European Social Survey, Round 5 Specification for participating countries May 2009 This document was written for the European Social Survey (ESS). The principle author was Dr. Ineke Stoop. The Central Coordinating Team of the ESS requests that you use the following form of words to cite this document: European Social Survey, (2009). Round 5 Specification for Participating Countries . London: Centre for Comparative Social Surveys, City University London. CONTENTS Specification overview .......................................................................................................... 4 1. Introduction ..................................................................................................................... 6 1.1. Coordination ............................................................................................................ 6 1.2. Funding ..................................................................................................................... 6 1.3. Support ...................................................................................................................... 6 1.4. Aims ........................................................................................................................... 6 1.5. Specifications and other supporting documents ................................................ 7 2. National level appointments ........................................................................................ 7 3. Specification for National Coordinator (NC) and survey organisation .............. 8 3.1. NC workload and time span .................................................................................. 8 3.2. NC Activities ........................................................................................................... 8 3.2.1. Liaise, communicate, meet and advise ......................................................... 8 3.2.2. Coordinate, monitor, support, provide and react ...................................... 8 3.3. NC Requirements ..................................................................................................... 9 3.4. Specification for survey organisation .................................................................. 9 4. Specification for the Survey ....................................................................................... 10 4.1. Questionnaire design, translation and pretesting ........................................... 10 4.1.1. Questionnaire design - process ................................................................... 10 4.1.2. Questionnaire design – content ................................................................... 11 4.1.3 Questionnaire translation, assessment and pre-testing .................................. 12 4.2. Sampling ................................................................................................................. 13 4.2.1. Population coverage ..................................................................................... 13 4.2.2. The sample ..................................................................................................... 13 4.2.3. Effective sample size ..................................................................................... 13 4.2.4. Documentation of sampling procedures ................................................... 14 4.3. Response ................................................................................................................. 14 4.3.1. Target response rates .................................................................................... 14 4.3.2. Response rate enhancement ......................................................................... 15 4.3.3. Response rate calculation and documentation ......................................... 15 4.3.4. Contact forms: field data, respondent dwellings and interviewers ....... 17 4.4. Fieldwork ................................................................................................................ 17 4.4.1. Fieldwork period ........................................................................................... 17 4.4.2. Respondent recruitment ............................................................................... 17 4.4.3. Interviewer workload and briefing ............................................................ 18 4.4.4. Monitoring, progress reports and quality control back-checks .............. 18 2 4.5. Data preparation ................................................................................................... 19 4.5.1. Deliverables .................................................................................................... 19 4.5.2. Coding ............................................................................................................. 19 4.5.3. Anonymised data .......................................................................................... 21 4.5.4. Indirectly Identifiable data ........................................................................... 21 4.6. ESS Round 5 Timetable (June 2009-September 2011)* ..................................... 22 4.7. Ethical guidelines .................................................................................................. 23 4.8. Copyrights .............................................................................................................. 23 5. Costs ................................................................................................................................ 23 I. Appendix 1 National participation - Rounds 1 to 5.................................................... 24 II. Appendix 2 Effective Sample Size ................................................................................ 25 III. Appendix 3 Overview of links to important background documents ...................... 28 IV. Appendix 4 IMPORTANT: Changes for Round 5...................................................... 29 3 Specification overview This specification documents the requirements for each country participating in the fifth round fieldwork of the European Social Survey (ESS). The specification provides detailed information and refers to the ESS website for further documents www.europeansocialsurvey.org (see also Appendix 3). National Coordinators should note that many of these documents will be revised and updated prior to Round 5 and they should check the ESS website regularly for the latest versions. In summary, participation in the ESS Round 5 fieldwork involves: • The appointment of a National Coordinator to oversee the project, co-ordinate between the various groups involved, and promote the use of ESS data spending between 30% and 50% of their time between September 2009 and September 2011 (see Section 3); • The appointment of a survey organisation capable of, and with a track record in, conducting national probability-based surveys to the most rigorous standards by means of face-to-face interviewing (see Section 3.4); • Conducting the fieldwork by adhering to exacting methodological standards including the following: Translation (see 4.1) • Translated questionnaires to be produced for any minority language groups constituting 5% or more of the population • Translation process to include review and adjudication stages, according to specified protocols • Every stage of translation to be documented for future reference Sampling (see 4.2) • Full coverage of the residential population • Use of strict random methods at all stages • No substitution at any stage • Minimum ‘effective’ sample size of 1,500 (or 800 where population is under 2m) (i.e. to obtain an effective sample size of 1,500, the actual number of interviews will be greater than this in most countries) • Target minimum response rate of 70% and a target maximum non-contact rate of 3% Fieldwork (see 4.3 and 4.4) • Fieldwork period of at least one month between September and December 2010 • Approximately hour-long interviews carried out face-to-face, plus a short supplementary questionnaire • At least 4 calls, on different days of the week and times of day, including at least 1 at the weekend and 1 in the evening to locate potential respondents • Employing ways of enhancing response rates such as the use of incentives, reissuing refusals and non-contacts, and so forth • All interviewers to be trained for the survey in face-to-face briefing sessions • The use of detailed contact forms to monitor the fieldwork process, including the outcome of each call at each address 4 • Limited interviewer workloads • Specified quality control checks Data preparation (see 4.5) • Deliverables specified in the ESS Data Protocol for Round 5 will be available from the Archive website at http://essdata.nsd.uib.no . • Coding of verbatim recorded items (occupation, industry, country and language) to international standard classifications available from http://essdata.nsd.uib.no • Bridging of country specific variables to ESS standards for religion, education and possibly other background variables. Details available from http://essdata.nsd.uib.no . • Checking of data: The National Coordinators are responsible for the validity of the national data. • Anonymised data: The National Coordinators must confirm in their National Technical Summary form that data that will be made publicly available from the ESS Data website has been anonymised in accordance with national or EU regulations. • Deposit of data and documentation to the Archive by end of January 2011, in accordance with the specifications given