Responsive Survey Design for Fertility Surveys: Paradata-Guided Active Interventions in the National Survey of Family Growth

Nicole Kirgis, University of Michigan
Emilia Peytcheva, University of Michigan
James Wagner, University of Michigan
William D. Mosher, National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), CDC

Fertility survey data collection is fraught with uncertainty (e.g., unknown eligibility rates and response rates). These uncertainties imply lack of control over the cost, timeliness, and ultimately the error structure of fertility survey data. The National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) uses a “responsive design,” which alters the data collection protocol base on paradata collected during the data collection period. This paper describes the conceptual framework of the NSFG paradata, illustrates the monitoring tools, and then evaluates two interventions in the data collection to improve the quality of the survey data. The results demonstrate how paradata and responsive survey design can be used to yield more and higher quality fertility survey data within the same cost and time constraints. These tools offer a means to advance the collection of fertility survey data and can be applied to survey data collection across a wide range of demographic topics.