OMG! How Generation Y Is Redefining Faith in the iPod Era. - Circle

Muslim Oversample
Unlike the Jewish, Asian, and Hispanic populations, we could not use surname samples to assist
us in locating Muslims. And at less than 1 percent of the population, we found that we could not obtain a
critical mass of completes using a list-assisted telephone sampling methodology, even when targeting the
areas most likely to have high Muslim populations.
Instead, we turned to a multi-tier methodology that, while functional, was not optimal to creating a
sample comparable to the other race and ethnicity oversamples in this study. We sampled young Muslims
in two ways: by calling from a list of survey volunteers and from person-to-person intercepts. The sample
is divided among these two samples, roughly 40 percent from the former, and 60 percent from the latter.
First, our list of volunteers was recruited from Muslim Student Associations in universities across the
country. Volunteers had the option of completing the survey online or over the telephone. While nationally
distributed, this sample was more likely than average to be college-educated, attend mosque regularly, and
strongly identify with being Muslim.
Second, we conducted person-to-person interviews with Muslim youth in the Detroit Metropolitan
area. Trained interviewers located Muslim youth at several different locations throughout the Detroit
Metropolitan area, including Fairlane Town Center, Michigan State University, Wayne County Community
College, University of Michigan at Dearborn, and Access Cultural Center. While locally distributed, this
sample was younger, less likely to identify as strongly with being Muslim, and less likely to attend church
regularly. When the two samples were considered together, the attitudinal and demographic estimates were
acceptably similar to the benchmarks provided by other surveys of Muslim youth, such as the American
Muslim Poll 2004 and the Detroit Arab American Study.
39
How Generation Y Is Redefining Faith In The iPod Era