befragning

Befragning is a noun used in several Scandinavian languages, most often Swedish, Danish, and Norwegian, to denote the act of asking questions to obtain information. The term can refer to both the process of questioning a person and the collection of data from a group or population, depending on the context and language.

In Swedish, bef ragning is commonly associated with formal questioning or interviewing, including situations of authorities questioning a person, journalistic interviews, or research interviews. It can imply a structured or official inquiry. In Danish and Norwegian, bef ragning is more frequently used to describe a survey or poll of opinions or attitudes, such as market research or public opinion studies, but it can also refer to the act of questioning in a broader sense.

Etymology traces bef ragning to the prefix be- combined with the verb fråga, meaning to ask. The concept is thus the process of asking, whether in the form of an interrogation, an interview, or a survey. Related terms include forhör or intervju in Swedish for a direct interrogation or interview, and the broader term undersökning (investigation or survey) used in research contexts.

Typical contexts include law enforcement, journalism, and social science research for gathering information; in polling practice, bef ragning refers to systematic collection of responses from a sample to infer broader opinions. The nuance depends on language and setting, with interrogation connoting a formal or accusatory tone, and survey indicating neutral data collection.