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- 1. Survey Quality ArchivedArticles and reports: 12-001-X201200211751Description:
Survey quality is a multi-faceted concept that originates from two different development paths. One path is the total survey error paradigm that rests on four pillars providing principles that guide survey design, survey implementation, survey evaluation, and survey data analysis. We should design surveys so that the mean squared error of an estimate is minimized given budget and other constraints. It is important to take all known error sources into account, to monitor major error sources during implementation, to periodically evaluate major error sources and combinations of these sources after the survey is completed, and to study the effects of errors on the survey analysis. In this context survey quality can be measured by the mean squared error and controlled by observations made during implementation and improved by evaluation studies. The paradigm has both strengths and weaknesses. One strength is that research can be defined by error sources and one weakness is that most total survey error assessments are incomplete in the sense that it is not possible to include the effects of all the error sources. The second path is influenced by ideas from the quality management sciences. These sciences concern business excellence in providing products and services with a focus on customers and competition from other providers. These ideas have had a great influence on many statistical organizations. One effect is the acceptance among data providers that product quality cannot be achieved without a sufficient underlying process quality and process quality cannot be achieved without a good organizational quality. These levels can be controlled and evaluated by service level agreements, customer surveys, paradata analysis using statistical process control, and organizational assessment using business excellence models or other sets of criteria. All levels can be improved by conducting improvement projects chosen by means of priority functions. The ultimate goal of improvement projects is that the processes involved should gradually approach a state where they are error-free. Of course, this might be an unattainable goal, albeit one to strive for. It is not realistic to hope for continuous measurements of the total survey error using the mean squared error. Instead one can hope that continuous quality improvement using management science ideas and statistical methods can minimize biases and other survey process problems so that the variance becomes an approximation of the mean squared error. If that can be achieved we have made the two development paths approximately coincide.
Release date: 2012-12-19 - Articles and reports: 12-001-X201200211757Description:
Collinearities among explanatory variables in linear regression models affect estimates from survey data just as they do in non-survey data. Undesirable effects are unnecessarily inflated standard errors, spuriously low or high t-statistics, and parameter estimates with illogical signs. The available collinearity diagnostics are not generally appropriate for survey data because the variance estimators they incorporate do not properly account for stratification, clustering, and survey weights. In this article, we derive condition indexes and variance decompositions to diagnose collinearity problems in complex survey data. The adapted diagnostics are illustrated with data based on a survey of health characteristics.
Release date: 2012-12-19 - Articles and reports: 12-001-X201200111681Description:
This paper focuses on the application of graph theory to the development and testing of survey research instruments. A graph-theoretic approach offers several advantages over conventional approaches in the structure and features of a specifications system for research instruments, especially for large, computer-assisted instruments. One advantage is to verify the connectedness of all components and a second advantage is the ability to simulate an instrument. This approach also allows for the generation of measures to describe an instrument such as the number of routes and paths. The concept of a 'basis' is discussed in the context of software testing. A basis is the smallest set of paths within an instrument which covers all link-and-node pairings. These paths may be used as an economic and comprehensive set of test cases for instrument testing.
Release date: 2012-06-27 - Articles and reports: 12-001-X201200111685Description:
Survey data are often used to fit linear regression models. The values of covariates used in modeling are not controlled as they might be in an experiment. Thus, collinearity among the covariates is an inevitable problem in the analysis of survey data. Although many books and articles have described the collinearity problem and proposed strategies to understand, assess and handle its presence, the survey literature has not provided appropriate diagnostic tools to evaluate its impact on regression estimation when the survey complexities are considered. We have developed variance inflation factors (VIFs) that measure the amount that variances of parameter estimators are increased due to having non-orthogonal predictors. The VIFs are appropriate for survey-weighted regression estimators and account for complex design features, e.g., weights, clusters, and strata. Illustrations of these methods are given using a probability sample from a household survey of health and nutrition.
Release date: 2012-06-27 - 5. Combining synthetic data with subsampling to create public use microdata files for large scale surveys ArchivedArticles and reports: 12-001-X201200111687Description:
To create public use files from large scale surveys, statistical agencies sometimes release random subsamples of the original records. Random subsampling reduces file sizes for secondary data analysts and reduces risks of unintended disclosures of survey participants' confidential information. However, subsampling does not eliminate risks, so that alteration of the data is needed before dissemination. We propose to create disclosure-protected subsamples from large scale surveys based on multiple imputation. The idea is to replace identifying or sensitive values in the original sample with draws from statistical models, and release subsamples of the disclosure-protected data. We present methods for making inferences with the multiple synthetic subsamples.
Release date: 2012-06-27
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- 1. Survey Quality ArchivedArticles and reports: 12-001-X201200211751Description:
Survey quality is a multi-faceted concept that originates from two different development paths. One path is the total survey error paradigm that rests on four pillars providing principles that guide survey design, survey implementation, survey evaluation, and survey data analysis. We should design surveys so that the mean squared error of an estimate is minimized given budget and other constraints. It is important to take all known error sources into account, to monitor major error sources during implementation, to periodically evaluate major error sources and combinations of these sources after the survey is completed, and to study the effects of errors on the survey analysis. In this context survey quality can be measured by the mean squared error and controlled by observations made during implementation and improved by evaluation studies. The paradigm has both strengths and weaknesses. One strength is that research can be defined by error sources and one weakness is that most total survey error assessments are incomplete in the sense that it is not possible to include the effects of all the error sources. The second path is influenced by ideas from the quality management sciences. These sciences concern business excellence in providing products and services with a focus on customers and competition from other providers. These ideas have had a great influence on many statistical organizations. One effect is the acceptance among data providers that product quality cannot be achieved without a sufficient underlying process quality and process quality cannot be achieved without a good organizational quality. These levels can be controlled and evaluated by service level agreements, customer surveys, paradata analysis using statistical process control, and organizational assessment using business excellence models or other sets of criteria. All levels can be improved by conducting improvement projects chosen by means of priority functions. The ultimate goal of improvement projects is that the processes involved should gradually approach a state where they are error-free. Of course, this might be an unattainable goal, albeit one to strive for. It is not realistic to hope for continuous measurements of the total survey error using the mean squared error. Instead one can hope that continuous quality improvement using management science ideas and statistical methods can minimize biases and other survey process problems so that the variance becomes an approximation of the mean squared error. If that can be achieved we have made the two development paths approximately coincide.
Release date: 2012-12-19 - Articles and reports: 12-001-X201200211757Description:
Collinearities among explanatory variables in linear regression models affect estimates from survey data just as they do in non-survey data. Undesirable effects are unnecessarily inflated standard errors, spuriously low or high t-statistics, and parameter estimates with illogical signs. The available collinearity diagnostics are not generally appropriate for survey data because the variance estimators they incorporate do not properly account for stratification, clustering, and survey weights. In this article, we derive condition indexes and variance decompositions to diagnose collinearity problems in complex survey data. The adapted diagnostics are illustrated with data based on a survey of health characteristics.
Release date: 2012-12-19 - Articles and reports: 12-001-X201200111681Description:
This paper focuses on the application of graph theory to the development and testing of survey research instruments. A graph-theoretic approach offers several advantages over conventional approaches in the structure and features of a specifications system for research instruments, especially for large, computer-assisted instruments. One advantage is to verify the connectedness of all components and a second advantage is the ability to simulate an instrument. This approach also allows for the generation of measures to describe an instrument such as the number of routes and paths. The concept of a 'basis' is discussed in the context of software testing. A basis is the smallest set of paths within an instrument which covers all link-and-node pairings. These paths may be used as an economic and comprehensive set of test cases for instrument testing.
Release date: 2012-06-27 - Articles and reports: 12-001-X201200111685Description:
Survey data are often used to fit linear regression models. The values of covariates used in modeling are not controlled as they might be in an experiment. Thus, collinearity among the covariates is an inevitable problem in the analysis of survey data. Although many books and articles have described the collinearity problem and proposed strategies to understand, assess and handle its presence, the survey literature has not provided appropriate diagnostic tools to evaluate its impact on regression estimation when the survey complexities are considered. We have developed variance inflation factors (VIFs) that measure the amount that variances of parameter estimators are increased due to having non-orthogonal predictors. The VIFs are appropriate for survey-weighted regression estimators and account for complex design features, e.g., weights, clusters, and strata. Illustrations of these methods are given using a probability sample from a household survey of health and nutrition.
Release date: 2012-06-27 - 5. Combining synthetic data with subsampling to create public use microdata files for large scale surveys ArchivedArticles and reports: 12-001-X201200111687Description:
To create public use files from large scale surveys, statistical agencies sometimes release random subsamples of the original records. Random subsampling reduces file sizes for secondary data analysts and reduces risks of unintended disclosures of survey participants' confidential information. However, subsampling does not eliminate risks, so that alteration of the data is needed before dissemination. We propose to create disclosure-protected subsamples from large scale surveys based on multiple imputation. The idea is to replace identifying or sensitive values in the original sample with draws from statistical models, and release subsamples of the disclosure-protected data. We present methods for making inferences with the multiple synthetic subsamples.
Release date: 2012-06-27
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