Taiwan Social Change Survey, 2009

DOI

10.17605/OSF.IO/83XQT

Citation

Chang, Y. (2021, June 15). Taiwan Social Change Survey, 2009.

Summary

The Taiwan Social Change Survey (TSCS) tracks the long-term trend of social changes through national representative survey data. Since the first nation-wide survey completed in 1985, this cross-sectional survey project has followed five-year cycles that rotate selective modules. These modules cover various topics including family, religion, stratification, mass communication, and political participation. Many of these surveys carry repetitive modules that have run through up to four cycles of survey operations, which enable researchers to understand social change from longitudinal perspectives. With more than 80,000 face-to-face interviews completed over the past 22 years, the TSCS has become the largest survey series among all of the general social surveys in the world.

The TSCS team also initiates and participates in international comparative surveys. Since 2001, the TSCS has been an active member in both the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) and the East Asian Social Survey (EASS). In the wave of the globalization of social surveys, not only will the TSCS continue to cover its major national research agenda, but it also will aim to present and demonstrate the characteristics of Taiwanese social changes by incorporating both ISSP and EASS modules into the surveys. Such a combination of local, regional, and global research interests should preserve the tradition of the TSCS while it expands into the international community. This survey is the fifth phase and fifth wave of Questionnaire II: Religion.

The ARDA has added three additional variables to the original data set to enhance the users' experience on our site.

Data File

Cases: 1927
Variables: 294
Weight Variable: WEIGHT

Data Collection

July 15 - October 16, 2009

Original Survey (Instrument)

Taiwan Social Change Survey Questionnaire, Religion

Funded By

National Science Council & Institute of Sociology, Academia Sinica

Collection Procedures

Our sampling frame consists of registered non-institutional residents aged 18 or over in Taiwan. The sampling area includes basically the main island of Taiwan, excluding the outlying islands. The three-stage Stratified PPS Sampling was used to select respondents (please refer to "sampling procedures" for more information about the sampling design). Data were collected from July to October in 2009 by face-to-face interview. We sent postal letters to all sampled individuals for advanced contacts. Interviewers must follow certain rules when they approached an address. Visits were made at different times of day and on different days of the week. Interviewers were required to make at least three visits before they stopped approaching an address. About two percent of interviews were supervised, and 44% of full productive interviews were back-checked (supervisors check later to see whether interviews were conducted). The total number of issued sample is 4488 (gloss sample size). With 1,927 completed interviews (net sample size), the survey generated a response rate (net sample size/gloss sample size) of 42.94%.

Sampling Procedures

The following variables are used to stratify the population frame into seven levels of regions: population density, educational level, the proportion of population over age 65, the proportion of population between ages15 and 64, the proportion of industrial employment as the total employment, and the proportion of service sector employment as the total employment. The sampling design has three stages. For the first stage, the number of target respondents is decided for each of the seven strata of regions proportionate to the size of their populations. For the second stage, the number of townships is decided for each regional level and is randomly selected from each level. Districts or villages then are randomly selected from each chosen townships. For the third stage, around 21 to 30 individuals ages 18 or over are randomly selected from household registers in each precinct or village.

Principal Investigators

Ying-hwa Chang, Research Fellow, Institute of Sociology, Academia Sinica

Related Publications

TSCS web sites (English version)

Note on Years

When "R.O.C. year" appears in the survey, it refers to the year according to the calendar of the Republic of China. (Taiwan has its own calendar year system. For example, the Taiwan year "84" refers to the year 1995 in the R.O.C. calendar.)

Weighting

Data were weighted using an iterative, proportional raking scheme. Each observation was weighted by gender, age, urbanization, and education level. Weights were then generated to match the population characteristics of Taiwan.

International Social Survey Program, 2008

The ISSP 2008 module was fielded with the Taiwan Social Change Survey 2009. The survey topics include religious beliefs, religious attitudes, religious behavior, numerology and magic, special religious experience, behaviors concerning charitable organizations, cultural values, concepts concerning charitable organizations, perceptions and evaluations of different cultures.