monitoring the future occasional paper series Paper 82 THE MONITORING THE FUTURE PROJECT AFTER FOUR DECADES: DESIGN AND PROCEDURES Jerald G. Bachman Lloyd D. Johnston Patrick M. O’Malley John E. Schulenberg Richard A. Miech Institute for Social Research The University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan 2015 THE MONITORING THE FUTURE PROJECT AFTER FOUR DECADES: DESIGN AND PROCEDURES Monitoring the Future Occasional Paper No. 82 Jerald G. Bachman Lloyd D. Johnston Patrick M. O’Malley John E. Schulenberg Richard A. Miech Institute for Social Research The University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan 2015 Occasional Paper No. 82: Design and Procedures Monitoring the Future: A Continuing Study of the Lifestyles and Values of Youth As its title suggests, this study is intended to assess the changing lifestyles, values, and preferences of American youth on a continuing basis. Each year since 1975, at least 13,000 seniors have participated in the annual survey, which is conducted in some 120 to 140 high schools nationwide. Since 1991, the study's annual surveys also have included surveys of similar nationally representative samples of eighth- and tenth- grade students. In addition, subsamples of seniors from previously participating classes receive follow-up questionnaires by mail each year. This Occasional Paper Series is intended to disseminate a variety of products from the study, including pre-publication (and somewhat more detailed) versions of journal articles, other substantive articles, and methodological papers. A full listing of occasional papers and other study reports is available on the study's website, www.monitoringthefuture.org. The website contains a complete listing of all publications from the study, the abstracts or full text of many of these publications, and recent press releases. The mailing address of Monitoring the Future is Institute for Social Research, The University of Michigan, P.O. Box 1248, Ann Arbor, MI 48106. iii Occasional Paper No. 82: Design and Procedures TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW ............................................................................... 1 Basic Design Surveying High School Seniors and Young Adults ................................. 1 Annual surveys of high school seniors ....................................................................... 2 Follow-up surveys of young adults ............................................................................. 2 Follow-up surveys into middle adulthood .................................................................. 4 Expanded Design Including Eighth- and Tenth-Grade Students .................................... 4 SCOPE, PURPOSES, AND RATIONALE ........................................................................ 5 Rationale for Annual Nationwide Sampling of High School Seniors ............................ 5 Nationally representative samples .............................................................................. 5 Senior year as starting point ........................................................................................ 5 Omission of dropouts from senior samples ................................................................ 6 Large-scale samples .................................................................................................... 7 Annual data collection ................................................................................................ 8 Rationale for Annual Nationwide Eighth- and Tenth-Grade Samples ........................ 8 More complete representation of age cohorts. ......................................................... 8 Sampling of earlier stages in developmental sequences .......................................... 8 MEASURES .................................................................................................................... 11 Overview and Conceptual Framework: High School Seniors and Young Adults ....... 11 Outline of Questionnaire Content: High School Seniors and Young Adults ............... 12 Monitored variables: Drug behaviors, attitudes, and related factors ....................... 12 Monitored variables: Other relevant social values, attitudes, and behaviors ........... 21 Background variables ............................................................................................... 21 Experiences, role behaviors, and satisfaction in high school ................................... 21 Post-high school experiences, role behaviors, and satisfactions .............................. 22 iv Occasional Paper No. 82: Design and Procedures Relative emphasis assigned to different content areas ............................................. 23 Questionnaire Organization and Format: High School Seniors and Graduates ............ 24 Six questionnaire forms ........................................................................................... 24 Matching base-year and follow-up forms ................................................................ 24 Advantages and limitations of multiple forms ......................................................... 24 Questionnaires for follow-ups at modal ages 35, 40, 45, 50, and 55 ....................... 25 Content and Format of Eighth- and Tenth-Grade Questionnaires ............................... 26 Questionnaire length and difficulty ......................................................................... 26 Number of questionnaire forms ............................................................................... 26 Content covered ....................................................................................................... 27 Pretesting of 8th- and 10th-grade questionnaires ....................................................... 27 SAMPLING AND DATA COLLECTION PROCEDURES .......................................... 28 Base-Year Data Collections from High School Seniors .............................................. 28 Samples of seniors ................................................................................................... 28 Stage 1: Geographic areas ........................................................................................ 28 Stage 2: Schools ....................................................................................................... 28 Stage 3: Students ...................................................................................................... 28 Two-year participation by sampled schools ............................................................ 29 School recruiting procedures ................................................................................... 29 Pre-administration arrangements ............................................................................. 30 Questionnaire administration ................................................................................... 31 Procedures for assuring voluntary participation and protection of confidentiality... 31 Follow-Up Data Collections from High School Graduates .......................................... 32 Follow-up design and strategy ................................................................................. 32 Selecting subsamples for follow-up data collections ............................................... 33 Follow-up procedures .............................................................................................. 35 v Occasional Paper No. 82: Design and Procedures Data Collection from Students in Eighth and Tenth Grades ........................................ 36 Samples of 10th-grade students ................................................................................ 36 Samples of 8th-grade students .................................................................................. 36 Administrative procedures ....................................................................................... 36 Follow-ups of selected respondents from 8th grade ................................................. 37 REPRESENTATIVENESS AND VALIDITY................................................................. 38 Representativeness of Samples (Lack of Bias) ............................................................ 38 School participation .................................................................................................. 38 Student participation ................................................................................................ 39 Omission of dropouts ............................................................................................... 40 Follow-up participation ............................................................................................ 40 Validity of Self-Report Data ........................................................................................ 42 Sampling Precision in the Annual School Surveys. ..................................................... 45 Summary Evaluation: Consistency and the Measurement of Trends .......................... 46 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................ 47 APPENDIX A: Cover of 12th-Grade Base-Year Questionnaire ....................................... 59 APPENDIX B: Cover of Follow-up Questionnaire ......................................................... 61 APPENDIX C: Core of 12th-Grade Drug Measures ........................................................ 63 APPENDIX D: 12th-Grade Background Measures ......................................................... 65 APPENDIX E: High School Experiences ........................................................................ 69 APPENDIX F: Post High School Experiences ................................................................ 70 APPENDIX G: Base-Year Address Form ....................................................................... 74 APPENDIX H: Follow-up Address Correction Form ..................................................... 75 APPENDIX I: Letter of Invitation to New Schools ......................................................... 76 APPENDIX J: Fact Sheet for Principals .......................................................................... 77 APPENDIX K: Description of Study .............................................................................. 78 vi Occasional Paper No. 82: Design and Procedures APPENDIX L: Instructions to Teachers for Classroom Administration ......................... 81 APPENDIX M: Instructions to Teachers for Mass Administration ................................ 83 APPENDIX N: Student Flyer .......................................................................................... 84 APPENDIX O: Implicit Parental Consent Form – 8th and 10th Grades ........................... 88 APPENDIX P: Implicit Parental Consent Form – 12th Grade ......................................... 89 APPENDIX Q: Explicit Parental Consent Form – 8th and 10th Grades ........................... 90 APPENDIX R: Explicit Parental Consent Form – 12th Grade ......................................... 92 vii Occasional Paper No. 82: Design and Procedures LIST OF TABLES TABLE 1: Measurement Content .....................................................................................16 TABLE 2: Classes of Abusable Substances Included in the Study ..................................20 LIST OF FIGURES FIGURE 1: Overview of Monitoring the Future Cohort-Sequential Design .....................3 FIGURE 2: Categories of Base-Year and Follow-Up Measurement................................14 FIGURE 3: Further Specifications of Elements in Theoretical Framework ....................15 FIGURE 4: Target Samples for a Given Class .................................................................34 viii Occasional Paper No. 82: Design and Procedures ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We greatly appreciate the contributions of Marcy Breslow, Carola Carlier, Ariel Bronson, Tanya Hart, Kathryn Johnson, and Patti Meyer in manuscript review, text management, and editing. The Monitoring the Future project continues to be supported through a series of investigator-initiated, competitive research grants from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (R01 DA001411 and R01 DA016575). ix Occasional Paper No. 82: Design and Procedures INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW This occasional paper updates and extends earlier papers in this series (Bachman & Johnston, 1978; Bachman, Johnston, & O’Malley, 1991a, 1996, 2001; Bachman, Johnston, O’Malley, & Schulenberg, 2006; 2011). Our purpose in this paper, as in the earlier ones, is to provide a detailed description of the Monitoring the Future research design, including sampling design, data collection procedures, measurement content, and questionnaire format. Here, as before, we have included information for others who wish to evaluate our results, to replicate aspects of the study, or to analyze data. The project findings have revealed many important changes since the project was launched in 1974. Most notably, there have been dramatic changes in the attitudes and behaviors that the project was designed to monitor, particularly those involving the use of drugs. There also have been substantial additions to the study design and procedures, as we outline below and detail in subsequent sections. But perhaps more important than any of these changes in the project is the fact that the basic study design described in our 1978 paper has remained constant in its fundamental characteristics; we view this consistency in survey methods across the years as a key condition for measuring change successfully. There is thus also a high degree of consistency over the years in our description of study design and procedures. Basic Design Surveying High School Seniors and Young Adults From its outset, the Monitoring the Future project was designed with two interrelated components: (1) annual nationwide surveys of high school seniors using group-administered questionnaires, and (2) periodic follow-up questionnaires mailed to randomly selected subsamples of each senior class cohort. This design permits us to examine at least four kinds of trends or changes: 1. Changes common to all cohorts in a given historical period, i.e., secular trends or period effects; 2. Developmental changes or age effects that appear consistently in the longitudinal data from all graduating classes; 3. Changes from one graduating class cohort to another, i.e., enduring cohort differences; and 4. Longitudinal changes reflecting the differential impacts of various important post- high school environments (college, military service, various types of employment, homemaking, unemployment), major role transitions (marriage, pregnancy, parenthood, divorce, remarriage), and individual developmental characteristics. We acknowledge, of course, that these several types of trends or changes, while easily distinguished in the abstract, are often intertwined in the real world, so that the analysis problems of separating one pattern from another are formidable. Nevertheless, this cohort-sequential design (Schaie, 1965; Labouvie, 1976) is uniquely powerful for addressing this complex set of questions; it creates analysis possibilities that would not exist in either a longitudinal study that followed a single panel of respondents for a number of years, or a series of once-only cross-sections (e.g., surveys of each high school class without any longitudinal follow-up). 1