FAQs
There are a few different ways that you can confirm you’re eligible for the study.
- Click on the link below and complete some brief screening questions. Once you submit this form, a member of our study team will reach out to you to let you know if you are eligible for the study and schedule your interview.
- You may also prefer to speak to a member of our study team to confirm your eligibility. You may call us at 1-877-271-9503.
The National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972 (NLS-72) is a research study started by the U.S. Department of Education and currently funded by the National Institute on Aging (NIA), a part of the National Institutes of Health. The current 2024 NLS-72 study is being conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago (www.NORC.org) with support provided by the NIA (https://www.nia.nih.gov) under a grant to Chandra Muller, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin. It is a scientific study that does not seek to promote a particular set of policies or viewpoints. The project investigates issues related to education, employment, and health.
You were scientifically selected in 1972 so the NLS-72 study would accurately represent our nation's high school seniors at that time. Around 23,000 diverse students from over 1,000 different high schools across the country were asked to participate in NLS-72 in 1972 and about 91% of you have been re-interviewed periodically since that time.
You provided your contact information last time you participated in the study. Since this is a follow-up study, we hold on to the contact information that you gave us in an effort to keep in touch with you in the future. To reach everyone, if you have changed addresses since the last follow-up, NORC uses publicly available sources to obtain contacting information.
The information you provide as part of this study will help researchers learn about how education and experiences in early adulthood affect people’s health and wellbeing later in life. By participating in this study, you help researchers and policymakers understand more about the perspectives of and issues facing your generation.
A trained interviewer will complete your home visit with you and only trained project personnel will have access to your data, which will all be stored on secure, protected computers. All of the information that you provide will be de-identified—that means you will be assigned a secure identification number so that none of your responses are linked to your identifying information. If you have other questions about how we maintain the privacy of your data, visit the Privacy tab.
There are a few different ways that you can participate in this year’s NLS-72 Study.
The home interview will include questions that will help us understand how people think and how well they remember things. We are interested in exploring how these particular things are related to social relationships and health. We will ask you about things like your employment situation and past experiences, and we will also collect cognitive and health measures. This will include a set of thinking and memory exercises, as well as physical measures like height, weight, and blood pressure. We will give you $150 as a token of our appreciation for your time.
After you complete the home interview and health assessments, you will also be asked if you’d like to participate in a home health visit where a trained health worker will ask for some additional information and request your permission to draw a small amount of your blood. If you participate in this separate health visit, we’ll give you an additional $100 to thank you for the additional time you share with us.
You may choose not to answer any specific question or not participate in any of the health measures for any reason, and you may stop participating at any point in time. The home interview and any follow-up visit in which you choose to participate will be scheduled at a convenient time of your choosing. Your participation will help us learn how to keep you, your friends, and your family enjoying long, healthy and happy lives.
- Call us, toll free, at 1-877-271-9503
- Email us at nls72@norc.org, or
- Visit us at nls-72.norc.org.
- If you have questions about your rights as a research participant, or wish to obtain information, ask questions, or discuss any concerns about this study with someone other than the researcher(s), please contact:
April Baker, NORC IRB Manager, toll-free, at 1-866-309-0542
Please refer to protocol STUDY 21-07-389. IRB Date Approved: 01/19/2023
Your participation in the study is voluntary. You always have the choice not to answer any specific question or not to participate in any of the health measures for any reason, and you may stop participating at any point in time. However, your participation matters and makes the study results more complete and accurate. We hope that you will choose to participate.
NLS-72 was sponsored by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) in the U.S. Department of Education through 1986. NCES continues to endorse the NLS-72 study. For more NLS-72 information from NCES, see the following website: https://nces.ed.gov/surveys/nls72/. The 2024 NLS-72 Study is supported by a grant from the National Institute on Aging, a part of the National Institutes of Health.
Although you may not benefit directly from being in this study, other people may benefit from the scientific advances to which this study leads. The risk to you of participating in this study is minimal and all of your information will be kept private.
You will receive $150 for participating in the home interview. You’ll also have the opportunity to participate in additional health measures like a home health visit. If you participate in the home health visit, you will receive an additional $100 to thank you for your time. If you decide to provide a small amount of blood as part of that visit, you will also receive lab results that will include a complete blood count and cholesterol levels.
The survey answers you provide will be used by researchers to improve education and health policies and services in the United States. In addition to questions about employment, you’ll be asked questions related to how you think and how well you remember things. You’ll also be asked to participate in an exciting and important new part of the 2024 study. We want to learn how people’s biology and things that happen to them in their lives impact their health later on. To do that, we will collect health measures like height, weight, and blood pressure. You can decide which measures you’re comfortable completing at the time of the visit. You’ll then be asked if you’re interested in completing some additional health measures including providing a blood sample during a separate in-home visit. Your participation will help us learn how to keep you, your friends, and your family enjoying long, healthy and happy lives. Your health data would be kept private and used only for research, just like the survey data.
Your privacy and the confidentiality of your information are extremely important to us. We work hard to protect the privacy of people who participate in our study. Information we get from you would be assigned a secure identification number. Your name, address, phone number, and email address would remain confidential and would never appear in any report or presentation about this study.
All researchers who want to use data from this study must agree to strict rules and procedures that are designed to protect your information. The data shared with researchers will not contain information that identifies you.
If you agree to donate blood, your blood samples would be stored securely for future analyses at the University of Minnesota. Data resulting from analyses using your samples would be stored securely at the National Institute on Aging’s Genetics of Alzheimer's Disease Data Storage Site. Some people worry that research about their genes might lead to discrimination in employment or health insurance against people who are found to have a higher average risk of certain health conditions. The federal Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 (GINA) makes it illegal for health insurers or most employers to discriminate against you based on your genetic information. Health insurance companies and employers may not ask for information about your genes that we get from this research.
The 2024 NLS-72 Study is directed by Chandra Muller (University of Texas-Austin), John Robert Warren (University of Minnesota), Eric Grodsky (University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Jennifer Manly and Adam Brickman (Columbia University). The study is conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago, a not-for-profit social science research organization. Since 1941, NORC has served the public interest and improved lives through objective social science research that supports informed decision making.
You might also remember NORC as the National Opinion Research Center! For more information about NORC, see www.norc.org.
The home interview takes approximately 3 hours to complete. If you agree to participate in the follow up health visit, it may take up to 30-60 additional minutes on a future date.
Using the home interview, which can be scheduled at a time that is convenient for you, a trained interviewer will come to your home for about three hours. The visit will consist of a survey and a set of thinking and memory exercises, which will help us understand people’s memory and comprehension. You’ll also be asked to participate in a variety of different health measures like height and weight measurements, blood pressure and pulse. You can still participate in the home interview even if you prefer not to complete every measure. You can decide at the time of the visit which measures you’re comfortable completing.
At the end of the home interview, you’ll be asked if you’d like to participate in some additional follow-up health measures like providing a blood sample. If you consent to this portion of the study, a trained health professional will draw your blood, in most instances, at your home and at your scheduling convenience. This visit will only take about 30 minutes.