Methodologic approach to sampling and field-based data collection for a large-scale in-depth interview study: The Social Position and Family Formation (SPAFF) project

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 14; no. 1; p. e0210776
• Main Authors: Romero, Diana, Kwan, Amy, Suchman, Lauren
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 01.01.2019; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Age; Cohabitation; Computer and Information Sciences; Data Collection; Demographics; Demography; Developed Countries; Earth Sciences; Ethnic factors; Ethnicity; Family Characteristics; Female; Females; Fertility; Heterosexuality; Humans; Income distribution; Internet; Interviews as Topic; Male; Males; Marital Status; Marriage; Medical screening; Medicine and Health Sciences; Metropolitan areas; Modems; Neighborhoods; New York City; People and Places; Polls & surveys; Project management; Public health; Qualitative analysis; Qualitative research; Recruitment; Research and Analysis Methods; Research methodology; Researchers; Sampling; Social Class; Social Sciences; Socioeconomic Factors; Studies; Subgroups; Surveys; Theory; Trends; United States; Womens health; Young Adult; Young adults; New York City; United States; England; New York; San Francisco California; United Kingdom > UK; United States > US
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0210776

Over the past several decades there have been dramatic shifts in demographic patterns pertaining to family formation, with declining and delayed marriage and childbearing, and increased cohabitation in the United States and other Western industrialized nations. These trends in family demography have been predominantly studied using large-scale datasets, which have identified total population and subgroup trends over time, including differences by age, gender, racial/ethnic, economic, educational, religious, and other characteristics. However, there is limited knowledge and understanding of how individuals across different levels of social position, as well as other important characteristics, make decisions around forming families. This lack of qualitative data on contemporary attitudes regarding family formation has hampered our ability to more completely understand the factors driving behaviors pertaining to the large-scale (ie, international) shifts in demographic trends. The Social Position and Family Formation (SPAFF) project is an in-depth interview study that used quantitative data to guide recruitment of a large sample for qualitative interview data collection on factors influencing different aspects of family formation among heterosexual females and males (18-35 years) in the context of individuals' social position. This methodological paper describes the use of a 'quantitatively-informed' purposive sampling approach in a large metropolitan area to collect qualitative data (through in-depth interviews) from a large sample (n = 200), utilizing web-based tools for successful community-based recruitment and project management.