International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) 2001 Social Networks II

The purpose of the study

The ISSP is a continuing annual programme of cross-national collaboration on surveys covering topics important for social science research. It brings together pre-existing social science projects and coordinates research goals, thereby adding a cross-national, cross-cultural perspective to the

individual national studies. Twenty-nine countries are members of the ISSP.

It started late in 1983 when SCPR, London, secured funds from the Nuffield Foundation to hold meetings to further international collaboration between four existing surveys - the General Social Survey, conducted by NORC in the USA, the British Social Attitudes Survey, conducted by SCPR in Great Britain, the Allgemeine Bevoelkerungsumfrage der Sozialwissenschaften, conducted by ZUMA in West Germany and the National Social Science Survey, conducted by

ANU in Australia. Prior to this, NORC and ZUMA had been collaborating bilaterally since 1982 on a common set of questions.

The four founding members agreed to (1) jointly develop modules dealing with important areas of social science, (2) field the modules as a fifteen-minute supplement to the regular national surveys (or a special survey if necessary), (3) include an extensive common core of background variables and (4) make the data available to the social science community as soon as possible.

Each research organisation funds all of its own costs. There are no central funds. The merging of the data into a cross-national data set is performed by the Zentralarchiv fuer Empirische Sozialforschung, University of Cologne.

Since 1984, the ISSP has grown to more than 38 nations: the founding four - Australia, Germany, Great Britain and the United States - plus Austria, Bangladesh, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Hungary, Israel, Ireland, Italy, Japan,

Latvia, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, the Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Russia, the Slovakian Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland, Venezuela. New members are Flanders, South Africa and Taiwan.

The annual topics for the ISSP are developed over several years by a sub-committee and are pre-tested in various countries. The annual plenary meeting of the ISSP then adopts the final questionnaire. ISSP questions need to be relevant to all countries and expressed in an equivalent manner in all languages. The questionnaire is originally drafted in British English and then translated into other languages.

The ISSP marks several new departures in the area of cross-national research. First, the collaboration between organisations is not ad hoc or intermittent, but routine and continual.

Second, while necessarily more circumscribed than collaboration dedicated solely to cross-national research on a single topic, the ISSP makes cross-national research a basic part of the national research agenda of each participating country. Third, by combining a cross time with a cross-national perspective, two powerful research designs are being used to study societal processes.

Main topics of the study

Number of adult brothers and sisters; frequency of personal (visits, meetings) and non-personal contacts (telephone, letter, fax or e-mail) with the parents, brothers and sisters and own children; time for the journey to where the mother lives, frequency of the contacts to relatives (uncles and aunts, cousins, parents-in-law, brothers-in-law or sisters-in-law, nieces and nephews, godparents); number of close friends at work place, in the neighbourhood, and in general; sex of best close friend; frequency of contact to the best friend; participation in activities of groups like sports club, charitable organisation, neighbourhood, political party, an association, and a church or religious organisation; first and second contact person for support in respondent's household, at money problems and in case of a depression; frequency of helping others in household, by loaning money, by talking to depressed persons and in giving help at job search; information source at the search for the present job; importance of character traits of close friends: Intelligence, helpfulness, understanding and enjoyable company (scale); attitude to the moral obligation of adult children to care for their parents; people who are better off should help friends who are less well off; attitude to development of friendships to once own advantage; attitude to a state responsibility to provide the childcare and an adequate standard of living for old people; personal luck assessment; feeling of being overused by family, relatives or friends; trust in neighbours (scale); duration of living at the place of residence; political efficacy; frequency of political discussions with friends.

Unit of Analysis

Sample design

Type of the sample applied in the Study

Geographic coverage of the sample

Data collection methods were used for the study

The total number of starting or issued names/addresses and the total number of successfully completed

Substitution or replacement of respondents

Post-stratification weight

Factors considered at construction of the post-stratified weighting factor

Weighting or post-stratification strategy used

Known limitations (biases) of the achieved sample. For example: differential coverage of particular groups, either because of sample design or response differences.

Description of sample design

Fieldwork

Start and end dates of fieldwork

Interviewers required to

Interviews back-checked (e.g. supervisor checks later whether interview was conducted

Other information about the study

Pattern for data quotation

The data utilized in this (publication) were documented and made available by the ZENTRALARCHIV FUER EMPIRISCHE SOZIALFORSCHUNG, KOELN. The data for the 'ISSP' were collected by independent institutions in each country (see: principal investigators in the study-description-schemes for each participating country). Neither the original collectors nor the ZENTRALARCHIV bear any responsibility for the analyses or interpretation presented here.

In order to provide funding agencies with essential information about the use of archival resources, and to facilitate the exchange of information about research activities based on the ZENTRALARCHIVE's holdings, each user is expected to send two copies of each completed manuscript to the ZENTRALARCHIV.

If the study is a part of a larger survey or coming from other sources (like e.g. public statistics) - what is its source?

Generally accessible publications that refer to this data

Data distribution

Data use restrictions