INNOVATIONS IN MULTI-SITED APPROACHES TO SAMPLING INTERNATIONAL MIGRANTS: A FEASIBILITY AND EVALUATION STUDY

Ayaga Bawah, University Of Ghana
Giovanna Merli, Duke University
Chenoa A. Flippen, University of Pennsylvania
Jere Behrman, University of Pennsylvania
Irma T. Elo, University of Pennsylvania
Patrick Asuming, University of Ghana

Multi-sited, longitudinal sampling designs of international migration that cross international boundaries to link migrants at origin and destination (or vice versa) and follow migrants over time have aided our understanding of migration processes. But they have also highlighted considerable challenges of establishing linked origin-destination samples for achieving representation of origin and destination communities, accounting for the selection of who migrates through appropriate comparisons across groups, recruiting meaningful samples of sufficient size and following movers and stayers over time. Here we evaluate an innovative multi-sited, multi-method sampling design of migration from Ghana to the US, which aims to refine previous multi-sited approaches. Our design establishes origin-destination linked samples of households using conventional as well as innovative network sampling designs that capitalize on peer referral to achieve coverage and representation of the Ghanaian immigrant population in the US, includes migrants linked by ties to origin as well as those without ties to origin but linked by a network of ties in the US. We assess the feasibility of obtaining cross-border referrals and evaluate the sampling strategy to achieve population representation through multiple tests grounded in data collected among four distinct samples of origin and destination households successively recruited in Ghana and the US.

Keywords: International Migration, Social network methods, Data and Methods

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