Artikel "Using Smartphone Technology for Research on Refugees: Evidence from Germany" dank der UB Mannheim jetzt über Open-access verfügbar


Dank eines Förderprogramms der Universitätsbibliothek Mannheim ist der dieses Jahr in der internationalen Fachzeitschrift Sociological Methods and Research erschienene Artikel "Using Smartphone Technology for Research on Refugees: Evidence from Germany" von ifm-Forscher Dr. Christoph Sajons nun über Open-Access frei verfügbar.

(English version further below)

Er entstand in Zusammenarbeit mit Prof. Dr. Florian Keusch und Mariel M. Leonard vom Mannheimer Zentrum für Europäische Sozialwissenschaften (MZES), und Prof. Dr. Susan Steiner vom Mannheimer Zentrum für Evaluation und Entwicklungsforschung (C4ED). In dem Artikel untersuchen die Autoren, inwieweit man die hohen Smartphone-Besitzraten unter Geflüchteten für die sozial- und wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Forschung nutzen kann. Insbesondere der Einsatz von Forschungsapps, die einmal installiert automatisch Informationen sammeln, erscheint dabei potentiell zukunftsweisend.

Den Abstract und einen Link zum Artikel finden Sie weiter unten.
 

Research paper "Using Smartphone Technology for Research on Refugees: Evidence from Germany" now available via Open-Access, courtesy of the UB Mannheim

Thanks to the Open Access Publishing Fund of the University Library of Mannheim, the research paper "Using Smartphone Technology for Research on Refugees: Evidence from Germany" by ifm researcher Dr. Christoph Sajons is now available free of charge via Open Access. The article was a joint project with Prof. Florian Keusch and Mariel M. Leonard of the Mannheim Centre for European Social Research (MZES) and Prof. Susan Steiner of the Center for Evaluation and Development (C4ED). It examines the extent to which the high smartphone ownership rates among refugees can be used for research in the social sciences and economics. The results show that this is the case in particular for the use of research apps which automatically collect information.


Abstract:
Researchers attempting to survey refugees over time face methodological issues because of the transient nature of the target population. In this article, we examine whether applying smartphone technology could alleviate these issues. We interviewed 529 refugees and afterward invited them to four follow-up mobile web surveys and to install a research app for passive mobile data collection. Our main findings are as follows: First, participation in mobile web surveys declines rapidly and is rather selective with significant coverage and nonresponse biases. Second, we do not find any factor predicting types of smartphone ownership, and only low reading proficiency is significantly correlated with app nonparticipation. However, obtaining sufficiently large samples is challenging—only 5 percent of the eligible refugees installed our app. Third, offering a 30 Euro incentive leads to a statistically insignificant increase in participation in passive mobile data collection.

 

Link to the paper


20.11.19

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Initiativen und Portale des ifm:
Dr. Christoph Sajons