Justification Memo

November 16, 2011

NONSUBSTANTIVE CHANGE REQUEST

The Urban Chicken portion of the Poultry 2010 package is a survey of urban poultry owners in four U.S. cities. The response rate for the first city was 17 percent. Efforts to improve the methodology in order to increase response have been discussed with the contractor collecting data. Based on the suggestions offered by the contractor, NAHMS would like to include a monetary incentive to increase response. NAHMS would like to perform a pilot study in the next U.S. city that will include a variety of incentives to evaluate which approach is effective in motivating urban chicken owners to complete the study questionnaire. This pilot will involve no more than 1000 respondents with incentives ranging from 0, 1, or 2 dollar incentives mailed out to respondents. Each approach will be evaluated by the contractor and NAHMS personnel to determine the most effective approach. This activity will not increase the cost of the NAHMS Urban Chicken study. Complete details of the proposed change appear below:

NAHMS proposes to amend the methodology for objective 3 (Urban Chicken Phase I) of the NAHMS Poultry 2010 study. Specifically, we would like to include a $1 or $2 incentive in the survey mailing, and this gift/payment was not mentioned in the original OMB documentation. The reason for this request is that Urban Chicken Phase I, conducted in Los Angeles, had a response rate that was considerably lower than expected (17.0%). The company contracted to perform data collection in the 3 remaining cities (Denver, New York and Miami) has suggested a change to the methodology to improve the response rate. The suggested change in methodology is based on the “Tailored Design Method” developed by Dr. Don Dillman from the University of Washington (see http://www.amazon.com/Internet-Mail-Mixed-Mode-Surveys-Tailored/dp/0471698687/ and http://education.astate.edu/dcline/slides/Students/DILLMAN’S.ppt). The contract company has references that have successfully used this method to achieve a response rate of nearly 35 percent. The company has suggested a pilot study (mailing to 1,000 households) to test if the incentive will improve response rates. If the pilot is successful, the company will use the incentive to complete the entire data collection. The price for the contract work has already been negotiated and finalized; the $1 or $2 incentive will not change the cost to the government. Our goal is to reduce the potential for non-response bias.

The original data collection method as approved in the OMB documentation was:

Residents will be contacted by mail to complete the survey. A second mailing will be sent to non-respondents. Non-responders to the second mailing will be contacted by telephone. Telephone numbers associated with the addresses will be obtained via reverse lookup method, which is expected to provide valid phone numbers for 60-70% of the addresses. No payment or gift to respondents will be provided.

The proposed new method:

1. Cover letter sent in advance of the survey mailing.

2. Survey mailing that includes another cover letter, the survey itself, a self-addressed, stamped envelope, and a token incentive of $1 or $2.

3. Reminder postcard sent one week later to encourage people to respond.

4. Second survey mailing that includes another cover letter, another copy of the survey, and another self-addressed, stamped envelope.  No incentive.

5. Telephone follow up for non-respondents as described above.