250
Cross-National Research: Ex-Post Survey Data Harmonization and Comparability
Abstract Submissions Closed
RC20 Comparative Sociology (host committee)
Language: English
Session Type: Oral
Survey data harmonization is a quickly growing interdisciplinary field that draws on the great wealth of extant survey projects to enhance substantive and methodological knowledge. Applied at the stage of survey design and implementation, harmonization facilitates that multinational, multiregional and multicultural surveys yield comparable data. Applied ex-post, harmonization represents a way to overcome limitations inherent in single comparative survey projects, such as restricted time and geographic coverage. In both its forms, ex-ante and ex-post, harmonization is a complex process, whose effective implementation calls for synergies of survey methods, statistical techniques and substantive theories.
In this session we invite papers on both methodological considerations and empirical analyses featuring ex-ante and ex-post harmonization of longitudinal and cross-national survey data. We welcome papers that deal, among others, with (a) substantive analyses on democracy and political participation, social structure, inequalities and intersectionality using harmonized survey data, (b) methodological contributions on harmonization procedures to enhance comparative research, and (c) studies on methodological and substantive implications of variability in cross-national survey data quality