1995 Race and Ethnicity - Data Collection Page
About 85 percent of month-in-sample 2 through 4 and 6 through 8 interviews are conducted by telephone. Interviewers continue to visit households without telephones, with poor English-language skills, or which decline a telephone interview. Approximately 15 percent of the sample each month is interviewed by telephone from one of three centralized telephone interviewing centers: Hagerstown, Maryland; Jeffersonville, Indiana; and Tucson, Arizona. Interviewing at these centers begins on Sunday afternoon of interviewing week and ends on Wednesday. Cases which have not been contacted at this point are transferred to the field staff, either for telephone or personal visit interviews. Field interviewers have until Tuesday of the following week to complete all their assigned cases.
One of the most difficult tasks an interviewer faces is obtaining respondent cooperation. CPS is a voluntary survey, and persuading residents to take the time to answer questions completely and accurately as possible is sometimes a difficult challenge. In recent years, between 93 and 94 percent of the eligible households have provided basic labor force information. In May 1995 there were 54,055 interviewed households. All individuals in those households were eligible for the supplement. Supplement information was not obtained from about 10.5 percent of those individuals.
In households which have not previously been interviewed, the interview begins with questions about the housing unit and the demographic characteristics of the people who consider this address their usual residence. Otherwise, after updating the household roster for any changes, the interview begins with the labor force portion of the interview. Labor force information is collected for each civilian 15 years of age or older, although the data for 15-year olds are not used in official BLS estimates.
After the labor force information has been collected for all eligible household members, the Race and Ethnicity Supplement questions were asked. Although interviewers were instructed to obtain self-reports when possible, typically, a single respondent reports for everyone in the household. Parents answered the supplement questions for children under age 15.
The specific questions to be asked appear on the computer screen, and the interviewer has been trained to ask each question exactly as it is worded. Based upon the response entered by the interviewer, the computerized questionnaire (or data collection instrument) determines the next question to be asked. While some questions require simple "yes" or "no" responses, others require the interviewer to categorize a response into a set of predetermined categories. Occasionally, interviewers type in answers directly, rather than selecting predetermined categories, although, with the exception of the responses to questions about the name of an employer, job duties, and occupation, the interviewer rarely has to type a lengthy response.
In continuing households, information collected in previous interviews is used to shorten portions of the interview and reduce spurious month-to-month changes. For example, employed persons who verify they are still working for the same employer are asked if their job duties have changed and if the description of their job last month is accurate, rather than having this information reasked each month.
1995 Race and Ethnicity - Data Collection Page
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