Incentive delivery timing and follow-up survey completion in a prospective cohort study of injured children: a randomized experiment comparing prepaid and postpaid incentives

Abstract

Background Retaining participants over time is a frequent challenge in research studies evaluating long-term health outcomes. This study’s objective was to compare the impact of prepaid and postpaid incentives on response to a six-month follow-up survey. Methods We conducted an experiment to compare response between participants randomized to receive either prepaid or postpaid cash card incentives within a multisite study of children under 15 years in age who were hospitalized for a serious, severe, or critical injury. Participants were parents or guardians of enrolled children. The primary outcome was survey response. We also examined whether demographic characteristics were associated with response and if incentive timing influenced the relationship between demographic characteristics and response. We evaluated whether incentive timing was associated with the number of calls needed for contact. Results The study enrolled 427 children, and parents of 420 children were included in this analysis. Follow-up survey response did not differ according to the assigned treatment arm, with the percentage of parents responding to the survey being 68.1% for the prepaid incentive and 66.7% with the postpaid incentive. Likelihood of response varied by demographics. Spanish-speaking parents and parents with lower income and lower educational attainment were less likely to respond. Parents of Hispanic/Latino children and children with Medicaid insurance were also less likely to respond. We found no relationship between the assigned incentive treatment and the demographics of respondents compared to non-respondents. Conclusions Prepaid and postpaid incentives can obtain similar participation in longitudinal pediatric critical care outcomes research. Incentives alone do not ensure retention of all demographic subgroups. Strategies for improving representation of hard-to-reach populations are needed to address health disparities and ensure the generalizability of studies using these results.

Recruitment and retention of adolescents for an ecological momentary assessment measurement burst mental health study: The MHIM engagement strategy

“… 45 , 46 There is also some evidence that informs optimal schedules of incentives. For example, unconditional monetary incentives provided before participation have been shown to achieve the same or higher retention than incentives paid after participation, 47 , 48 , 49 suggesting that costs can be reduced by offering advance payment of incentives. In principle this could also help with the underrepresentation of less privileged groups who may be discouraged from participating where there is a need to wait for payment.…”

“…45,46 There is also some evidence that informs optimal schedules of incentives. For example, unconditional monetary incentives provided before participation have been shown to achieve the same or higher retention than incentives paid after participation, [47][48][49] suggesting that costs can be reduced by offering advance payment of incentives.…”

Engaging adolescents in contemporary longitudinal health research: strategies for promoting participation and retention

“…These show that higher incentives promote better retention, with diminishing marginal increases [43]. Monetary incentives paid unconditionally before a survey have been demonstrated to yield comparable or higher retention rates to conditional postsurvey incentives [44,46,47]. Incentive boosts have also been found to be effective as a way to engage 'high-effort' and under-represented respondents [48e50].…”