Online and Offline Recruitment of Young Women for a Longitudinal Health Survey: Findings From the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health 1989-95 Cohort.
BACKGROUND
In 2012, we set out to recruit a cohort of at least 10,000 women aged 18-23 from across Australia. With recent research demonstrating the inadequacy of traditional approaches to recruiting women in this age group, we elected to conduct open recruiting.


OBJECTIVE
Our aim was to report on the overall success of open recruiting and to evaluate the relative success of a variety of recruitment methods in terms of numbers and demographics.


METHODS
We used referrals, Facebook, formal advertising, and incentives in order to recruit the cohort.


RESULTS
In all, 17,069 women were recruited for the longitudinal online survey, from 54,685 initiated surveys. Of these women, most (69.94%, n=11,799) who joined the longitudinal cohort were recruited via Facebook, 12.72% (n=2145) via the fashion promotion, 7.02% (n=1184) by referral, 4.9% (n=831) via other Web activities, and 5.4% (n=910) via traditional media.


CONCLUSIONS
Facebook was by far the most successful strategy, enrolling a cohort of women with a similar profile to the population of Australian women in terms of age, area of residence, and relationship status. Women recruited via fashion promotion were the least representative. All strategies underrepresented less educated women-a finding that is consistent with more traditional means of recruiting. In conclusion, flexibility in recruitment design, embracing new and traditional media, adopting a dynamic responsive approach, and monitoring the results of recruiting in terms of sample composition and number recruited led to the successful establishment of a new cohort.
Priority Research Centre for Gender, Health and Ageing, School of Medicine and Public Health, University of Newcastle, Callaghan, Australia. deborah.loxton@newcastle.edu.au.
Deborah
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4745-8612
D
Loxton
Jennifer
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8434-3382
J
Powers
Amy E
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4298-4613
AE
Anderson
Natalie
http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4506-9274
N
Townsend
Melissa L
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5733-9684
ML
Harris
Ryan
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8548-0354
R
Tuckerman
Stephanie
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1861-9587
S
Pease
Gita
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9610-5904
G
Mishra
Julie
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3984-6877
J
Byles
D000293:Adolescent; D001315:Australia; D015331:Cohort Studies; D005260:Female; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D018579:Patient Selection; D012017:Referral and Consultation; D061108:Social Media; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D016387:Women's Health; D055815:Young Adult
cohort studies; longitudinal studies; social media; women’s health