IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/somere/v50y2021i4p1552-1583.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Experimental Evidence on Immediate and Long-term Consequences of Test-induced Respondent Burden for Panel Attrition

Author

Listed:
  • Corinna Kleinert
  • Bernhard Christoph
  • Michael Ruland

Abstract

Panel attrition is a major problem in long-term panel studies. While the design of the German National Educational Panel Study adult survey—combining biannual competency tests with regular face-to-face interviews—is highly innovative, such a design could raise respondent burden and thus potentially increase panel attrition and nonresponse bias. To test this possibility, we use an experimental split questionnaire design administering two tests to one half of the respondents but only one test to the other half. Analyzing the effects of these different experimental settings on response behavior shows that even though those assigned to the longer test variant had no higher probability of refusing to participate in the survey, they were significantly more likely to apply alternative strategies for not taking the tests. The results also show that not only test avoidance but also low test performance has negative consequences for survey participation in later waves.

Suggested Citation

  • Corinna Kleinert & Bernhard Christoph & Michael Ruland, 2021. "Experimental Evidence on Immediate and Long-term Consequences of Test-induced Respondent Burden for Panel Attrition," Sociological Methods & Research, , vol. 50(4), pages 1552-1583, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:somere:v:50:y:2021:i:4:p:1552-1583
    DOI: 10.1177/0049124119826145
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0049124119826145
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0049124119826145?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nicoletti, Cheti & Buck, Nick, 2004. "Explaining interviewee contact and co-operation in the British and German Household Panels," ISER Working Paper Series 2004-06, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Yan Ting & Williams Douglas, 2022. "Response Burden – Review and Conceptual Framework," Journal of Official Statistics, Sciendo, vol. 38(4), pages 939-961, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Wuyts Celine & Loosveldt Geert, 2020. "Measurement of Interviewer Workload within the Survey and an Exploration of Workload Effects on Interviewers’ Field Efforts and Performance," Journal of Official Statistics, Sciendo, vol. 36(3), pages 561-588, September.
    2. Nicole Watson & Mark Wooden, 2011. "Re-engaging with Survey Non-respondents: The BHPS, SOEP and HILDA Survey Experience," Melbourne Institute Working Paper Series wp2011n02, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne.
    3. Lynn, Peter & Jäckle, Annette & G. Blom, Annelies, 2008. "Understanding cross-national differences in unit non-response: the role of contact data," ISER Working Paper Series 2008-01, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    4. Pforr, Klaus & Blohm, Michael & Blom, Annelies G. & Erdel, Barbara & Felderer, Barbara & Fräßdorf, Mathis & Hajek, Kristin & Helmschrott, Susanne & Kleinert, Corinna & Koch, Achim & Krieger, Ulrich & , 2015. "Are Incentive Effects on Response Rates and Nonresponse Bias in Large-scale, Face-to-face Surveys Generalizable to Germany? Evidence from Ten Experiments," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 79(3), pages 740-768.
    5. Annamaria Bianchi & Silvia Biffignandi, 2019. "Social Indicators to Explain Response in Longitudinal Studies," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 141(3), pages 931-957, February.
    6. Sadig, Husam, 2014. "Weighting for non-monotonic response pattern in longitudinal surveys," ISER Working Paper Series 2014-34, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    7. Kleinert, Corinna & Ruland, Michael & Trahms, Annette, 2013. "Bias in einem komplexen Surveydesign : Ausfallprozesse und Selektivität in der IAB-Befragung ALWA," FDZ Methodenreport 201302_de, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany].
    8. Isabella Buber-Ennser, 2014. "Attrition in the Austrian Generations and Gender Survey," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 31(16), pages 459-496.
    9. G. Blom, Annelies, 2009. "Explaining cross-country differences in contact rates," ISER Working Paper Series 2009-08, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    10. repec:iab:iabfme:201302(de is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Sadig, Husam, 2014. "Non-response subgroup-tailored weighting: the choice of variables and the set of respondents used to estimate the weighting model," ISER Working Paper Series 2014-36, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    12. Sadig, Husam, 2014. "Unknown eligibility whilst weighting for non-response: the puzzle of who has died and who is still alive?," ISER Working Paper Series 2014-35, Institute for Social and Economic Research.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:somere:v:50:y:2021:i:4:p:1552-1583. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.