Consolidated Marital, Cohabitation and Fertility Histories from BHPS

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Consolidated Marital, Cohabitation and Fertility
Historiesfrom BHPS

• Royal Statistical Society, May 2nd 2008
• Chiara Pronzato

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Introduction

• The consolidated marital, cohabitation and
  fertility file contains retrospective lifetime
  histories and subsequent panel data related to
  respondents partnerships and childbearing
• It contains 30,549 adults interviewed at least
  once during the survey
• Every date is calculated as months elapsed since
  January 1900
• When we are not sure about the month, we denote
  it to be June and we add .5 at the end
• Missing dates are set to -1

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General information

• Time-invariant variables
• pp person identification number
• sex gender
• birth date of birth
• Time-variant variables
• hh_ household identification number
• region_ region of residence

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Fertility historyThe variables

• childbirth_ date of birth from the oldest to
  the youngest child
• twin_ indicates whether the birth is a
  singleton, twins or triplets
• fertility provides the source of information

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Fertility historySource of information
No retrospective interview - no children in the hh
Retrospective interview newborn children
No retrospective interview children in the hh
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Fertility historySome descriptives
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Union historiesThe variables

• From the retrospective histories and the panel we
  can determine how many unions each respondent has
  had during their life up to their last interview
  in the panel
• For those without a retrospective history, we can
  observe how many they have had during the panel
• union_ type indicator variable equal to 1 when
  it is a marriage, to 2 when it is cohabitation
  and 0 otherwise
• start_date_ starting date
• left_ for some unions we do not know the start
  date these are indicated by a value of 1 for the
  indicator variable for left censoring. For such
  unions the variable start_date_ gives the first
  date in which we observe them in the union.
• stop_date date of the end of the each union

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Union historiesThe variables

• end_ how the union ended
• If the union type is equal to 1 (marriage)
• the partner can die (widowhood, end_1)
• they can get divorced (end_2) separation_
  (when available)
• separate (end_3)
• or they can be currently together (end_6)
• if the union type is equal to 2 (cohabitation)
• they can split (end_4),
• get married (end_5)
• or they can be currently together (end_6).

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Union historiesThe variables

• partner_ pid number of the partner (when
  available)
• marital indicates the source of information

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Union historiesMarriages - Source of information
No retrospective history but changes in marital
status during the panel
No retrospective history no changes in marital
status during the panel
Retrospective history changes in marital status
during the panel
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Union historiesCohabitations - Source of
information
Main difference from marriage histories (for the
panel) no change in marital status, but
relationships in the hh entry / exit from the
house
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Union historiesSome descriptives
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Union historiesSome descriptives
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An example(Ermisch, Pronzato, EJ 2008)

• Financial support from fathers who have children
  living elsewhere, and have formed new
  relationships
• To understand the influence of the second-wife
  on the transfers the fathers makes to children
  living with the first-wife

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An example(Ermisch, Pronzato, EJ 2008)
cohabitation
marriage
May 1980
September 2003
June 1985
September 1990
July 1998 child aged 16
July 1982 childbirth
Child support due