An assessment of equivalence between paper and social media surveys: The role of social desirability and satisficing

•The study examines psychological mechanisms for potential measurement nonequivalence.•It is not socially desirable responding but satisficing leads to inconsistent results.•Females are less likely to engage in satisficing in both online and offline surveys.•Sociability may reduce the possibility of engaging in satisficing in online surveys.

Investigation of the underlying mechanisms responsible for measurement variance has received little attention. The primary objective of this study is to examine whether paper and social media surveys produce convergent results and investigate the underlying psychological mechanisms for the potential measurement nonequivalence. Particularly, we explored the role of social desirability and satisficing on the measurement results. We collected data via five different survey modes, including paper survey, ad hoc Web survey, online forum (message boards)-based, SNS-based and microblog-based surveys. The findings show that socially desirable responding does not lead to inconsistent results. Rather we found that satisficing causes inconsistent results in paper versus online surveys. Sociability reduces the possibility of engaging in satisficing that results in inconsistent results between traditional Web surveys and social media-based Web surveys.