Checklists & Commonly Made Mistakes

1. Checklists & Commonly Made Mistakes

2. Checklist • Number all pages; be consistent in formatting! • Use standardized codes (Don’t Know-999, Refuse- 888) • Make sure your codelist is exhaustive • Use Others [specify] to capture factors not coded (* develop a system for capturing this during data entry) = -777 (generally)

3. Checklist • Probing: important to specify where to and where not to – don’t always take “do not know” for an answer. Use DO NOT PROBE or READ OUT THE OPTIONS where necessary. • Maintain a separate codebook/sheet. • Questions should be clear and easy to read/understand • Avoid complicated and long questions. Break it up into sub questions/grids

4. WATCH OUT! Commonly made mistakes • Blank vs. Not Answered. Always make this distinction! Not answered should be coded as ‘-888’ “Refused to answer” etc. While blank simply means bad data collection. Blanks should be sent back to the field to collect data on the same. • Different codes across similar surveys carried out at different points in time (ex. Baseline and Endline) If new questions are to be added, keep serial numbers the same. Add the new questions as 23(a), 77(a), 77 (b) etc. Refer to household grid format for 2.2a and 2.2b which were added during the midline survey in between the original questions 2.2 and 2.3 from the baseline survey.

5. WATCH OUT! • Id system to be comprehensive. Member IDs should be unique. Do not substitute IDs, whether it is the household, respondent or even the survey staff collecting the data. If someone drops out or leaves the project, delete the id. Any new member or household should get the next ID in the last serial chronology. VILID _ _ HHID_ _ _ RESPONDENT ID _ _ • Assigning Unique HH IDs • If a household is “Unique”=1 • Split HH = 2, “Son of/ Brother of/…”: member split and moved away in same village • Merged HH = 3, “Same as HH…”: families that have moved in together • Migrated = 4,