Immigration 2009 Methodology

Methodology

A Place To Call Home: What Immigrants Say Now About Life In America is based on a telephone survey utilizing both landline and cellular telephones. Respondents include a representative sample of 1,138 foreign-born adults, 18 years and older who currently live in the United States and came to the United States at the age of five or older. The survey was preceded by six focus groups conducted in sites across the country as well as 12 in-depth interviews with immigration experts in academia, public policy, law and community outreach.

Telephone Survey

Telephone interviews were conducted from April 23 – June 7, 2009. The interviews averaged 31 minutes in length. The response rate for the study was 25 percent.

The survey was offered in both English and Spanish. Four-hundred-seventy-one interviews were conducted with Spanish-speaking respondents.

Throughout the survey, special efforts were taken to make the interview process comfortable for immigrants for whom English is, at best, a second language. Interviewers received enhanced training in order to sensitize them to the particular challenges of speaking with non-native English speakers regarding potentially anxiety-provoking issues. Survey questions were extensively pre-tested to reduce the overall wordiness of the instrument and improve question clarity. In addition, language was used to assure respondents that their information and responses would be kept confidential.

The margin of error for the report is plus or minus 5.4 percentage points. However, it is higher when comparing subgroups or question items that weren’t asked of all respondents.

Sample Design

The study employed a dual-frame landline/cell phone telephone design. According to both the 2009 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) and the General Social Survey (GSS), 22 percent of foreign-born residents of the United States do not own a landline telephone but do own a cell phone. Consequently, the cell phone portion of the sample was included to better represent immigrant households. A total of 159 interviews were completed via cell phone.

A disproportionate stratified sample design that combined random-digit dial (RDD) sample with listed sample (supplied by Ethnic Technologies, or E-Tech ,a leading provider of multicultural marketing lists, ethnic identification software, and ethnic data appending services) was used in this study to increase the incidence of households with foreign-born adults from specified heritages and oversample persons of South Asian, East Asian, Middle Eastern and Central/South American heritage. Thirty-eight percent of interviews completed came from this sample. The RDD sample utilized strata of areas known to have a high incidence of individuals of South Asian, East Asian, Middle Eastern and Central/South American heritage, but no strata was excluded from the sample design. The landline portion of the study employed an open design, meaning that, as long as their heritage quota was open, anyone who was eligible would be asked to complete the study regardless of the strata in which they reside. Cell phone completes were not subject to heritage quotas.

Questionnaire

The questionnaire was designed by Public Agenda, and all interpretation of the data reflected in this report was done by Public Agenda. As in all surveys, question order effects and other non-sampling sources of error can sometimes affect results. Steps were taken to minimize these, including pre-testing the survey instrument and randomizing the order in which some question and answer categories were read.

The interviewing was conducted by ICR/International Communications Research in conjunction with SSRS/Social Science Research Solutions in Media, PA.

Weighting Procedures

Survey data were weighted to (1) adjust for the fact that not all survey respondents were selected with the same probability and (2) account for gaps in coverage and non-response biases in the survey frame. Weights were applied to balance heritage, age, years in the United States, education, region and gender. The overall design effect of the weighting procedure is 3.46.

Focus Groups

Focus groups allow for an in-depth, qualitative exploration of the dynamics underlying the public’s attitudes toward complex issues. Insights from participants in these focus groups were important to the survey design, and actual quotes were drawn from the focus groups to give voice to attitudes captured statistically through the surveys. Six focus groups were conducted as follows:

• A mix of immigrants from different countries and backgrounds in New York, NY;
• Hispanic immigrants in Atlanta, GA, conducted in Spanish;
• Hispanic immigrants in Los Angeles, CA, conducted in Spanish;
• Asian immigrants in San Francisco, CA;
• Immigrants from Middle Eastern countries in the greater Detroit, MI area; and
• Immigrants making more than $75,000 a year in Boston, MA.

The Experts

Prior to conducting the focus groups and the telephone survey, Public Agenda interviewed 12 immigration experts to obtain grounding in the current substantive issues concerning immigrants in the United States. Experts were guaranteed anonymity to ensure their complete cooperation with the study.

* Survey data was weighted by heritage, age, years in the United States, education, region and gender in order to match current census data. For the analysis, these demographic characteristics were balanced to reflect the proportion of these groups naturally occurring in the U.S. population.