Non-Substantive Change Request Memo - 25JUL2025

Request for Approval of a Non-Substantive Change to the

National Survey of Family Growth

OMB No. 0920-0314

(Expiration: 9/30/2026)

Contact Information:

Anjani Chandra, Ph.D.

Principal Investigator and Team Lead

National Survey of Family Growth Team

Division of Health Interview Statistics/Survey Planning and Special Surveys Branch

CDC/National Center for Health Statistics

3311 Toledo Road, Room 5136

Hyattsville, MD. 20782

301-458-4138

301-458-4034 (fax)

[email protected]

July 11, 2025

1. Circumstances making the collection of information necessary

This request is for a non-substantive change to the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) (OMB No. 0920-0314, Exp. Date 9/30/2026), conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

NCHS, under its duties specified in 42 U.S.C. 242k, Section 306(a and b)(1)(h) of the Public Health Service Act, conducts the NSFG to collect and disseminate “statistics on family formation, growth, and dissolution” among a nationally representative sample of reproductive-age women and men in the U.S. household population. The NSFG supplements and complements data from birth and fetal death certificates by monitoring factors (such as sexual activity, contraception, marriage and cohabitation, and infertility) that affect birth and pregnancy rates. In addition, the NSFG serves a variety of data needs in public health programs that sponsor and depend on it, including several divisions within CDC/National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention and CDC/National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion.

Our most recent OMB revision package for NSFG specified a multi-mode, multi-phase survey design that builds on the most successful features of the continuous fieldwork design used for NSFG from 2006-2019 and has been implemented since January 2022. Data collection from January 2022 through December 2025 comprise the first 4 of 8 years of data collection planned under the NSFG’s current 10-year contract with RTI.

NSFG public-use data files for 2022-2023 were released in December 2024. Data collection for 2024-2025 is ongoing with the survey instruments as approved in the revision package in September 2023, as well as a small number of changes made in January 2025 in response to Executive Order 14168.

The current nonsubstantive change request is for a set of survey instrument changes for implementation starting in January 2026 (Year 5). These survey changes consist primarily of question deletions and are proposed to reduce respondent burden and lessen the overall sensitivity of the survey content. No new content areas are proposed. Attachment 1 provides a listing of the proposed changes to the female and male questionnaires, and Attachments 2-3 show these changes (yellow highlighting) within the context of the full female and male questionnaires.

2. Purpose and use of the information collection

The NSFG responds to the congressional mandate for NCHS to collect and publish reliable national statistics on “family formation, growth, and dissolution” (Sec. 306(a and b), paragraph 1(H) of the Public Health Service Act) as well as vital statistics on births and deaths, and a number of aspects of health status and health care. The NSFG collects and publishes the most reliable, and in most cases the only, national data to monitor such major topics as: contraceptive use and effectiveness, infertility and use of infertility services, unintended births, self-reported pelvic infection and sexually transmitted disease, sterilization, expected future births, marriage and cohabitation, the sexually active population, and the use of and need for family planning services. Under the continuous data collection design planned for the survey, as described in the revision package approved in September 2023, the NSFG is expected to be able to maintain adequate sample sizes for reliable time series for nationally representative statistics on these major topics, with cost-effectiveness goals in place to remain within available funding.

The proposed survey content changes in this nonsubstantive change request will not alter the NSFG’s ability to meet these central data needs. By potentially reducing the overall survey length and respondent burden, it is hoped that survey response rates may improve, thereby increasing the chances that estimates are more statistically reliable and more representative of the U.S. household population, potentially at lower cost.

12. Estimates of annualized burden hours and costs

The 2022-2023 NSFG showed an average survey length of 74 minutes for female respondents and 47 minutes for male respondents, within the OMB-approved lengths of 75 minutes and 50 minutes, respectively. While it is expected that average survey lengths will be reduced as a result of the proposed Year 5 changes to the survey instruments, no changes are proposed at this time in the burden notice. These burden estimates will be reevaluated with our renewal package to be submitted in 2026, or possibly later when there is sufficient timing information from data collection with the revised survey instruments.

15. Explanation for program changes and adjustments

NSFG is not changing its burden estimates at this time. The changes proposed in this non-substantive change request may eventually lead to a reduction in the estimated average burden hours from the previously approved clearance.

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