[Federal Register Volume 83, Number 5 (Monday, January 8, 2018)]
[Notices]
[Page 783]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2018-00085]


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 Notices
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  Federal Register / Vol. 83, No. 5 / Monday, January 8, 2018 / 
Notices  

[[Page 783]]



DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE


Submission for OMB Review; Comment Request

    The Department of Commerce will submit to the Office of Management 
and Budget (OMB) for clearance the following proposal for collection of 
information under the provisions of the Paperwork Reduction Act.
    Agency: U.S. Census Bureau.
    Title: American Community Survey Methods Panel Tests, 2018 Data 
Slide Test.
    OMB Control Number: 0607-0936.
    Form Number(s): ACS-1, ACS CAPI, ACS internet.
    Type of Request: Non-substantive Change Request.
    Number of Respondents: 288,000.
    Average Hours Per Response: 40 minutes.
    Burden Hours: No additional burden hours are requested under this 
non-substantive change request.
    Needs and Uses:
    The American Community Survey (ACS) collects detailed socioeconomic 
data from about 3.5 million housing units in the United States and 
36,000 in Puerto Rico each year. The ACS also collects detailed 
socioeconomic data from about 195,000 residents living in Group Quarter 
(GQ) facilities. An ongoing data collection effort with an annual 
sample of this magnitude requires that the ACS continue research, 
testing, and evaluations aimed at reducing respondent burden, improving 
data quality, achieving survey cost efficiencies, and improving ACS 
questionnaire content and related data collection materials. The ACS 
Methods Panel is a research program designed to address and respond to 
issues and survey needs.
    Residents of sampled housing units are invited to self-respond to 
the ACS through a series of up to five mailings. Some respondents call 
the Census Bureau with questions or concerns about the survey after 
receiving the mail invitation. One common reason for calling is to 
verify that the ACS is a real survey. Respondents are hesitant to 
provide information about their household online or on a paper 
questionnaire without knowing that the survey is legitimate. 
Additionally, respondents want to understand how the data are used. To 
address these concerns, in addition to potentially improving the self-
response rate, the Census Bureau seeks to test the inclusion of a data 
slide (also known as a slide chart) with the current ACS mail 
materials. The primary goals of the data slide are to help legitimize 
the survey and to present statistics of interest. The data slide could 
also potentially serve as a reminder to complete the survey. Promoting 
survey legitimacy and respondent trust may ultimately reduce respondent 
burden and increase self-response. The data slide will contain 
information on selected statistics from the ACS for each state, the 
District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.
    Two experimental treatments are proposed. This test will involve 
the initial package (the first mailing) and the paper questionnaire 
package (the third mailing); some experimental cases will receive a 
data slide in the initial package and other experimental cases will 
receive it in the paper questionnaire package (if a response is not 
received prior to the third mailing).
    This test will study the impact on self-response and cost of 
including the data slide in the mail materials. To field this test, the 
Census Bureau plans to use the ACS production sample (clearance number: 
0607-0810, expires 06/30/2018). Thus, there is no increase in burden 
from this test since each treatment will result in the same burden 
estimate per interview (40 minutes). The ACS sample design consists of 
randomly assigning each monthly sample panel into 24 groups of 
approximately 12,000 addresses each. Each group, called a methods panel 
group, within a monthly sample is representative of the full monthly 
sample. Each monthly sample is a representative subsample of the entire 
annual sample and is representative of the sampling frame.
    The Census Bureau proposes to test the data slide as part of the 
ACS May 2018 panel, adhering to the same data collection protocols as 
production ACS. The Census Bureau proposes to use two randomly selected 
methods panel groups for each treatment. Hence, each treatment will 
have a sample size of approximately 24,000 addresses. In total, 
approximately 48,000 addresses will be used for the two experimental 
treatments. Additionally, 24,000 addresses will receive the current 
production mail materials, but will be sorted and mailed at the same 
time as the other treatment materials and serve as the control for 
statistical comparison. The remaining sample will receive production 
materials.
    The Census Bureau proposes to evaluate treatment comparisons by 
comparing self-response rates at various points in the mailing schedule 
and by comparing the final response rates. For each comparison a two-
tailed test will be used so that the Census Bureau can measure the 
impact on the evaluation measure in either direction with 80 percent 
power, at the [alpha]=0.1 level. The effective samples were calculated 
based on the previous year's data for the May panel. The sample size 
will be able to detect differences of approximately 1.25 percentage 
points between the self-response return rates of the control and 
experimental treatments. Additionally, a cost analysis will also be 
conducted.
    Affected Public: Individuals or households.
    Frequency: One-time test as part of the monthly American Community 
Survey.
    Respondent's Obligation: Mandatory.
    Legal Authority: Title 13, United States Code, Sections 141, 193, 
and 221.
    This information collection request may be viewed at 
www.reginfo.gov. Follow the instructions to view Department of Commerce 
collections currently under review by OMB.
    Written comments and recommendations for the proposed information 
collection should be sent within 30 days of publication of this notice 
to [email protected] or fax to (202) 395-5806.

Sheleen Dumas,
Departmental PRA Lead, Office of the Chief Information Officer.
[FR Doc. 2018-00085 Filed 1-5-18; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 3510-07-P