Zhang Shiyu, West Brady T, Wagner James, Couper Mick P, Gatward Rebecca, Axinn William G
is a PhD candidate, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
is a Research Associate Professor, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
J Surv Stat Methodol. 2023 Feb 22;11(5):1011-1031. doi: 10.1093/jssam/smac041. eCollection 2023 Nov.
In push-to-web surveys that use postal mail to contact sampled cases, participation is contingent on the mail being opened and the survey invitations being delivered. The design of the mailings is crucial to the success of the survey. We address the question of how to design invitation mailings that can grab potential respondents' attention and sway them to be interested in the survey in a short window of time. In the household screening stage of a national survey, the American Family Health Study, we experimentally tested three mailing design techniques for recruiting respondents: (1) a visible cash incentive in the initial mailing, (2) a second incentive for initial nonrespondents, and (3) use of Priority Mail in the nonresponse follow-up mailing. We evaluated the three techniques' overall effects on response rates as well as how they differentially attracted respondents with different characteristics. We found that all three techniques were useful in increasing the screening response rates, but there was little evidence that they had differential effects on sample subgroups that could help to reduce nonresponse biases.
在通过邮政信件联系抽样案例的一键上网调查中，参与调查取决于信件被打开以及调查问卷被送达。邮件的设计对调查的成功至关重要。我们探讨了如何设计邀请函邮件，使其能够在短时间内吸引潜在受访者的注意力并使他们对调查产生兴趣。在美国全国家庭健康研究的家庭筛查阶段，我们通过实验测试了三种招募受访者的邮件设计技巧：（1）在初始邮件中设置可见的现金奖励；（2）对初始未回复者提供第二次奖励；（3）在未回复跟进邮件中使用优先邮件。我们评估了这三种技巧对回复率的总体影响，以及它们如何不同地吸引具有不同特征的受访者。我们发现，所有这三种技巧都有助于提高筛查回复率，但几乎没有证据表明它们对样本亚组有不同影响，而这种影响有助于减少无回复偏差。
