Memorandum U.S. Census Bureau
DATE: May 24, 2022
TO: OMB
FROM: Jenny Hunter Childs, PI, Ask U.S. Panel
SUBJECT: Ask U.S. Panel Pilot Non-Substantive Change Request (OMB# 0607-1020, exp. 04/30/2025)
The Ask U.S. Panel pilot is in Phase 1 of the full panel recruitment, where 10% of the full panel sample members are recruited in advance in order to inform the full panel design. The pilot will answer critical methodological questions related to the ability to recruit and retain historically undercounted populations. The current pilot recruitment design involves the following prepaid and promised incentives:
Initial Invitation: $5 prepaid incentive sent with the initial invitation to complete a household roster (~5-minutes long) via web or telephone.
Early Bird: $5 early bird incentive for completing the household roster via web or telephone within 1 week of the survey invitation mailing to encourage more timely responses and reduce the need for and costs associated with nonresponse follow up (NRFU).
NRFU Household Roster: $5 promised incentive for household roster completion via face-to-face mode.
Baseline Questionnaire: $20 promised incentive for completion of the baseline enrollment survey (approximately 20 minutes long).
Topical Survey: $10 promised incentive for completion of each topical survey (approximately 15 minutes on average).
The initial invitation letters were sent out on April 25 and 26, 2022. Delays in the postal service led to an abbreviated early bird incentive period (approximately 5 days for most sample members), yielding fewer respondents than desired for this part of the protocol. In fact, less than 1% of sample members took advantage of the early bird offer.
As we get ready for the nonresponse follow-up phase, it is clear that the additional $5 incentive that was largely unused at the start of data collection is needed to increase participation at a later stage in data collection. Because the face-to-face NRFU will focus on screener nonresponse, we are concerned about the lack of tools our current design offers to address baseline nonresponse. This request is to shift the unused early bird incentives to boost the baseline offer by $5 in the last baseline survey reminder (scheduled to be mailed on June 13, 2022). In addition to theoretical justification (leverage saliency theory [Groves, Singer and Corning, 2000] postulates that different design features attract different sample members, suggesting that “one-fits all” incentive amount may not be a good solution to nonresponse), this approach will better align with the nonresponse effort for screener nonrespondents, who are offered $5 for household roster completion during NRFU.
Reference:
Groves RM, Singer E, Corning AD. Leverage-salience theory of survey participation:
Description and an illustration. Public Opinion Quarterly. 2000; 64:299-308.
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| Author | Peytcheva, Emilia |
| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 2022-05-27 |