Researching Social and Economic Change: The Uses of Household Panel Studies (Social Research Today)

In this user-friendly introduction, European and American experts in the field join forces to explain what panel studies can achieve and to illustrate some of the potential pitfalls in the construction and analysis of panel data. Household panel studies provide one of the most significant national and international resources for analysing social and economic change. This is an essential and accessible introduction for those contemplating the use of panel studies for the first time and will be an invaluable resource for both practising researchers and the commissioners of research. Book Cover......Page 1 Title......Page 4 Contents......Page 5 List of figures......Page 15 List of tables......Page 16 Notes on contributors......Page 19 Acknowledgements......Page 23 Introducing household panels......Page 26 Household panel studies: an overview......Page 28 Panel surveys: adding the fourth dimension......Page 61 Using panel studies to understand household behaviour and well-being......Page 79 Panel data quality......Page 102 Panel attrition......Page 104 Weighting in household panel surveys......Page 121 Dealing with measurement error in panel analysis......Page 138 Tangled webs of family relationships: untangling them with survey data......Page 151 Dissemination issues for panel studies: metadata and documentation......Page 171 Panel data analyses......Page 188 Dynamics of poverty and determinants of poverty transitions: results from the Dutch socioeconomic panel......Page 190 Low-income dynamics in 1990s Britain......Page 213 A new approach to poverty dynamics......Page 235 Using panel data to analyse household and family dynamics......Page 255 Using panel surveys to study migration and residential mobility......Page 275 Bibliography......Page 298 Index......Page 323 In this user friendly introduction, European and American experts in the field join forces to explain what panel studies can achieve and to illustrate some of the potential pitfalls in the construction and analysis of panel data. Household panel studies provide one of the most significant national and international resources for analysing social and economic change. This is an essential and accessible introduction for those contemplating the use of panel studies for the first time and will be an invaluable resource for both practicing researchers and the commissioners of research. This is a guide to the purposes and potential of one of the most significant national and increasingly international resources for analyzing social change. It explains to social researchers the possibilities and pitfalls in the analysis of panel This is a guide to the purposes and potential of one of the most significant national and increasingly international resources for analyzing social change. It explains the possibilities and pitfalls in the analysis of panel study data This book is intended as a primer for those interested in the purpose, design, conduct and analysis of household panel studies.