In this study, we use qualitative research methods to identify, discuss, and investigate the self-reported motivational factors and barriers in all stages of the probability-based online panel lifecycle—recruitment to the panel, wave-by-wave data collection, and voluntary attrition. Our data were gathered with qualitative in-depth interviews (IDIs). Between March 2020 and February 2021, panelists from the Life in Australia™ probability online panel were classified into four groups based on their previous panel response behavior and each was interviewed. The qualitative data were used to link the reported motivation for and barriers against joining and staying active in the panel with theories about survey participation. Evidence from the IDIs shows that motivations and barriers can be directly linked to social-psychological theories that explain panel/longitudinal survey participation, including how theories such as social-exchange theory, leverage-salience theory, and the reasoned action approach, are sufficiently robust to help understand the time dimension of survey participation and behavioral change of panel members. Our findings have practical implications for probability-based online panel management.
The objective of this study is to identify factors affecting participation rates, i.e., nonresponse and voluntary attrition rates, and their predictive power in a probability-based online panel. Participation for this panel had already been investigated in the literature according to the socio-demographic and socio-psychological characteristics of respondents and different types of paradata, such as device type or questionnaire navigation, had also been explored. In this study, the predictive power of online panel participation paradata was instead evaluated, which was expected (at least in theory) to offer even more complex insight into respondents’ behavior over time. This kind of paradata would also enable the derivation of longitudinal variables measuring respondents’ panel activity, such as survey outcome rates and consecutive waves with a particular survey outcome prior to a wave (e.g., response, noncontact, refusal), and could also be used in models controlling for unobserved heterogeneity. Using the Life in Australia™ participation data for all recruited members for the first 30 waves, multiple linear, binary logistic and panel random-effect logit regression analyses were carried out to assess socio-demographic and online panel paradata predictors of nonresponse and attrition that were available and contributed to the accuracy of prediction and the best statistical modeling. The proposed approach with the derived paradata predictors and random-effect logistic regression proved to be reasonably accurate for predicting nonresponse—with just 15 waves of online panel paradata (even without sociodemographics) and logit random-effect modeling almost four out of five nonrespondents could be correctly identified in the subsequent wave.
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