The effect of prepaid incentives on panelists’ response across survey modes in a sequential mixed-mode design

Abstract

While the use of prepaid incentives and data collection in a sequential mixed-mode survey design is standard in cross-sectional and longitudinal studies, little is known about the interaction of these strategies and how this affects target persons’ survey participation. Therefore, based on a panel study, this study investigates whether such unconditional prepayments—monetary or non-monetary incentives—increase the efficiency of a sequential mixed-mode survey design in regard to boosted response rates and speed of return after receipt of an invitation to participate in a survey. While the survey design is always identical, the different incentives vary across the waves considered. Different prepayments, such as cash or in-kind incentives, have different effects on invitees’ participation in different survey modes. In particular, non-monetary incentives seem to work only in a sequential mixed-mode design, while cash, as a universal medium, always works in the expected way, across different survey modes. In sum, the study finds that when a single sequential mixed-mode design is used across panel waves the overall response rates are rather similar, even when different incentives are provided.