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This article leverages a five-treatment response mode experiment (paper-only, web-only, sequential web-mail, choice, and choice-plus [choice with a promised incentive for responding online]) that was conducted within a nationally representative survey. Because this survey's sample was drawn from respondents to another nationally representative survey, we have rich frame data that includes multiple indicators of comfort using the internet for our sample members and we can compare their response behavior across two surveys. We find that the paper-only treatment yielded a lower response rate than most of the other treatments, but there were not significant differences between the response rates for the other treatments. Among our mixed-mode treatments, the sequential web-mail treatment had the highest percentage of response by web and the lowest cost per response. When focusing on the subgroups that we expected to be the least—and the most—comfortable with the internet, we found that the paper-only treatment generally performed worse than the others, even among subgroups expected not to be comfortable with the internet. We generally did not find significant differences in the effect of response mode treatment on the response rate or percentage of response by web between the subgroups who were the most and least comfortable with the internet. In terms of the consistency of response mode choice over time, our results suggest that some people respond consistently—but also that response mode preferences are weak enough that they can be influenced by the way in which the modes are offered. We ultimately recommend using a sequential web-mail design to minimize costs while still providing people who cannot or will not respond by web with another response mode option. We also find evidence that there may be a growing lack of interest in responding by paper; more research is needed in this area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Eastern Shore Islands (ESI) archipelago on the Scotian Shelf supports a rich variety of biogenic habitats and associated diversity of coastal species. The unique and complex geometry of the ESI coastline has a significant impact on circulation and, correspondingly, influences the dispersal of nearshore organisms. For many coastal areas, the ability to accurately resolve the dispersal processes is contingent on the availability of oceanographic models that can resolve fine-scale coastal boundary conditions, including coastlines and bathymetric features. We applied a high-resolution ocean circulation model and Lagrangian particle tracking in the ESI to simulate dispersal of nearshore organisms. Our results revealed predominant southwest–northeast transport that was associated with a nearshore reversal flow. While transport among different zones of the study region is mainly determined by residual currents over the long term, tidal currents dominate patterns of particle dispersal over shorter time scales. An analysis of Lagrangian coherent structures found that they were consistently associated with the mouths of bays, demonstrating that the islands and associated oceanographic processes promote self-retention. These results highlight how complex coastlines and associated oceanographic processes promote retention and underline the need to resolve these fine-scale physical and oceanographic features when estimating biophysical dispersal in the coastal environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When survey respondents have nothing to report for questions asking for a quantity, they should report a lack of quantity instead of skipping the question. Reports of zero can be collected by asking respondents to check a None box. However, the effectiveness of this design has not been supported and, with the growing prevalence of web surveys, new design options are available. This study on data quality and user experience tested a web survey and the impact of three designs for reporting zero: a None box, instructions to enter “0” if respondents had nothing to report, and a Yes/No filter question preceding a write-in quantity. We administered the online survey to an opt-in panel of respondents in the U.S. Respondents were randomly assigned one of the three designs. They received a four-question survey with expected high rates of reporting zero. After controlling for demographic variables, we found that the None Box design resulted in significantly more item nonresponse than the Enter 0 design and nominally more than the Filter Question design. Additionally, the None Box design was the least efficient as it took more time on average to answer, and respondents who received that design rated the survey as less easy to answer. These findings align with previous literature that the None Box design is problematic. This research supports the use of alternative question designs in web surveys such as entering “0” or using filter questions when respondents may not have anything to report. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Captain Ken Houtler laughed when I remarked that I didn't know the sun rose this early as I boarded his boat last summer. Now climbing aboard again in January, I [...]

Telephone surveys have been a ubiquitous method of collecting survey data, but the environment for telephone surveys is changing. Many surveys are transitioning from telephone to self-administration or combinations of modes for both recruitment and survey administration. Survey organizations are conducting these transitions from telephone to mixed modes with only limited guidance from existing empirical literature and best practices. This article summarizes findings by an AAPOR Task Force on how these transitions have occurred for surveys and research organizations in general. We find that transitions from a telephone to a self-administered or mixed-mode survey are motivated by a desire to control costs, to maintain or improve data quality, or both. The most common mode to recruit respondents when transitioning is mail, but recent mixed-mode studies use only web or mail and web together as survey administration modes. Although early studies found that telephone response rates met or exceeded response rates to the self-administered or mixed modes, after about 2013, response rates to the self-administered or mixed modes tended to exceed those for the telephone mode, largely because of a decline in the telephone mode response rates. Transitioning offers opportunities related to improved frame coverage and geographic targeting, delivery of incentives, visual design of an instrument, and cost savings, but challenges exist related to selecting a respondent within a household, length of a questionnaire, differences across modes in use of computerization to facilitate skip patterns and other questionnaire design features, and lack of an interviewer for respondent motivation and clarification. Other challenges related to surveying youth, conducting surveys in multiple languages, collecting nonsurvey data such as biomeasures or consent to link to administrative data, and estimation with multiple modes are also prominent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assessing changes in the marine carbon cycle arising from anthropogenic CO2 emissions requires a detailed understanding of the carbonate system's natural variability. Coastal ecosystems vary over short spatial and temporal scales, so their dynamics are not well-described by long-term and broad regional averages. A year-long time series of pCO2, temperature, salinity, and currents is used to quantify the high-frequency variability of the carbonate system at the mouth of the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia. The seasonal cycle of pCO2 is modulated by a diel cycle that is larger in summer than in winter, and a tidal contribution that is primarily M2, with amplitude roughly half that of the diel cycle throughout the year. The interaction between tidal currents and carbonate system variables leads to lateral transport by tidal pumping, which moves alkalinity and DIC out of the bay, opposite to the mean flow in the region, and constitutes a new feature of how this strongly tidal region connects to the larger Gulf of Maine and Northwest Atlantic carbon system. These results suggest that tidal pumping could substantially modulate the coastal ocean's response to global ocean acidification in any region with large tides and spatial variation in biological activity, requiring that high-frequency variability be accounted for in assessments of carbon budgets of coastal regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A key goal of survey interviews is to collect the highest quality data possible from respondents. In practice, however, it can be difficult to achieve this goal because respondents do not always understand particular survey questions as designers intended. Researchers have used a variety of indicators to identify and predict respondent confusion and difficulty in answering questions in different modes. In web surveys, it is possible to automatically detect response difficulty in real time. The research to date has focused on response latencies—mostly long response times—as evidence of difficulty. In addition to response latencies, however, web surveys offer rich behavioral data, which may predict respondent confusion and difficulty more directly than response times. This article focuses on one such behavior, mouse movements. We examine a set of mouse movements participants engage in when answering questions about experimental scenarios whose difficulty has been manipulated (as confirmed by respondent ratings). This approach makes it possible to determine which movements are general movements, demonstrating how a person interacts with a computer, and which movements are related to response difficulty. We find not only that certain mouse movements are highly predictive of difficulty but also that such movements add considerable value when used in conjunction with response times. The approach developed in this article may be useful in delivering help to confused respondents in real time and as a diagnostic tool to identify confusing questions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several letters to the editor are presented in response to articles in previous issues including "Equalizing Opportunity: Dramatic Differences in Children's Home Life and Health Mean That Schools Can't Do It Alone," by Richard Rothstein and "The Kids Are Alright," both in the Summer 2009 issue, and "Why Don't Students Like School?" by Daniel T. Willingham in the Spring 2009 issue.