Research Design

CCRC study

Respondents and Recruitment
Respondents were recruited from a letter sent by the director of the CCRC to all individuals on the waiting list. The baseline pre-move sample of 104 individuals includes 50% of the 204 individuals who were expecting to move into the CCRC once it opened during the winter of 1995/96. Of the 101 who participated in the first wave, four decided not to move to the CCRC, and five died before the summer of 1997. Three respondents gave only partial interviews in 1995 and refused to participate in 1997. We interviewed all of the remaining 92 individuals in the summer of 1997, one and one-half years after their move into the CCRC, plus 3 spouses of original respondents not previously interviewed.

Interview
Interviews were usually conducted in person at the home of the respondents by students trained in interviewing techniques. In both 1995 and 1997, respondents completed a 2-hour in-person interview, as well as a self-administered, mail-back booklet. Most consented to a home observation as well.

Pathways Study 1997-1998

The Pathways to Life Quality proposal outlined a plan for a sample of 800 individuals, with a community sample of about 500 individuals and about 300 individuals living in senior housing.

Respondents and Recruitment
There are several distinct groups of respondents:
1. Continuing respondents from the CCRC study (N=95).
2. Individuals living in senior housing facilities within Tompkins County (N=316).
Respondents were recruited from eleven senior housing facilities in Tompkins County, New York. Three of these facilities are within the City of Ithaca, one is "suburban," four are in small towns and three are rural. They house between twenty-five and 253 residents, and three of the facilities house younger residents who may be disabled. The facilities are staffed with between two and 150 staff members, depending on services offered.
Individuals were recruited via mailed recruitment packets to facilities, formal recruitment presentations, through newsletters, informal and one-on-one recruitment activities, and by individual telephone calls to residents.
3. Random sample of Tompkins County residents age 60 and over (N=457).
A random sample of 1500 community participants was drawn from a list of 11,000 Tompkins County residents over 60 years of age; this list was from voter registration lists and from a professional sampling organization. Because we wanted as representative a sample as possible, 1600 additional names were culled from the Senior Citizens’ Council / Area Agency on Aging mailing list. Participants were then recruited via letter and follow-up telephone call. The group of 457 community residents includes spouses of randomly-chosen participants (N=50) as well as volunteers who responded to a newspaper article (N=41).

Interview
Interviews of about one and a half hours were usually conducted in person at the home of the respondents, by students trained in interviewing techniques and by Pathways staff. Most also consented to a home observation.

Future Data Collections

As of March 2000, we have interviewed about 65% of the 868 respondents from the 1997-98 sample. In addition, new participants have been recruited from the senior housing facilities. The current data collection effort is scheduled to finish in May 2000. The next data collection will run from June 2001 to May 2002.

Access to Pathways Data

All research (including student research) using Pathways data will be done in collaboration with faculty or staff associated with the Pathways project. To request permission to use Pathways data, researchers should send to the Co-Principal Investigators:

1. A short proposal outlining the proposed research
2. A letter from a Pathways faculty collaborator verifying the collaboration.

The Co-Principal Investigators (John Krout and Elaine Wethington will review the proposed research to ensure that it does not conflict with other Pathways research projects. If the proposal is accepted, the co-PIs will send a letter of permission. The researcher will then need to sign a confidentiality agreement. The Co-Principal Investigators reserve the right to collaborate on Pathways research. Neither the data nor the instruments may be copied or used without permission.

The Pathways to Life Quality Study is a collaboration across institutions and across disciplines. We anticipate many diverse research findings emerging from the data and encourage faculty collaborators and their students to use the data for many purposes. The following guidelines will help this process go smoothly.

1. The Co-Principal Investigators need to be informed of any research being undertaken using Pathways data, including student projects, posters, presentations, and papers. This helps us to coordinate efforts of faculty and avoid duplication of effort, as well as helping guide further work on the data and constructed variables.

2. Pathways staff need copies of anything produced using project data (including student theses). This allows us to be informed when responding to questions.

3. The Co-Principal Investigators would like to have the opportunity to work with others on research projects using project data and to help write up articles, becoming primary or secondary authors as appropriate. The Co-Principal Investigators will not choose to become involved in every project but would like the opportunity to consider becoming involved in every one.

4. It is particularly important that the Co-Principal Investigators be informed about any new data being collected at project sites or from project respondents. Respondents and those at facilities will assume that the PIs and project staff are knowledgeable about any related projects. Accordingly, they need to be kept up-to-date on what is going on under the auspices of the Pathways project.

5. We are eager to facilitate student involvement in the project. We are involving students at all stages of the project. Project staff are always happy to inform students about the data and to suggest references or methods, but student projects should always be supervised by a faculty collaborator.

6. The role of the project staff is to collect meaningful data and to help you and your students use it in your research. The Project Managers are always happy to help you use the data and to assist with problems you may encounter. If more significant involvement of one of the Project Managers or Research Assistants is requested (e.g., actually writing portions of a paper), she or he should be offered the chance to share authorship, as appropriate.

7. We ask that you use this statement when acknowledging the project: "This paper (presentation) is part of the Pathways to Life Quality Study, a collaborative research project conducted by the Gerontology Institute at Ithaca College and the Bronfenbrenner Life Course Center at Cornell University, John Krout and Phyllis Moen, Co-Principal Investigators."

8. The working paper series is an important component of the project. The goal is to have all project research represented in one or more working papers. The Co-Principal Investigators will review all proposed working papers.

Users of project data must pledge to preserve the confidentiality of the respondents who participate in the study. In general, researchers should also preserve the confidentiality of the facilities who cooperate with the study. For a copy of the guidelines and confidentiality form click here.