When and how to contact survey respondents |
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| Coordinator 1 | Dr Alessandra Gaia (University of Milano-Bicocca) |
In an era of declining response rates, it is increasingly important for survey practitioners and methodologists to identify best practices to obtain respondents' participation. First, the choice of the invitation mode (e.g. telephone, mail or email) may impact both on respondents’ propensity to participate in surveys and on their ability to participate within a short time frame (participation speed). Secondly, invitation timings (i.e. day of the week and time of the day) and timing of reminders may also influence respondents propensity to participate and/or response speed.
In defining contact strategies, survey practitioners/researchers also face a trade-off between survey burden and unit non-response: indeed, on one hand researchers may want to split a survey in different follow-up modules to reduce survey length (and, hence, response burden), on the other hand, administering survey follow-ups may lead to higher unit non-response or attrition, as respondents may not be willing to be interviewed an additional time.
The session discusses the effects of varying survey invitations modes and timings (day of the week and time of the day) on unit non-response and non-response bias. Also, it discusses trade-offs between item non-response (due to drop-off rate associated with response burden in longer survey instruments) and unit-non-response (due to lack of contact/participation in survey follow-ups).
Research on contacts modes and timing is particularly important nowadays, as the Covid-19 pandemic led to changes in time-use and schedules, which has not been fully reverted/may not revert to pre-pandemic habits; these changes might have important implications for the effectiveness of contact invitations and, more broadly, on survey participation.