No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

This study shows that under the conditions denned below the enclosure of a twenty-five cent piece in a mail questionnaire brought 32.4 per cent more replies than the same questionnaire without the coin. Six hundred eight persons receiving the coin returned 51.6 per cent replies while three hundred seventy-six not receiving the coin returned only 19.1 per cent. Data are also presented on the r&le of selective factors and on relative costs.The study is a by-product of an evaluation of the Cattaraugus County Health Demonstration in western New York. For a period of seven years the Milbank Memorial Fund financed an intensive demonstration of rural public health work in Cattaraugus County. In the spring of 1930 a staff of experts under the direction of Professor C-E. A. Winslow 1 undertook to evaluate that work. The author assisted in a survey of the educational aspects of the demonstration among school children and adults. With some reluctance a questionnaire by mail was used to assay the attitudes of adults especially toward the financial support of public health work. One of our chief doubts about the questionnaire was the fear of an inadequate proportion of replies. To solve this difficulty, it was decided to enclose a twenty-five cent piece secured in a coin mailing card with each questionnaire. Evaluation of the results required a control county and for this purpose, Steuben, the county just east but one from Cattaraugus, was selected. The inquiry to these counties consisted of a short personal letter each of which was separately typed and obviously so, the questionnaire proper containing six questions, a stamped and addressed envelope, and the coin.The investment involved and the novelty of the procedure naturally led to an attempt to test the effect of the coin. Accordingly, the inquiry was duplicated in all respects save only two sentences in the personal letter and the presence of the coin. This inquiry was sent to persons in the six New York counties immediately surrounding Cattaraugus and Steuben.The personal letter which accompanied the coin was as follows:

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract