Famine,social disruption,and involuntary fetal loss: Evidence from chinese survey data

Relying on half a million pregnancy histories collected from Chinese women in the late 1980s, we studied nearly a quarter century of self-reported miscarriages and stillbirths in China. Our results suggest that these two forms of involuntary fetal loss are affected not only by biological and demographic factors, such as the mother's age, pregnancy order, and pregnancy history, but also by the mother's social characteristics and the larger social environment. In this article, we focus on how two social and economic crises--the Great Leap Forward famine and the Cultural Revolution--resulted in elevated risks of miscarriage and stillbirth in the Chinese population.     

Studying children in armed conflict: data production,social indicators and analysis

The authors seek to give an overview of ways in which social indicators relevant to research on children affected by armed conflict can be developed, and how such research can be carried out. Technical and methodological challenges involved in this pursuit are discussed. It is argued that data production must consider issues of definition and delineation of the phenomenon of war-affected children more actively than it does currently. An analytical approach is proposed, in which children’s characteristics in different situations, or in different stages of conflict, may be used as intakes to understanding how the social processes pertaining to life histories of children in armed conflict are created and reproduced.

Where does social change come from?

Many discussions, academic and otherwise, implicitly assume that public opinion changes because opinions change. This ignores the possibility that public opinion changes because publics change. In this paper I show how, by modifying existing component-difference methods, the proximate sources of societal change - actual individual change versus change in publics (turnover) - can be separated using repeated survey data. The method is applied to change in gender role attitudes in the United States, using 1972–1988 data from the General Social Surveys. Both components have contributed substantially to the trend away from traditional attitudes. Yet there is an important difference: Population turnover has contributed steadily to the trend, whereas the contribution of individual change has been erratic from survey to survey.     

Environmental change and migration: methodological considerations from ground-breaking global survey

In recent years, policy makers and scientists have become interested in the dynamic links between migration and environmental change (Döös in Global Environ Change 7(1):41–61, 1997; Adger et al. in Living with Environmental Change: Social vulnerability, adaptation and resilience in Vietnam, 2001; Gunderson and Holling in Panarchy—understanding transformations in systems of humans and nature, Island Press, Washington, DC, Gunderson and Holling 2002; Scoones et al. in Dynamic systems and the challenge of sustainability, 2007; Galaz et al. in Ecosystems under pressure. A policy brief for the International Commission on Climate Change and Development, 2008). Recently, scoping activities have emerged to produce empirical observations about the role of environmental change in decisions about human mobility, including a range of movements from voluntary to forced migration and displacement. One notable recent attempt to contribute to the base of knowledge about the links between environmental change and migration has been the European Commission co-sponsored the Environmental Change and Forced Scenarios (EACH-FOR) project. The EACH-FOR project was created to assess the impact of environmental change on migration at the local, national, regional and international level. This paper shares the methods and fieldwork experiences of a first-time, multicontinent survey of environmental change and migration from the research project supported by the European Commission: Environmental Change and Forced Migration Scenarios (EACH-FOR, Contract Number 044468, http://www.each-for.eu). This paper has three purposes. First, the authors explore issues related to how EACH-FOR designed its methodological approach for the first global survey of environmental change and migration. The paper then describes how the project attempted to create a method that would produce comparable results in a challenging context of multiple scientific challenges and trade-offs for research design. The second purpose of this paper is to examine how field researchers implemented and used this methodology in the EACH-FOR project. This paper takes a closer look at the fieldwork approach applied in investigating the 23 EACH-FOR project case studies. These case studies presented diverse local conditions and social contexts and different types of environmental changes. The paper discusses some of the practical considerations and shortcomings of the method in practice and illustrates how local researchers from selected case studies managed the challenges of their complex assignment. The third purpose of this paper is to explore lessons learned from the initial fieldwork experience and fruitful directions for future research.     

Calculation of life tables from survey data: A technical note

Life table calculations from survey data are frequently based on events for which exact dates are not available. When these dates are coded in monthly form (e.g., century months), estimates should take into account the fact that the first duration interval—the interval which captures events occurring in the first month of exposure—is half the length of all remaining intervals. Although failure to do so has a trivial effect on many demographic calculations, estimates which are based on events which occur with high frequency in the first few months of exposure can be substantially biased. Estimates offecundability for four countries in the World Fertility Survey are used to illustrate this bias.     

Cohort disaggregation analysis of fertility data from a sample survey

Social differentials in cumulative fertility revealed by field surveys in a number of countries typically have been interpreted with the implicit assumption that the timing of childbearing within the reproductive period remains constant. However, the reproductive histories that have been collected in such surveys provide a largely unexploited source of data for the analysis of trends in timing. An analysis by birth cohort of the fertility experience of 592 ever-married women surveyed in San Juan, Puerto Rico, in 1966 shows that significant changes in timing have occurred. Women in the more recent birth cohorts are distinguished by earlier childbearing and sustained higher fertility in consecutive age periods. The inter-cohort differences remain when adjustments are made for duration of time in legal and consensual unions.     

Some aspects of the use of birth expectations data from sample surveys for population projections

The value of national sample survey data relating to birth expectations for projecting births is reassessed in the light of data limitations pointed out by Ryder and Westoff among others and of the methods of projection used by the United States Bureau of the Census. The annual level of fertility under the cohort-fertility projection method depends on the assumptions regarding completed fertility, about which the available survey data are fairly informative, and on the assumptions regarding the timing of births, about which the survey data tell us very little. Test calculations suggest that Ryder and Westoff have overstated the significance of timing relative to completed family size for the level of future births. We believe that the fall in the annual total fertility rate in the first half of the sixties is to be explained only in part by a general delay in childbearing; a moderate to substantial decrease in completed family size has also occurred. Analysis of the latest set of fertility projections of the Census Bureau also suggests that the assumptions about completed fertility are a much more important determinant of the level of future births than timing, both in the short and long term. Although the available expectations data cannot help in predicting short-term annual changes in fertility, they appear useful for making long-term projections of annual fertility. Expansion of the size, frequency, and content of the sample surveys and incorporation of parity and birth interval into the projection method may improve projections.     

Death by survey: Estimating adult mortality without selection bias from sibling survival data

The widely used methods for estimating adult mortality rates from sample survey responses about the survival of siblings, parents, spouses, and others depend crucially on an assumption that, as we demonstrate, does not hold in real data. We show that when this assumption is violated so that the mortality rate varies with sibship size, mortality estimates can be massively biased. By using insights from work on the statistical analysis of selection bias, survey weighting, and extrapolation problems, we propose a new and relatively simple method of recovering the mortality rate with both greatly reduced potential for bias and increased clarity about the source of necessary assumptions.     

Happiness surveys: Some comparability issues and an exploratory survey based on just perceivable increments

Most questionnaires to obtain reports of happiness are primitive with the results obtained of low (interpersonal) comparability. This paper argues that happiness is intrinsically cardinally measurable and comparable though with many difficulties. Moreover, a sophisticated questionnaire was developed and used to obtain more accurate and interpersonally comparable reports of happiness based on the concept of just perceivable increments of pleasure/pain. Comparisons with the traditional questionnaire are also made (by the respondents) to show the superiority of the sophisticated questionnaire.     

The accuracy of survey-reported marital status: Evidence from survey records matched to social security records

Researchers have concluded that divorced persons often fail to report accurate marital information in surveys. I revisit this issue using surveys matched exactly to Social Security data. Older divorced persons frequently misreport their marital status, but there is evidence that the misreporting is unintentional. I offer some suggestions on how surveys can be improved.     

Measuring social indicators in opinion surveys: A method to improve accuracy on sensitive questions

Asking sensitive questions, without risking a terminated interview or response bias, is a major problem in deriving accurate social indicators based on public opinion surveys. This problem has become particularly acute as the topics that interest researchers have become more personal in nature. Mail and telephone surveys, and methods such as the randomized response technique, have all been used to try and overcome this problem, with varying degrees of success. In this paper, we describe an alternative approach using a sealed booklet. We report results from a question-format experiment that asked respondents the same sensitive questions in a sealed booklet, completed in the presence of the interviewer, and in a standard face-to-face interview. The survey used for the experiment was a personal interview survey of drug use based on a national population sample. The sealed booklet format was found to produce more accurate estimates of drug use compared to direct questions. In addition to assuring the respondent greater anonymity, the sealed booklet permits a wide range of questions to be asked and does not limit the analyses that can be conducted on the data.     

Scholastic ability vs family background in educational success: evidence from Danish sample survey data

This research examines the role of scholastic ability and family background variables in the determination of educational attainment in Denmark. A categorical representation of the highest level of education attained by the individual is the dependent variable. It is analyzed by procedures that take account of the presence of unobservable factors. Parent’s education and occupation, along with an indicator of scholastic ability which is represented by a set of aptitude tests, explain a small but significant portion of the variation in their children’s educational success. Women are shown to respond differently to their environments than men, and including these test scores does not remove the need to deal with unmeasured attributes. On the basis of the available data, family background variables as a group contribute more to the explained variation in the data than the test scores. Finally, credit constraints do not appear to be a factor in educational attainments.

Using gross migration data compiled from the social security sample file

A study by Donald Pursell (1972), which examines migration data compiled from the one-percent sample file of the Social Security Administration, is discussed in this paper. An important feature of the data which is neglected by Pursell is pointed out, and the Pursell results are compared with findings obtained using somewhat different treatments of the social security data. The Pursell conclusion that out-migration is negatively related to employment growth is supported by the alternative tests.     

The economic rationality of high fertility: An investigation illustrated with Nigerian survey data

Summary In much of the developing world, especially among rural populations who usually are the majority, field researchers find that fertility is high and fairly stable and that there is little evidence either that high-fertility parents are relatively economically disadvantaged or that they believe themselves to be so. On the other hand most of modern economic-demographic theory suggests that the members of large families should be worse off than the members of small families. It is argued that the 'hardest' data are those of high fertility and the relative well being of large families and that the proper social scientific approach should have been to base further investigation upon such findings. It is suggested that much of the economic theorizing has erred because of bad survey data and ethnocentric bias in the research. Data are analysed from research programmes in Ghana and Nigeria to show that high fertility is not as disadvantageous as is often suggested. The main source of evidence is Project 2 of the Nigerian segment of the Changing African Family Project, a 1973 sample survey of 1,499 females and 1,497 males, Yoruba and over 17 years of age, in the Western and Lagos States of Nigeria. It is concluded that the economic ends of a society are largely determined by its social ends and that the economic rationality of high fertility can be determined only within the context of a society's structure and ends. There can be no such thing as a purely economic theory of fertility. It is also concluded that the society studied is moving towards a condition where high fertility will be increasingly disadvantageous and that this is being brought about more by Westernization than modernization.     

Summary of the social sciences and population policy: A survey

This survey makes quite explicit the willingness of the social sciences and demography to initiate or expand teaching, research, and training on population policy. The disciplines now differ greatly in these activities. Of the 117 suggestions for research on policy, 41 are related to policy content; 16 to policy initiative and implementation; 47 to policy evaluation; and 13 to policy philosophy. The social scientists identified thirteen barriers which obstruct them from undertaking the needed research. Nine of the same barriers were named by the demographers. Barriers associated with the academic profession itself include expertise or technical competence, data limitations, ideology, professional identification, intellectual priorities, and role strains. The remaining barriers are associated with the organization of the university or the larger society rather than the academic profession.     

Bayesian estimation of hispanic fertility hazards from survey and population data*

Previous studies have demonstrated both large gains in efficiency and reductions in bias by incorporating population information in regression estimation with sample survey data. These studies, however, assumed that the population values are exact. This assumption is relaxed here through a Bayesian extension of constrained maximum likelihood estimation applied to U.S. Hispanic fertility. The Bayesian approach allows for the use of both auxiliary survey data and expert judgment in making adjustments to published Hispanic Population fertility rates, and for the estimation of uncertainty about these adjustments. Compared with estimation from sample survey data only, the Bayesian constrained estimator results in much greater precision in the age pattern of the baseline fertility hazard and therefore of the predicted values for any given combination of socioeconomic variables. The use of population data in combination with survey data may therefore be highly advantageous even when the population data are known to have significant levels of nonsampling error.     

Creating Retirement Paths: Examples from the Lives of Women

Through in-depth interviews with 40 retired women diverse in age, marital status, ethnicity, income, and occupational background, we explored how women experience retirement. Following our analysis, we identified five retirement pathways: family-focused, service-focused, recreation-focused, employment-focused, and disenchanted retirements. These pathways represent dominant activities and interests at the time the women were interviewed and challenge the cultural portrayal of retirement as an unvarying life stage. The participants' narratives provide a glimpse into the pathways retired women create by revealing the complexity of later life and the changing nature of retirement.     

Using satellite remote sensing and household survey data to assess human health and nutrition response to environmental change

Climate change and degradation of ecosystem services functioning may threaten the ability of current agricultural systems to keep up with demand for adequate and inexpensive food and for clean water, waste disposal and other broader ecosystem services. Human health is likely to be affected by changes occurring across multiple geographic and time scales. Impacts range from increasing transmissibility and the range of vectorborne diseases, such as malaria and yellow fever, to undermining nutrition through deleterious impacts on food production and concomitant increases in food prices. This paper uses case studies to describe methods that make use of satellite remote sensing and Demographic and Health Survey data to better understand individual-level human health and nutrition outcomes. By bringing these diverse datasets together, the connection between environmental change and human health outcomes can be described through new research and analysis.