Questionnaire Dwelling Unit-Level and Person Pair-Level Sampling ...

B.1.1 Person Level
B.1.1.1 Receiving and Deriving Person-Level Poststratification Control Totals
Civilian, noninstitutionalized population estimates for ages 12 or older were provided by
the Population Estimates Branch of the U.S. Bureau of the Census. We received two files, one at
the national level and the other at the State level, each containing estimates of the population
broken down by levels of month (12 levels), Hispanicity (2), race (6), sex (2), and age (11).
The breakdown received from the census did not match the levels of the domains that we
wanted to control. To account for this, we collapsed levels. From this altered data, we created
datasets with model group-specific control totals. Observations in these datasets corresponded to
a breakdown by quarter (4), Hispanicity (2), race (5), sex (2), age (11), and number of States 26 in
the model group (number of States varied according to which census region was represented in
the model group).
B.1.1.2 Adjusting SDU Data to the Control Totals
In the person-level weighting, the SDU weights were poststratified to meet control totals
based on the population estimates received from the census. For NSDUH weighting, GEM was
utilized to calibrate sample weights to multiple control totals. In doing so, each SDU received an
adjustment factor, which, when multiplied by the initial weight, produced a final weight. The
sum of all final weights corresponded to the civilian, noninstitutionalized population estimate for
ages 12 or older, and the sum of all final weights in a domain corresponded to the control total
for that domain. Note that there were a number of controls being calibrated to for each SDU,
depending upon the domains to which the SDU belonged. The adjusted SDU weight reflected the
civilian, noninstitutionalized population estimates for ages 12 or older and could be utilized as a
basis for constructing controls at the QDU and person pair levels.
B.1.2 QDU Level
B.1.2.1 Deriving QDU-Level Poststratification Control Totals from Adjusted SDU Weights
Since there were no controls for QDU-level poststratification available directly, we used
the adjusted SDU weights. For these weights to be applicable at the QDU level, the SDU-level
data had to be restructured by sorting and summing over the domains to be used in the QDUlevel
calibration. This provided a dataset where the summed weight, which still added up to the
proper population, was available for every domain to be utilized in the QDU calibration and thus
could be used as a control total.
26 The District of Columbia is included among States.
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