Prepaid Incentives Research Articles

Effect of Incentives on Web-Based Surveys

Investigators seek ways to effectively raise the response rate of surveys. Incentives have a great influence on response rate, retention rate, and response quality in traditional surveys. The purpose of this paper is to investigate what kinds of incentives are effective in web-based surveys. This study summarizes the research framework of previous studies on the effect of incentives in web-based surveys to show that material incentives have a significant effect on web-based surveys with prepaid incentives having a moderate influence on raising the response rate. Contingent incentives significantly reduce the response rate. These findings provide guidance for web-based investigations.

Effect of Incentives and Mailing Features on Online Health Program Enrollment

With the growing use of Internet-based interventions, strategies are needed to encourage broader participation. This study examined the effects of combinations of monetary incentives and mailing characteristics on enrollment, retention, and cost effectiveness for an online health program. In 2004, a recruitment letter was mailed to randomly selected Midwestern integrated health system members aged 21-65 and stratified by gender and race/ethnicity; recipients were randomly pre-assigned to one of 24 combinations of incentives and various mailing characteristics. Enrollment and 3-month retention rates were measured by completion of online surveys. Analysis, completed in 2005, compared enrollment and retention factors using t tests and chi-square tests. Multivariate logistic regression modeling assessed the probability of enrollment and retention. Of 12,289 subjects, 531 (4.3%) enrolled online, ranging from 1% to 11% by incentive combination. Highest enrollment occurred with unconditional incentives, and responses varied by gender. Retention rates ranged from 0% to 100%, with highest retention linked to higher-value incentives. The combination of a $2 bill prepaid incentive and the promise of $20 for retention (10% enrollment and 71% retention) was optimal, considering per-subject recruitment costs ($32 enrollment, $70 retention) and equivalent enrollment by gender and race/ethnicity. Cash incentives improved enrollment in an online health program. Men and women responded differently to mailing characteristics and incentives. Including a small prepaid monetary incentive ($2 or $5) and revealing the higher promised-retention incentive was cost effective and boosted enrollment.

Does the Effect of Incentive Payments on Survey Response Rates Differ by Income Support History?

This article asks which subgroups of the population are affected by the payment of a small cash incentive to respond to a telephone survey with a listed sample. We find that a promised incentive improves response rates primarily amongst those individuals with the longest history of income support receipt. Importantly, these individuals are least likely to respond to the survey in the absence of an incentive. The incentive thus improves both average response rates and acts to equalize response rates across different socio-economic groups, potentially reducing nonresponse bias. Interestingly, the main channel through which the incentive appears to increase response rates is in improving the probability of making contact with individuals in the group with heavy exposure to the income support system. Incentive payments are often used in conjunction with surveys to increase response rates and/or to improve data quality. In this article, we examine whether the effect of a promised incentive, paid upon survey completion, is related to the socio-economic status of respondents. Specifically, we examine whether a past history of income support receipt is correlated with refusal rates and response rates in a telephone survey with a listed sample. There is a large literature using randomized experiments to assess the impact of incentives on response rates. Most of it is based on mail-out surveys, though a number of studies have looked at incentives in telephone and face-to-face surveys. Both monetary and nonmonetary incentives have been assessed. Church (1993) and Singer et al. (1999) discuss the literature and conclude, generally, that incentives raise response rates, that prepaid incentives are better than incentives which are paid only upon survey completion, and that monetary incentives are more effective at increasing response rates and data quality than gifts or lotteries. In this article, we approach the question from a slightly different angle. Incentives may increase response rates, but do they do so in a uniform way across all socio-economic groups? Using detailed administrative data about the income support receipt of individuals (and their families) from 1993 to 2006, we examine whether the intensity and recentness of

Prepaid and Promised Incentives in Web Surveys

Prepaid monetary incentives consistently exert the largest positive effect on response rates in mail surveys. For web-based surveys, it has not been possible to administer monetary incentives via the Internet in advance. Recently, several new web-based services have been introduced that can transfer money to people online. Does this really have the same positive effect on response rates as shown in traditional mail surveys? The authors investigated this question experimentally in the context of a web-based survey among members of a professional association in Virginia. The results indicate that prepaid incentives in web surveys seem to have no advantages concerning the willingness to participate, actual completion rates, and the share of incomplete response patterns when compared with postpaid incentives. Furthermore, postpaid incentives show no advantages over no incentives. Finally, compared to no incentives, prize draws increase completion rates and also reduce various incomplete participation patterns.

Experiments with incentives in telephone surveys.

In an effort to counter the problem of noncooperation, survey organizations are offering incentives to respondents with increasing frequency, some at the outset of the survey, as has traditionally been done in mail surveys, and some only after the person has refused, in an attempt to convert the refusal. This article reports on a series of experiments carried out over a period of about 2 years with a monthly telephone survey, the Survey of Consumer Attitudes, in an effort to increase response rates or reduce interviewer effort. We report on experiments with prepaid versus promised incentives; advance letters; and advance letters with prepaid incentives; and we also report on the effects of incentives on response quality, sample composition, response bias, interviewer and respondent expectations, and costs.

Charities, No; Lotteries, No; Cash, Yes: Main Effects and Interactions in a Canadian Incentives Experiment

The effects on response rates to mail surveys of prepayment cash incentives, charitable donations, and the chance to win a lottery prize are examined in a true experimental design. A survey on environmental issues was conducted during the fall of 1994 among 3,088 households drawn from the Grand River watershed region of southwestern Ontario, Canada. The 20-cell incentives experiment crossed three levels of prepaid monetary cash incentive ($2, $5, and $10) with a control group (no cash incentive), plus the offer to make a charitable donation ranging from $2 to $10 on behalf of the respondent, or participation in a lottery for prizes of $200. The overall response rate to the survey, with three follow-ups, was 70.7 percent with the effects of the prepaid cash rewards demonstrated, but not those for the lottery or charitable donations. Logistic regression analysis of response rate supports a main effects model for cash incentives but does not support either of two alternative models for main effects of the lottery and charitable donations or interactions. Further analysis demonstrates a pattern of earlier response as a result of prepaid incentives. The findings are discussed in terms of their cost-benefit implications and with respect to conceptualizations of respondents' motives for completing mail questionnaires.

The use of a prepaid incentive to convert nonresponders on a survey of physicians.

Obtaining high response rates on physician surveys provides a difficult challenge to health services researchers. Recent studies have indicated that the use of a prepaid incentive can dramatically increase response rates. The National Survey of Diagnostic Allergy Testing included a controlled experiment in which one group of respondents received a prepaid monetary incentive while a second group did not receive an incentive. Persons assigned to a third group received a prepaid incentive only if they did not respond to the first mailing. The study examined whether or not the decision to provide a monetary incentive can be postponed until the results of the initial mailing are available. This would enable researchers to restrict the use of monetary incentives to surveys where early results indicate response rates may be inadequate. The findings confirmed earlier studies which indicated that the use of a prepaid incentive leads to a large increase in response rate. The study indicated, however, that the value of a prepaid incentive is greatly diminished if the inventive is postponed until the second mailing. The study also indicated the great majority of nonresponders do not cash the incentive checks. The prepaid incentive is, therefore, an effective and relatively inexpensive way of reducing