A Question Database for the German Longitudinal Election Study Wolfgang Zenk-Möltgen GESIS – Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences IASSIST 2014 – Aligning data and research infrastructure Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada June 3-6, 2014
Outline German Longitudinal Election Study (GLES) GLES Question Database Inside GLES Question Database Future Work
German Longitudinal Election Study National Election Study to enable analyses of changes of voters and voting behavior in longitudinal comparison Conducted by 5 principle investigators together with GESIS and the German Society for Electoral Studies (DGfW) Data collection in cross-section, short- and long-term longitudinal surveys Candidate survey, analysis of TV debates, and content analysis of media Using mixed methods like face to face, CATI, or web-survey 9 components connected by a core questionnaire Funded by DFG for 2009, 2013 und 2017 national elections Intended to be the basis of a long-running research programme GESIS works on data documentation and distribution, provides advice to users, makes data freely available, and archives it
GLES Components Pre-election and Post-election Cross-Section (CAPI) Rolling Cross-Section Campaign Survey (CATI 100 respondents per day) Short-term Campaign Panel (online) Campaign Media Content Analysis (online, 7 waves) TV Debate Analysis (experiment, 4 waves) Candidate Campaign Survey (Interviews with candidates, print and online) Long-term Panel (CAPI and mixed mode) Long-term Online Tracking (online, 4 waves per year) Long-term Media Agenda Analysis (content analysis of TV news and newspapers) Pre-election Online Tracking (separately funded) Multi Level Panel (EU and state elections - separately funded)
GLES Components Source: http://gles.eu/wordpress/english/design/
GLES Question Database Existing internal GLES database Manage questions over different instruments: modes and points in time Find differences in wording or answer categories See questions related to specific concepts Quickly access study level documentation
Question Search
Question Results
Questions with answer categories
Use facets to limit search results
Compare questions (or studies)
Question comparison
Study Search
Study search results
Select to compare
Compare studies
Open in Data Catalogue
Inside GLES QD DDI-L data model: STARDAT architecture Import studies from data catalogue DBK in DDI-L format Import questions from legacy database in Excel format
Manage Metadata
Import studies from DBK DDI-L
Import mapping from XLS
Import questions from XLS
Export DDI-L (study, …
… methodology, …
… and variables)
Future Work Improve Usability Apply GLES case to other collections Expand functionality Develop the STARDAT case Editing options Dataset documentation Report generation
Acknowledgements to the project members: http://gles.gesis.org/ Thank you! wolfgang.zenk-moeltgen@gesis.org Acknowledgements to the project members: Monika Linne, Philipp Schaer, Daniel Hienert, Claus-Peter Klas Johann Schaible, Alexander Mühlbauer