Classroom-Based Surveys of Teen Dating Violence: Possible Ways to Reduce Biases

Background: Despite the growth of survey research with adolescents in schools, there is almost no research that provides guidance on reducing biases in classroom-based surveys about teen dating violence. The existing methodological studies are more general, limited and outdated (i.e. Costello, Angold, Burns, Stangl, Tweed, Erkanli, & Worthman, 1996; Fidler & Kleinknecht, 1977; Prager, Fitton, Cahill, & Olson, 1989). Using a case study approach, this investigation examined implementation of classroom-based surveys on teen dating violence in four high schools.

 Method: Data for the case study came from research staff meeting minutes, classroom rosters as well as records of consents/assents received and completed surveys. Major themes from meeting minutes were identified in a collaborative process by four research staff members. Using classroom records, survey response rates were calculated for each school and overall.

 Results: Overall, across the four schools, 547 students were eligible to participate in a pre and post survey about dating violence. Two hundred and forty eight students completed the pre-test and 219 completed the post-test, providing us with overall response rates of 45% for the pre-test and 40% for the post test. However, the response rates for both the pre and post-test among schools range from 8-76%. Major themes that emerged from staff meeting minutes included the importance of collaboration with schools on parental consent process, communication of research study and consent process to parents, clear ways to explain the study and assent to student, incentives for students, and ways to maintain privacy of students during survey taking.

 Implications: Findings indicate that an intensive collaboration between the researchers, superintendent, class teachers, and parents might increase the response rates among students and reduce bias.  Suggestions to improve the data collection at high school include but are not limited to; meeting with school superintendent to introduce the study and distribute parental consent during the Parent Teacher’s Conference Night. Moreover, the feasibility of using a cell-phone based survey platform should be explored. More research is needed to understand if using technology or other methods would increase students’ perception of privacy and therefore reduce bias due to desirability response.