Design and Analysis of an Experiment for Nonresponse Followup in the 2020 Decennial Census

Music City Center 

An experiment carried out within the 2020 Census evaluated a new training module for bilingual enumerators to aid in administering the census questionnaire to Spanish-speaking households during nonresponse followup. An objective of the experiment was to study the association between enumerator training and response rate. We describe statistical considerations which emerged in several stages of the experiment. Work carried out before the census formulates a test and studies its power to justify the scope of the experiment. Work after the census analyzes data collected in the field. Both stages utilize a multinomial model with continuation-ratio logit link to jointly capture response probabilities over multiple contact attempts. We present the methodology, findings, and lessons from the experiment.