Potential and Challenges in Collecting Social and Behavioral Data on Adolescent Alcohol Norms: Comparing Respondent-Driven Sampling and Web-Based Respondent-Driven Sampling

Abstract

BackgroundRespondent-driven sampling (RDS) is a method successfully used to research hard-to-access populations. Few studies have explored the use of the Internet and social media with RDS, known as Web-based RDS (WebRDS). This study explored the use of combining both “traditional” RDS and WebRDS to examine the influences on adolescent alcohol use.ObjectiveThis paper reports on the recruitment processes and the challenges and enablers of both RDS and WebRDS. It details comparative recruitment data and provides a summary of the utility of both methods for recruiting adolescents to participate in an online survey investigating youth alcohol norms.MethodsProcess evaluation data collected from research staff throughout the study were used to assess the challenges and solutions of RDS and WebRDS. Pearson chi-square test (Fisher’s exact test if applicable) was used to compare the differences in sociodemographics and drinking behavior between data collected by RDS and WebRDS.ResultsOf the total sample (N=1012), 232 adolescents were recruited by RDS and 780 by WebRDS. A significantly larger proportion of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander (P<.001) participants who spoke English as their main language at home (P=.03), and of middle and lower socioeconomic status (P<.001) was found in the RDS sample. The RDS sample was also found to have a higher occurrence of past 7-day drinking (P<.001) and past 7-day risky drinking (P=.004). No significant differences in gender, age, past month alcohol use, and lifetime alcohol use were observed between the RDS and WebRDS samples. This study revealed RDS and WebRDS used similar lengths of chains for recruiting participants; however, WebRDS conducted a faster rate of recruitment at a lower average cost per participant compared to RDS.ConclusionsUsing WebRDS resulted in significant improvements in the recruitment rate and was a more effective and efficient use of resources than the traditional RDS method. However, WebRDS resulted in partially different sample characteristics to traditional RDS. This potential effect should be considered when selecting the most appropriate data collection method.

Evaluating different recruitment methods in a longitudinal survey: Findings from the pan-European PASTA project (Preprint)

“…street recruitment) were very effective in terms of the number of recruited participants; recruiting people through social media (mainly Facebook) was not only effective, but also very time-efficient. Similar results were observed by others [4,10,11], who applied web based sampling in their research. Regarding to the near ubiquity of the Internet, it has become easier for people to engage in surveys [22] as it can overcome barriers such as physical distance, transportation, and limited time [23].…”

“…due to an increase in exclusive use of mobile phones or email rather than traditional mail or landline phone. Opportunistic approaches such as recruitment via social media promise cost savings [4,[7][8][9][10][11][12] and a better coverage of person groups that are hard to reach with the traditional recruitment methods, like parents of adolescents [8], adolescents themselves [10], people with special conditions [13,14], smokers [15] or low-income people [16]. Social media, like Facebook and Twitter, can potentially have a strong snowballing effect [17] given their intensive use and continuing growth (around 1.94 billion monthly active Facebook users worldwide [26]), their feature that information can be shared very easily among networks [17], and are therefore able to reach a large number of people in a very short time.…”

“…Poor response rates can further be improved by including rewards for participation such as financial compensations [18]. One major drawback of the opportunistic recruitment methods is the concern of sample bias as the population reached thereby does not necessarily represent each group of the total population equally well [10]. Specific types of social media might, for example, be preferably used by younger people [3,7,11] and not by elderly.…”

Prevalence and correlates of hazardous alcohol consumption and binge drinking among men who have sex with men (MSM) in San Francisco

“…Furthermore, our study may have included individuals who are more marginalized, have fewer resources, and/or have more time to participate in the study. Prior RDS studies noted greater recruitment of participants with lower education or income [ 62 , 63 ] compared to non-RDS samples. Indeed, researchers have observed challenges in using RDS to recruit MSM with higher socioeconomic status (SES) in San Francisco and elsewhere [ 23 , 25 ].…”

Influences of club connectedness among young adults in Western Australian community-based sports clubs

“…A new Facebook business page was created for the study to enhance communication and recruitment, a strategy successfully employed in another alcohol study with young people [27]. Paid Facebook advertising was used to assist with recruitment.…”