Abstract
The development by the authors of socio-demographic standards for cross-national comparative survey research was prompted by the fact that cross-national comparative surveys use their own instruments to measure socio-demographic variables. Hence, the individual surveys of one country – be they academically driven or conducted by national statistical institutes (NSI) – are not comparable. However, even within NSI or academic surveys, individual variables are not comparable across participating countries. This is because the measurement instruments used are not harmonised, but rather are based on national concepts or structures. Comparability of findings within or across studies is possible only when variables are measured in a comparable way. Therefore, comparability problems exist to a greater or lesser degree within and across surveys. To overcome these problems, socio-demographic standards for cross-national comparative research are called for.
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Notes
- 1.
Hoffmeyer-Zlotnik and Warner (2008, pp. 41ff.) interviewed interviewers and potential respondents in Germany about their subjective definitions of private household. The definitions provided were numerous and varied (see Section 5.5.2 under ‘“Household” as Defined by Respondents and Interviewers’).
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Hoffmeyer-Zlotnik, J.H.P., Warner, U. (2014). Comparability of Currently Available Survey Data. In: Harmonising Demographic and Socio-Economic Variables for Cross-National Comparative Survey Research. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7238-0_7
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