Privacy Concerns and the Census Long Form: Some Evidence from Census 2000

Disclaimer: This report is released to inform interested parties of research and to encourage discussion. The views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of the U.S. Census Bureau. This paper reports the results of research and analysis undertaken by Census Bureau staff. It has undergone a Census Bureau review 1 more limited in scope than that given to official Census Bureau publications. This report is released to inform interested parties of ongoing research and to encourage discussion of work in progress. I. Introduction Declining public cooperation with the census (Miskura, 1992) and surveys has been attributed in part to increasing public concerns about privacy and confidentiality (Singer, Hippler, and Schwarz, 1992). Such concerns appear to be increasingly important barriers to public cooperation in recent censuses. Concern about privacy and mistrust of confidentiality predicted lower mail response in the 1990 Census, although it had not in 1980, controlling for This paper examines trends in privacy and confidentiality attitudes during the course of Census 2000, analyzes concerns about long form questions, and explores what information might allay those concerns.