Introduction to Survey Sampling (Quantitative Applications in the Social Sciences)

Sample design is key to all surveys, fundamental to data collection, and to the analysis and interpretation of the data. Introduction to Survey Sampling, Second Edition provides an authoritative and accessible source on sample design strategies and procedures that is a required reading for anyone collecting or analyzing survey data. Graham Kalton discusses different types of probability samples, stratification (pre and post), clustering, dual frames, replicates, response, base weights, design effects, and effective sample size. It is a thorough revision and update of the first edition, published more than 35 years ago. Although the concepts of probability sampling are largely the same, there have been important developments in the application of these concepts as research questions have increasingly spanned multiple disciplines, computers have become central to data collection as well as data analysis, and cell phones have become ubiquitous, but response rates have fallen, and public willingness to engage in survey research has waned. While most of the volume focuses on probability samples, there is also a chapter on nonprobability samples, which are becoming increasingly important with the rise of social media and the world wide web.