A Guide for Population-based Analysis of the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study Baseline Data

ABCD is a longitudinal, observational study of U.S. children, ages 9-10 at baseline, recruited at random from the household populations in defined catchment areas for each of 21 study sites. The 21 geographic locations that comprise the ABCD research sites are nationally distributed and generally represent the range of demographic and socio-economic diversity of the U.S. birth cohorts that comprise the ABCD study population. The clustering of participants and the potential for selection bias in study site selection and enrollment are features of the ABCD observational study design that are informative for statistical estimation and inference. Both multi-level modeling and robust survey design-based methods can be used to account for clustering of sampled ABCD children in the 21 study sites. Covariate controls in analytical models and propensity weighting methods that calibrate ABCD weighted distributions to nationally-representative controls from the American Community Survey (ACS) can be employed in analysis to account for known informative sample design features or to attenuate potential demographic and socio-economic selection bias in the national sampling and recruitment of eligible children. This guide will present results of an empirical investigation of the ABCD baseline data that compares the statistical efficiency of multi-level modeling and distribution-free design-based approaches—both weighted and unweighted--to analyses of the ABCD baseline data. Specific recommendations will be provided for researchers on robust, efficient approaches to both descriptive and multivariate analyses of the ABCD baseline data.