INTERVIEWING A NATIONAL SAMPLE BY LONG-DISTANCE TELEPHONE

Changing emphases in programs of social welfare, including public health, make it increasingly necessary to plan and conduct programs responsive to the subjective needs and values of the consumer groups for whom they are intended. Obtaining information about such needs in turn requires the development of inexpensive but valid tools for collecting data. In recent years the telephone has seen increasing use as a means of collecting data quickly and inexpensively. Despite some limitations, a small number of published studies generally support the usefulness of the telephone as a means of obtaining personal information. Unfortunately, most of these studies have focused on a relatively small geographic area, where the cost of telephoning is minimal and where it is feasible to undertake intensive efforts to reduce nonresponse rates. The present report is one of the very few which attempted to obtain personal information via the telephone from a probability sample of the U. S. adult population. It also provides detailed data on the costs of this method, and on nonresponse rates, and estimates possible sample bias stemming from differences in personal characteristics of telephone owners and nonowners. The results of an effort to reduce bias are also described. Finally, since the sample interviewed by telephone had earlier given personal interviews, data are provided on the consistency of information obtained by the two methods.