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<p>Nearly all panel surveys suffer from unit nonresponse and the risk of nonresponse bias. Just as the analytic value of panel surveys increase with their length, so does cumulative attrition, which can adversely affect the representativeness of the resulting survey estimates. Auxiliary data can be useful for monitoring and adjusting for attrition bias, but traditional auxiliary sources have known limitations. We investigate the utility of linked-administrative data to adjust for attrition bias in a standard piggyback longitudinal design, where respondents from a preceding general population cross-sectional survey, which included a data linkage request, were recruited for a subsequent longitudinal survey. Using the linked-administrative data from the preceding survey, we estimate attrition biases for the first eight study waves of the longitudinal survey and investigate whether an augmented weighting scheme that incorporates the linked-administrative data reduces attrition biases. We find that adding the administrative information to the weighting scheme generally leads to a modest reduction in attrition bias compared to a standard weighting procedure and, in some cases, reduces variation in the point estimates. We conclude with a discussion of these results and remark on the practical implications of incorporating linked-administrative data in piggyback longitudinal designs.</p>
</abstract>

Nearly all panel surveys suffer from unit nonresponse and the risk of nonresponse bias. Just as the analytic value of panel surveys increase with their length, so does cumulative attrition, which can adversely affect the representativeness of the resulting survey estimates. Auxiliary data can be useful for monitoring and adjusting for attrition bias, but traditional auxiliary sources have known limitations. We investigate the utility of linked-administrative data to adjust for attrition bias in a standard piggyback longitudinal design, where respondents from a preceding general population cross-sectional survey, which included a data linkage request, were recruited for a subsequent longitudinal survey. Using the linked-administrative data from the preceding survey, we estimate attrition biases for the first eight study waves of the longitudinal survey and investigate whether an augmented weighting scheme that incorporates the linked-administrative data reduces attrition biases. We find that adding the administrative information to the weighting scheme generally leads to a modest reduction in attrition bias compared to a standard weighting procedure and, in some cases, reduces variation in the point estimates. We conclude with a discussion of these results and remark on the practical implications of incorporating linked-administrative data in piggyback longitudinal designs.

Evaluating the Utility of Linked Administrative Data for Nonresponse Bias Adjustment in a Piggyback Longitudinal Survey

Journal of Official Statistics

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Nearly all panel surveys suffer from unit nonresponse and the risk of nonresponse bias. Just as the analytic value of panel surveys increase with their length,...

Evaluating the Utility of Linked Administrative Data for Nonresponse Bias Adjustment in a Piggyback Longitudinal Survey

Published Online: Dec 26, 2021

Page range: 837 - 864

Received: Oct 01, 2020

Accepted: May 01, 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/jos-2021-0037

Keywords
Attrition, auxiliary data, between-wave events, panel survey, weighting

© 2020 Tobias J.M. Büttner et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Supplementary Material Details

Evaluating the Utility of Linked Administrative Data for Nonresponse Bias Adjustment in a Piggyback Longitudinal Survey

Published Online: Dec 26, 2021

Page range: 837 - 864

Received: Oct 01, 2020

Accepted: May 01, 2021

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/jos-2021-0037

KeywordsAttrition, auxiliary data, between-wave events, panel survey, weighting

© 2020 Tobias J.M. Büttner et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Supplementary Material Details

Keywords
Attrition, auxiliary data, between-wave events, panel survey, weighting