Abstract
Over the past several decades there have been dramatic shifts in demographic patterns pertaining to family formation, with declining and delayed marriage and childbearing, and increased cohabitation in the United States and other Western industrialized nations. These trends in family demography have been predominantly studied using large-scale datasets, which have identified total population and subgroup trends over time, including differences by age, gender, racial/ethnic, economic, educational, religious, and other characteristics. However, there is limited knowledge and understanding of how individuals across different levels of social position, as well as other important characteristics, make decisions around forming families. This lack of qualitative data on contemporary attitudes regarding family formation has hampered our ability to more completely understand the factors driving behaviors pertaining to the large-scale (ie, international) shifts in demographic trends. The Social Position and Family Formation (SPAFF) project is an in-depth interview study that used quantitative data to guide recruitment of a large sample for qualitative interview data collection on factors influencing different aspects of family formation among heterosexual females and males (18–35 years) in the context of individuals’ social position. This methodological paper describes the use of a ‘quantitatively-informed’ purposive sampling approach in a large metropolitan area to collect qualitative data (through in-depth interviews) from a large sample (n = 200), utilizing web-based tools for successful community-based recruitment and project management.
Highlights
The field of family demography has been extensively studied using large-scale datasets from both observational surveys [1,2] as well as surveillance or administrative datasets [3]
We present a detailed account of the integrated use of multiple web-based tools to recruit a diverse sample from the larger New York City (NYC) metropolitan area
The Social Position and Family Formation (SPAFF) study utilized a research design involving both ‘quantitatively-informed’ purposive sampling and qualitative data collection, supported by combined use of various web- and field-based tools to address research questions pertaining to family-formation decision making
Summary
The field of family demography has been extensively studied using large-scale datasets from both observational surveys [1,2] as well as surveillance or administrative datasets [3]. These research approaches have been able to identify trends over time, including important. Quantitative-informed purposive sampling and field-based data collection for a large IDI study (NIH), Grant #1K01HD055263 to DR, URL: https:// www.nichd.nih.gov/Pages/index.aspx. The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript
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