality check.
• Screening too late. Put qualifying questions first. Screening someone out after five minutes wastes their time and hurts trust.
• Too many criteria without checking reach. Six criteria together can exclude almost everyone. Estimate the incidence before launch.
• Not recording why people were screened out. Without it you can't tell which criterion is eating your sample.
• Expecting screening to fix bias. It filters by the criteria you set; it doesn't fix selection bias from a one-sided distribution channel.

Screenout in SurveyNinja

In SurveyNinja, screenout is a Disqualification screen plus a logic jump rule that sends non-qualifying answers to it. The screen has its own text, separate from the final screen, and can show a button that follows a link, for example back to a panel provider. Quotas stop accepting answers once a question or an option has collected enough of them. See Logic Map, Disqualification and Quotas.

FAQ

Can you hide the screening from respondents?

Partly. Screening questions can look like ordinary demographic or usage questions without revealing which answer qualifies. People who are screened out will still notice the survey ended early.

Does a high screenout rate hurt data quality?

Not by itself: it means much of the invited audience isn't the target. Data suffers when screening is set up badly: guessable questions let the wrong people in, and no screening at all mixes target and non-target answers in one sample.