Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Monetary incentives are used in many research studies to increase participation rates and have increasingly taken the form of gift cards or gift certificates particularly when study participants are lower income. A larger study of parents with young children in childcare centers in North Carolina provided parents with the option of receiving their incentive as either a check or a gift card. To increase our understanding of how incentives are best provided to study participants, we asked the following questions: (1) Given a choice, which incentive option do parents select? (2) What factors (income, proximity to store, demographics) are associated with the choice of gift card versus check? We compare the characteristics of respondents and the incentive form chosen. We also present findings on whether distance between the store and home address played a role in their preference.