We show changes in the proportion of respondents coming from each source across cohorts using this year’s data here.
You can see the increase in absolute numbers coming from Podcasts and the % of each cohorts coming from Podcasts below. Because some portion of each cohort drop out every year, this should give an inflated impression of the raw total coming from the most recent cohort (2020) compared to earlier cohorts though. Comparing raw totals across years is not straightforward, because sample size varies each year (and we sampled fewer people in 2020 than earlier years as discussed here and here and although we think we can estimate our sampling rate for engaged EAs quite well, we’re less certain about the true size of the more diffuse less engaged EA population (see here))- so the totals for ~2017 at the time were likely relatively higher.
Incidentally your comment just now prompted me to look at the cross-year cross-cohort data for this. Here we can see that in EAS 2019, there was a peak in podcast recruitment closer to 2016 (based on when people in EAS 2019 reported getting involved in EA). Comparing EAS 2019 to EAS 2020 data, we can see signs of dropoff among podcast recruits among those who joined ~2014-2017 (and we can also see the big spike in 2020).
These are most instructive when compared to the figures for other recruiters (since the percentage of a cohort recruited by a given source is inherently a share relative to other recruiters, i.e. if one percentage drops between EAS 2019 and EAS 2020 another’s has to go up).
Comparing personal contact recruits we can see steadier figures across EAS 2019 and EAS 2010, suggesting less dropoff. (Note that the figures for the earliest cohorts are very noisy since there are small numbers of respondents from those cohorts in these surveys).
We show changes in the proportion of respondents coming from each source across cohorts using this year’s data here.
You can see the increase in absolute numbers coming from Podcasts and the % of each cohorts coming from Podcasts below. Because some portion of each cohort drop out every year, this should give an inflated impression of the raw total coming from the most recent cohort (2020) compared to earlier cohorts though. Comparing raw totals across years is not straightforward, because sample size varies each year (and we sampled fewer people in 2020 than earlier years as discussed here and here and although we think we can estimate our sampling rate for engaged EAs quite well, we’re less certain about the true size of the more diffuse less engaged EA population (see here))- so the totals for ~2017 at the time were likely relatively higher.
Sorry, I neglected to say thank you for this previously!
Thanks!
Incidentally your comment just now prompted me to look at the cross-year cross-cohort data for this. Here we can see that in EAS 2019, there was a peak in podcast recruitment closer to 2016 (based on when people in EAS 2019 reported getting involved in EA). Comparing EAS 2019 to EAS 2020 data, we can see signs of dropoff among podcast recruits among those who joined ~2014-2017 (and we can also see the big spike in 2020).
These are most instructive when compared to the figures for other recruiters (since the percentage of a cohort recruited by a given source is inherently a share relative to other recruiters, i.e. if one percentage drops between EAS 2019 and EAS 2020 another’s has to go up).
Comparing personal contact recruits we can see steadier figures across EAS 2019 and EAS 2010, suggesting less dropoff. (Note that the figures for the earliest cohorts are very noisy since there are small numbers of respondents from those cohorts in these surveys).