Scotland's New Ethnicity Classification for Scottish Official Statistics and Recommended for Scotland's 2011 Census
Scotland's New Ethnicity Classification for Scottish Official Statistics and Recommended for Scotland's 2011 Census
Annex B UK Guiding Principles for Developing Census Questions
1. As part of the drive towards UK harmonisation, SG, GROS and the other UK census offices formulated a set of UK Guiding Principles to help assess evidence and develop classifications in a broadly consistent way across the UK.
2. The principles set out some key criteria that should considered for the development of robust census questions. In essence, they are fundamental to good survey design. There are five broad principles, including:
(A) Strength of need for information on a specific ethnic group;
(B) lack of alternative sources of ethnicity information;
(C) clarity and quality of the information collected and acceptability to respondents;
(D) comparability with ethnicity data derived from the 2001 Census; and
(E) operational considerations such as length of question(s), speed and cost-effectiveness of processing, and ability to collect comparable information on other surveys.
3. SG and GROS used these principles as a general guide to help assess its evidence. However, as detailed earlier, some compromises had to made in some cases, based on the evidence. ONS and WAG applied the principles using a tool to score and prioritise which ethnic groups should be included in their classifications. However, like SG and GROS, they also took other factors into consideration.
4. The detail of each guiding principle is set out below.
(A) Strength of need for information on a specific ethnic group There is a strong need in general for accurate information on an ethnic group. This criterion is intended to pick up any need for information in addition to this. (Ai) The group is of particular interest for equality monitoring or for policy development (for example it is particularly vulnerable to disadvantage). The Census needs to provide data for policy development, it should be in line with the Race Relations Act and it should provide data on ethnic groups to allow inequalities to be identified. (Aii) The group is of particular interest for service delivery. In line with the Race Relations Act, the Census needs to provide data on ethnic groups to allow services to be tailored and delivered effectively. |
(B) Lack of alternative sources of ethnicity information The Census needs to be as clear and efficient as possible and needs to avoid having two or more questions that elicit the same information. (Bi) Write-in answers are not adequate for measuring this group. If the majority of a group wrote in answers in a consistent manner, this data could be analysed to provide data without the need for a tick box. (Bii) Other Census information is inadequate as a suitable proxy. For example if another Census question such as language, religion, country of birth etc provides similar (proxy) information for an ethnic group, there is a lesser need to provide a tick box on the ethnic group question. |
(C) Clarity and quality of the information collected and acceptability to respondents The question needs to be as user-friendly as possible and structured in a way that elicits the most useful information. (Ci) Without a tick box respondents would be unduly confused or burdened and so the quality of information would be reduced. For example if a large, well known, or highly distinctive group was not given a separate tick box they may be confused about how to respond. They may respond using different tick boxes or they may not respond at all. This could reduce the quality of their responses or damage the response rate. It may also not be possible to obtain a robust count of that ethnic group. (Cii) The addition of the tick-box and its terms are acceptable and clear to respondents i.e. they are not confused as to which tick box to use. The tick box should provide the required information to an acceptable level of quality. Inclusion of the tick box will give a high and consistent response and will provide data that reasonably represents a distinct ethnic group population. Any other reason why lack of a tick box would compromise the accuracy of ethnic group population estimates. |
(D) Comparability with ethnicity data derived from the 2001 Census (Di) For groups included in 2001, there is a strong need for continuity of data with the 2011 Census. Consultation reveals a strong need for comparability with 2001 data, to enable users to see changes over time. (Dii) For groups not included in 2001 (but included in 2011), there is evidence that there will be no adverse impact on comparability . Consultation reveals a strong need for comparability with 2001 data, to enable users to see changes over time. |
(E) Operational considerations such as length of question(s), speed and cost-effectiveness of processing, and ability to collect comparable information on other surveys (Ei) The question and list of tick boxes does not require more form space than reasonably available on the Census form, when taking into account the space required by other Census questions and the overall amount of space available. (Eii) The amount of form space given to each question and tick box is proportionate for the ethnic diversity of a given population, the level of information required by data users, and the acceptability of higher level groupings among respondents. (Eiii) The number of tick boxes will not place an undue burden on other surveys which use the Census classifications. |
There is a problem
Thanks for your feedback