DATA REPORT
1998
Survey Conducted by:
Social and Economic Sciences Research Center
Washington State University
Pullman, WA 99164-4014
(509) 335-1511
For:
Year 2020 Commission
Office of Financial Management (OFM)
Insurance Building, P.O. Box 43113
Olympia, WA 98504-3113
John Tarnai, Principal Investigator
Report Prepared by:
Marion Landry, Study Director
Data Book #98-20 (YR20) of the Social and Economic Sciences Research Center
SESRC Project Profile
Title:
Year 2020 Commission Citizen Survey
Abstract:
This is a Computer Assisted Telephone Interview survey designed to assess the attitudes and opinions of Washington state residents regarding higher education within the state. A total of 404 household interviews were completed. Principal Investigator, John Tarnai; Project Director, Marion Landry.
Objectives:
The objectives of the study were to assess the attitudes and opinions of Washington state residents regarding higher education within the state.
Methods:
Completed telephone interviews with 404 Washington State residents from an RDD sample of Washington state telephone numbers. Each case received a minimum of 10 call attempts.
Results:
Calls were attempted to a total of 1627 residences. Of these, 404 completed interviews, another 18 were determined ineligible because they were not households or no one in the household was over 18 years of age.
Timeframe:
June 15, 1998 through July 28, 1998
Contract with
Office of Financial Management (OFM)
Insurance Building, P.O. Box 43113
Olympia, WA 98504-3113Contract Number:
OFM IAA No. 1050-98
Funding Source:
Office of Financial Management (OFM)
Contract Amount:
$21,381.00
Principal Investigator:
John Tarnai, Ph.D.
Study Director:
Marion Landry, M.A.
SESRC Acronym:
YR20
SESRC Number:
0316
Data Book Number:
98-20
WSU OGRD Number:
NA
Deliverables:
Data reports, survey, data set, SAS program.
Project Contributors
All of the work conducted at the Social and Economic Sciences Research Center is a result of a cooperative effort made by a team of dedicated research professionals. While it is impossible to identify the contributions provided by each member of this research team, the following list does identify the major contributors. The research in this report could not have been conducted were it not for the effort of the coders, data-entry personnel, and administrative support of the staff at SESRC.
Principal Investigators
John Tarnai, Ph.D.
Director
Contract Management
Don Dillman, Ph.D.
Deputy Director of Research & Development
Rita Koontz
Administrative Services Manager
Tammy Small
Head Secretary
Sandy Johnson
Fiscal Specialist
Julie Nielsen
Fiscal Specialist
Project Management
Danna Moore, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator / Research Coordinator
Dretha Phillips, Ph.D.
Research Associate
Rosie Pavlov, M.A.
Study Director
Marion Landry, M.A.
Study Director
Arrick Jackson, B.S.
Research Assistant
Data Management/Analysis
Rodney K. Baxter, Ph.D.
Data Manager / Analyst
Zoltan Porga
Programmer / Analyst
Dan Vakoch, M.S.
Data Analyst
Lisa Carley, M.A.
Data Analyst
Shawn Scamahorn
Data Analyst
David Schultz
Network Manager / CATI Programmer
Lance Krull
Data Analysts
Brian Adams
CATI Programmer
Data Collection
Kent Miller, M.A.
Data Collection Unit Manager / Survey Supervisor
Jolyn Persons
Data Collection Unit Manager / Survey Supervisor
Thom Allen, B.A.
Data Collection Unit Manager / Survey Supervisor
Keeley Duft
Survey Supervisor
Anita Neill
Survey Supervisor
Sarah Frost
Survey Supervisor
Mary Kate Watson
Survey Supervisor
Carmen Lugo-Curry
Survey Supervisor
I. Survey Administration
BACKGROUND
The Social and Economic Sciences Research Center ( SESRC) was contracted by the Year 2020 Commission to design and implement a statewide telephone survey about post-secondary education needs of Washington state households.
SURVEY OBJECTIVES
1. Assess the attitudes and opinions of Washington state residents regarding higher education.
SAMPLE
The population for the Year 2020 Commission survey consists of all households located within the geographic boundaries of Washington State. A random digit dialing (RDD) approach was used to obtain the sample. This is the most common approach used for telephone interviews because it has the most complete coverage of public populations. The only households that are excluded by an RDD approach are households without telephones. This non-coverage error is quite small. Statewide, the percent of households without telephones is less than four percent, although there are a few counties with higher rates of non-telephone households.
The RDD sampling frame was prepared by the Genesys Sampling company. Telephone numbers are generated randomly using a computer, after determining all the working telephone exchanges and working blocks within the state. All possible combinations of telephone numbers within these exchanges and blocks are determined, and the sample is drawn from this sample frame.
The assumptions used to estimate the starting sample size of telephone numbers in ordering the sample were:
46% rate of non-working telephone numbers
50% rate of households that are contactable during the survey period
50% response rateFor the statewide sample, a total of 2,000 telephone numbers were ordered from the Genesys Sampling company. A total of 373 non-working and business numbers were purged from the sample. The sample consisted of 1,627 numbers which were released for interviewing in replicates of 100.
PROCEDURES
Questionnaire Design. The original survey was designed by the Year 2020 Commission. After an initial review by SESRC staff members, several changes were made to the survey . Primarily the changes were to re-write the questions in a standard telephone interviewing format used by SESRC. After the changes were made the questionnaire was time tested. It was determined that the questionnaire was too long, approximately 28 minutes to complete. Several questions were removed from the questionnaire to reduce the calling time. After the questionnaire was finalized it was programmed into the Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing system, Info Zero Un.
Pre-test of Questionnaire. An internal pretest was conducted for the Year 2020 Commission survey. A total of twelve internal interviews were conducted with interviewers and staff. Through these pretest interviews it was determined that the length of the interview was too long, approximately 25 minutes. SESRC and the Commission staff jointly determined which questions to eliminate for the survey. After several editing session the final questionnaire was developed and was time tested at 21 minutes.
Interviewer Training. Interviewers selected to work on this project were given approximately two hours of training, including background information, purpose of the study, questions and content of this study. This training was conducted on June 28, 1998. In addition, each interviewer spent about half an hour reviewing the Computer Assisted Telephone Interview program for this study. A second training was held on June 30, 1998 for two hours in order to increase the total number of interviewers available to call on the project. A total of 38 interviewers were trained on this project.
Refusal Conversion. SESRC attempted refusal conversions on all of the call records terminated as R1, R2 and RP during the first day of calling. One attempt was made on each of these call records.
RESPONSE
Response rate statistics for the survey are presented in Table 1. Attempts were made to contact a total of 400 households. A household was ineligible for participation in the survey if there was no one 18 years of age or older in the household.
Table 1. Disposition Report for All Cases
Sample Disposition
YR20
CM: Completed Interview
404
PC: Partial complete
14
PB: Partial complete
2
R1: Refusal, hang up
134
R2: Soft refusal
31
R3: Hostile refusal
98
RN: Refusal for respondent not available
12
RP: Refusal by other person
14
CB: Specific callback
18
GB: General callback
7
BZ: Busy signal
14
NA: No answer
132
AM: Answering Machine
107
DF: Deaf respondent
5
HC: Handicapped respondent
3
LG: Language problem
26
IE: Ineligible household situation/under 18
18
BG: Business or Govt
196
DS: Disconnected
283
ED: Electronic device
79
OT: Other
30
PN: Purged nonworking numbers
373
Table 2 presents a summary of the sample disposition variables needed to calculate response rates for the survey. Several different response rates are calculated and presented in this table. The reason for this is that different organizations have varying needs for presenting information and some response rates are more appropriate than others. In addition, some response rate calculations use estimates of ineligible households to calculate final response rates. For example The Council of American Survey Research Organizations (CASRO) has proposed adjusting response rates to reflect the obtained proportion of ineligible households.
The first raw response rate (RR1) is the ratio of the number of completed interviews to the total number of completed, partially completed and refused interviews. The raw response rate for this study is (404/709) 56.98 %.
The second raw response rate (RR2) takes into account those households that were never reached during the survey period, by including them in the denominator of the ratio. This response rate is (404/697) 57.95 %.
The final two response rates presented provide adjustments for the estimated proportion of ineligible households. The first adjusted response rate (RR3) is the ratio of the number of completed interviews to the total number of eligible respondents. For this study, 404 interviews were completed. This calculation adjusts for respondents that refuse to participate and were not able to be reached during the data collection period. When the ratio of completed interviews to the eligible cases is calculated in Table 2, the adjusted response rate is (404/1021) 39.577%. This adjusted response rate only adjusts for the proportion of ineligible households, but does not include noncontactable households in the denominator.
The second adjusted response rate (RR4) adds the noncontactable households to the denominator of the ratio. For this study the adjusted response rate is (404/939) 43.01 %. This response rate is probably the most representative of the actual outcome of the survey.
Table 2. Response Rate Calculations Table
Sample disposition summary
YR20
CM (CM)
404
RF1 (PB, PC)
16
RF2 (R1, R2, R3, RN, RP)
289
NA1 (CB, GB, BZ, AM, DF, HC, LG)
180
NA2 (NA)
132
IEH (IE)
18
IEO (BG, DS, ED, OT, PN)
931
Total
1970
Response Rate Calculations
ADJ1=%INELIGIBLE
4.11% (IEH)/(CM+RF1+IEH)
ADJ2=%OUT OF SAMPLE
47.26% IEO/TOTAL
RR1
56.98% CM/CM+RF1+RF2
RR2
57.95% CM/CM+RF1+(1-ADJ1)*RF2
RR3
39.57% CM/(CM+RF1+ RF2 +NA1+NA2)
RR4
43.01% CM/(CM+RF1+(1-ADJ1)*(RF2+NA1)+(1-ADJ2)*NA2)