How Important are High Response Rates for College Surveys?

Abstract

Higher education researchers have witnessed a long term decline in college student survey participation. However, survey methodologists have found that low response rates do not necessarily bias results. We investigated whether this proposition holds true for a college student survey by performing a level of effort analysis on 555 survey administrations that achieved a response rate of at least 50 percent. Using five quantitative measures, we found that population estimates, derived from a simulated sample with a low response rate, frequently are very similar to those based on actual high response rates.