Editorial Introduction

This issue of Survey Research Methods contains four papers that were presented at the ITACOSM11 conference held in Pisa, Italy, June 27-29, 2011. ITACOSM is an Italian scientific conference on the development, testing, and application of survey sampling methodologies in the fields of economics, social and demographic sciences and ocial statistics and in studies of biological and environmental phenomena. It is organized by the Permanent Working Group on Sample Survey Methodology of the Italian Statistical Society.