Ipek Bilgen is a principal research methodologist in the Methodology and Quantitative Social Sciences (MQSS) Department at NORC at the University of Chicago. Bilgen is also the deputy director of NORC’s Center for Panel Survey Sciences. Additionally, she oversees AmeriSpeak’s methodological research. As part of her role within AmeriSpeak, she also provides survey design, questionnaire development and review support, and leads cognitive interview and usability testing efforts for client studies. She has over 17 years of experience in survey research methods and received both her Ph.D. and M.S. from the Survey Research and Methodology (SRAM) Program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Bilgen joined NORC in 2011. To date, she has managed numerous multi-mode projects which called for her expertise to contribute to decisions regarding web, computer-assisted telephone, and mail contact and implementation strategies, effective interviewing techniques, and considerations of survey error. Bilgen has been involved in extensive research related to communication and cognition in surveys, web, mail, and phone survey implementation and design, interviewer effect on data quality, measurement, non-response, and coverage errors in multi-mode surveys, as well as use of innovative technologies in survey data collection. Additionally, in the past she directed web and emerging technologies strategic initiative at NORC and held an academic appointment as affiliate faculty at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Survey Research and Methodology Program, where she taught graduate-level research methods courses, including survey questionnaire design.

Prior to joining NORC, Bilgen worked at the Gallup Research Center (GRC) and was a teaching assistant at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL). During her time at GRC, she was involved in several projects which addressed methodological issues related to survey data quality and total survey error, specifically, communication and cognition in surveys, event history calendar methodology, interviewer effect on data quality, cross-cultural survey methodology, and survey data analyses.

Bilgen has presented her research in several national and international conferences, workshops, and webinars. She has published and co-authored articles in Journal of Official Statistics, Public Opinion Quarterly, Survey Practice, Social Currents, Social Science Computer Review, Field Methods, Journal of Quantitative Methods, SAGE Research Methods, and Quality and Quantity on issues related to interviewing methodology, web surveys, internet sampling and recruitment approaches, cognition and communication, and measurement error in surveys. Her current research investigates panel recruitment and retention, total survey error sources in probability-based online panels, the use of web and emerging technologies in surveys, questionnaire development and design, cognitive testing, and survey implementation issues.

Bilgen is currently serving as associate editor of Public Opinion Quarterly (POQ). In the past, she has served as an elected member of American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR)’s Executive Council as Membership and Chapter Relations Chair. Additionally, she has served in several AAPOR committees for a decade. She has also served on Midwest Association for Public Opinion Research (MAPOR)’s Executive Council as President, Vice President, Conference Chair, and Secretary Treasurer.