Conducting Physician Mail Surveys on a Limited Budget

David A. Asch · Nicholas A. Christakis · Peter Anthony Ubel

122 citations0/0 files storedMedical Care

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Survey Methodology and Nonresponse Primary Care and Health Outcomes Survey Sampling and Estimation Techniques

Abstract

OBJECTIVES: The effects of incentive size on physicians' response rates to a mail survey were determined. METHODS: One thousand US primary care physicians were assigned randomly to receive a survey with either a $5 bill or a $2 bill as an incentive. For each of the two incentive groups, the overall response rate for three mailing waves, the total cost, and the total cost per usable response were measured. RESULTS: The response rate among those receiving the $5 bill (61%) was 32% higher than the response rate among those receiving the $2 bill (46%); overall costs were slightly higher in the $5 group, but the cost per response for each group was similar ($15.46 versus $14.93). For the same cost, a higher response rate could have been achieved in the $2 group if costs saved from foregoing the third mailing were instead used to increase the incentive for a portion of the subjects. CONCLUSIONS: A $5 bill incentive yielded a higher response rate among the physicians in this study than did a $2 bill incentive. Moreover, the powerful effect of the incentive size, combined with the consequent decline in the costs of subsequent mailing waves, suggests that resources in a fixed survey budget are allocated more efficiently to increasing the initial incentive rather than to providing a third wave to nonresponders.

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References

1960The Norm of Reciprocity: A Preliminary Statement 1982Mail and Telephone Surveys: The Total Design Method.1970Marketing Research 1997Response rates to mail surveys published in medical journals 1975Mail Surveys and Response Rates: A Literature Review 1983A Quantitative Review of Research Design Effects on Response Rates to Questionnaires 1993Estimating the Effect of Incentives on Mail Survey Response Rates: A Meta-Analysis 1995Mail Surveys: Improving the Quality

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2002Increasing response rates to postal questionnaires: systematic review 2009Methods to increase response to postal and electronic questionnaires 2001Physician response to surveys A review of the literature 2007Nonresponse Bias in a Mail Survey of Physicians 2010Getting Physicians to Respond: The Impact of Incentive Type and Timing on Physician Survey Response Rates 2002Randomized Trial of $5 Versus $10 Monetary Incentives, Envelope Size, and Candy to Increase Physician Response Rates to Mailed Questionnaires

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