IBUC 2006 Abstract

Developing an Integrated Household Survey (IHS) Blaise Questionnaire from Four Major Social Surveys
Tim Burrell; ONS, UK

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is undertaking a project to merge the 4 main ONS continuous household
surveys into one Integrated Household Survey (previously known as the Continuous Population Survey).

The rationale behind combining these surveys is, amongst other things, to take advantage of common practices
across these surveys including the types of questions asked and an increased sample size to provide better quality
of information on key social and economic variables.

Although the four component surveys share some common practices, there are some important differences. These
include different procedures for interviewing such as who within the households is interviewed, policies for which
cases are re-issued and whether proxy interviews are allowed. There are also differences between surveys in
terms of the subject matter and methods of data collection. One of the surveys has a diary element for collecting
household expenditure while another well has a self completion questionnaire administered using CASI or on
paper.

This paper will discuss the issues and solutions for how to programme a Blaise questionnaire which can handle all
these different rules and structures with a view to producing coherent and consistent outputs with the original
surveys.

Contact: tim.burrell@ons.gov.uk