Cohort 1967
Cohort 1967 is a stratified municipality and class selection where the majority of the students were born in 1967. The first collection was made in 6th grade in 1980 and consisted of tests and questionnaires. Unlike other cohorts, the selection was made in 6th grade.
Summary
The original idea was, after the cohort collections in 1948 and 1953, that the project would continue with new cohorts of students every five years. For many reasons, this has not been done, and the ongoing work can be said to be an attempt to build on the original plans.
The first collection for this project took place in the spring semester of 1980. However, the selection of individuals was made according to principles other than those applied in the Individual Statistics, as the first two cohorts were called. The population here does not consist of all individuals born in a certain year but of all students in a certain grade, more specifically of all students in 6th grade during the spring term 1980. Furthermore, the selection was carried out in two steps. First, a stratified selection of municipalities was made, after which a number of classes from the selected municipalities were sampled. In the selected classes, all students were then allowed to participate. The principles guarantee that a nationally representative sample is obtained. With this collection, Statistics Sweden became more involved and they called the project Student Panels and this cohort became Student Panel 1.
It should be pointed out that even if the selection principles differ, there are good opportunities for comparisons between the samples in the two projects, especially if the comparisons are limited to the normal-year students, that is those who at the age of thirteen attended 6th grade.
The total number of students in the sample in the spring of 1980 amounted to 9,601. Due to the refusal to participate, the sample size was reduced by 487 individuals or by 5 percent. Later, another 10 students were eliminated, so the final selection thus amounts to 9,104 students.
Planning, implementation and results from the data collection can be read in Evaluation Through Follow-up of students. A new individual statistics project (pdf downloadable from GUPEA in Swedish) and Evaluation through follow-up of students. The first data collections (pdf downloadable from GUPEA in Swedish).
In the spring of 1984, a follow-up study of the cohort was carried out, which completed its compulsory school education one year earlier. The follow-up was done with the help of a questionnaire to those who belonged to the sample (approx. 9,000) in 6th grade in the spring of 1980. Many of the questions in 1984 were similar to those given in 1980. In addition, questions were added that were only relevant after completing primary school. Just over 7,000 answered the survey in 1984.
Conduct of the survey
It has been a relatively long time since data collection for a corresponding longitudinal study was carried out. Many conditions for such collections have changed over time. Among other things, new laws that regulate the rights of participating persons in connection with investigations that require the establishment of personal registers within the meaning of the Data Act have been added. During the 1970s, the debate about the risks of using computers and the desire to limit personal register layouts has also been intense and often heated. It is reasonable that these things, together with individuals' need to have their personal integrity secured, have affected the tendency to participate in surveys of the kind that are relevant within, for example, the UGU project. Against this background, we have judged it to be valuable to have an accurate and relatively detailed account of the collection work.
The report therefore describes in some detail the various phases, from the initial information to the bodies and persons concerned to the results in the form of lists of available and processable information in the project data. Loss of individuals and/or information is always a difficult problem in longitudinal studies. A special section in the report is therefore devoted to detailed explanations of the causes of loss and the extent of the same.
Basic information
Information collected from grade 6 to grade 9 in compulsory school.
Basic information
Register data that Statistics Sweden applies in connection with the selection of classes. These mainly consist of:
- year of birth
- gender
- migration background
- educational background
- socio-economic data
School administrative data
The school administrative tasks were obtained from grade 6 and thereafter throughout the compulsory school period. A form is sent to the school the student attends and the school fills in information for each student included in the survey. Information is collected in grade 6, initially including entire classes but as students move over time, the form is sent out to more and more schools which then complete information for individual students. This is done so that the students who were included from the beginning can be followed over the years up to adulthood. This information consists of:
- municipality
- school
- school grade
- age integrated or age diverse class
- mother tongue
- Swedish for immigrants
- date when moving to another school
- new municipality
- new school
- grades when given
- The standard test results in English from grade 8 as well as in Swedish and mathematics from grade 9 were collected in the academic year 1983/84.
Collection of standard test results in English for 8th grade in the spring of 1982 (pdf downloadable from GUPEA in Swedish) and Collection of standard test results in mathematics and Swedish for 9th grade academic year 1983/83 (pdf downloadable from GUPEA in Swedish).
The collection in 6th grade
The collection was carried out in the spring of 1980 with a test, a questionnaire for the students in 6th grade and a questionnaire that was sent home to the parents
Cognitive tests
The Cognitive tests are intelligence tests containing tasks of a verbal, inductive and spatial nature. These have been given at each collection in 6th grade and began with the evaluation in 1961. The three subtests and how they were developed are described in Svensson, A. (1964) (pdf downloadable from GUPEA, in Swedish).
- Antonyms: To choose the opposite of a particular keyword among four options
- Sheet metal folding: To work out which of the four figures you get, if you fold a pictured “sheet metal piece”
- Number series: To continue a number series, where six numbers are given, with two more numbers
More about the cognitive tests can be read in: Relative achievement: school performance in relation to intelligence, sex and home environment (pdf downloadable from GUPEA in Swedish)
Questionnaire for students
The questionnaire for students contains 48 questions.
- Students' self-perception in different school situations (questions 1-20)
- Pupils' attitudes towards certain activities in school (questions 21-36)
- Students' study choices and career plans (questions 37-45)
- Students' leisure activities (questions 46-48).
The exact wording of the questions can be found in the questionnaire for the students (pdf 1.2 MB in Swedish).
Questionnaire to the guardians
The questionnaire sent to the guardians contains 21 questions divided into the following areas:
- The child's upbringing conditions.
- Ambitions and wishes regarding the child's education.
- The parents' own educational and professional situation.
- Views on the school's objectives.
The exact wording of the questions can be found in the questionnaire to the guardians (pdf in Swedish).
The collection in upper secondary school 1st grade
In the spring of 1984, a follow-up study of the cohort was carried out, which completed its compulsory school education one year earlier. The follow-up was done with the help of a questionnaire to those who belonged to the sample (approx. 9,000) in 6th grade in the spring of 1980. Many of the questions in 1984 were similar to those given in 1980. In addition, questions were added that were only relevant after completing primary school. Just over 7,000 answered the survey in 1984. Nine per cent of these had never attended upper secondary school. In 6th grade, the group that did not continue to upper secondary education group answered to a greater extent than the others that they were not good at mathematics. This group chose the general course in mathematics to a greater extent and had to a greater extent lower grades than those who answered the questions in the spring of 1984. A consequence of the drop-out is probably that the proportion of students who have experienced problems in upper secondary school is greater than is shown in data.
Questionnaire for students
The questionnaire contained 59 questions and contained questions about:
- The employment of the student September 1983 - March 1984
- Views on and experiences of upper secondary school
- Future plans
- The perception of their knowledge
- Leisure activities
- Views on and experiences of upper secondary school (only students who have attended upper secondary school)
The exact wording of the questions can be found in the questionnaire for students in upper secondary school / not in upper secondary school.
The survey was conducted from the last week of March to mid-July 1984. Each student received both questionnaires because there was no information on who had been admitted to the high school. Along with the questionnaires, there was information about the project and a response envelope addressed directly to the project. Questionnaires and other information were sent directly to their home address.
Codebook
The number of variables for each cohort varies from a few hundred to a couple of thousand. Some variables are present in all cohorts, others are only found in some. Some variables enable longitudinal studies, others only cross-sectional studies. UGU has developed an interactive list of variables to make it easier to search among the variables and see relationships between variables in different cohorts.
The variables are accessed through the links below. Questions about documentation are answered via e-mail to data controllers within UGU.
Selection principles
The population that was to be examined consisted of all students in 6th grade of compulsory school during the academic year 1979/1980. In order to obtain data for the stratification (grouping) of the municipalities, a lot of information about the municipalities was collected, through co-processing of registers. Through a stratified selection, 29 municipalities were selected, after which the school classes were selected with the help of the class registers in the municipalities in question. In the small municipalities all classes were included, while a random sample was made from the larger ones. The final sample consisted of approximately 10,000 students divided into 437 classes and mainly of individuals born in 1967. Statistical Releases U73 SM 9601 (pdf 11.3 MB in Swedish) gives a brief description of the selection procedure for the cohorts 1967 - 1982 (Student Panel 1 - 4).
Questionnaires
Student questionnaire, 6th grade, spring term 1980 (pdf 1.2 MB in Swedish)
Student questionnaire, upper secondary school 1st grade, spring term 1984 (pdf 1.5 MB in Swedish)
Parental questionnaire, 6th grade, spring term 1980 (pdf)
Reports
Questionnaire and tests as well as register information that has been used within the UGU collections are described for each cohort in reports and working memoranda from the departments and as technical reports or statistical announcements from Statistics Sweden (SCB).
Reports from IPS (IPD)
Working Memorandum (IPS)
Statistical Communication from Statistics Sweden
Ugu67 - From primary school through high school 1983-1987. SMU 1988: 01 (pdf 14 MB in Swedish)
Statistical Releases U73 SM 9601 (pdf 11.3 MB in Swedish)