Filtering is a means of programmatically restricting the questions and responses presented to respondents. It is an efficient alternative to using complicated If statements or writing multiple variations of a question with different response combinations.

Jagged grids (hide cells in a grid)

Filtering affects the items that are passed to the interviewing program, usually for presentation to respondents. It does not affect the items that are available for use in the script that controls the interview. All items are available, just as they are in scripts with no filtering, and can always be accessed in the script by name. In other words, if a response list contains responses A to G, and an interview is filtered so that only A to C are displayed, responses D to G can still be referenced by name and used in the script even though the respondent might never see them.