Retention and Reasons for Non-Interview

Sample Representativeness & Attrition

The retention rate for the Older Men as of the 1983 survey was 52.5 percent, or 2,633 of the original 5,020 respondents. In 1990, 41.5 percent or 2,092 of the original respondents completed an interview, along with 1,341 widows and 865 other next-of-kin; some information was obtained about 85.6 percent of the cohort members. The retention rate for the Young Men as of the final 1981 survey was 64.9 percent, or 3,398 of the original 5,225 respondents. Retention rate is defined as the percent of base year respondents who were interviewed in any given survey year; included in the calculations are deceased and other out-of-scope respondents (see Table 1 for definitions).

An analysis of selected characteristics of respondents interviewed in the tenth year samples of the Original Cohorts found that noninterviews had not seriously distorted the sample representativeness of any of the cohorts for the characteristics studied (Rhoton 1984). A second analysis of differential attrition among wealthy and non-wealthy subsamples of each of the four Original Cohorts found that non-wealthy respondents of each cohort showed a consistent tendency toward greater attrition (Rhoton and Nagi 1991). Among the three younger cohorts, almost all of the difference between wealthy and non-wealthy subsamples is accounted for by attrition reasons other than the death of the respondent.

In Table 6, the racial composition of interviewed respondents is presented for the base survey year (1966) and the most recent interview year for which data are available. This table also provides information on numbers of deceased respondents by race.

Table 6. Cohort Characteristics by Race

Race¹	# of Int'd. Respondents		Racial Composition		Retention	Number of Deaths²
Older Men
	1966	1990	1966	1990	1990 as % of 1966	As of 1990
Non-black	3600	1603	71.7 %	76.6 %	44.5 %	1807
Black	1420	489	28.3 %	23.4 %	34.4 %	886
Young Men
	1966	1981	1966	1981	1981 as % of 1966	As of 1981
Non-black	3787	2622	72.5 %	77.2 %	69.2 %	77
Black	1438	776	27.5 %	22.8 %	54.0 %	62

¹ See section in this guide on "Race, Ethnicity & Nationality" for details on race classifications. Respondent totals in this table are based on R00023. for the Older Men and R00023. for the Young Men.
² Numbers are derived from R07075. for the Older Men and R06835. for the Young Men.

Finally, Tables 7 and 8 present the number of interviews completed by respondents, broken down by race. In these tables, the "number who completed" column shows how many respondents completed exactly that number of surveys. The "cumulative %" column shows a cumulative total percent of those completing at least a given number of surveys rather than a percentage of those completing an exact number of surveys.

Table 7. Number of Interviews Completed out of 13 Survey Years by Race: Older Men 1966-90

	All Respondents		Non-Black Respondents		Black Respondents
Number of Surveys¹	Number who completed	Cumulative %	Number who completed	Cumulative %	Number who completed	Cumulative %
13	1601	31.9	1223	34.0	378	26.6
12	944	50.7	657	52.2	287	46.8
11	316	57.0	223	58.4	93	53.4
10	174	60.5	115	61.6	59	57.5
9	240	65.2	163	66.1	77	63.0
8	280	70.8	200	71.7	80	68.6
7	201	74.8	151	75.9	50	72.1
6	233	79.5	164	80.4	69	77.0
5	230	84.0	151	84.6	79	82.5
4	267	89.4	169	89.3	98	89.4
3	216	93.7	155	93.6	61	93.7
2	169	97.0	118	96.9	51	97.3
1	149	100.0	111	100.0	38	100.0
Total	5020		3600		1420

Note: This table is based on R00635.01, R01120.01, R01156.01, R01629.01, R02541.01, R02689.01, R02857.01, R03739.10, R04076.10, R04488.10, R05496.10, and R06015.90. The number of respondents completing 13 interviews does not represent the total for whom data are available. The 1990 resurvey collected information about deceased respondents from widows or other next-of-kin.
¹ Surveys completed in any year, not necessarily consecutive survey years.

Table 8. Number of Interviews Completed out of 12 Survey Years by Race: Young Men 1966-81

	All Respondents		Non-Black Respondents		Black Respondents
Number of Surveys¹	Number who completed	Cumulative %	Number who completed	Cumulative %	Number who completed	Cumulative %
12	2084	39.9	1692	44.7	392	27.3
11	611	51.6	440	56.3	171	39.2
10	486	60.9	355	65.7	131	48.3
9	354	67.7	249	72.2	105	55.6
8	364	74.6	268	79.3	96	62.2
7	254	79.5	167	83.7	87	68.3
6	224	83.8	127	87.1	97	75.0
5	194	87.5	96	89.6	98	81.8
4	143	90.2	75	91.6	68	86.6
3	177	93.6	98	94.2	79	92.1
2	190	97.2	126	97.5	64	96.5
1	144	100.0	94	100.0	50	100.0
Total	5225		3787		1438

Note: This table is based on R00645., R01169.10, R01751.10, R02343., R03059.10, R03925.10, R04130.10, R04390., R05468.10, R05967.10, and R06835.10.
¹ Surveys completed in any year, not necessarily consecutive survey years.

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Retention and Reasons for Non-Interview