Random Digit Dialing: A Comparison to Personal Surveys

DURING the past few years, a minor revolution has taken place in survey research. Telephone surveys based on some form of random digit dialing (RDD) have gained general acceptance among much of the survey community as a legitimate method for sampling public opinion. Not too long ago, telephone surveys were viewed with skepticism or outright distrust. Backstrom and Hursch (1963:138) explicitly warned their readers to avoid this method. Even new texts restrict themselves to the traditional methods. The most recent example is Weisberg and Bowens (1977) book which purports to be a general treatment of survey research even though it totally ignores telephone surveys. Sudmans (1976) new work on sampling is the only text which provides a significant, although brief, discussion of RDD. Although textbooks have been slow to pick up on telephone surveys, the revolution has spread through the profession by other means. A few articles on random digit dialing (Glasser and Metzger, 1972; Hauck