Justification for Change Request

Cover page

Program Contact: Andra Tharp, PhD

Submission Date: August 4, 2014

Circumstances of Change Request for OMB 0920-0941

This is a change request for #0920-0941, which received approval through May 2016 for the multi-site evaluation of Dating Matters. The current request aims to amend the available administration formats for the student follow-up survey for the participating youth as they matriculate into high school and to introduce participant gifts for the completion of the student follow-up survey by high school youth. Although the follow-up of high school students was previously approved (September 2013), over the past school year, the study team has realized that the participating youth are particularly difficult to follow, given the high risk nature of our sample, and response rates would be greatly enhanced by additional survey formats and incentives. Response rates for the follow-up survey were anticipated to be 90%, however, in the first administration of the survey in 2012/2013, within school year (e.g., Fall to Spring) follow-up with the middle school students proved challenging due to community characteristics - such as high mobility - and as a result we achieved an overall response rate of 73%. Among outgoing 8^th graders who will be the first cohort to be surveyed in high school as of Spring 2014, the 2013 follow-up response rate was 56.3%. Efforts to improve response rates for middle school youth are underway, however, we have particular concerns for youth who matriculate from middle school to high school, as they will be in different school buildings and their schools will no longer be participating in the programmatic components of the initiative. Therefore, we propose 1) the use of different survey formats, and 2) the use of incentives to bolster response rates. Below these two proposed strategies are described in more detail.

The current change request has two aims:

1) To amend the available administration formats for the student follow-up survey for the participating youth as they matriculate into high school.

In the 2013-2014 school year, the first cohort of youth who will be followed as part of the Dating Matters evaluation will matriculate into high school. In the currently approved protocol, the students are provided surveys for data collection using a scannable paper-and-pencil format. However, as these youth matriculate into high school, we are requesting approval to conduct the survey online, via telephone, or in-person home visits, in addition to the currently approved paper and pencil formats, in order to optimize student participation in the high school follow-up survey. Online administration will only be used for youth 13 years of age or older. These changes are reflected in SSA section 3 and 15 and SSB section B.2. The screen shots for the high school follow-up survey are found in Attachment E1.

2) To propose the use of incentives for the high-school student follow-up survey.

In addition, when youth matriculate into high school, they are no longer in the Dating Matters participating middle schools, making follow-up potentially challenging. Therefore, to maintain robust response rates and data quality, for high school youth only, we are requesting to provide a nominal non-monetary gift to participants in an amount up to $15. The use of this non-monetary gift is critical to maintain a high response rate of this high-risk and highly mobile sample. As described above, given the challenges in following these high school youth, additional measures, including non-monetary gifts, will be necessary to engage them in the survey to achieve our target response rate. These changes are reflected in SSA sections 9 and 15. Please note that the requested student incentive is completely separate from the current approved parent incentive. The parent incentive is for parent completion of the parent survey and the student incentive is for high school student completion of the follow-up survey. The samples for the high school follow-up and parent surveys are different (parents not followed as their youth enter high school) so the likelihood of the same family receiving both incentives in a given year is slim.

No modifications are being made to attachments. The burden table below remains unchanged.

	Total Burden Hours	Total Burden Cost
Approved	28,814	$380,848.84
Proposed	28,814	$380,848.84
Difference	0	0