Extracting More Knowledge from Time Diaries?

Time-use diary data convey information about the activities an individual was engaged in, when and for how long, and the order of these activities throughout the day. The data are usually analyzed by summarizing the time used per activity category. The aggregates are then used to determine the mean time use of a mean individual on an average day. However, this approach discards information about the duration of activities, the order in which they are undertaken, and the time of day each activity is carried out. This paper outlines an alternative approach grounded in the time-geographic theoretical framework, which takes the duration, order, and timing of activities into consideration and thus yields new knowledge. The two approaches to analyzing diary data are compared using a simple empirical example of gender differences in time use for paid work. The focus is on the effects of methodological differences rather than on the empirical outcomes. The argument is made that using an approach that takes the sequence of activities into account deepens our understanding of how people organize their daily activities in the context of a whole day at an aggregate level.