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The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
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The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
Lois Biener, PHD, Center for Survey Research, University of Massachusetts, Boston, 100 Morrissey Blvd, Boston, MA 02125, 617-287-7200, lois.biener@umb.edu and Charles F. Turner, PhD, Health and Behavior Measurement Program, Research Triangle Institute, 1615 M Street, NW, Suite 740, Washington, DC 20036.
A key concern for tobacco researchers is obtaining accurate information on youth smoking behaviors. School-based self-administered surveys under-represent school drop-outs, truants and absentees, and securing cooperation from school systems is difficult. In addition, obtaining parental consent can reduce both the response rate and the representativeness of the sample. RDD telephone surveys can recruit representative samples, but they yield lower estimates of smoking prevalence than in-school,self-administered surveys. Although some of this discrepancy may arise from over-reporting in school settings, children’s worries about being overheard by parents and reluctance to disclose smoking to adult interviewers is likely to produce under-reporting in telephone surveys. We present results of an experiment in which these factors were reduced. A representative sample of 3800 youth, aged 12 to 17 were recruited for the UMass Tobacco Study. They were randomly assigned to be surveyed about their smoking experiences using either standard interviewer-administered questioning (T-IAQ) or a private computer-administered self-interview (T-ACASI). In T-ACASI respondents listen to pre-recorded questions and enter answers on the keypad of a touchtone telephone. In preliminary analyses of the first 2000 interviews, T-CASI estimates of the prevalence of smoking in the past month for 14-15 year olds was double that obtained in T-IAQ interviews (p.<05). No effect was found for 12-13 year olds. Among 16-17 year olds, the T-ACASI prevalence estimate was 1.3 times higher than the T-IAQ estimate, but the difference was not statistically significant. The implications of these findings for interpreting the difference between telephone and self-administered survey results will be discussed.
Learning Objectives: After attending this session, participants will be able to
Keywords: Survey, Adolescent Health
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.
Handout (.ppt format, 108.5 kb)