FORS is delighted that Professor Peter Farago, Founding Director of FORS, has been elected as new honorary member by the Assembly of Delegates of the Swiss Academy of Humanities and Social Sciences (SAHS).

Peter Farago became honorary member in recognition of his decisive contribution to the development of empirical social research in Switzerland and for his outstanding commitment to the establishment of the Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences FORS. Peter Farago, professor emeritus at the University of Lausanne, headed the FORS Centre based at the same university until his retirement in 2016. In the 1990s, he led the largest social science research programme ever conducted in Switzerland, “Demain la Suisse”, which revitalised the social sciences at the universities. This programme was launched on the initiative of the “SOWI Club”, which was informally formed by the presidents of some of the member societies of the SAHS in the fields of political science, sociology, psychology and education. Peter Farago is still committed to the development of methodology in the empirical social sciences.

Source and further reading

When: June 10, 2021
Where: Online on zoom

This edition will include thematic sessions that cover a wide variety of topics, such as health and well-being, education and labour market, families, migration, or politics and attitudes. We also welcome a special session organized by TREE as well as by the Swiss Federal Statistical Office.

Scientific programme

The EVS Trend File 1981-2017 is constructed from the five EVS waves and covers almost 40 years. In altogether 159 surveys, more than 223.000 respondents from 48 countries/regions were interviewed.

It is based on the updated data of the EVS Longitudinal Data File 1981-2008 (v.3.1.0) and the current EVS 2017 Integrated Dataset (v.4.0.0). The Trend File follows a new concept agreed between EVS and WVS to transfer their large longitudinal data files into leaner and easier to handle files based on the Common EVS/WVS Dictionary (v.2021). The next release is planned in cooperation with the World Value Survey (WVS) for the beginning of July 2021. From these new Trend files, it will be easy for data users to build the Integrated Values Surveys 1981-2021. For more information, please go to the EVS Trend File 1981-2017.

The data and documentation are accessible through the GESIS data collection at GESIS- Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences.

The ISSP team at the GESIS Data Archive is glad to announce the publication of the first partial data release of ISSP 2019 Social Inequality V (ZA7600_v1.0.0), including data from Switzerland and 14 other countries.

The data and documentation on this release can be found here:

https://www.gesis.org/en/issp/modules/issp-modules-by-topic/social-inequality/2019

In March 2021, SHARE, the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe celebrated its 10th anniversary as the first European Research Infrastructure Consortium ever. SHARE has set new standards in research and scientific data collection: Over the years, it built an operative infrastructure with research teams in 27 European countries and Israel. One of these research teams is SHARE Switzerland that managed by FORS and the University of Lausanne.

The survey’s large-scale design has encouraged the SHARE team to come up with constant conceptual improvements, bearing plenty innovations in the fields of methodology. Furthermore, SHARE data enabled researchers all over the world to practice in-depth and topical research in a variety of research fields, from biology to demography, economics, epidemiology, gerontology, medicine, psychology, public health, sociology, and more. To date, more than 12,000 researchers in 75 countries are working with SHARE data and have produced more than 3,000 SHARE-based publications. The number of publications and users are steadily increasing. In 2020, SHARE registered one new publication every day on average. Research based on SHARE data can be used as a valuable tool for evidence-based policy making – among others – for the European Commission, the OECD, the WHO and several national governments.

SHARE-based research over the past 10 years. A summary.

For more information and the main milestones, have a look at this page.

The Swiss Household Panel (SHP) workshop will take place from 13 to 15 September 2021 at the University of Lausanne.

On the first day, there will be an introduction to the SHP and the R software.

On the second and third day the workshop will focus on data management with R, based on data from the SHP. The workshop will be led by Dr. Hannah Klaas and Dr. Erika Antal from FORS.

The workshop will be held in English.

The registration and a detailed program will follow soon.

We are happy to present our Annual Report 2020. It showcases our methodological research in the social sciences, our data and research information services, scientific collaboration programs and publications. The report further summarizes all of the activities associated with our surveys and further mentions all the studies and surveys conducted by the Data Collection & Analysis group at FORS.

Annual Report 2020

We hereby invite scholars to propose questions for the follow-up survey administered after the ISSP 2022 module on “Family and Changing Gender Roles”. Proposals will be selected according to their scientific quality, thematic relevance and survey applicability. Successful proposals will be fielded in spring 2022 and data will be available early 2023. The deadline for submissions is Monday April 26^, 2021.

Further information and documentation can be found in the CALL MOSAiCH 2022  or on our webpage https://forscenter.ch/projects/mosaich/

The 21st wave of the SHP data is now available. Check out the SHP_I data for the years 1999-2019, the SHP_II data for the years 2004-2019, the SHP_III data for the years 2013-2019 as well as additional data such as imputed income, wealth, and CNEF data. 

We strongly recommend that all users, also those who analyze previous waves, download the newest release as we constantly improve the quality of our data. You will also find the Covid-19 data; an intermediate wave conducted during spring 2020 with many repeated measures as well as new variables related to the pandemic.

See https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/17411/1/.

The Swiss Covid-19 Data Symposium organised by FORS will give social science researchers an overview of different Swiss datasets that can be analyzed to assess the impact of the Covid-19-pandemic on numerous aspects of individuals’ everyday lives.

COVID-19 data from the following surveys and studies are presented: MOSAiCH, Swiss Corona Stress Study, Selects, Swiss Household Panel, COVID-19 Social Monitor ZHAW, SHARE and the COVID-19 Edition of the Science Barometer Switzerland.

Researchers also get the chance to talk to the producers of the data and ask detailed questions. The event takes place online and all presentations are held in English.

All detailed information on the COVID-19 data, the surveys, studies and presenters and the registration are to be found on the Symposium website.

The event is organised by FORS.

Registration

Questions regarding the organisation: info@forscenter.ch
Questions regarding the content of the symposium: Dr Marieke Heers

The Selects team has now added data from wave 4 to the Selects 2019 Panel Survey. Data from wave 4 was collected between September 28, 2020 and November 2, 2020.

https://forsbase.unil.ch/datasets/dataset-public-detail/17396/2250/

All data from Selects 2019 can be found here :

https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/17396/2250/

Information on Selects:

The Swiss Election Study (Selects) has been investigating the electoral behaviour of Swiss citizens in national elections since 1995. The project sheds light on the dynamics of the citizens’ opinion formation as well as on the determinants of their political participation and voting choice for a specific candidate or party.

More information on www.selects.ch

One of the primary aims of Selects has been to systematically combine the new survey data with data collected by its precursor research projects. The product of these efforts is presented here: A pooled set of Swiss election survey data which covers the period between 1971 and 2019 and includes most of the variables that have been included at least twice in the data collections.

Cumulative Selects dataset: https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/17384/0/

Election Surveys Used:

All the available Swiss election surveys were used to build up this database. Each of them is separately archived and documented at DARISS:

Political Attitudes and Behaviour in Switzerland 1971/72, conducted by the Department of Political Science, University of Geneva (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/13036/0/)
Political Attitudes in Switzerland 1975 (Political Action), conducted by the Department of Political Science, University of Geneva (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/10710/0/)
National and Federal Council Elections 1979, conducted by the Department of Psychology, University of Zurich, on behalf of the Tages Anzeiger (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/2551/0/)
National Elections 1987 (VOX), conducted by the Research Center for Swiss Politics, University of Bern, and GfS
National Elections 1991 (VOX), conducted by the Research Center for Swiss Politics, University of Bern, and GfS
Swiss Electoral Studies (Selects) 1995: Post-Election Survey, conducted by the Departments of Political Science, Universities of Bern, Geneva, and Zurich (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/1993/0/)
Swiss Electoral Studies (Selects) 1999: Post-Election Survey, conducted by the Departments of Political Science, Universities of Bern, Geneva, and Zurich (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/5937/0/)
Swiss Electoral Studies (Selects) 2003: Post-Election Survey, conducted by the Departments of Political Science, Universities of Bern, Geneva, St. Gall, and Zurich, DARIS and OVP/USTAT (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/11328/0/)
Swiss Electoral Studies (Selects) 2007: Post-Election Survey, conducted by the Departments of Political Science, Universities of Bern, Geneva, Lausanne, St. Gall, and Zurich, FORS, OVP/USTAT, FSO and the Federal Chancellery (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/8436/0/)
Swiss Electoral Studies (Selects) 2011: Post-Election Survey, conducted by FORS (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/12631/0/)
Swiss Electoral Studies (Selects) 2015: Post-Election Survey, conducted by FORS (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/13882/0/)
Swiss Election Study (Selects) 2019: Post-Election Survey, conducted by FORS (see https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/16968/0/)

Measuring party affiliation (FORS Guide N°12), Georg Lutz, Lukas Lauener

Party affiliation is a key concept used in many social science surveys. To measure such affiliations, one can either ask about previous, current or future voting behavior, about party identification or about party proximity. Moreover, there are questions that ask about an evaluation of different parties simultaneously. This guide provides an overview of the different concepts to measure party affiliation, shows examples of their use in Swiss surveys and outlines the implications for researchers who have to choose among them.

Preparation of survey data (FORS Guide N°13), Alexandre Pollien, Jessica M. E. Herzing, Erika Antal

This guide focuses on the data preparation phase, which starts after data collection and ends before their analysis. This first assessment of the “raw” survey data is crucial since data preparation can affect the quality of the data in a positive or negative way. After an overview of the different types of errors, the guide discusses the remedies and issues related to these editing procedures.

The cumulative VOTO dataset contains all 13 VOTO studies, including all voting dates and proposals from September 2016 to September 2020. Researchers can access all the data free of charge at https://forsbase.unil.ch/project/study-public-overview/17219/0/

Mandated by the Federal Chancellery, the research project VOTO analysed after each federal ballot the voting decisions of Swiss citizens. For this purpose, VOTO surveyed about 1500 eligible voters all over Switzerland.

VOTO is a joint project of the Swiss Centre of Expertise in the Social Sciences FORS, the Centre for Democracy Studies Aarau (ZDA) and the Survey Institute LINK. The standardized post-vote surveys are the result of the harmonization of the VOTO surveys. All VOTO reports are published on www.voto.swiss.

Sequentially mixing modes in an election survey

Authors: Oliver Lipps and Nicolas Pekari (FORS)

In this paper, the authors analyze to what extent a sequential mixed mode survey, consisting of push-to-web, telephone and mail-paper modes, is able to improve representativeness in terms of socio-demographic variables and reduce bias in terms of voting behavior compared to a single mode survey. In addition, they study whether changes in mode lead to measurement error issues by focusing on income. They find that adding the telephone mode improves sample representation in terms of socio-demographic variables. Meanwhile, adding the paper mode does not show further improvements in this respect. However, adding the telephone, and in particular the paper mode, turn out to reduce bias in voting behavior when compared to official figures. As for measuring income, the web and the telephone mode perform similarly well. Finally, they find little evidence of measurement differences of income when the same respondents are interviewed first by web or telephone and subsequently by paper questionnaire.

The FORS Working Paper series presents findings related to survey research, focusing on methodological aspects of survey research or substantive research. Manuscripts submitted are papers that represent work-in-progress. This series is intended to provide an early and relatively fast means of publication prior to further development of the work.  A revised version might be requested from the author directly. Further information on the FORS Working Paper Series can be found on https://forscenter.ch/publications/working-papers/

The ISSP team at the GESIS Data Archive is glad to announce the final publication of the ISSP 2018 data on Religion IV, including data from 33 countries across the world. The full set of documentation on this release can be found at:

 https://www.gesis.org/issp/modules/issp-modules-by-topic/religion/2018

Together with the international ISSP 2018 data set comes the data of “A cross-national and comparative study of religion” in additional 14 Asian and African countries based on the ISSP questionnaire. Overview information on the project (chaired by NORC) can be found at:

https://www.gesis.org/en/issp/modules/issp-modules-by-topic/religion/2018/2018-additional-14-countries

Both data sets together enable cross-national comparisons of ISSP Religion 2018 data with 47 countries.

Robin Tillmann, Monica Budowski, Dean R. Lillard, and Annette Scherpenzeel published a special issue in the Swiss Journal of Sociology in celebration of 20 years of the Swiss Household Panel. After an introduction to the history, the design and the content of the Swiss Household Panel, nine contributions from different fields shed light on social change in Switzerland over the last two decades.

All details and access to the content: https://content.sciendo.com/view/journals/sjs/sjs-overview.xml?language=en&tab_body=latestIssueToc-79128.

The results of the Swiss Household Panel – Covid-19 study, published in the FORS Working Paper Series, shows for example that especially young people in Switzerland were affected by the pandemic and that the self-employed population had to deal, from an early stage onwards, with the negative consequences of COVID-19.

The 11^th International Conference of Panel Data Users in Switzerland will take place on June 9-10, 2021 at the University of Lausanne. The thematic sessions include health and well-being, education and labour market, socio-economic inequality and mobility, families, gender, ethnic minorities and migration, politics and attitudes, survey methodology, and longitudinal methods. Contributions about Covid-19 are also welcome.

Please send us your abstract or session proposal until February 14, 2021.

We hope that we will be able to welcome you on site!

Consult the call for abstracts.

The Swiss Household Panel has conducted a special wave to assess living conditions during the COVID-19 semi-lockdown. Thanks to this intermediate measuring point, the SHP offers a unique opportunity to observe the impact of this period on the daily lives and the changes that it entailed for the Swiss population. The additional wave focuses on well-being and health, changes in work and financial situation, time use, home schooling, family and social life as well as the evaluation of the government policies.

The data of the SHP COVID-19 study are now available on FORSbase!

A new ESS Topline Results Series publication on Justice and Fairness in Europe has been published. It is based on analysis of ESS 2018 data and written by the authors of the respective questionnaire module.

The publication focuses on the normative views people hold on the principles that should guide the fair allocation of goods and burdens within a society, the fairness of incomes for self and for others, the fairness of life chances, and the fairness of related political procedures. The highest scores of political procedural justice for instance are found in Switzerland, Norway, and Sweden, while the lowest are found in Croatia, Bulgaria, and Italy.

Access the publication:

Justice and Fairness in Europe.

FORS makes an important contribution to the evaluation of the impact of COVID-19 on the Swiss population. Questions on COVID-19 were included in various FORS surveys and then made available to researchers in Switzerland.

One survey is MOSAiCH, which this year was devoted to the theme of environment and climate. MOSAiCH is conducted in two parts. The second part contained questions about COVID-19 and the actions taken by the Confederation. In addition to some policy questions, the effects on well-being, work status and family/work compatibility were studied. The questionnaire was completed by just over 2,000 people between the end of April and the end of May.

Results of the MOSAiCH survey, summarized in factsheets

The following factsheets are avaiable in German and French:

Well-being and worries during the lockdown. Factsheet N°1.

Policy, fundamental rights and environmental concerns during the lockdown, Factsheet N°2.

Work situation during the lockdown. Factsheet N°3.

Reconciling family and career during the lockdown. Factsheet N°4.

The factsheets in German

The factsheets in French