Methodological Challenges in Studying Wealthy Families
Abstract
ABSTRACT Studying the wealthy is not easy. This piece provides suggestions for recruitment, interview strategies, and design to gain high‐quality data on wealthy people. It is based on an interview study of 81 US racially‐diverse families with a median net worth of $25 million. First, to gain access to the wealthy, it is key for the researcher to use a wide array of social networks, particularly weak ties, by asking acquaintances if they can mention the study to a potential respondent, and making the first request very small (such as a brief phone call) rather than large (a two‐hour interview). Second, rather than standardization of the interview protocol, flexibility is invaluable along with early “safe” questions about money (i.e., salary of a first job) for gaining concrete information about family wealth. Third, designing a study to include multiple members of the same family can improve data quality by adding depth, nuance, and confidence in the findings.
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Record history
| When | Event | Field | Old | New |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-06-18 19:37:53.011249+00:00 | identifier_assigned | DSEID | DSEID-001-9181033 |