[Factors associated with responses of telephone screening interview in a validity and reliability study of telephone interview to assess dietary intake in urban China].
OBJECTIVE
To describe the first phase of a multi-phase study exploring the possibility of conducting telephone dietary intake interviewing in Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong in urban China in 2002.


METHODS
Three hundred healthy urban Chinese women aged 20 to 49years were sampled by random telephone screening interviews.


RESULTS
Examination of the factors associated with their responses to the telephone screening showed that the completion rates differed by day of the week and time of the day. The completion rates were higher onWednesday and Thursday than other weekdays, and higher on Sunday than Saturday at the weekend. There was a trend for the completion rates to peak from 18 :00 to 21:30 during weekday evenings and between 11:00 and 12:00 AM and 19:00 and 20:00 PM during weekends. There was no significant interviewer difference in the completion rates except for one interviewer in Hong Kong, indicating that interviewer performance did not influence completion rates. Of all numbers dialed, 25% of the responding persons refused, with almost all (94.3%) occurring at or near the beginning of the screening interviews, either before or at invitation. Key reasons for refusal included "hung up without any interaction" (35.1%), "not available to participate" (28.6%) or "not interested in survey" (19.0%). Most of the refusals were firm and not possible to reverse.
Li
Ying
Y
Guldan
Georgia S
GS
Shi
Hui-Jing
HJ
Jia
Feng-Mei
FM
Zhai
Fengying
F
Ye
Xinqi
X
D000328:Adult; D002681:China; D002947:Cities; D003625:Data Collection / Q000379:methods; D004034:Diet Surveys; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008875:Middle Aged; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012494:Sampling Studies; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013689:Telephone; D013997:Time Factors; D014505:Urban Population; D055815:Young Adult