Do People Trust Enough to Respond to Surveys?
Published in CHANCE, 2025
In this increasingly insular world of people being immersed in work or being conscious of sharing information with others, it is a matter of concern to survey researchers whether people are motivated enough to take surveys. This article looks at social trust as a possible mechanism for nonresponse. Socioeconomic surveys like the ACS and CPS showed the strongest relation with trust in government and economic institutions. Comparatively, the authors found limited evidence suggesting that institutional trust bears an association with response rates to surveys related to health. Taken together, the results suggest that there is still work to be done to understand the root causes underlying declining survey response rates in the US federal surveys.
Recommended citation: Das, U., & Forrester, A. C. (2025). Do People Trust Enough to Respond to Surveys? *CHANCE, 38(2)*, 23–33. https://doi.org/10.1080/09332480.2025.2510158.
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