This is a request for a 3-year generic clearance for the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) that will allow it to develop, test, and improve its survey and data collection instruments and methodologies. The procedures utilized to this effect include, but are not limited to, tests of various types of survey and data collection operations, focus groups, cognitive laboratory activities, pilot testing, field testing, exploratory interviews, experiments with questionnaire design, and usability testing of electronic data collection instruments.
BJS is requesting the generic clearance in order to test new methodologies for surveys and data collection activities. In addition to the self-report surveys BJS conducts, such as the National Crime Victimization Survey and the Prison and Jail Inmate Surveys, BJS is expanding or enhancing its data collection efforts in the areas of establishment surveys, for instance through enhancement and expansion of knowledge in the areas law enforcement, corrections (including community corrections), and victimization. We believe the generic clearance will be a helpful vehicle for evaluating questionnaires/assessments and various other data collection procedures related to these new or changing data collections.
Prior to the initial Generic Clearance initiated in 2013, BJS had approached design and testing either through redesign projects that obtained full OMB clearance for data collection, such as BJS’s efforts under the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA); or BJS has relied on convenience samples of 9 or fewer persons to provide input and feedback on survey design and data collection methodologies. Neither of these approaches met BJS’s needs to develop and implement more rigorous testing procedures. Seeking full OMB clearance prior to testing instruments causes delays to BJS achieving its timeliness objectives for collections. Reliance on 9 or fewer persons does not provide a basis for conducting any type of test and the data from 9 or fewer have no generalizability. The information collected via these mechanisms, while still helpful, was nonetheless somewhat limited in its ability to detect and diagnose problems with the instruments and the procedures being tested. The generic testing clearance will continue to allow BJS to take advantage of a variety of methods that are useful for identifying questionnaire/assessment and procedural problems, suggesting solutions, and measuring the relative effectiveness of alternative solutions. Through the use of these techniques, when employed routinely in the testing phase of BJS data collections, questionnaires and assessments can be simplified for respondents, respondent burden can be reduced, procedures for the collection of administrative data can be streamlined, and the quality of the questionnaires and assessments used in continuing and one-time surveys and assessments can be improved. Thus an increase in the quality of the data collected can be achieved as well.
BJS is requesting a three-year generic clearance for pretesting, during which BJS will provide periodic reports on pretesting activities. The pretesting activities conducted under this generic clearance will be for development work only. These development activities will include such things as investigation of item types, research on the availability and quality of administrative data from state and local justice agencies, small scale tests to test appropriate access and retrieval methods for various types of administrative data, research about mode of administration (telephone, paper and pencil, computer-based, mail-out and mail-in, etc.), methodology of questionnaires and assessments, and testing of items. Activities covered under this generic clearance will not include field testing of a full-scale program implementation protocol.
This clearance package is intended to serve as a request for generic clearance. In this document we have provided a description of the scope of possible activities that might be covered under this clearance. The requested clearance is important to BJS’s use of pretesting activities, because of the length of time required to plan the activities. This generic clearance will go through the usual two Federal Register Review periods. Subsequent to these review periods, BJS requests that OMB review then comment on or clear proposed studies in a two-week period with no 30-day Federal Register Notice period required under the Generic clearance. This clearance is similar to the testing clearances held by the Census Bureau, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the National Center for Education Statistics, and the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics.
The specific methods proposed for coverage by this clearance are described below. Also outlined are the procedures BJS plans to put in place for keeping OMB informed about the identity of the surveys and the nature of the research activities being conducted.
The methods proposed for use in questionnaire and assessment development are as follows:
Pilot testing. For the purposes of this clearance, we are defining pilot tests as data collection efforts conducted among either purposive or statistically representative samples, for which evaluation of the questionnaire and/or procedures is the main objective. BJS will only publish research and development (R&D) and methodological reports on the results of these pilot tests, but will not publish statistical reports or data sets based on the findings. Pilot tests are an essential component of this clearance package because they serve as the vehicle for investigating basic item properties for new or redesigned data collection efforts, such as reliability, validity, and difficulty, as well as feasibility of methods for standardized administration of forms. Under this clearance a variety of surveys will be pretested, and the exact nature of the surveys and the samples is undetermined at present. However, due to the smaller nature of the tests, we expect that some will not involve representative samples. In these cases, samples will basically be convenience samples, which could be limited to specific geographic locations, may involve expired rotation groups of a current survey, are known to have specific aggregate demographic characteristics, etc. The needs of the particular sample will vary based on the content of the survey being tested, but the selection of sample cases will not be completely arbitrary in any instance. Where applicable, pilot testing may also include collecting sample administrative data, which will allow BJS to test procedures regarding data procurement as well as comparability of data across sites.
Behavior coding. This method involves applying a standardized coding scheme to the completion of an interview or questionnaire, either by a coder using a tape-recording of the interview or by an in-person observer at the time of the interview. The coding scheme is designed to identify situations that occur during the interview that reflect problems with the questionnaire. For example, if respondents frequently interrupt the interviewer before the question is completed, the question may be too long. If respondents frequently give inadequate answers, this suggests there are some other problems with the question. Quantitative data derived from this type of standardized coding scheme can provide valuable information to identify problem areas in a questionnaire, and can be used as a substitute for or as a complement to the traditional interviewer debriefing.
Interviewer debriefing. This method employs the knowledge of the employees who have the closest contact with the respondents. In conjunction with other methods, we plan to use this method in our field tests to collect information about how interviewers react to the survey instruments, as well as understand problems and pitfalls encountered by interviewers during the interview.
Exploratory interviews. These may be conducted with individuals to understand a topical area and may be used in the very early stages of developing a new survey. It may cover discussions related to administrative records (e.g. what types of records, where, and in what format), subject matter, definitions, etc. Exploratory interviews may also be used to investigate whether sufficient issues are present related to an existing data collection to consider a redesign.
Respondent debriefing questionnaire. In this method, standardized debriefing questionnaires are administered to respondents who have participated in a field test. The debriefing form is administered at the end of the questionnaire being tested, and contains questions that probe to determine how respondents interpret the questions and whether they have problems in completing the survey/questionnaire. This structured approach to debriefing enables quantitative analysis of data from a representative sample of respondents, to learn whether respondents can answer the questions, and whether they interpret them in the manner intended by the questionnaire designers.
Follow-up interviews or re-interviews. This involves re-interviewing or re-assessing a sample of respondents after the completion of a survey or assessment. Responses given in the re-interview are compared with the respondents’ initial responses for consistency between responses. In this way, re-interviews provide data for studies of test–re-test reliability and other measures of data quality. In turn, this information aids in the development of improved, more reliable measures.
Split sample experiments. This involves testing alternative versions of questionnaires, and other collection methods, at least some of which have been designed to address problems identified in draft questionnaires or questionnaires from previous surveys. The use of multiple questionnaires, randomly assigned to permit statistical comparisons, is the critical component here; data collection can include mail, telephone, Internet, or personal visit interviews or group sessions at which self-administered questionnaires are completed. Comparison of revised questionnaires against a control version, preferably, or against each other, facilitates statistical evaluation of the performance of alternative versions of the questionnaire. Split sample tests that incorporate questionnaire design experiments are likely to have a larger maximum sample size than field tests using other methodologies. Larger sample sizes will enable the detection of statistically significant differences and facilitate methodological experiments that can extend questionnaire design knowledge more generally for use in a variety of BJS data collection instruments.
Cognitive and usability interviews. This method involves intensive, one-on-one interviews in which the respondent is typically asked to "think aloud" as he or she answers survey questions. A number of different techniques may be involved, including asking respondents to paraphrase questions, probing questions asked to determine how respondents came up with their answers, and so on. The objective is to identify problems of ambiguity or misunderstanding, or other difficulties respondents have answering questions. This is frequently one of the early stages of revising a questionnaire.
Focus groups. This method involves group sessions guided by a moderator, who follows a topical outline containing questions or topics focused on a particular issue, rather than adhering to a standardized questionnaire. Focus groups are useful for surfacing and exploring issues (e.g., confidentiality concerns) which people may feel some hesitation about discussing.
Procedures for Clearance
Before testing activity is undertaken, BJS will provide OMB with a memo describing the study to be conducted and a copy of instrumentation and debriefing materials that will be used. Depending on the stage of instrumentation development, this may be a printed questionnaire, a set of prototype items showing each item type to be used and the range of topics to be covered by the questionnaire, or an interview script. When split sample experiments are conducted, either in small group sessions or as part of a field test, the different versions of the questionnaires to be used will be provided. For a test of alternative procedures, the description and rationale for the procedures will be submitted. A brief description of the planned field activity will also be provided. BJS requests that OMB raise comments on substantive issues within 10 working days of receipt.
Data collection for this project is permitted under the authorizing legislation for the questionnaire being tested. In most cases, data collection activities conducted by BJS will be authorized under the BJS enabling legislation, 42 USC, Section 3731, Chapter 46, Subchapter III. At this time, it is not known whether other titles will be referenced for specific projects, as we do not know all of the survey questionnaires or data collection protocols that will be pretested during the course of the clearance. The authorizing statute will be specified in each information clearance.
2. Needs and Uses
The information collected in this program of developing and testing questionnaires and other data collection protocols will be used by staff from BJS to evaluate and improve the quality of the data in the surveys and assessments that are ultimately conducted. None of the data collected under this clearance will be published for its own sake.
Because the questionnaires being tested under this clearance are still in the process of development, the data that result from these collections are not considered official statistics of BJS or other Federal agencies. Data will not be made public, except it can be included in research reports prepared for sponsors inside and outside of BJS. The results may also be prepared for presentations related to survey methodology at professional meetings or publications in professional journals.
Information quality is an integral part of the pre‑dissemination review of the information disseminated by BJS (described in BJS’s Data Quality Guidelines, which can be found at http://www.bjs.gov/content/dataquality/dataquality.cfm). Information quality is also integral to the information collections conducted by BJS and is incorporated into the clearance process required by the Paperwork Reduction Act.
BJS anticipates conducting testing work under this Generic IC for a number of projects, including but not limited to the following:
Survey to assess states’ ability to provide individual-level probation data to the National Corrections Reporting Program (NCRP): BJS is interested in investigating whether it can enhance its existing collection of individual-level prison and post-custody community supervision data, the NCRP (OMB #1121-0065) by introducing the collection of entry and exit records for persons on state probation, or pre-prison community supervision. BJS obtains an aggregate count of probationers through its Annual Survey of Probation (OMB #1121-0064), but cannot describe this population in the same way it can for prisoners because we do not have individual-level data on persons prior to their entry into prison. BJS’s individual-level collection of state courts data, the National Judicial Reporting Program (OMB #1121-0130) has been temporarily suspended given collection difficulties and lack of resources. Therefore, our understanding of persons before they enter the state prison system, including age, race by sex, and more detailed offense characteristics is non-existent. While 36 states could theoretically report individual-level probation records, BJS is not sure how many would be able to provide them (e.g., some state DOCs may not actually have access to the individual-level records, and may only be compiling totals reported to them by counties). BJS proposes a brief (5-6 question) telephone interview of the current NCRP DOC respondents from these 36 states to assess whether they would be able to give individual-level probation records, the quality of those records, and any permissions BJS may need to obtain to request these data. The telephone interview will be conducted by the project manager of BJS’s NCRP data collection agent. The total burden is estimated to be about 6 hours (36 respondents X 10 minutes per response)
Cognitive interviews of the Core Annual Survey of Probation and Parole (ASPP) with data providers: As part of an ongoing effort by BJS to expand and improve its Community Corrections Statistics Program (CCSP), BJS would like to engage in activities to inform the redesign of its ASPP questionnaires to a core set of data elements that can be used to produce key statistics to track changes in size and composition of the nation’s probation and parole populations. BJS has recently conducted discussions with directors (or their designees) of probation and parole agencies and retrospective cognitive debriefings with ASPP respondents (OMB #1121-0039) in an effort to identify the necessary changes to the survey instruments to enhance data quality, reduce burden, and increase efficiencies for the annual collections. Based on this work it is recommended that BJS redesign the ASPP instruments and conduct cognitive interviews with data providers to examine issues associated with survey content, question working, definitions and instructions.
Usability/Pilot test of Core ASPP: As a continuation of cognitive interviews conducted on the redesigned core ASPP instruments, BJS would like to conduct remote usability testing. This testing will be conducted with up to 24 data providers and will focus on the way respondents interact with and navigate through the questionnaire of the resulting instruments to assess burden of the newly redesigned instruments.
Pilot test supplemental community corrections data collections: BJS is developing a series of supplemental data collections to the ASPP in order to address information gaps and emerging issues in the field of community corrections. This is part of ongoing efforts by BJS to expand and enhance its Community Corrections Statistics Program (CCSP) by producing statistics on the operations, policies, and practices of community corrections agencies and by addressing emerging issues or information gaps in order to enhance the understanding of population trends and characteristics as they relate to the changing nature of community supervision (i.e., the policies and practices of agencies). BJS would seek clearance for developmental research to include pilot testing supplemental collections in order to assess the functionality of the instrument, the capacity of respondents to provide the information, and the level of burden associated with reporting the information prior to implementing it on a national scale. The findings will be used to make the necessary changes to the instrument to enhance its functionality, improve the quality of the data collected, and minimize burden prior to national implementation.
Assess respondents understanding of jail and prison Deaths in Custody Reporting (DCRP) data: BJS is interested in pursuing development work for the DCRP (OMB #1121-0249). BJS proposes to pilot test one item currently on the DCRP jail annual summary forms and two items on the DCRP jail and prison death forms. BJS is proposing a pilot test of the admissions data items in a select number of local jails to determine: 1) if jail respondents have any significant comprehension problems related to definitional issues, terminology, and question content. The information will be used to explain the fluctuation in state and jurisdiction estimates when comparing admissions data on all administrative jail collections (Census of Jail Facilities, ASJ, and DCRP). On the death forms, BJS would like to test the feasibility and reliability of revamped items for cause of death and offense for which the inmate was being held (jails) or had been convicted of (prisons). Currently, the cause of death item is a mix of manner (e.g. illness, suicide) and cause of death (drug/alcohol intoxication, AIDS-related). BJS would like to determine if it would be feasible to revise the DCRP cause of death item to look more like the U.S. standard death certificate. BJS is proposing a pilot test of a sample of jail and prison respondents, which will assess the following: (1) impact burden, either negatively by increasing it, or positively by decreasing it; (2) whether cause of death data quality would improve for all deaths, especially in cause of unnatural deaths like suicides, homicides and accidents; (3) whether retaining the ‘pending investigation’ will increase the number of cases reported as missing cause of death; and (4) assess the cognitive burden to respondents and their understanding of the revised cause of death item. Each pilot test will be submitted separately to OMB.
Annual Survey of Jails (ASJ): The Annual Survey of Jails has been existence since 1982, but has not been pilot tested since the initial launch of the collection. In 2016, the ASJ will move from the U.S. Census Bureau to a new contractor, and BJS would like to pilot portions of the survey to assess respondents understanding of survey questions and use the results of the pilot to improve questionnaire items. Potential items include: conviction status of confined populations; releases; staffing; and populations supervised in the community. The ASJ is the only annual jail collection that collects jail population data that is more detailed than admissions, confined populations and average daily population. BJS will conduct pilot studies of the content of the instrument in order to: 1) determine respondent capacity to report survey items; 2) assess the cognitive burden of respondents and their understanding of survey items (potentially through cognitive interviews or debriefings) and 3) estimate the burden associated with responding to the questionnaire.
Survey of Inmates in Local Jails (SILJ): BJS will pursue development work for the SILJ study under the generic clearance in order to test the survey administration prior to seeking full clearance. A memorandum detailing the testing activities will be submitted to OMB for approval. BJS will pilot test the SILJ instrument to a sample of about 500 inmates to ensure the questions and response options do not cause any significant comprehension or recall problems, as well as to test the mode of survey administration (i.e., CAPI with PAPI as the back-up mode) to: 1) ensure the instrument is performing appropriately and the skip logic is programmed accurately; 2) test the length of the survey to ensure it is running within specific time constraints; and 3) test sampling and interviewing protocols to ensure the procedures developed do not cause any significant burden to the facilities or staff.
Census of State and Federal Adult Correctional Facilities: BJS first documented the use of private prison facilities under contract to hold inmates for state correctional authorities in the 1990 Census of State and Federal Adult Correctional Facilities (prison census). At that time, 67 private facilities were under exclusive contract with state correctional authorities. Since then, the number has increased to more than 400 and accounts for about a quarter of all facilities holding inmates for state DOC’s and the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP). BJS is doing developmental work for the upcoming Census of State and Federal Correctional Facilities (projected to be conducted in 2017). In addition to contracts with state DOC’s and BOP, private facilities are contracted to hold for authorities excluded from the prison census: local correctional authorities, state juvenile authorities, and other federal entities (e.g. Immigration Custody Enforcement and the U.S. Marshal’s Service). The growing number of private facilities combined with the number of authorities contracting with those facilities has made the task of obtaining an inclusive and accurate list of facilities to include on the roster for the prison census collection an increasingly difficult task. In order to accomplish this, BJS intends to use the generic clearance to work with each state DOC and BOP to update the roster for the prison census with the facilities with which each DOC is contracting to hold inmates.
Victim-Offender Overlap Surveys: This BJS pilot data collection will assess the victim-offender overlap for a sample of jail inmates. Research has consistently shown that victimization and offending are strongly correlated, yet most often these aspects of crime are studied in isolation from each other. Since the NCVS is a household-based survey that does not capture institutionalized populations, neither incarcerated offenders nor offending behavior are included in the survey, and this represents a potential gap in survey coverage and our understanding of the correlates of victimization. The key objectives of this project are to develop a survey instrument that can be pilot tested with a sample of jail inmates to investigate the potential impact of sample coverage error on national victimization estimates from the NCVS; to better understand the relationship between victimization and offending; and to test questions regarding the response to victimization that could be incorporated into the fully redesigned NCVS instrument. Jail inmate surveys offer an important opportunity to examine the relationships between victimization and offending because such persons are at high risk for both types of events and because recall problems will be lesser for the period of risk under consideration for jail inmates compared to prisoners who will have been incarcerated for longer periods prior to an interview. Additionally, jail inmates are typically incarcerated for short periods of time meaning that they are a population that could be eligible for inclusion in the NCVS. However, since these inmates typically represent a highly mobile, transient population it is likely that they are not captured under household rostering efforts and represent a source of coverage error for NCVS victimization estimates. Understanding the victimization experiences of these inmates and the impact of this coverage error on victimization rates is important for better understanding crime in the US. It is also important for NCVS redesign efforts as part of the project involves considering ways to improve the coverage of the sample through expansion of the core NCVS or through supplemental surveys designed to focus on at-risk, hard to reach populations. During the development of the instrument, BJS will likely need to employ several of the development and testing methodologies delineated in this generic IC, such as cognitive interviewing, re-interviews, and a field study. Requests for distinct development and testing activities will be submitted to OMB for approval separately.
Assessment of Administrative Data on Elder Abuse, Mistreatment and Neglect (AADEAMN): This BJS study will assess the capacity of Adult Protective Service (APS) agency data systems to report key indicators of victimization and criminal victimization. Of particular interest to BJS is whether APS data can be used to distinguish between criminal and non-criminal acts. This will require documenting practices by which APS and law enforcement interact since APS workers might not distinguish between criminal and non-criminal acts. BJS will assess the extent to which referral to the criminal justice system is a valid marker for criminal acts and how these are recorded in APS data systems. It will be important to establish what “referral to the criminal justice system” means for each agency. For example, some APS agencies refer all substantiated cases to law enforcement as a matter of policy while others are more selective. Finally, BJS will document APS data systems' capacity to record criminal justice outcomes or link to criminal justice data sources (such as maintaining police report numbers or prosecution case file numbers in APS data records) and assess perceived barriers in the relationship between law enforcement and APS. This developmental study will launch a web-based survey of state APS agencies and selected local level agencies in those states where previous work found that data were maintained locally. BJS anticipates collecting data from the universe of approximately 140 state and local APS data collection entities.
Survey of Law Enforcement Personnel in Schools (SLEPS) – This new collection effort will gather data on the presence and roles of police officers in K-12 public schools. The project will identify a national roster of active law enforcement agencies with officers in schools and will collect data on the infrastructure that supports these officers. Officers from these law enforcement agencies will then be sampled in order to learn about their specific functions and roles in schools. Estimated burden hours needed for testing the administration protocols and follow-up procedures and for cognitive testing of the officer survey are 150 hours.
Law Enforcement Rapid Information System (LERIS) – BJS is establishing a data collection vehicle that can administer a survey within a relatively short time frame to provide relevant, timely statistical information about emerging or critical time-sensitive issues confronting law enforcement. While current data collections such as the Census of State and Local Law Enforcement Agencies and the Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics survey are excellent for gathering a wide variety of information, they are not structured to provide detailed data about a particular topical area quickly. The Law Enforcement Rapid Information System (LERIS) is proposed to fill that gap. The goal of the LERIS is to develop and field a rapid response system to quickly collect and disseminate information to address emerging, critical, or time-sensitive law enforcement issues from a small, but representative, sample of LEAs using a series of brief, narrowly focused web-based instruments. The LERIS is intended to be a data collection platform to collect issue-oriented data quickly and with minimum response burden from law enforcement agencies across the US. Data collected through LERIS surveys will be representative at the national level, drawing on a list of law enforcement agencies that includes local police departments, sheriff’s offices, and state police organizations. Survey questions will differ with each wave of the survey, ensuring that findings are timely and relevant. Topics currently under consideration include but are not limited to forensic laboratories, stop and frisk practices and policies; police foot pursuits, and lethal and less-than-lethal force policies and practices. LERIS is projected to require the use of cognitive testing and expert focus groups over the course of development of the platform and the various survey instruments, as well as during implementation. Requests for distinct development and testing activities will be submitted to OMB for approval separately. Preliminary estimates for associated burden hours total 120 hours across the various methodologies.
Criminal Victimization of Persons with Disabilities Residing in Group Quarters (CVGQ) – This project is a design effort to determine the feasibility of collecting information about criminal victimization on a periodic basis from persons with disabilities residing in group quarters, such as nursing homes and group homes for adults with disabilities. The project will pre-test a survey instrument and set of survey administration protocols prior to full implementation of the nationwide data collection. Estimated burden for the pre-test is 130 hours.
Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics (LEMAS) – The LEMAS Survey is presently the most systematic and comprehensive source of national data on law enforcement personnel, expenditures and pay, operations, equipment, computers and information systems, and policies and procedures. The LEMAS survey provides national estimates for all state and local general purpose law enforcement agencies based on a nationally representative sample of agencies. LEMAS surveys have been conducted periodically since 1987, and data collected through the surveys have provided information on current issues and trends in law enforcement practices in the United States. The next wave of the LEMAS will be administered in 2016, based on a redesigned data collection instrument and set of survey administration protocols. Burden estimate to conduct cognitive testing of the new instrumentation and to test the survey protocols is 150 hours.
Police Use of Force Pilot Data Collection – BJS is proposing a two-phase process to implement a national statistical collection on law enforcement use of force. Under phase one, BJS has created a list of incident-level data elements that will guide law enforcement agencies as to what should be collected for every incident involving use of force. This list of data elements will be vetted with stakeholders for feedback. Phase two involves administering a pilot study that examines the capabilities of agencies to collect and provide the data elements vetted in Phase one. The goal of the pilot involves 1) determining current practices by law enforcement agencies for documenting and tracking use of force incidents and civilian complaints; and 2) obtaining summary estimates on police use of force. The pilot will obtain information on the ability of agencies to collect the data elements of importance determined in Phase one, and for those agencies collecting the data will also detail how the data are being recorded. A survey will be administered to a sample of local, county and state law enforcement agencies. In addition to the survey, agencies will be asked to provide copies of the current policies on use of force and any forms they currently use to document force for coding and analytical purposes. Results will be generalized to agencies of similar characteristics based on the stratification methods chosen. During the development of the pilot study instrumentation and administration protocols, BJS will likely need to employ several of the development and testing methodologies delineated in this generic IC, such as cognitive testing, exploratory interviews, and expert focus groups. Requests for distinct development and testing activities will be submitted to OMB for approval separately. Preliminary estimates for associated burden hours total 120 hours across the possible methodologies.
Surveys of Law Enforcement Officers – BJS conducts a number of national data collections of federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies covering a variety of general and special topics in law enforcement. Despite the wide range of information collected by these surveys, BJS has focused exclusively on establishments as the unit of analysis. To date, BJS has not conducted a survey of individual law enforcement officers (LEOs). This is an important gap as understanding the attitudes and perceptions LEOs have on issues such as their job responsibilities, perceptions of procedural justice within their agency, their role in the community, training, and crime control and prevention are essential to understanding police-community relations and how officer attitudes may impact perceptions of police legitimacy. To understand these issues better, BJS will conduct developmental and testing activities to determine an appropriate sample design and identify a mechanism to field an officer survey that would encourage response while minimizing respondent burden. This testing work would include pilot testing surveys on topic areas of interest, such as perceptions of trust and legitimacy in the community, perceptions of procedural fairness, and law enforcement cynicism. The estimated burden for these developmental activities is 250 hours.
National Inmate Survey (NIS-4): BJS will pursue development work for the next NIS survey, as mandated by the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003. Developmental work for NIS-4 is needed under the generic clearance in order to (1) conduct cognitive tests of new items and modifications of past items; (2) conduct initial pilot test of ACASI and PAPI instrumentation and survey collection protocols; (3) develop and test a survey addendum to which 10% of sampled respondents will be assigned in an effort to provide additional level of anonymity in the prison and jail setting; (4) develop and test a facility characteristics form that collects data related to PREA standards and other factors related to variations in sexual victimization. A memorandum detailing the testing activities will be submitted to OMB for approval. BJS will pilot test the NIS-4 instruments to (1) ensure the questions and response options do not cause any significant comprehension or recall problems for inmates; (2) ensure the instruments are performing appropriately and the skip logic is programmed accurately; (3) test the length of the surveys to ensure that they are running within specific time constraints; and (4) test sampling and interviewing protocols to ensure the procedures developed do not cause any significant burden to the facilities or staff. Estimated burden hours needed for cognitive testing of the self-report surveys is 40 hours; for the administration protocols, 20 hours; for facility questionnaire review and testing 30 hours, and for pilot testing, 400 hours. The total is 490 hours.
National Survey of Youth in Custody (NSYC-3): BJS will pursue development work for the next NSYC survey, as mandated by the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003. Developmental work for NSYC-3 is needed under the generic clearance in order to (1) conduct cognitive tests of new items and modifications of past items; (2) conduct initial pilot test of ACASI and PAPI instrumentation and survey collection protocols; (3) develop and test a survey addendum to which 10% of sampled respondents will be assigned in an effort to provide additional level of anonymity in the correctional facility; (4) develop and test a facility characteristics form that collects data related to PREA standards and other factors related to variations in sexual victimization. A memorandum detailing the testing activities will be submitted to OMB for approval. BJS will pilot test the NSYC-3 instruments to (1) ensure the questions and response options do not cause any significant comprehension or recall problems for inmates; (2) ensure the instruments are performing appropriately and the skip logic is programmed accurately; (3) test the length of the surveys to ensure that they are running within specific time constraints; and (4) test sampling and interviewing protocols to ensure the procedures developed do not cause any significant burden to the facilities or staff. Estimated burden hours needed for cognitive testing of the self-report surveys is 40 hours; for the administration protocols, 20 hours; for facility questionnaire review and testing 30 hours, and for pilot testing, 400 hours. The total is 490 hours.
3. Use of Information Technology
When the survey or assessment being pretested employs automated methods for its data collection, the research conducted under this submission will also use automated data collection techniques. This clearance offers BJS the opportunity to try innovative technologies that can reduce burden, improve data quality and reliability, and increase the use of information technology.
4. Efforts to Identify Duplication
This research does not duplicate any other questionnaire design work being done by BJS or other Federal agencies. The purpose of this clearance is to stimulate additional research, which would not be done under other circumstances due to time constraints. This research will involve collaboration with staff from other agencies that are sponsoring surveys conducted by BJS, when applicable. The research may also involve joint efforts with staff from other Federal laboratory facilities. All efforts would be collaborative in nature, and no duplication in this area is anticipated.
To the maximum extent possible, we will make use of previous information, reviewing results of previous evaluations of survey data before we attempt to revise questionnaires. However, this information is not sufficient to refine our survey questionnaires and assessments without conducting additional research.
5. Minimizing Burden
This research will be designed as relatively small-scale data collection efforts. This will minimize the amount of burden required to improve questionnaires, data collection instruments, and procedures, to test new ideas, and refine or improve upon positive or unclear results from other tests. The results of the research conducted under this clearance are expected to improve the methods and instruments utilized in full scale studies and thereby improve information quality while minimizing burden to respondents.
6. Consequences of Less Frequent Collection
This clearance involves one-time questionnaire and data collection research and development activities for each survey or data collection connected with the clearance. If this project were not carried out, the quality of the data collected would suffer. In addition, activities covered under this clearance will allow for more specific and precise calculation of burden hours and costs associated with survey and data collection efforts conducted by BJS.
7. Special Circumstances
All the guidelines listed in the OMB guidelines are met. There are no special circumstances.
8. Consultations Outside the Agency
The 60-day Federal Register notice was published on October 8, 2015 (80 FR, No. 195, p. 60935). The 30-day Federal Register notice was published on December 11, 2015 (80 FR, No. 238, p. 77022). No public comments have been received in response to this notice.
Consultation with staff from other Federal agencies that sponsor surveys conducted by BJS will occur in conjunction with the testing program for the individual survey. Consultation with staff from other Federal laboratory facilities may also occur as part of joint research efforts. These consultations will include discussions concerning potential response problems, clarity of questions and instructions, and other aspects of respondent burden. Additional efforts to consult with potential respondents to obtain their views on the availability of data, clarity of instructions, etc., may be undertaken as part of the testing that is conducted under this clearance.
9. Paying Respondents
While no currently proposed projects involve the use of incentives, BJS may develop other projects where incentives could be used. BJS may offer up to $40 for any cognitive labs and up to $75 for focus group participation. We also may propose incentive experiments in limited cases.
10. Assurance of Confidentiality
According to 42 U.S.C. Section 3735, the information gathered under this clearance shall be used only for statistical or research purposes, and shall be gathered in a manner that precludes their use for law enforcement or any purpose relating to a particular individual other than statistical or research purposes. All respondents who participate in research under this clearance will be informed that the information they provide may be used only for statistical purposes and may not be disclosed, or used, in identifiable form and that their participation is voluntary. For personal visit and telephone interviews, this information will be conveyed verbally by the interviewer. For personal visit interviews, respondents will also be notified in writing to give them something they can keep and read. For self-administered questionnaires, the information will be included in the mailing package, recruitment communications and materials, either on the questionnaire, or the instructions. For Internet-based data collections, this information will be displayed prominently, and in a format that allows the respondent to print it out. All participants in cognitive research will be required to sign written notification concerning the voluntary and confidential nature of their participation. We will also inform respondents in writing of the need to have an OMB number. No participant direct identifiers will be maintained. The Generic Information Clearance will specify the particular authority for the data collection.
11. Justification for Sensitive Questions
It is possible that some potentially sensitive questions may be included in questionnaires that are tested under this clearance. One of the purposes of the testing is to identify such questions, determine sources of sensitivity, and address concerns related to those questions, insofar as possible, before the actual survey is administered. Justification for any sensitive questions included in a project covered by this generic IC will be included in the individual project submissions.
12. Estimate of Hour Burden
We estimate that the number of people involved in our exploratory, field test, pilot, cognitive, and focus group work is estimated to cover about 20,000 respondents over the three year period, with a total estimated respondent burden of approximately 15,000 hours for the period from January 2016 through December 2019.
A variety of forms will be used in conducting the research under this clearance, and the exact number of different forms, length of each form, and number of subjects/respondents per form are not thoroughly known at this time. However, we can project that our activities will likely include testing items and data collection modes, and conducting pilot tests, cognitive labs or interviews, exploratory interviews, re-interviews, behavior coding and focus groups.
13. Estimate of Cost Burden
There is typically no cost to respondents for participating in the research being conducted under this clearance, except for their time to complete the questionnaire or participate in an interview or focus group.
14. Cost to Federal Government
It is very difficult to anticipate the actual number of participants, length of interview, and/or mode of data collection for the work to be conducted under this clearance over the entire 3-year clearance period. Without that information, it is not possible to estimate in advance the cost of the work under this IC to the Federal Government. Costs associated with each individual project will be covered by the statistical unit conducting the research and will come from their data collection budgets. We will include information about costs in the individual submissions.
15. Reason for Change in Burden
There is no change in burden, as this is an initial request for a generic information clearance.
16. Project Schedule
This research program is for questionnaire and procedure development purposes. Data tabulations will be used to evaluate the results of questionnaire testing. The information collected in this effort will not be the subject of estimates or other statistics in BJS reports; however, it may be published in research and development reports or be included as a methodological appendix or footnote in a report containing data from a larger data collection effort. The results of this research may be prepared for presentation at professional meetings or publication in professional journals. Due to the nature of this clearance, there is no definite or tentative time schedule at this point. We expect work to be conducted more or less continuously throughout the duration of the clearance.
17. Request to Not Display Expiration Date
No exemption is requested.
18. Exceptions to the Certification
There are no exceptions to the certification.
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| File Title | Hi All, |
| Author | Edith.McArthur |
| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 2021-01-24 |