SN 3951 -OPCS Omnibus Survey, Time Use Module, May 1995

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Title:
OPCS Omnibus Survey, Time Use Module, May 1995

Subject Categories:
ONS Omnibus Survey - Major studies
Time use - Society and culture
Social attitudes and behaviour - Society and culture

Depositor(s):
Office for National Statistics

Principal Investigator(s):
Office of Population Censuses and Surveys. Social Survey Division

Sponsor(s):
Central Statistical Office

Other Acknowledgements:
Jonathan Gershuny and Rachel Smith, ESRC Research Centre on Microsocial Change at the University of Essex, undertook, on behalf of ONS, a development programme to create a field instrument for measurement of time use, and tested this instrument as part of the May wave of the OPCS Omnibus Survey.

Abstract:
The ONS Opinions Survey (OPN), previously known as ONS Omnibus Survey or Omnibus, is a regular, multi-purpose survey which was carried out in eight months of the year until April 2005. From this point it has run monthly. It started operating commercially in 1990 and was set up originally to meet the needs of government departments for a survey that used short and simple sets of questions, had greater statistical reliability than private sector omnibus surveys and a properly designed random sample. Now, however, an increasing number of academics are finding it a valuable research tool.

The Opinions Survey is used for a number of purposes, for example:

to provide quick answers to questions of immediate interest
to provide information on topics that do not require a full survey
to develop and pilot questions for other surveys
to sift for subgroups that can be followed up in another survey

History
From January 2008 the ONS Omnibus Survey changed its name to the ONS Opinions Survey and became part of the Integrated Household Survey (IHS). As a result, certain classificatory variables were altered to harmonise with the rest of the surveys that form the IHS. For further information, see detailed breakdown of the changes contained within the documentation for 2008 studies onwards.

Subsequently, in January 2010, the OPN component was dropped from the IHS due to only one individual per household being interviewed, while the IHS requires questions to be asked of all household members. This process significantly increased the length of the OPN interview and, therefore, OPN reverted back to interviewing one household member, but still contains questions harmonised to the IHS.

Special Licence Access Opinions Survey data
With effect from 2008, the decision was made by ONS to make all new and currently available Disability Monitoring data (Module 363) and Contraception data (Module 170) issuable only to Approved Researchers under Special Licence access conditions due to the disclosive nature of the modules. See the ONS Opinions Survey Special Licence Access datasets page. Work to carry out the withdrawal of these modules from existing Omnibus datasets is currently underway. Standard End User Licence versions will be re-deposited and again made available at a future date.

The objective of the project was to develop a light time budget instrument suitable for use as an add-on component to other surveys, without adding unduly to respondent burden. In the course of the activity, a development programme was undertaken, involving workshops, field-testing of alternative experimental instruments, evaluation and redesign of these, and a full-scale pilot study. The instrument is designed to be used in both self-response and interview completion modes.
Some 2005 Omnibus Survey respondents were asked to provide a retrospective diary-type account on a designated day. The pilot study has thus yielded useful statistical information, sufficient to make broad national estimates of adult time use patterns in the early summer of 1995. The sample is sufficient to make reliable contrasts between broad time use aggregates for subgroups at, for example, a full-time employed woman vs part-time employed woman level. It is too small to make reliable estimates for smaller time use categories and for smaller classificatory categories. Despite the presence of geographic classificatory variables (Standard Regions), the sample size is not sufficiently large to make reliable sub-national estimates of any of the time use categories.
Main Topics:
Each month's questionnaire consists of two elements: core questions, covering demographic information, are asked each month together with non-core questions that vary from month to month.
The non-core questions for this month were:

Time use (module 117): Each case records data for each of the 2005 people surveyed. There are around 100 classificatory variables which have SPSS data labels which are largely self-explanatory. These data were derived by interviewer or self-completion of a questionnaire.
The remaining 96 variables record activities in each of the 96 quarter hour periods throughout the designated day being measured. These data were derived from a self-completion diary, and again the data variables in the SPSS datasets are largely self-explanatory. Respondents were asked to code their major activity in each of the quarter hour periods, according to a coding frame specifying 30 separate activity codes.
Standard Measures: Prevailing Government Standard Socio-Economic Classificatory Variables were used.

Coverage:
Time Period Covered: Each respondent was asked to complete a diary for a designated single 24-hour day during May 1995. The method of allocating the designated day to respondents was calculated by the Methodological Unit of OPCS, in order to get an even distribution throughout the week.
Dates of Fieldwork: May 1995
Country: Great Britain
Spatial Units: Government Office Regions (GORs); Standard Regions
Observation Units: Individuals; Families/households
Kind of Data: Textual data; Numeric data; Alpha/numeric data; Individual (micro) level

Universe Sampled:
Location of Units of Observation:National
Population:Adults, aged 16 or over, living in private households in Great Britain.

Methodology:
Time Dimensions: Repeated cross-sectional study
Cross-sectional (one-time) study
monthly (up to year 2000), eight cycles per year (up to April 2005), monthly thereafter.
Sampling Procedures: Multi-stage stratified random sample
Number of Units: 2005 (obtained)
Method of Data Collection: Face-to-face interview; Self-completion; Diaries

Language(s) of Written Materials:
Study Description: English
Study Documentation: English

Access:
Access Conditions: The depositor has specified that registration is required and standard conditions of use apply. The depositor may be informed about usage. See terms and conditions for further information.
Availability: ESDS Government, UK Data Archive
Contact: Help desk: govsurveys@esds.ac.uk
Please Note: The data for the monthly Opinions surveys have been supplied to the UK Data Archive (UKDA) in such a way that core demographic data are included in each module. This allows users to use each module individually, although modules cannot be ordered individually from the UKDA.

Date of Release:
First Edition: 9 December 1998

Copyright:
Crown copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen's Printer for Scotland. Copyright of the individual modules resides with their respective sponsors.

Documentation:

Format	Name	Size in Kilobytes	Description
PDF	a3951uab.pdf	1950	User guide time use module 117 may 1995
HTML	UKDA_Study_3951_Information.htm	24	Study information and citation

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Catalogue record last updated:
7 June 2010

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Users are advised to visit the ONS Opinions Survey (formerly the ONS Omnibus Survey) web pages for support in using these data, additional resources, and news and events.

Included in these pages is a list of the modules (non-core questions) and for each module a list of the months in which it appears.

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