The Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) is a longitudinal survey of a nationally representative sample of U.S. families that began in 1968. With data collected on the same families and their descendents for 36 waves over 41 years (as of 2009), the PSID can justifiably be considered a cornerstone for empirical social science research in the U.S. Through its long-term measures of economic and social well-being, and based on its weighted representative sample of U.S. families, the study has compelled researchers to address the dynamics of social, economic, demographic, and health processes and their interrelationships. NICHD has co-sponsored the collection of the biennial PSID core interview in 2003, 2005, 2007, 2009, and 2011. This project will build upon this prior investment by collecting, in 2013 and 2015, core data on family dynamics and background and new data on education and on newborns supplemented by administrative linkages. The specific aims are to administer three PSID modules: (1) a family dynamics and background module, comprising 8.5 minutes of survey questions on marriage, fertility, family composition, family background, childhood circumstances, and related topics; (2) an education module that will measure changes in educational attainment and educational experiences between waves for all persons 16 years of age and older and will be used for linking education enrollment reports to national databases on educational institutions; and (3) a newborn module that will collect detailed information for all births that occur between waves and will allow us to obtain linked birth records from state vital statistics databases that provide gold-standard information on birth outcomes. After collection, the data will be processed and distributed in the PSID Online Data Center, which will allow users to create customized extracts and codebooks using a cross-year variable index. In addition, outreach and support will continue to be provided to current and new data users. The proposed modules will make PSID the only long-term panel representative of the full U.S. population that can be used to study family dynamics, investments in children, and well-being over the life course, across generations, and over time.
Funding:
Health and Human Services, Department of-National Institutes of Health
Funding Period:
08/18/2011 to 04/24/2016