Summary: Well-written screeners ensure that your study participants are appropriate for your research goals, improve data quality, save resources, and reduce bias.
There is no worse feeling for a researcher than realizing in the middle of a research session that the data is invalid because the participant is a bad match. Avoid this disaster by using a screener to recruit the right participants for your study.
What Is a Screener?
Conducting user research is one of the most effective ways to ensure that the solution you’re designing will serve the needs of the end users. However, it works only if you can find the right test participants.
By “right test participants,” I mean actual users of your product or representative users who mimic the demographic and behavioral characteristics of your users. Using a screener is the best and easiest way to ensure that you are conducting research with the right users.