Research Program
Independent research is the basis for competent scientific services and facilities for knowledge transfer. This is why research in the social sciences has a long tradition at GESIS of relying on official microdata. The tradition dates back to 1987 when the Scientific Advisory Board at the GESIS Center for Survey Research and Methodology (ZUMA) recommended establishing a center for official microdata.
Research subjects can loosely be categorized into processing of content-based and methodological questions. Projects on methodological aspects of official data, for instance, include contributions on sampling errors in the microcensus or on harmonization of available Scientific Use Files (SUFs) in the microcensus. In recent years, another specialist focus of methodological research has been testing sampling selectivity of the microcensus panel which was studied with reference to the example of issues relating to educational statistics. The special focus of content-based research include social structure analysis as well as analyses on change of households and families.
Our research projects
Methodical Projects
Development of Microdata Tools
- Identification of opposite-sex and same-sex partnerships (ongoing)
- Compilation of microcensus panel (ongoing)
- Development of a socio-Economic classification scheme for Europe (ESeC) (completed)
- CASMIN- and ISCED classifications of education (completed)
- Constructing Wegener's Magnitude Prestige Scale (MPS) on the Basis of Occupational Classification of the Official Statistics (completed)
- Cumulation of Microcensusdata (completed)
Methods and Data Quality
- Class-specific costs of maintaining status (ongoing)
- Methodological challenges in recording poverty (ongoing)
- Regional Context Data with the Microcensus (completed)
- Anonymization and Data Protection (completed)
- Non-response and respresentativeness (completed)
- Proxy-Interviews in the German Microcensus (completed)
- Variance estimation using microcensus data (completed)
- Employment in the microcensus. Concepts, definition, implementation (completed)
- Sample selectivity of the microcensus panel (completed)
Data Access and Metadata
- Metadata for official microdata (MISSY) (ongoing)
- MISSY 3.0 (completed)
- Data without boundaries(completed)
Content based projects
Employment
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The influence of social contacts on educational success and the transition to the first job (ongoing)
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The Gender Gap in Workplace Authority in a European Comparison (ongoing)
- Gender Typing of Occupational Aspirations: Comparing Young Women with Turkish and without Migration Background (completed)
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Earning Arrangements in Germany (completed)
- Working Time Models of Couples with Children (completed)
- East - West Comparison: Ostdeutsche Genossenschaftsbauern - Westdeutsche Landwirte. Agrarische Lebensweisen im Vergleich (completed)
- Operationalisation of protection against dismissal and effects on content-related results (completed)
- Subjective well-being after transition to retirement (completed)
Migration
- The influence of family involvement on the social contacts of refugees in Germany (ongoing)
- Ethnic Penalties in the German Rental Housing Market (ongoing)
- Small-scale segregation of the population with a history of migration (ongoing)
- There goes the 'Auswahlbezirk': Estimation of the 'White-Flight'-Effect with the German Microcensus (laufend)
- Ethnic differences in social capital mobilization at the transition to vocational training in Germany (abgeschlossen)
- Education qualifications and labor market success of ethnic minorities: The Case of Germany (completed)
- Determinants of labor market positioning of Migrants and German and the Measuring of Labor Market Success (completed)
- Do birth order effects on secondary school track placement differ for natives and migrants? (completed)
- Ethnic Segregation (completed)
- Marital Patterns of Migrants and Ethnic Minorities in Germany (completed)
- Immigrants in the Education System (completed)
- Differences in birth order effect on school choice at secondary school age between migrants and natives in Germany (completed)
Households and living arrangements
- Same-sex partner selection in Germany (ongoing)
- Partnership histories of people with different sexual orientations (ongoing)
- Time Use of Children and Adolescent (completed)
- Childcare in Europe (completed)
- Change of Lifestyles (completed)
- Concepts of Living Arrangements and Family in the Microcensus (completed)
- Family, Social Structure, Partner Choice (completed)
- Higher Qualifications for Women and Social Differentiation between Households (completed)
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Do personality traits have an influence on the repartnering tendency after divorce? (completed)
Poverty
- Describing the socio-demographic structure of social transfers across Europe with regression trees (ongoing)
- The Keys to the House - How Wealth Transfers Stratify Homeownership Opportunities (ongoing)
- Causes and changes in family poverty in Germany (completed)
- Debts, negative life events and subjective well-being: disentangling relationships (completed)
- Poverty and migration (completed)
Education
- Do birth order effects on secondary school track placement differ for natives and migrants? (completed)
- Comparative Analyses on Advanced Vocational and Professional Training with Microcensus Data (completed)
- Education Research and Educational Inequality (completed)
- The effect of parental wealth on educational decisions (completed)
- Effect of parental wealth on the child's educational decision: Risk minimisation or demotivation? (completed)
- Effects of inheritances on educational and occupational success and life course across the wealth distribution (completed)
- The Influence of the Educational Composition of the Neighborhood on the Transition from Primary to Secondary School (completed)