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[Federal Register Volume 80, Number 51 (Tuesday, March 17, 2015)]
[Notices]
[Pages 13868-13869]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2015-06050]

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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

[60Day-15-0222; Docket No. CDC-2015-0007]

Proposed Data Collection Submitted for Public Comment and 
Recommendations

AGENCY: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Department of 
Health and Human Services (HHS).

ACTION: Notice with comment period.

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SUMMARY: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as part 
of its continuing efforts to reduce public burden and maximize the 
utility of government information, invites the general public and other 
Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on proposed and/or 
continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork 
Reduction Act of 1995. This notice invites comment on the Questionnaire 
Design Research Laboratory (QDRL)generic clearance request, which 
encompasses general questionnaire development and pre-testing 
activities to be carried out in 2014-2017.

DATES: Written comments must be received on or before May 18, 2015.

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments, identified by Docket No. CDC-2015-
0007 by any of the following methods:
     Federal eRulemaking Portal: Regulation.gov. Follow the 
instructions for submitting comments.
     Mail: Leroy A. Richardson, Information Collection Review 
Office, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton Road 
NE., MS-D74, Atlanta, Georgia 30329.
    Instructions: All submissions received must include the agency name 
and Docket Number. All relevant comments received will be posted 
without change to Regulations.gov, including any personal information 
provided. For access to the docket to read background documents or 
comments received, go to Regulations.gov.

    Please note:  All public comment should be submitted through the 
Federal eRulemaking portal (Regulations.gov) or by U.S. mail to the 
address listed above.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: To request more information on the 
proposed project or to obtain a copy of the information collection plan 
and instruments, contact the Information Collection Review Office, 
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton Road NE., MS-
D74, Atlanta, Georgia 30329; phone: 404-639-7570; Email: [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 
(PRA) (44 U.S.C. 3501-3520), Federal agencies must obtain approval from 
the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for each collection of 
information they conduct or sponsor. In addition, the PRA also requires 
Federal agencies to provide a 60-day notice in the Federal Register 
concerning each proposed collection of information, including each new 
proposed collection, each proposed extension of existing collection of 
information, and each reinstatement of previously approved information 
collection before submitting the collection to OMB for approval. To 
comply with this requirement, we are publishing this notice of a 
proposed data collection as described below.
    Comments are invited on: (a) Whether the proposed collection of 
information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of 
the agency, including whether the information shall have practical 
utility; (b) the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden of the 
proposed collection of information; (c) ways to enhance the quality, 
utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; (d) ways to 
minimize the burden of the collection of information on respondents, 
including through the use of automated collection techniques or other 
forms of information technology; and (e) estimates of capital or start-
up costs and costs of operation, maintenance, and purchase of services 
to provide information. Burden means the total time, effort, or 
financial resources expended by persons to generate, maintain, retain, 
disclose or provide information to or for a Federal agency. This 
includes the time needed to review instructions; to develop, acquire, 
install and utilize technology and systems for the purpose of 
collecting, validating and verifying information, processing and 
maintaining information, and disclosing and providing information; to 
train personnel and to be able to respond to a collection of 
information, to search data sources, to complete and review the 
collection of information; and to transmit or otherwise disclose the 
information.

Proposed Project

    Questionnaire Design Research Laboratory (QDRL) (OMB No. 0920-0222, 
expires 6/30/2015)--Revision--National Center for Health Statistics 
(NCHS), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Background and Brief Description

    Section 306 of the Public Health Service (PHS) Act (42 U.S.C. 
242k), as amended, authorizes that the Secretary of Health and Human 
Services (DHHS), acting through NCHS, shall undertake and support (by 
grant or contract) research, demonstrations, and evaluations respecting 
new or improved methods for obtaining current data to support 
statistical and epidemiological activities for the purpose of improving 
the effectiveness, efficiency, and quality of health services in the 
United States.
    The Questionnaire Design Research Laboratory (QDRL) is the focal 
point within NCHS for questionnaire development, pre-testing, and 
evaluation activities for CDC surveys (such as the NCHS National Health 
Interview Survey, OMB No. 0920-0214) and other federally sponsored 
surveys; however, question development and evaluation activities are 
conducted throughout NCHS. NCHS is requesting 3

[[Page 13869]]

years of OMB Clearance for this generic submission.
    The QDRL and other NCHS programs conduct cognitive interviews, 
focus groups, in-depth or ethnographic interviews, usability tests, 
field tests/pilot interviews, and experimental research in laboratory 
and field settings, both for applied questionnaire development and 
evaluation as well as more basic research on response errors in 
surveys.
    Various techniques to evaluate interviewer administered, self-
administered, telephone, Computer Assisted Personal Interviewing 
(CAPI), Computer Assisted Self-Interviewing (CASI), Audio Computer-
Assisted Self-Interviewing (ACASI), and web-based questionnaires are 
used.
    The most common questionnaire evaluation method is the cognitive 
interview. These evaluations are conducted by the QDRL. The interview 
structure consists of respondents first answering a draft survey 
question and then providing textual information to reveal the processes 
involved in answering the test question. Specifically, cognitive 
interview respondents are asked to describe how and why they answered 
the question as they did. Through the interviewing process, various 
types of question-response problems that would not normally be 
identified in a traditional survey interview, such as interpretive 
errors and recall accuracy, are uncovered. By conducting a comparative 
analysis of cognitive interviews, it is also possible to determine 
whether particular interpretive patterns occur within particular sub-
groups of the population. Interviews are generally conducted in small 
rounds of 20-30 interviews; ideally, the questionnaire is re-worked 
between rounds, and revisions are tested iteratively until interviews 
yield relatively few new insights.
    Cognitive interviewing is inexpensive and provides useful data on 
questionnaire performance while minimizing respondent burden. Cognitive 
interviewing offers a detailed depiction of meanings and processes used 
by respondents to answer questions--processes that ultimately produce 
the survey data. As such, the method offers an insight that can 
transform understanding of question validity and response error. 
Documented findings from these studies represent tangible evidence of 
how the question performs. Such documentation also serves CDC data 
users, allowing them to be critical users in their approach and 
application of the data.
    In addition to cognitive interviewing, a number of other 
qualitative and quantitative methods are used to investigate and 
research survey response errors and the survey response process. These 
methods include conducting focus groups, usability tests, in-depth or 
ethnographic interviews, and the administration and analysis of 
questions in both representative and non-representative field tests. 
Focus groups are conducted by the QDRL. They are group interviews whose 
primary purpose is to elicit the basic sociocultural understandings and 
terminology that form the basis of questionnaire design. Each group 
typically consists of one moderator and 4 to 10 participants, depending 
on the research question. In-depth or ethnographic interviews are one-
on-one interviews designed to elicit the understandings or terminology 
that are necessary for question design, as well as to gather detailed 
information that can contribute to the analysis of both qualitative and 
quantitative data. Usability tests are typically one-on-one interviews 
that are used to determine how a given survey or information collection 
tool functions in the field, and how the mode and layout of the 
instrument itself may contribute to survey response error and the 
survey response process.
    In addition to these qualitative methods, NCHS also uses various 
tools to obtain quantitative data, which can be analyzed alone or 
analyzed alongside qualitative data to give a much fuller accounting of 
the survey response process. For instance, phone, internet, mail, and 
in-person follow-up interviews of previous NCHS survey respondents may 
be used to test the validity of survey questions and questionnaires and 
to obtain more detailed information that cannot be gathered on the 
original survey. Additionally, field or pilot tests may be conducted on 
both representative and non-representative samples, including those 
obtained from commercial survey and web panel vendors. Beyond looking 
at traditional measures of survey errors (such as missing rates, item 
non-response, and don't know rates), these pilot tests can be used to 
run experimental designs in order to capture how different questions 
function in a field setting.
    Similar methodology has been adopted by other federal agencies, as 
well as by academic and commercial survey organizations. There are no 
costs to respondents other than their time. The total estimated annual 
burden hours are 13,150.

                                        Estimated Annualized Burden Hours
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                                                                                      Average
                                                     Number of       Number of      burden per     Total burden
      Type of respondent            Form name       respondents    responses per   response  (in       hours
                                                                    respondent        hours)
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Individuals or households.....  Eligibility               12,000               1            5/60           1,000
                                 Screening.
Individuals or households.....  Questionnaire             11,700               1               1          11,700
                                 Development
                                 Studies.
Individuals or households.....  Focus groups....             300               1           90/60             450
                                                 ---------------------------------------------------------------
    Total.....................  ................  ..............  ..............  ..............          13,150
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Leroy A. Richardson,
Chief, Information Collection Review Office, Office of Scientific 
Integrity, Office of the Associate Director for Science, Office of the 
Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
[FR Doc. 2015-06050 Filed 3-16-15; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 4163-18-P
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