Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
JOSEPH WAKSBERG*
1. INTRODUCTION
1975). Most of these numbers are unused; others are assigned to businesses, institutions, government bodies, etc.
The effort in designating these numbers, dialing them,
and then ascertaining whether or not they are working
numbers located in housing units adds considerably .to
the cost of a survey. Chilton Research Services has stated
that a t considerable expense, it has eliminated large
blocks of nonworking numbers from its sampling frame
and has been able to increase the proportion of household
numbers to 40 percent in the frame (Chilton 1967). The
reduced list is not available to the general public, and
most researchers cannot afford to duplicate the Chilton
effort.
Sudman (1973) has described a method of sampling
using banks of numbers as clusters, which reduces the
proportion of nonhousehold numbers to be dialed.
Sudmans procedure involves selecting numbers from
telephone directories, having each number identify a
bank of numbers, and dialing random numbers within
each bank until a predetermined number of listed telephone numbers has been reached. Although this system
reduces the workload dra.matically, it contains several
awkward operational features. First, for each dialed
household it involves ascertaining whether or not the
number has been listed. Where directories arranged in
numerical order do not exist, it is necessary to obtain the
information from the households interviewed raising
problems in cases of refusals or no-answers, as well as
some uncertainty regarding accuracy of response. Second,
for a national survey, it requires working with a large set
of telephone directories and unduplicating overlapping
sections of the directories. Finally, the procedure produces
inequality in the number of households per cluster, which
usually adds to the variance of the results as well as
creates uncertainty about the number of clusters needed
to achieve a specific sample size.
A different method of selecting the sample clusters
(using Sudmans definition of clusters) avoids the problems cited in the preceding paragraph and also achieves
sizeable reductions in t,he workload, although probably
not as much as Sudmans method does. This new method
was initially developed by Warren Mitofsky of CBS
Recently there has been an increasing interest in telephone surveys in lieu of personal interview surveys. The
main motivation, of course, is to avoid the high cost of
personal interviews. There appear to be other advantages
to telephone surveys: They can be completed more
quickly; the way the questions are actually asked and the
practices of the interviewers can be observed and controlled more effectively ; and interviewers willing to
work in inner-city areas can be recruited without difficulty. As a result of this rising interest, a number of
studies have been instituted on the quality of responses in
telephone surveys. The evidence seems to indicate that
generally there is little difference in accuracy of reporting
between telephone and personal interviews (Rogers 1976).
There are essentially two kinds of sampling frames used
for telephone surveys. One is the list of names and numbers in telephone directories. The other is the set of all
possible four-digit numbers within existing telephone exchanges. The use of the latter is referred to as random
digit dialing. Random digit dialing is generally preferred
because telephone directories do not contain unlisted
numbers and t,hose issued since the publication dates of
the most recent directories, and thus are subject to
potentially serious biases (Fletcher and Thompson 1974 ;
Glasser and Metzger 1975; Roslow and Roslow 1972).
Several recent papers describe techniques for sampling
and interviewing with random digit dialing (Glasser and
Metzger 1972; Hauck and Cox 1976; Sudman 1973).
Unless there is a considerable amount of advance work,
the use of unrestricted random scmpling for random
digit dialing turns out to be quite inefficient because a
Another procedure that is sometimes used involves selecting
very high percentage of the numbers in the sampling numbers from directories and replacing the last digit (or two) by the
addition of a fixed number. This does not result in known probabilities
frame-approximately 80 percent-are not assigned to of
selection.
households (Chilton 1967; Glasser and Metzger 1972,
Q
41
2. NOTATION
Let the number of telephone prefix areas (PSUs) be M .
For this analysis, we assume that the prefix area includes
the three-digit area code, the three-digit prefix code, and
the first two digits of the suffix. (The development which
follows does not really depend on this assumption and
others may be considered.)
The following notation will be used :
42
00
43
mPi lOOk
C -__
1
__ =
lOOTM Pi
mk
-.
(4.4)
7r
C
1
mPi lOOk
mk
(1 - t ) -.
--=
100TM Pi
optimum ( k
(5.1)
+ 1)
1-T-t
=-
LP,CU
Optimum Value of k
+ (1 - t ) k ] .
m(k
+ l)Cp + [:- (1 + (1 - t ) k )
- m(k
-cu
7r
.I
.3
7r
.6
.4
.2
.6
.4
.4
.2
4
3
2
5
3
6
4
3
2
1
3
2
1
4
3
2
3
2
1
3
2
1
4
2
2
2
2
1
3
2
1
2
1
1
2
1
1
.2
CJC, = 2
.02
.05
.10
2
1
1
2
1
1
2
2
1
3
2
1
4
2
2
c./c,. = 5
.02
.10
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
2
1
1
.02
.05
.10
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
.05
3
2
1
CX..=7
.10
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
.02
.05
.10
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
2
1
1
1
1
1
= 10
2
2
1
= 20
2
1
1
.5
+ 111C,
mt
CJC,
(5.2)
. (5.5)
.05
expected cost
- t)
7r
.02
- [l
+ (1 -
___
c,/c.
(31
7r
+ (1 - t)mk
cu
Therefore,
E(tota1 calls)
tCu
(l--OM
(5.3)
+.
44
+ 1) - l]/n
(6.1)
so that
expected total calls
mrs(k
+ 1)(1 - t ) + t ] / n .
variance is
m(k
(7.2)
Of these, s m ( k
1) will cost C, per call and the balance
will cost C, per call. The variance of each survey will be
the same as (5.4).
The cost function can be expressed as :
sm(k
1)C,
m ( s - st
+ t ) / n { ( l- n s / ( s - st + t ) )
+ k ( l - ( t + n s ) / ( s - st + t)))CU .
+ t) ,
t / ( s - st + t ) ,
[CP/C
+:
+ s ( k + 1) c,/cu + n
(1 - t
T)]
(1
+ kP)
. (7.4)
1-n
= TS/(S
- st
(+)I4.
45
tunately, the estimates of total households will be subject to a fairly high sampling error. If a moderately accurate independent estimate of the number of households
is available, it is probably preferable to use the independent estimates.
This uncertainty about the sampling rates also affects
the use of stratification. The information available for
stratification on the AT&T tapes of existing telephone
prefixes is the geographic location. Stratification by
region or state is thus possible and can be performed fairly
easily. However, stratification in the sense that the term
is usually used cannot really be effectively applied. With
finite populations, stratified sampling is usually performed by sampling a t fixed rates within strata. With
random digit dialing, because of the variability on sample
size it seems preferable to work with fixed sample sizes
rather than with predetermined sampling rates. The proposed sampling method follows this principle.
Under these conditions, stratification can only be applied by assigning fixed quotas to the strata. The quotas
are necessarily based on information availabe prior to
the start of the survey. If the information is not very
accurate, the procedure will introduce biases in the survey
results. Normally, with stratified sampling, poor prior
information will reduce the efficiency of a sample but will
not introduce any bias.
Assigning quotas to strata involves obtaining independent estimates of the number of households in each
state or region and using these estimates to establish the
quotas. Alternatively, the same data can be used to
establish poststratified estimates (or ratio estimates).
With fairly large samples, there seem to be no special
advantages to stratification as contrasted with ratio
estimates. For small samples, it probably is worth the
effort of stratification. I n either case, it is important to
superimpose on the weighting system some form of ratio
estimate, to reduce the biases in the survey arising from
the exclusion of nontelephone households and to adjust
for nonresponse. The items used to produce ratio estimates generally depend on the subject of the survey and
the kinds of information available on a 100 percent basis.
However, the major source of bias arises from the exclusion of telephone households and, obviously, availability of telephones is closely related to family income.
For example, according to the 1970 Census of Population
and Housing, only 76 percent of the households with
family incomes under $5,000 had telephones available
whereas about 95 percent of those with incomes of $25,0tx)
or more had telephones. The close relationship of telephones with income is reflected in items that correlate
with income. Thus the 1970 Census reported that 89
percent of white households had telephones but only 70
percent of black households.
For most surveys, ratio estimates by income and race
should be effective in sharply reducing potential biases.
We have found it useful to replace income in the ratio
estimates by items that correlate highly with income.
Census Bureau statistics on income are produced an-
46
REFERENCES
Chilton Research Services (1967), Continuous Tracking Studies
via WATS Lines and Personal Interviewing, report presented to
the Advertising Research Foundation, 13th Annual Conference,
Chilton Research Services, Phila., Pa.
Fletcher, James E., and Thompson, Harry B. (1974), Telephone
Directory Samples and Random Telephone Number Generation,
Journal of Broadcasting, 18.2, 187-191.
Hansen, Morris H., Hurwitr, William N., and Madow, William G.
(1953), Sample Survey Methods and Theory, 1, New York: John
Wiley & Sons.
Glasser, Gerald J., and Metrger, Gale D. (1972), Random Digit
Dialing as a Method of Telephone Sampling, Journal of Marketing
Research, 9, 5964.
, and Metzger, Gale D. (1975), National Estimates of Nonlisted Telephone Households and Their Characteristics, Journal
of Marketing Research, 12, 35S361.
Groves, Robert M. (1977), An Empirical Comparison of Two
Telephone Sample Designs, unpublished report of the Survey
Research Center of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich.
Hauck, Mathew, and Cox, hlichael (1976), Locating a Sample by
Random Digit Dialing, Public Opinion Quarterly, 40, 253-260.
Lahiri, D.B. (19.51), A Method of Sample Selection Providing Unbiased Ratio Estimates, Bulletin International Statistical Institute,
33, 133-140.
Rogers, Theresa F. (1976), Interviews by Telephone and in Person:
Quality of Responses and Field Performance, Public Opinion
&uarterly, 40,51-65.
Roslow, Sydney, and Roslow, Laurence (1972), Unlisted Phone
Subscribers Are Different, Journal of Advertising Research, 12,
3S38.
Sudman, Seymour (1973), The Uses of Telephone Directories for
Survey Sampling, Joumal of Marketing Research, 10, 204-207.