FORS and the Swiss National Data and Service Center for the Humanities DaSCH have launched a new series of free online data management webinars for researchers in the humanities and social sciences.

The second online webinar Applying FAIR & CARE principles, will take place on February 5, 2025 (2:00–3:30 PM) and will be hosted by Noémi Villars-Amberg (DaSCH) and Meret Hildebrandt (FORS). It will cover the theory behind the FAIR and CARE principles, followed by practical applications illustrated through two case studies. The webinar will conclude with a 30-minute discussion.

Register now for the workshop

Further information

As part of his doctoral thesis, Sebastian Bahr has published an interesting study based on the SHP on the relationship between urban greenery, mixed land use and life satisfaction in Switzerland. Taking into account different age groups, his study shows, among other things, that mainly the life satisfaction of older residents is positively influenced by a greener neighbourhood. It provides interesting insights for future urban planning.

You can find all the detailed results here.

To mark a quarter-century of longitudinal research in Switzerland, the Swiss Household Panel (SHP) and Transitions from Education to Employment (TREE) are pleased to announce a celebratory conference to be held at the University of Lausanne on June 4-5, 2025.

Keynote speakers

Corinna Kleinert – Leibniz-Institut für Bildungsverläufe
Flaviana Palmisano – Sapienza University of Rome

Conference Themes

The event will feature diverse thematic sessions, focusing on key areas such as:

• Education and Labour Market Pathways
• Health and Well-being Development
• Socio-economic Inequality and Mobility
• Family Formation and Dynamics
• Gender, Ethnic Minorities, and Migration
• Politics and Attitudes
• Methodological Issues in Longitudinal Surveys

Call for Abstracts and Session Proposals

We invite scholars to submit abstracts for individual presentations or 90-minute symposia (typically consisting of three related presentations) based on longitudinal data. Contributions from major projects such as SHP, TREE, SHARE, COCON, and other international longitudinal datasets are highly encouraged. The working language of the conference is English.

Submissions should address one or more of the thematic areas outlined above, with an emphasis on original research utilizing longitudinal methodologies.

The call

Submissions are to be made via the conference platform:https://www.conftool.net/longitudinal-surveys2025/

Deadline for abstract and session proposal submissions: January 17, 2025 

For further details, including venue information please visit the conference webpage.

Do you use SWISSUbase to share or access data? If you are interested in learning more about the platform, its services, or the teams and institutions behind SWISSUbase, visit our newly launched Info Website:
https://info.swissubase.ch.

Explore our comprehensive Help Centre, packed with resources and support to guide you in preparing, sharing, and accessing research data on SWISSUbase.

Share, find, and access research data on SWISSUbase:
https://www.swissubase.ch/
Discover our mission, services, Help Centre, and how we can support you: https://info.swissubase.ch

The ISSP is pleased to announce the release of the final version of the international ISSP 2021 Health and Health Care II data file (ZA8000_v2.0.0), which includes data from Switzerland and 29 other ISSP member countries and provides a global perspective on attitudes and behaviours towards health and health care.

The data and associated documentation for this release can be found at the following link:
https://www.gesis.org/en/issp/data-and-documentation/health-and-health-care/2021

In addition, the Call for Abstracts for the third ISSP User Conference is open until September 23, 2024. The virtual conference entitled “Celebrating 40 Years of the International Social Survey Programme” will take place on November 25, 2024. For more details please visit: ISSP User Conference.

We are pleased to announce the release of our updated search tool, designed to provide a detailed overview of the available SHP questions and variables. Visit our platform to make use of the updated search tool and discover the data you need.

Search by Domain
The tool allows users to search across various domains such as health, politics or employment, making it straightforward to find relevant questions.

Custom Search Options
For more specific needs, the custom search feature allows users to specify parameters such as variable names, labels or waves. This customization helps users find the exact variables they need.

Why Use Our Search Tool?

– Comprehensive Coverage: Access a wide range of questions/variables across numerous domains.

– Customizability: Fine-tune your searches for precise results.

– User-Friendly Interface: Navigate variable lists efficiently.

To download the SHP-data, please go to https://www.swissubase.ch/en/catalogue/studies/6097/20179/datasets

We are pleased to announce that the beta-version of wave 25 of the Swiss Household Panel has been published on SWISSUbase. Wave 25 contains the two modules “Social Participation” and “Political Behaviour and Values”.

You can access this preliminary data set here: https://www.swissubase.ch/en/catalogue/studies/6097/latest/datasets/932/3254/overview

Valérie-Anne Ryser and her colleagues at FORS have published a new study on the well-being of older adults before, during, and after the Covid-19 pandemic. They found that older people experienced increased stress levels as well as decreased life satisfaction and positive affect after the pandemic. The authors conclude that older people face more difficulties adapting to the new uncertain post-pandemic world.

Please find the detailed results here: https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00127-024-02706-1.pdf

You can read the report online. The report is written in German, French and Italian.

https://forscenter.ch/selects_reports/slc-2024-00001/ (German)

https://forscenter.ch/selects_reports/slc-2024-00002/ (French)

https://forscenter.ch/selects_reports/slc-2024-00003/ (Italian)

Authors: Tresch, Anke, Rennwald, Line, Lauener, Lukas, Lutz, Georg, Alkoç, Nursel, Benvenuti, Romane und Oscar Mazzoleni (2024). Eidgenössische Wahlen 2023. Wahlteilnahme und Wahlentscheid. FORS-Lausanne. DOI: 10.24447/SLC-2024-00001.

The Swiss Election Study Selects

The Swiss Election Study Selects has been investigating turnout and electoral behaviour in federal elections since 1995. In order to gain a better understanding of how citizens form their opinions and decide whom to vote for, Selects also collects data on media coverage and candidates’ campaign activities. Selects is funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and conducted by FORS in Lausanne.

Further information on Selects: www.selects.ch

Data

As part of Selects, extensive surveys were conducted for the 2023 Swiss federal elections:

• Post-election survey of 5’033 eligible voters
• Three-time surveys of the same individuals before and after the elections, with between 8’000 and 5’500 eligible voters per survey
• Survey of 2’527 candidates for the National Council and Council of States
• Media study: Content analysis of 116 print and online media (daily and weekly newspapers)

All datasets are documented and freely available on SWISSUbase for scientific purposes https://www.swissubase.ch/en/catalogue/studies/20738/latest

Based on the structure of the SPSS version of the Swiss Household Panel (SHP) data, a new R package developed by Gilbert Ritschard, Professor Emeritus at the University of Geneva, provides a function that searches for user-specified variable data in each of the wave files and assembles them into sequences. The function also matches the sequences with variables from unique files such as the personal and household master files (MP, MH), social origins (SO), or calendar of activity (CA) data.

https://cran.rstudio.com/web/packages/seqSHP/seqSHP.pdf

Survey data collected in the latest round of the European Social Survey (ESS) is now available for 13 countries.

Round 11 data has been published for Austria, Croatia, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Lithuania, The Netherlands, Norway, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

The data is available from the ESS Data Portal and is published with design weights only. Post-stratification weights will be added when data from the majority of countries is available later this year.

There are 31 countries who have participated in this latest round of our survey – a second data release including a larger number of countries will be published in November / December 2024.

Following on from a mixed mode approach implemented in the previous round due to the pandemic, Round 11 (2023/24) data collection has been conducted using face-to-face fieldwork (including video interviewing)[1].

Data is available for more than 200 questions asked in all countries, including respondents’ ancestry; education; employment; financial circumstances; household composition; and other socio-demographics including sex, age as well as information about their partners and parents.

Attitudinal data collected in every round focuses on climate change and energy; crime and justice; democracy and government; immigration; health and wellbeing; institutional and social trust; media and internet use; European, national and ethnic identity; perceived discrimination; political affiliation, interest and participation; religion; social exclusion; and values.

Round 11 includes two rotating modules that focus on gender, for the first time, and social inequalities in health, with many questions repeated from Round 7 (2014/15).

Proposed by a team led by Susan Banducci (University of Exeter), the gender module explores attitudes towards feminine and masculine identities, sexism, gender discrimination and gender equality.

The health proposal was submitted by the majority of researchers involved in the initial module and was led by Mirza Balaj (CHAIN Scientific coordinator Norwegian University of Science and Technology).

A combination of repeat and new items examine the social determinants of health in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic and how they are related to income and wealth inequalities.

Further information: https://europeansocialsurvey.org/news/article/round-11-data-now-available

[1] Only one country (Czechia) has been forced to collect data using self-completion methods in this round, due to restrictions in the capacity of in-person interviewers.

On April 24, 2024, during a meeting involving over 60 representatives from national research infrastructures, the Swiss nodes of European ERICs and long-term projects, we launched the “Social Science and Humanities Open Cluster Switzerland (SSHOC-CH)”. This initiative aims to enhance collaboration, find synergies among social sciences and humanities infrastructures, and coordinate national resources to better support SSH scholars in their research and in managing their data in the spirit of Open Science and FAIR principles.

Beat Immenhauser, General Secretary of the Swiss Academy of Social Sciences and Humanities, commended the bottom-up formation of SSHOC-CH, noting its broad-based membership from the very beginning. This new organization seeks to streamline coordination across research infrastructures concerning European and national roadmaps, ERICs (European Research Infrastructure Consortium), and the creation of joint tools, platforms, and services.

Bonnie Wolff-Boenisch, Director of CESSDA (Consortium of European Social Science Data Archives) and Chair of the SSHOC Open Cluster, praised the initiative, reflecting on SSHOC’s evolution from a top-down European Commission project to a sustained collaborative effort backed by a Memorandum of Understanding among European Research Infrastructures that is now also reaching out to the national level.

The founding meeting participants discussed a whitepaper contextualizing SSHOC-CH within the broader national and European framework, outlined the mission and potential activities, which include participating in the ongoing national policy dialogues, developing joint policies especially with respect to data management and sharing, creating an inventory of existing resources, fostering interdisciplinary collaboration, enhancing community engagement, and coordinating funding strategies and training programs.

The founding assembly also formalized the organization by approving its Statutes, electing a Board with 10 members, and appointing Georg Lutz, director of FORS to the President position.

In his concluding remarks, Georg Lutz emphasized the need for the SSH community to leverage existing resources effectively. The SSH community should design and build robust, valuable projects and infrastructures that bring added value and services to the different research communities and that are professionally managed.

However, he also stated that this should lead to a better recognition of SSH infrastructure needs and ongoing clustering efforts by key policy makers in Switzerland. In the last round of the national roadmap process, only two new rather small projects made it on the infrastructure roadmap, and they still struggled to get funding, the entire roadmap process was biased against SSH projects. The SSH community in Switzerland is now at the forefront of building such a coordinating organisation.

In the coming months, the SSHOC-CH Board will start working on the priorities and thus lay the foundation for a stronger and better coordinated national infrastructure landscape.

For more information and to become a member: www.sshoc.ch

The Kohli Foundation for Sociology has recently announced this year’s laureate of the Infrastructure Prize for Sociology. The prize goes to the European Social Survey (ESS). “With its European focus and excellent accessibility, the ESS is one of the outstanding infrastructure projects for sociology and related fields”, says the Kohli Foundation.

For details see:

Infrastructure Prize for Sociology 2024: European Social Survey – Kohli Foundation

Members of the Swiss Household Panel team have published a call for contributions in Frontiers in Sociology for the Research Topic “Exploring Social Stratification Dynamics: Insights from Longitudinal Survey Data”. Interested researchers can submit their abstract until 31 July 2024.

The editors welcome substantive contributions from different conceptual and theoretical approaches, addressing topics such as education, employment, material reward, health, social networks, integration, political behaviour, or attitudes and values. Articles based on the SHP data and comparative analyses using the Cross-National Equivalent File (CNEF) are particularly welcome.

Please find all the information here: fro.ntiers.in/RT64137

We are delighted to announce the release of our Annual Report 2023, a noteworthy achievement as we celebrate 15 years of contributing to social science research and data infrastructure.

The Annual Report 2023 captures our diverse activities and accomplishments throughout the year, showcasing our commitment to advancing social science research in Switzerland and beyond. The report features comprehensive insights into various aspects of our activities, including surveys, data management, infrastructure development, scientific collaborations, methodological research, data collection and analysis, outreach efforts, governance, staff statistics, and financial information.

In the editorial, FORS Director Georg Lutz describes FORS’ 15th anniversary as a significant milestone celebrated with many invited guests. This occasion provided an opportunity for reflection on the current state of FORS and its future direction.

The Annual Report 2023 is now available for download.

In 2024 in response to requests from past editions’ participants, we are introduction three new courses:

Bayesian modelling

Visual data and visual methods for the Social Sciences

Agent-based modelling

Check out the programme

Register here.

The European Social Survey (ESS) is seeking applications from multinational research teams to design modules of questions for its upcoming rounds. The ESS questionnaire comprises a fixed core module of substantive and socio-demographic questions, alongside two rotating modules of around 30 questions each.

Previously, these rotating modules, which cover specific academic or policy concerns in Europe, have been selected for each round. These modules are designed by competitive Question Module Design Teams (QDTs) collaborating with the Core Scientific Team (CST) of the ESS.

In the latest call for Round 13 Rotating Modules, the ESS is inviting research teams to apply for the creation of either 15 or 30-item modules. This novel addition of a 15-item module option aims to encourage submissions on pertinent topics that may not necessitate a full 30-question module.

To the call

The 15th-anniversary celebration of FORS took place on November 16, 2023, at the University of Lausanne, marking a momentous occasion. The event gathered many past and present FORS members for discussions centered on FORS’s remarkable journey and its future trajectory.

Estelle Doudet, Chair of the FORS Foundation Board and Vice-Rector of the University of Lausanne, highlighted FORS’s history and impact. Established 15 years ago as an independent foundation at the University of Lausanne after a national competition, FORS has significantly contributed to advancing high-quality data collection and empirical social research in Switzerland and beyond.

A roundtable discussion with experts emphasized FORS’s contributions to the social sciences. FORS played a crucial role in supporting the social science research community by meeting data production and accessibility needs, managing archives efficiently, and fostering connectivity among researchers. Challenges in securing long-term funding for FORS were addressed, acknowledging its success while emphasizing the necessity of innovation alongside stability to maintain survey and data service quality. Anticipating current trends, panelists discussed FORS’s future role in coordinating initiatives beyond the social sciences, recognizing its expertise in managing fair and open research data.

FORS Director Georg Lutz highlighted the importance of adapting to evolving research data challenges and expressed gratitude to contributors who have supported FORS’s success over the years.

FORS remains a pivotal player in the Swiss research landscape, leveraging past achievements while adapting to future changes to maintain its excellence as a benchmark infrastructure for the social sciences.

Consult the press release

The CESSDA Country Spotlight series showcases national service providers and holds interviews with representatives of the national service providers and members of the CESSDA community.

This time the series portrayed FORS. Discover the interview with Brian Kleiner, Head of Data & Research for Social Sciences at FORS. It sheds light on the power of CESSDA to foster teamwork in data archives.

The whole interview and further information:

https://www.cessda.eu/News/CESSDA-Newsitem-nid3592

Georg Henning from the German Centre of Gerontology in Berlin, Germany, and his colleagues have published their research on historical and cross-country differences in life satisfaction across retirement between 2000 and 2019 in Germany and Switzerland. They used data from the SHP and the SOEP and found that life satisfaction trajectories around retirement age have improved over the last 20 years. Their findings may be explained by general improvements in the health and psychosocial functioning of older people.

Please find the detailed results here: https://doi.org/10.1093/geronb/gbad066

Call Social Surveys

Are you working on topics such as crises, risks, uncertainty and vulnerability and are using MOSAiCH-data or other Swiss surveys on attitudes? Then this is for you! FORS organizes a session entitled “MOSAiCH and attitudinal surveys in Switzerland: a tool for measuring crisis, uncertainty and Vulnerability?” at the Congress of the Swiss Sociological Association 2024 (9-11 September in Basel). We are looking for papers that either are based on MOSAiCH data or discuss collecting data using general population surveys in Switzerland such as MOSAiCH.

Organizers:
Alexandre Pollien (FORS / UNIL), Michèle Ernst Stähli (FORS / UNIL), Marlène Sapin (FORS / UNIL), Karin Nisple (FORS / UNIL), Michael Ochsner (FORS / UNIL)

Contact: Michèle Ernst Stähli et Alexandre Pollien

Deadline: January 5, 2024

All info: https://www.fhnw.ch/plattformen/sgs-kongress/wp-content/uploads/sites/342/WS_MOSAiCH_pollien-1.pdf

Call on Analysing Gender

Exploring Innovative Measures in Quantitative Surveys / Analyser le genre : exploration d’indicateurs innovants dans les enquêtes quantitatives

The main objective of this workshop is to move beyond the binary thinking and the traditional approach to gender roles. To capture diversity more comprehensively in quantitative surveys, it is essential to develop new measures (or integrate established ones) regarding sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, attitudes and behaviours related to gender, as well as lived experiences.

Organizers:
Christina Bornatici (FORS – Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences), Jérôme Blondé (University of Lausanne (UNIL), Jacques-Antoine Gauthier (University of Lausanne (UNIL), Lavinia Gianettoni (University of Lausanne (UNIL), Jean-Marie Le Goff (University of Lausanne (UNIL), Stephanie Steinmetz (Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences (FORS) / University of Lausanne (UNIL)

Contact : christina.bornatici@fors.unil.ch

Deadline: January 5, 2024

All info: https://www.fhnw.ch/plattformen/sgs-kongress/wp-content/uploads/sites/342/WS_Analysing_Gender_bornatici-2.pdf

Call on (De)gendering vulnerabilities

The workshop will critically discuss this relationship between gender and vulnerabilities in different research contexts. To what extent is gender
(ir)relevant with regard to vulnerable groups and how does the category influence the perception and construction of vulnerabilities in the first place (e.g., single parents, employees in the low-wage sector, sex workers, welfare recipients)? How do organizations or national contexts (re)poduce vulnerabilities and how is gender linked to it (e.g., science, school, labor market, social work)? How can we do methodological justice to the current complexity of change and persistence of gender differences?

Organizers: Stephanie Steinmetz (University of Lausanne, Quartier UNIL-Mouline), Nathalie Pasche (Hochschule für Soziale Arbeit FHNW), Christina Bornatici (FORS – Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences), Irene Kriesi (Swiss Federal University for Vocational Education and Training, SFUVET), Lucia Lanfranconi (Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts); Isabelle Zinn (University of Lausanne), Martina Peitz (Independent researcher)

Contact:  stephanie.steinmetz@unil.ch
Deadline: January 5, 2024

All info: https://www.fhnw.ch/plattformen/sgs-kongress/wp-content/uploads/sites/342/WS_Degendering_vulnerabilities_pasche-1.pdf

The Swiss Election Study (Selects) has researched Swiss citizens’ voting behavior in national elections since 1995. It explores opinion formation dynamics, factors influencing political participation and voting choices, and gathers data on candidate campaigns, policies, and representation views. Selects, funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation and based at FORS since 2008, provides datasets for long-term comparisons and continually incorporates new research.

Below you will find some links to articles in which the Selects study and/or members of the Selects team are mentioned:

The 2023 Swiss Federal Elections: Last Time’s Winners Lose and Losers Win (Who Governs Europe, 03.11.2023)

Mit der SVP wollen sie nichts zu tun haben – weshalb die ausscherenden Frauenparteien keine Überraschung sind (NZZ, 02.11.2023)

Wo sind all die Liberalen hin? (NZZ am Sonntag, 28.10.2023)

«Seuls contre tous» (Le Courrier, 24.10.2023)

Fédérales 2023: la victoire du parti «seul contre tous» (Le Nouvelliste, 24.10.2023)

Anke Tresch, politologue: «Il faut du contenu qui parle aux jeunes, pas uniquement de la forme» (Le Temps, 04.10.2023)

Les élections ne changent in fine pas grand-chose (20minutes, 26.09.2023)

Signora Tresch, come riesce un partito a vincere le elezioni? (DeFacto, 21.09.2023)

Frau Tresch, wie wird eine Partei zur Wahlsiegerin? (DeFacto, 21.09.2023)

Madame Tresch, comment un parti devient-il victorieux aux élections ? (DeFacto, 21.09.2023)

Signora Rennwald, l’UDC è il partito dei lavoratori? (DeFacto, 05.09.2023)

Frau Rennwald, ist die SVP die Partei der Arbeiterschaft? (DeFacto, 05.09.2023)

Madame Rennwald, l’UDC est-elle le parti des travailleurs ? (DeFacto, 05.09.2023)

La chute de l’identification partisane en Suisse et ses conséquences pour les échéances électorales (Le Temps, 03.07.2023)

In a paper from the expert circle coordinated by the Swiss Data Alliance for secondary data usage, FORS/linkhub.ch and Interpharma set forth the requirements for a ‘Framework Law for Secondary Data Usage’ from the perspective of social science and pharmaceutical research.

In June of this year, the Parliament passed the motion ‘Framework Law for Secondary Data Usage’ to the Federal Council for implementation, thereby making an important policy decision: it calls on the Federal Council to establish the necessary foundations in a framework law to quickly create and build infrastructures for the secondary use of data in strategically relevant areas. This should enable data to be linked and utilized in many areas for evidence-based research and political decision-making in the future. This is of great importance especially for social science research in Switzerland.

Ansprüche an ein Rahmengesetz aus Sicht der sozialwissenschaftlichen und pharmazeutischen Forschung

Exigences vis-à-vis d’une loi-cadre du point de vue de la recherche en sciences sociales et en pharmacie

Are you involved in the provision of data management support to social science researchers in Swiss research institutions? Do researchers ask you for advice on how to comply with open data requirements? Are you dealing with questions such as:

• “Do my research materials include personal data?”
• “Can research materials including personal data be shared with other researchers or for teaching?”
• “What are the conditions for sharing research materials including personal data in a data repository?”
• “What are the different options for complying with open data requirements?”

Format: Presentations by FORS and Unil staff members + Q&A sessions
Audience: Support staff, data stewards, librarians, research consultants, anyone involved in the provision of data management support

During this half-day event, the FORS data management support team, in collaboration with the research office of the University of Lausanne, will provide you with practical guidance on how to assess the shareability of research data, including personal and sensitive data, both quantitative and qualitative. The focus of the workshop will be on data that have already been collected, and which are intended to be shared in a data repository, such as SWISSUbase.

Detailed information and registration:  https://forscenter.ch/sharing-personal-data-through-a-data-repository/