Sampling

The scope of the 2021-22 Personal Safety Survey was persons aged 18 years and over residing in private dwellings across Australia (excluding very remote areas). Interviews were conducted with one randomly selected person aged 18 years or over who was a usual resident of the selected household.

Private dwellings are:

• houses
• flats
• home units
• any other structures used as private places of residence at the time of the survey.

Usual residents are people who usually live in a particular dwelling and regard it as their own or main home. People usually residing in non-private dwellings, such as hotels, motels, hostels, hospitals, nursing homes, or short-stay caravan parks were not in scope.

Both urban and rural areas in all States and Territories were included in the survey, except for very remote areas of Australia. The following groups were also excluded from the scope of the survey:

• visitors at a dwelling whose usual place of residence is Australia (as they would have their chance of selection at their usual residence)
• overseas visitors intending to stay in Australia for less than 12-months
• non-Australian diplomats, non-Australian diplomatic staff, and non-Australian members of their household
• members of non-Australian defence forces stationed in Australia and their dependants
• people who usually reside in non-private dwellings
• households where all residents are aged less than 18 years.

It should be noted that the survey was developed in 2019, before the release of the Standard for Sex, Gender, Variations of Sex Characteristics and Sexual Orientation (2020).  As described in the next section of this chapter (Sample design and selection), the sample was designed to support estimates for female and male sex.

The sample size, distribution, and method of selection for the 2021-22 PSS were based on several factors:

• key estimates required to be produced from the survey
• level of disaggregation and accuracy at which these key survey estimates were required
• costs and operational constraints of conducting the survey.

The aim of the survey was to produce certain key estimates of interest with an acceptable level of quality. This included sexual, physical and partner violence, and partner emotional abuse estimates.

The sample was designed to meet these requirements as closely as possible whilst taking into consideration the overall costs and operational constraints of conducting the survey.

The PSS was originally scheduled for enumeration in 2020.  However, the COVID-19 pandemic and associated responses resulted in multiple postponements to data collection activities.

These disruptions were experienced across the ABS statistical program and led to a number of adjustments to the household survey schedule and collection approach.  Resulting adjustments included postponing surveys, reducing content, introducing digital collection channels, and reducing sample sizes to balance priorities across the survey program.

For the PSS, the decision was taken to reduce and redesign the approached sample to maximise the ability to report against key information requirements.  While the reduced sample maintains the quality of headline indicators, it has had some impact on the range of data able to be produced.

The adjusted sample was designed to produce each of the key estimates and be disaggregated for:

• females – at the national and state/territory level
• males – at the national level.

The sample for females was allocated roughly equally in each state and territory to provide sufficiently reliable state and territory and national level estimates for women. The sample for males was allocated to states and territories roughly in proportion to their respective population size, in order to provide sufficiently reliable national level estimates for males.

In order to target the differential numbers of male and female sample, dwellings were allocated as either male (where an interview with a male aged 18 years and over was required) or female (where an interview with a female aged 18 years and over was required). One in-scope person of the pre-allocated sex was then randomly selected from each dwelling. Where the household did not contain an in-scope resident of the pre-allocated sex, an in-scope resident of the opposite sex was randomly selected, referred to as a sex-selection 'flipped' household (for further information refer to the Survey Development and Data Collection chapter of this publication). Due to relative differences in the number of male to female dwellings selected in the sample, approximately half of the final male sample came from sex-selection 'flipped' households.

Lastly, response rates to the survey were impacted by a number of operational factors, designed to help ensure the safety of respondents, the safety of interviewers and also to help ensure data integrity. These included:

• the partially voluntary nature of the survey
• the sensitive nature of the survey content
• the requirement for interviews to be conducted in a private interview setting
• no proxy interviews were allowed for the voluntary/sensitive component of the survey (therefore people requiring proxy interviews are not included in the final data).

Due to these factors, the original sample design also catered for lower response rates, expecting to attain around a 70% response rate. COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, lockdowns, and adherence to public health guidelines led to lower response rate expectations.

When entering the field in 2021, it was initially planned that a total sample of 38,837 households would be selected and approached for interview. Due to COVID-19 restrictions and lockdowns, only 22,790 households were able to be approached. Details on the final response rates achieved are available in the next section of this chapter (Response Rates).

The 2021-22 PSS had a total sample of 38,837 households. Of these, 6,886 households were pre-allocated as part of the male sample and 31,951 households were pre-allocated as part of the female sample. These sex-based samples were subject to change depending upon whether there was someone of the pre-allocated sex in the household (for more details on the requirement for pre-allocated sex, refer to the Sample design and selection section in this chapter.

After removing sample loss of 17.5% (households where residents were out of scope of the survey or where dwellings proved to be vacant, under construction or derelict), and an additional 23.8% that were classified as other loss (either prior to or after approach), this resulted in a final selection of 22,790 eligible dwellings.

A final response rate of 52.2% was achieved for the 2021-22 PSS, with 11,905 persons completing the survey questionnaire nationally. The response comprised 2,073 fully responding males and 9,832 fully responding females.

A fully responding household is one in which all parts of the interview were completed for the selected respondent. Households where all compulsory parts of the interview were completed (but the voluntary component was not started or completed) were classified as adequate complete, however they were not included as part of the final data file. For more details on what was included in the compulsory part of the survey, refer to Survey Content in the Survey Questionnaire and Content section of the Survey Development and Collection chapter of this publication.

The computer-assisted self-interview (CASI) gave the respondent the option to complete the voluntary section of the survey directly and privately on the interviewer’s laptop. For respondents who were not comfortable with completing a CASI, the option for the interview to continue as a computer-assisted personal interview (CAPI), where the interviewer asks the respondent the questions aloud and records their answers, was available. For more details, see the Survey Development and Data Collection chapter of this publication.

In total, 2,458 respondents (21%) chose to continue the survey as a CASI, 5,436 respondents (46%) chose to proceed with the CAPI, and 4,011 respondents (34%) completed the survey with a computer-assisted telephone interview (CATI). The following table presents the characteristics of respondents by the interview mode utilised.

Due to the procedures used for collecting data for the PSS, particularly regarding the requirement for a private interview with the respondent, there are some groups which are under-represented in the survey. The table presented below identifies the characteristics of fully responding (11,905) and adequate complete (2,310) respondents.