Publication type
Journal Article
Authors
Publication date
August 11, 2026
Summary:
Nonresponse in surveys is particularly problematic among young people in both cross-sectional and panel studies. This article investigates the factors driving lower participation rates among young people in longitudinal surveys. We study whether nonresponse can be explained by young people experiencing more life events associated with disengagement from panel surveys. Using data from the Understanding Society panel in the United Kingdom, we employ a discrete-time multinomial logistic hazard model to study nonresponse across panel waves. Consistent with previous research, our analysis identifies lower education, unemployment, immigrant background, and residential circumstances as key predictors of nonresponse. Furthermore, we demonstrate that changes in employment status and (expectations of) residential relocation significantly contribute to predicting attrition among young participants, with age remaining a significant factor. Living with parents also plays an important role, as it is associated with a lower risk of non-contact.
Published in
Journal of Survey Statistics and Methodology
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1093/jssam/smag001
ISSN
23250984
Subjects
Notes
Online Early
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Association for Public Opinion Research.
Open Access
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Code: The code used in this article is publicly available at https://osf.io/9z54k
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