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A total of 21,966 respondents were interviewed for the survey throughout Scotland during 1999 and the first two quarters of 2000 by interviewers from System Three and MORI Scotland. The sample was drawn from the Small User File of the Postcode Address File (PAF), a listing of all active address points maintained by the Post Office. The survey interview, which lasts an average of 42 minutes, is carried out in respondents' homes by interviewers using Computer Aided Personal Interviewing (CAPI). It has a two-part structure.
The first part of the interview is carried out with the Highest Income Householder (HIH), or his/her spouse or partner, and collects mainly factual information about the composition and characteristics of the household. Some questions are asked in respect of each household member.
The second part of the interview takes place with an adult member of the household selected at random and focuses more on individual attitudes and behaviours. (In many cases, of course, both parts of the interview are completed by the same person).
The response rate for the first part of the survey (taking account of 'deadwood' in the sample) was 65%.
The data have been weighted to take account of the unequal probabilities of selection inherent in the sample design due to (a) the over-sampling of smaller local authority areas relative to their household population in order to obtain a minimum number of interviews in each area and (b) the under-sampling of adults resident in multi-person households because only one 'random adult' is interviewed in each household.
Comparisons with external sources, such as Census data and the 1996 Scottish House Condition Survey, suggest that the weighted data are broadly representative of the Scottish household population; consequently, no further weighting has been carried out.
In many instances, the survey uses the same questions as in other government surveys in order to facilitate comparisons on a consistent basis. Due to differences in sampling and survey methods, however, the results from this survey will inevitably be slightly different from other government surveys.
Throughout the Bulletin, the results presented in the text are statistically significant at the 95% confidence level.
The bases reported in different tables may differ. In some cases this is because they relate to different populations (such as all households, all adults, adults of working age). In addition, some questions were not asked of all respondents because they only applied in certain circumstances (for example, questions about childcare would not be asked in a household without any children). In some cases (an example is income _ see section 8), the bases differ because some people did not want to answer certain questions, or because the information that was requested was not available at the time of the interview. Finally, some questions were only included in the survey with effect from the start of 2000, so tables relating to these questions will inevitably have smaller bases.
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