Multi-Generation Family and Life History Panel Dataset

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This project makes publicly available via ICPSR an existing longitudinal individual-level database, the Liaoning Multi-Generational Panel (LMGP), that comprises 1.3 million triennial observations of more than 230,000 residents of approximately 628 northeast Chinese communities between 1749 and 1909. The data provide socioeconomic, demographic, and other characteristics for individuals, households, and communities, and record demographic outcomes such as marriage, reproduction and death. The data also record specific disabilities for a subset of adult males. Through record linkage, paternal pedigrees may be reconstructed as far back as seven generations, and kin living outside the household may be identified. Recording of community of residence allows for spatial analysis via GIS techniques. The LMGP will be unique among publicly available population databases because of its time span, volume, detail, and completeness of recording, and because it provides longitudinal data not just on individuals, but on their households, descent groups, and communities. Publications by the PI and the collaborators have already established the suitability of the dataset for quantitative analysis by social and behavioral scientists, but exploitation of its full potential awaits use by the research community after its public release. Possible applications of the dataset include the study of relationships between demographic behavior, family organization, and socioeconomic status across the life course and across generations, the influence of regional and community on demographic outcomes, and development and assessment of quantitative methods for the analysis of complex longitudinal datasets. Methodological research will be undertaken to develop methods to distribute such data that maximize its ease of use and research potential. Specific tasks are to carry out additional cleaning of the existing data and prepare a linked database of community and regional conditions, reformat the data according to ICPSR and other emerging specifications for archived longitudinal data, prepare the documentation needed for users to make use of the data, and carry out outreach and training via presentations at relevant professional meetings and organization of a User’s Group. We will also train interested students to use an initial partial early release of the LMGP data at an on-going ICPSR summer workshop on the Longitudinal Analysis of Historical Data and use this experience to help us produce better training guides and documentation. Such documentation includes Users' Guides (codebooks) describing the variables, Reference Guides that describe the historical and institutional context of the populations and the registration system, and Training Guides that demonstrate through annotated examples how to manipulate and analyze the data.