The effect of monetary incentive on survey response for vulnerable children and youths: A randomized controlled trial.

Registry-linked trialAbstract readRandomized Controlled Trial

In one paragraph

Trial report in PloS one, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT01741675 (The Effect of Monetary Incentive on Survey Response for Vulnerable Children and Youth), which is not on this map. Cited by 4 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it

0cells of the map it votes in

4citing papers in PubMed, 2 pooled it

–field-weighted citation impact

1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

NCT01741675 nacompletednot on this map

The Effect of Monetary Incentive on Survey Response for Vulnerable Children and Youth

TypeinterventionalSponsorVIVE - The Danish Center for Social Science ResearchRan2012 to 2014Enrolled270ConditionsQuality of LifeArmsQuestionnaire and monetary incentive, Questionnaire only

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

4 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.

Methods to increase response to postal and electronic questionnaires.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2023
Pooled it
Methods, strategies, and incentives to increase response to mental health surveys among adolescents: a systematic review.BMC medical research methodology · 2023
Pooled it
Efforts and systems by local governments to improve participation rates in national and local health and nutrition surveys in Japan: Findings from a workshop 2019-2024.PloS one · 2025
Article
Possible Measures to Improve Both Participation and Response Quality in Japan's National Health and Nutrition Survey: Results from a Workshop by Local Government Personnel in Charge of the Survey.Nutrients · 2022
Article

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author.

Jan Hyld PejtersenVIVE-The Danish Center for Social Science Research, Copenhagen, Denmark.ORCID 0000-0001-9363-7454

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

aimIn surveys non-responders may introduce bias and lower the validity of the studies. Ways to increase response rates are therefore important. The purpose of the study was to investigate if an unconditional monetary incentive can increase the response rate for vulnerable children and youths in a postal questionnaire survey.

methodsThe study was designed as a randomized controlled trial. The study population consisted of 262 children and youth who participated in an established intervention study aimed at creating networks for different groups of vulnerable children and youths. The mean age of the participants was 16.7 years (range 11-28) and 67.9% were female. The questionnaire was adapted to three different age groups and covered different aspects of the participants' life situation, including the dimensions from the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). In the follow-up survey, participants were randomly allocated to two groups that either received a €15 voucher for a supermarket together with the questionnaire or only received the questionnaire. We used Poisson regression to estimate the differences in response rate (Rate Ratio RR) between the intervention group and the control group.

resultsThe response rate was 75.5% in the intervention group and 42.9% in the control group. The response rate in the intervention group was significantly higher than in the control group when adjusting for age and gender (Rate Ratio, RR 1.73; 95% CI 1.38-2.17). We did not find any significant differences in scales scores between the two groups for the five scales of the SDQ. In stratified analyses, we found the effect of the incentive to be higher for males (RR 2.81; 95% CI 1.61-4.91) than for females (1.43; 95% CI 1.12-1.84).

conclusionsMonetary incentives can increase the response rate for vulnerable children and youths in surveys.

trial registrationThe trial was retrospectively registered at ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT01741675.

Indexed as

MotivationVulnerable PopulationsAdolescentAdultChildDenmarkFemaleHumansMalePsychosocial Support SystemsSelection BiasSocial NetworkingSurveys and QuestionnairesYoung Adult

Identifiers

PMID32396564

DOI10.1371/journal.pone.0233025

PMCPMC7217457

What OpenQuestion holds

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LicenceCC BY

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Registered trials

NCT01741675ClinicalTrials.gov

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.