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Journal ArticleDOI

Web-Based Network Sampling: Efficiency and Efficacy of Respondent-Driven Sampling for Online Research

Cyprian Wejnert, +1 more
- 01 Aug 2008 - 
- Vol. 37, Iss: 1, pp 105-134
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TLDR
Web-based RDS (WebRDS) is found to be highly efficient and effective and methods for testing the validity of assumptions required by RDS estimation are presented.
Abstract
This study tests the feasibility, effectiveness, and efficiency of respondent-driven sampling (RDS) as a Web-based sampling method. Web-based RDS (WebRDS) is found to be highly efficient and effective. The online nature of WebRDS allows referral chains to progress very quickly, such that studies with large samples can be expected to proceed up to 20 times faster than with traditional sampling methods. Additionally, the unhidden nature of the study population allows comparison of RDS estimators to institutional data. Results indicate that RDS estimates are reasonable but not precise. This is likely due to bias associated with the random recruitment assumption and small sample size of the study. Finally, this article presents methods for testing the validity of assumptions required by RDS estimation.

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Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI

European Christians are at the forefront in accepting evolution: results from an internet‐based survey

TL;DR: An internet‐based survey was conducted to elicit information from people who self‐identify as Christians, atheists, agnostics and other belief systems, on acceptance of evolution or creationism, certainty with which each position is believed, and reasons for rejecting the alternative.
Journal ArticleDOI

International Student Migration: A Partial Identification Analysis

TL;DR: In this article, an empirical structural decision model which reflects the importance of both the return to the investment and the budgetary constraint in the choice of the family to invest in student migration is proposed.
Book ChapterDOI

Respondent-Driven sampling in online social networks

TL;DR: A new RDS recruitment protocol for online social networks (OSNs) is presented and it is shown via simulation that it outperforms the standard RDS protocol in terms of sampling accuracy and approaches the accuracy of Markov chain Monte Carlo random walks.

Quest for Quotidian: A National Survey of Non-Heterosexual Attitudes Toward Marriage

TL;DR: Quest for Quotidian: A National Survey of Non-Heterosexual Attitudes Toward Marriage as mentioned in this paper ) is a survey of attitudes toward marriage in the US conducted by the American Psychological Association.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI

Collective dynamics of small-world networks

TL;DR: Simple models of networks that can be tuned through this middle ground: regular networks ‘rewired’ to introduce increasing amounts of disorder are explored, finding that these systems can be highly clustered, like regular lattices, yet have small characteristic path lengths, like random graphs.
Book

Random Graphs

Proceedings ArticleDOI

Random graphs

TL;DR: Some of the major results in random graphs and some of the more challenging open problems are reviewed, including those related to the WWW.
Journal ArticleDOI

Respondent-driven sampling : A new approach to the study of hidden populations

TL;DR: A new variant of chain-referral sampling, respondent-driven sampling, is introduced that employs a dual system of structured incentives to overcome some of the deficiencies of such samples and discusses how respondent- driven sampling can improve both network sampling and ethnographic investigation.
Reference EntryDOI

Snowball Sampling—I

Sven Berg
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present two different approaches to snowball sampling: the first is to ask a person to inform potential subjects about the research project and share the investigator's contact information, and then it is up to the potential subjects to contact the investigator.
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Trending Questions (1)
What is referral sampling in research?

Referral sampling, also known as respondent-driven sampling (RDS), is a method in research where participants are recruited through referrals from existing participants.