Low response rate: What to do? - 2025

Low response rate: what to do?

Course Leader

Barry Schouten 

• All NSIs staff dealing with survey data collection facing low response rates due to the failure to obtain information from a designated individual.

• Sound command of English. Participants should be able to make short interventions and to actively participate in discussions

• An academic degree with some knowledge of statistics (social science, statistics, economics), especially multivariate statistics
• Some basic knowledge of survey sampling and statistical modelling.

• The main objective of the courses is to enhance the theoretical and practical knowledge related to the treatment of unit non-response and item non-response. In particular, participants will gain knowledge on weighting techniques in order to deal with unit non-response and imputation techniques in order to deal with item non-response. For unit-nonresponse, participants will also learn about up to date monitoring of data collection and application of adaptive survey designs.

Theory and practice; covering both person and household surveys and business surveys. Distinguish between item non-response and record non-response: relative unimportance of item non-response (low frequency and easy to impute).

Prevention: survey design (e.g. frame errors, introduction letter, questionnaire, modes)

Detecting and describing non-repsonse patterns ; reasons for non-response; ways to survey non-response

Correction methods :

• Adjusting the weights

• deductive imputation and model-based imputation

• donor imputation: hot deck vs. cold deck

• nearest-neighbour

• predictive mean matching

• longitudinal imputation (panel data)

• last information carry forward

• Communication to different user groups on the level of non-response, on the correction methods applied and on the impact on accuracy of results

• Good understanding of the non-response problem. Knowledge of correction methods for unit and item non-response, and the ability to apply these methods in practice. 

• Lectures about non-response problems and correcting methods for unit and item non-response
• Some practical cases
• Practical exercises based on real data sets
• Reading material (course books + additional papers)

Required Reading 

None

• Jelke Bethlehem, Fannie Cobben & Barry Schouten (2011), Handbook of Non-response in Household Surveys. Wiley & Sons, Hoboken, NJ
• Little, R.J.A. and D.B. Rubin (2002), Statistical Analysis with Missing Data (second edition). John Wiley & Sons, New York.
• Schouten, B., Peytchev, A., Wagner, J. (2017), Adaptive Survey Design, Chapmann & Hall

Participants are invited to sketch non-response in their own organisation, both unit non-response as well as item non-response: magnitude, treatment, etc.

Participants are also invited to present their own survey case studies and list questions they may have. These will receive extra attention in the course.

Prof. dr. Barry Schouten (Statistics Netherlands)

Prof. dr.  Ton de Waal (Statistics Netherlands)