Time-Use Measurement and Research: Report of a Workshop (2000)
Chapter: Appendix D Draft Questionnaire for Prososed BLS Survey
APPENDIX D Draft Questionnaire for Proposed BLS Survey
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Survey Script |
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Explanatory Notes |
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Element 1: Updating CPS Data |
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Because time use can vary in important ways depending on the respondent’s labor force status and the composition of the respondent’s household, it is important to have up-to-date information on household characteristics. The first portion of the survey will include an update of selected CPS questions, using a “dependent interviewing” approach. |
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Element 2: Other Background |
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Additional background data that would improve time use analyses, such as data on home ownership, could be collected either as a standard part of the survey or as a periodic addition. |
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Element 3: Time-Use Component |
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Introduction “This study is sponsored by the Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics. I’d like to ask you some questions about how you spent your time yesterday. |
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This will be the typical BLS telephone survey introduction. This version was used in the pilot test during the summer of 1997. |
APPENDIX D Draft Questionnaire for Proposed BLS Survey
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Survey Script |
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Explanatory Notes |
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Your participation is completely voluntary. The Bureau of Labor Statistics will use the information that you provide for statistical purposes only and will hold the information in confidence to the full extent permitted by law. This interview usually takes about 25 minutes. |
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The best way to collect accurate information on the way people use their time is to complete a diary listing of all their activities over a 24-hour period. We start our diary at midnight (reporting day).” |
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Example for respondent Let me give you an example: At midnight I was asleep until 7:00 a.m. (reporting day) morning. I took a shower and got dressed between 7:00 and 8:30. I made breakfast for my family between 8:30 and 9:00. We all ate breakfast together until 9:30. I cleaned up the dishes after breakfast until 9:45. After that I read the newspaper and I |
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Since the time-use survey is a semi-structured interview, dependent upon the respondent verbatim accounts of their day, it is necessary for the interviewer to provide the respondent with a brief example of how to proceed. This version was used during our pilot test. The key elements are: |
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a. clarification of the correct reporting day (shown |
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watched television until 10:30. Then I drove with my daughter to the mall from 10:30 to 10:50. We were shopping for clothes until 1:00. |
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my linking it with the wake-up time of the reporting day). |
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b. indications of how to proceed sequentially (shown by reporting several tasks in an orderly temporal progression), and |
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c. training in the level of detail that is required from the respondent (shown by omitting specific details about the grooming process and by including activities such as travel, as well as the location and key persons included in the activity. |
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Time-use reports Now I would like to find out how you spent your time from midnight (reporting day) until midnight last night. If we get to times you spent working at a job, just tell what time you started working and what time you stopped. |
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Following the conventions used by other time-use surveys, we are not asking for the same level of detail for work times as for non-work times. Since the vast majority of work times are simply spent in a series of “work” activities, researchers have generally chosen to save interview time by giving the general “work” classification to that entire time period. Since non-work time is more multifaceted, it is necessary for respondents to itemize |
APPENDIX D Draft Questionnaire for Proposed BLS Survey
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Survey Script |
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Explanatory Notes |
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each activity in more detail in order to correctly classify them. We propose, however, going beyond the traditional approach by asking respondents if they stopped working at any time in order to do something that was unrelated to their work. This should enable us to collect personal, social or non-marked work activities that have been omitted and, consequently, underestimated in the past. |
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Initial activity At midnight (reporting day) morning, what were you doing? |
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Interviewer will type the verbatim response here. This is coded for analysis as an “initial” or “primary” activity. |
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Start time What time did this start? |
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Interviewer will enter the starting time. |
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Stop time What time did this end? |
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Interviewer will enter the ending time. |
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Location Where were you?/were you still … (accept only one answer) |
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Following the Canadian procedure, interviewers would be asked to classify the response into categories similar to these: |
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PLACE |
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a. respondent’s home b. work place c. someone else’s home d. other place (type-in verbatim location) OR IN TRANSIT e. car (driver) f. car (passenger) g. walking h. bus or subway (include street cars, commuter trains or other public transit) i. bicycle j. other such as airplane, train, motorcycle (type-in verbatim location) |
