Best questions for high school sophomore student survey about study habits

Here are some of the best questions for a High School Sophomore Student survey about study habits, plus tips on how to create them. You can use Specific to build this type of survey in seconds.

Best open-ended questions to ask

Open-ended questions encourage students to go beyond yes/no answers, unlocking real insights into their study routines and mindsets. These questions work best when you want rich stories, reflections, or context—especially for understanding why students behave the way they do or what they wish could be better. Here are the 10 best open-ended questions for this group:

1. What study strategy has helped you the most this school year?

2. Describe a typical day when you’re preparing for a big test or assignment.

3. When you struggle to focus on schoolwork, what usually distracts you?

4. How do you decide which homework or subjects to start with after school?

5. Share a time you felt especially successful or proud of your study habits. What did you do differently?

6. What’s your ideal study environment? Why?

7. How does technology (like apps or AI tools) impact your studying?

8. If you could change one thing about how you study, what would it be?

9. Who or what motivates you the most to keep up with your schoolwork?

10. Tell us about one challenge you’ve faced with studying this year and how you tried to overcome it.

Open-ended questions like these help uncover motivations, hurdles, and unique approaches—insights you can't get from multiple choice alone. With as much as 63% of U.S. teenagers now using AI-powered study aides for assignments [5], it’s also crucial to explore their perceptions and habits around these new tools.

Best single-select multiple-choice questions

Single-select multiple-choice questions are perfect when you need to quickly quantify habits, get a sense of the group, or break the ice. They work well early in the survey—or anytime the topic has clear, limited options. They’re easier for respondents who might find open-ended questions intimidating, and they set up natural follow-up opportunities to probe for “why” or “how.” Here are three strong examples for high school sophomores studying habits, with choices:

Question: How much time do you usually spend on homework each night?

• Less than 30 minutes

• 30-60 minutes

• 1-2 hours

• More than 2 hours

Question: What’s your favorite study location?

• Bedroom

• Kitchen/Dining Room

• Library

• Other

Question: Which tool do you use most often to help you study?

• Textbooks/Printed Materials

• Online resources (websites, YouTube, blogs)

• AI tools/chatbots

• Group study

When to followup with "why?" Asking “why” as a follow-up is gold when you notice an answer that stands out, or you want to dig for the story behind a choice. For example, if a student selects “AI tools/chatbots” as their main study resource, a followup like “Why do you prefer AI tools over traditional methods?” can reveal a lot. This approach is especially important now that 86% of students use AI tools in their studies, with 24% using them daily and 54% at least weekly [2].

When and why to add the "Other" choice? Always add “Other” when you can’t cover every option, or want students to suggest tools or locations you missed. Following up here can uncover unexpected trends you hadn’t even considered—like new apps, innovative study spots, or group study routines you didn’t realize were popular. These off-script answers are often where unique insights hide.

NPS-style questions for student study habits

NPS, or Net Promoter Score, is a simple way to gauge loyalty or satisfaction by asking, “How likely are you to recommend X to a friend?” It works surprisingly well for study habits, too—you might ask, “How likely are you to recommend your current study approach to a friend?” Using NPS helps benchmark the effectiveness and confidence students feel about their own habits, and gives you a way to track improvement over time. If you want to see an NPS survey designed for high school sophomores on this topic, check out our purpose-built example.

The power of follow-up questions

Follow-up questions are where real discovery happens, surfacing the stories, patterns, and context behind surface-level answers. Automated follow-ups such as those in Specific’s AI survey platform save massive time compared to emailing respondents for clarification. In real time, smart probes clarify ambiguity, explore reasoning, or drag out helpful detail. That’s especially useful with groups like high school sophomores, who may give brief answers by default.

• Student: "I usually study with friends."

• AI follow-up: "What do you like most about studying with friends? Does it help you focus, or do you think you sometimes get distracted?"

How many followups to ask? For most student surveys, two or three well-targeted follow-ups are enough. You want just enough context to clarify and dig a bit deeper, but respect the student’s time and patience. Specific lets you set a “max follow-up” so that, once you’ve got the insight you wanted, the survey moves on automatically.

This makes it a conversational survey—students feel like they’re in a real, responsive chat, not ticking boxes in a cold web form.

AI survey response analysis: Even with lots of free-text answers, it’s easy to analyze and summarize conversational survey data using AI-powered analysis tools. That means you can quickly spot emerging themes or hidden challenges from hundreds of students, without slogging through transcripts yourself.

Automated, dynamic followups are a new frontier. Try generating a conversational survey and experience this smart feedback collection for yourself.

Prompts for ChatGPT to generate more survey questions

If you’d like to use ChatGPT or Similar AI to brainstorm more questions, start here. Prompt one is a general starter:

Suggest 10 open-ended questions for High School Sophomore Student survey about Study Habits.

If you give AI more context about your school, specific goals, or what you’re hoping to learn, you’ll get higher-quality results. Try a prompt like:

"Our school has noticed a recent drop in math grades and increased use of AI. I want to understand what habits sophomores use and how technology plays a role. Suggest 10 open-ended survey questions to explore these trends."

Once you have a set of questions, let AI group them for you:

Look at the questions and categorize them. Output categories with the questions under them.

Now focus on a key area (e.g., technology use, motivation, time management):

Generate 10 questions for the category "motivation and mindset."

What is a conversational survey?

Conversational surveys are radically different from old-fashioned survey forms. Instead of static “tick the box” webforms, a conversational survey feels like a chat interaction. Students reply to natural, flowing questions and the AI follows up just like a sharp interviewer would. Automated tools—like Specific’s AI survey generator—create the entire survey for you, saving you from building long lists manually or having to guess at the best followup logic.

Why use AI for high school sophomore student surveys? Teens today expect everything to be interactive and easy—making a conversational AI survey both engaging and low-pressure. And with so many using AI for their own assignments now, a smart, personalized conversational survey feels modern and familiar. You can see an AI survey example tailored for this purpose using our survey generator for high school sophomores.

Specific stands out with best-in-class design for conversational feedback, turning surveys into a smooth chat for students and instant insight for you. If you want to learn more about creating a survey from scratch, see our full guide: how to create a survey for high school sophomores.

See this study habits survey example now

See how effortless it is to engage students and capture richer insights about study habits—create your own conversational survey and experience the new standard in student feedback.