National Child Development Study: Employment Histories, 1974-2000

<p>Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.</p>The <I>National Child Development Study</I> (NCDS) originated in the <I>Perinatal Mortality Survey</I> (see SN 5565), which examined social and obstetric factors associated with still birth and infant mortality among over 17,000 babies born in Britain in one week in March 1958. Surviving members of this birth cohort have been surveyed on eight further occasions in order to monitor their changing health, education, social and economic circumstances - in 1965 at age 7, 1969 at age 11, 1974 at age 16 (the first three sweeps are also held under SN 5565), 1981 (age 23 - SN 5566), 1991 (age 33 - SN 5567), 1999/2000 (age 41/2 - SN 5578), 2004-2005 (age 46/47 - SN 5579), 2008-2009 (age 50 - SN 6137) and 2013 (age 55 - SN 7669).<br> <br> There have also been surveys of sub-samples of the cohort, the most recent occurring in 1995 (age 37), when a 10% representative sub-sample was assessed for difficulties with basic skills (SN 4992). Finally, during 2002-2004, 9,340 NCDS cohort members participated in a bio-medical survey, carried out by qualified nurses (SN 5594, available under more restrictive Special Licence access conditions; see catalogue record for details). The bio-medical survey did not cover any of the topics included in the 2004/2005 survey. Further NCDS data separate to the main surveys include a response and deaths dataset, parent migration studies, employment, activity and partnership histories, behavioural studies and essays - see the <a href="http://discover.ukdataservice.ac.uk/series/?sn=2000032" title="NCDS series page">NCDS series page</a> for details.<br> <br> Further information about the NCDS can be found on the <a href="http://www.cls.ioe.ac.uk" title="Centre for Longitudinal Studies">Centre for Longitudinal Studies</a> website.<br> <br><i>Employment Histories, 1974-2000</i>:<br> This dataset was compiled as a result of work done to improve the quality and consistency of the spells of employment collected for all main respondents of the NCDS, covering the period 1974 to 2000. The information is based on data collected when the respondents were aged 24 (NCDS4), 33 (NCDS5) and 42 years (NCDS6). The work was undertaken as part of the <a href="http://www.genet.ac.uk/index.html" title="Gender Equality Network Project">Gender Equality Network Project</a> (GeNet), co-ordinated at Cambridge University, with Professors Shirley Dex and Heather Joshi, which examined the occupational mobility of men and women over the life-course, using the retrospective employment histories from NCDS waves 4, 5 and 6.<br> <br> An updated version of the Employment Histories dataset has now available from the Archive under SN 6942 - <i>National Child Development Study: Activity Histories, 1974-2008</i>. The updated file includes activities histories from sweep 4 (age 23) to sweep 8 (age 50). The updated file deals with work and non-work activities and identifies duplicate activities (i.e. where an activity was reported again in a later sweep).<br> <br> For the second edition (August 2008), the serial number has been replaced with a new one, variable Ncdsid. This change has been made for all datasets in the NCDS series. Further information may be found in the 'CLS Confidentiality and Data Security Review', included in the documentation.<br> <br><B>Main Topics</B>:<br>The data cover employment history, including job changes, economic activity, occupations and occupational status