Justification for Debriefings for CCM ILB

The Census Bureau plans to conduct additional research under the generic clearance for questionnaire pretesting research (OMB number 0607-0725). The objective is to conduct respondent debriefings to determine if the 2008 Census Coverage Measurement (CCM) Independent Listing Booklet (ILB) gathered enough information and the correct information in order to create an accurate list of housing units for coverage measurement areas in the 2008 Dress Rehearsal. Deficiencies found in the 2008 ILB or procedures can then be remedied prior to the 2010 Census.

We will accomplish this goal by having up to 14 Census Bureau staff members, knowledgeable in the goals of CCM listing, observe interviewers using the ILB. In the ILB, there is one respondent question pertaining to possible additional housing units at the address. See Figure A.

Figure A: Respondent question in the 2008 CCM ILB

This question was modified from a comparable question used in 2000. Census Bureau staff may probe respondents on this question if they encounter respondent confusion when it is asked during the listing operation. Staff will use such generic probes as, “What does that mean in your own words?”, etc. We estimate that no more than 10 respondents per observer will encounter such difficulties. In order to verify the question is working as intended, staff will also probe on this question for a small number of cases (not exceeding 10 per observer) where they suspect there is no respondent difficulty. All total, then, we estimate each observer will probe on no more than 20 respondents (10 who expressed some kind of confusion, and 10 who did not), for a total of approximately 280 respondents. Using generic probes, staff may also ask about additional issues that arose during the brief exchange between the interviewer and respondent.

Although three listing pages are enclosed, most of the probing is likely to focus on Enclosure 1, the single unit listing page.

These observations and debriefings will occur in November 2007 in both of the 2008 Dress Rehearsal sites: San Joaquin County, CA and a nine-county area surrounding Fayetteville, NC. Burden hours for the ILB data collection are approved under OMB number 0607-0940.

We estimate that the respondent burden for the respondent debriefing questions to be about 2 minutes per case. Thus the total burden for this information collection is approximately 10 hours.

The contact person for questions regarding data collection and study design is:

Elizabeth Nichols

Statistical Research Division

U.S. Census Bureau

4600 Silver Hill Road

Washington, D.C. 20233

(301) 763-1724

[email protected]