The Research and Development Papers series is a collection of research papers that detail statistical methods that will be applied to analyzing and reporting official findings from BJS's data collection programs. The papers examine the effectiveness of the survey methods currently used by BJS programs, investigate alternative methods to determine their appropriateness and application, recommend approaches for improving the efficiency and quality of the data collections, and present findings.

BJS's Research and Development Papers are designed to foster improvements in the methods used to obtain, analyze, and report national-level data on crime and criminal justice.

Areas of study

• developing more efficient sample designs
• developing response-level data quality measures
• disclosure limitation
• estimation and inference with complex sample survey data
• evaluations of alternative estimators
• metadata methods and practice
• measurement and reduction of sampling and non-sampling error
• model-based estimation
• missing data techniques
• nonresponse, measurement error, and variance estimation
• questionnaire design
• respondent–interviewer interactions
• time series for seasonal adjustment
• usability tests of computer systems.