IASS Webinar 59: Some History of the Use of Models in Survey Sampling
| Date | 17 Dec 2025 |
| Time | 13:00 GMT+01:00 - 14:30 GMT+01:00 |
| Level of instruction | Intermediate |
| Instructor |
Richard Valliant
|
| Registration fee | |
Note: This webinar is the postponed Webinar 55 from 3 September 2025
Webinar Abstract
In the 1930s sampling statisticians convinced government agencies to move away from non-random methods like quota sampling for use in official statistics. Probability sampling gradually became the standard through the 1940s and 1950s. Use of models in estimation was implicit in adjustments for non-coverage and non-response and sometimes used via ratio or regression estimators but randomisation properties were still considered key. Since the 1970s and 1980s, the explicit use of models has proliferated in sampling for use in basic point estimation, non-response and non-coverage adjustment, imputation, and a variety of other areas. This paper summarises some of the early developments, controversies in the design-based versus model-based debate, and uses of models for inference from probability and non-probability samples.
Instructors
About the instructor
Richard Valliant is a Research Professor Emeritus at the University of Michigan and the Joint Program for Survey Methodology at the University of Maryland. He received his PhD from Johns Hopkins University in Biostatistics and an MS in statistics from Cornell University. He has over 45 years of experience in survey sampling, estimation theory, and statistical computing. He was formerly an Associate Director at Westat and a athematical statistician with the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). He has a range of applied experience in survey estimation and sample design on a variety of establishment, institutional, and household surveys, including the US Consumer Price Index, the Current Population Survey, and other surveys done by BLS, the National Center for Education Statistics, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the Department of Energy, and the National
Agricultural Statistical Service among others.
He is a Fellow of the American Statistical Association and an elected member of the International Statistical Institute. He was an associate editor of the Journal of the American Statistical Association-Theory and Methods Section and the Applications and Case Studies Section, Journal of Official Statistics, and Survey Methodology.
He is the co-author of three books:
- Finite Population Sampling and Inference: A Prediction Approach (2000) with A. Dorfman and R.M. Royall; Survey Weights: A Step-by-step Guide to Calculation (2018) with J.A. Dever;
- Practical Tools for Designing and Weighting Survey Samples, (2018, 2nd edition) with J.A. Dever and F. Kreuter. The first edition of the Practical Tools book was the winner of the 2020 Book Award from the American Association for Public Opinion Research.
- He is also the author of the R packages: PracTools and svydiags.