How Accurate Are Self-Reports of Voluntary Association Memberships?

Autor/inn/en	Rap, Robyn; Paxton, Pamela
Titel	How Accurate Are Self-Reports of Voluntary Association Memberships?
Quelle	In: Sociological Methods & Research, 50 (2021) 2, S.866-900 (35 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Zusatzinformation	ORCID (Paxton, Pamela)
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0049-1241
DOI	10.1177/0049124118799384
Schlagwörter	Accuracy; Measurement Techniques; Error of Measurement; Voluntary Agencies; Group Membership; Social Science Research; Classification; Responses; Individual Characteristics; Predictor Variables; Social Desirability; Surveys; General Social Survey + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Messtechnik; Messfehler; Gruppenzugehörigkeit; Social scientific research; Sozialwissenschaftliche Forschung; Classification system; Klassifikation; Klassifikationssystem; Personality characteristic; Personality traits; Persönlichkeitsmerkmal; Prädiktor; Soziales Bedürfnis; Survey; Umfrage; Befragung
Abstract	Questions on voluntary association memberships have been used extensively in social scientific research for decades. Researchers generally assume that these respondent self-reports are accurate, but their measurement has never been assessed. Respondent characteristics are known to influence the accuracy of other self-report variables such as self-reported health, voting, or test scores. In this article, we investigate whether measurement error occurs in self-reports of voluntary association memberships. We use the 2004 General Social Survey (GSS) questions on voluntary associations, which include a novel resource: the actual organization names listed by respondents. We find that this widely used voluntary association classification scheme contains significant amounts of measurement error overall, especially within certain categories. Using a multilevel logistic regression, we predict accuracy of response nested within respondents and interviewers. We find that certain respondent characteristics, including some used in research on voluntary associations, influence respondent accuracy. Inaccurate and/or incorrect measurement will affect the statistics and conclusions drawn from the data on voluntary associations. (As Provided).
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Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2024/1/01