Quantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical Methodologies Commons^™

Assessing Within-Household Selection Methods In Household Mail Surveys, Kristen Olson, Mathew Stange, Jolene D. Smyth

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Household surveys are increasingly moving toward self-administered modes of data collection. To maintain a probability sample of the population, researchers must use probability methods to select adults within households. However, very little experimental methodological work has been conducted on within-household selection in mail surveys. In this study, we experimentally examine four methods—the next-birthday method, the last-birthday method, selection of the youngest adult in the household, and selection of the oldest adult in the household—in two mail surveys of Nebraska residents (n = 2,498, AAPOR RR1 36.3 percent, and n = 947, AAPOR RR1 31.6 percent). To evaluate how accurately respondents …