1. Linking to ATUS

2. What is ATUS? Time diary survey funded by BLS
Fielded annually since 2003
Respondents report
All of the activities they engage in starting at 4am yesterday and ending at 4am today
Where they were, who they were with, and whether they were engaged in childcare or eldercare at the same time
Samples individuals 15+
~12,000 people per year

3. Spans a 24-Hour Period START STOP ACTIVITY LOCATION WITH WHOM 4:00
6:00
Sleep
n/a
6:10
Personal Care
6:15
Dressing
Home
Alone
6:30
Eating Breakfast
Spouse
6:45
Driving to Train Station
Car
6:55
Waiting for the Train
Train Station
7:30
Taking the Train to Work
Train
10:00
Working
Work
11:00
Co-Workers
11:05
12:00
12:10
Walking to Restaurant for Lunch
Walking

4. Modules Like CPS supplements Eating and Health (2006-2008, 2014-2016)
Shopping/meal preparation variables, poverty, food program participation
Well-Being (2010, 2012, 2013)
Life satisfaction, momentary well-being
Employee Leave (2011)
Access to and use of paid/unpaid leave

5. Research Using Time Diaries
Gender division of paid and unpaid work
Parents’ time with children
Adolescent time use
Time with others (spouse, friends, etc)
Time spent in healthy/unhealthy behaviors
Differences in leisure time activities
Comparisons of time in various activities by demographic characteristics

6. How is ATUS related to CPS?
CPS is the sampling frame for ATUS
Individual respondents are drawn from households that have completed their participation in CPS
Only requirement is that they completed final CPS interview (MISH 8)
ATUS interview is conducted 2-5 months after final CPS interview

7. Why link these data?
CPS has lots of information about ATUS respondents and their household members
Spouse’s or parents’ employment, occupation, earnings, hours worked
The entire final basic CPS interview is available with the data

8. Why link these data?
With ATUS you get data from last month of participation in CPS
Augment ATUS with CPS supplement information
ASEC program participation, taxes, poverty, detailed income, self-reported health
Tobacco use supplement for a different health measure
Fertility supplement to tap into timing of women’s family formation

9. ATUS Linked to a Specific CPS Supplement
ATUS data are collected on an ongoing basis
This has implications for linking to CPS!
Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
June
July
Aug
Sep
Oct
Nov
Dec
2011
2012
Under no circumstances are all ATUS respondents from a given year able to be found in a particular month during the previous year. Lets work through an example.
ATUS data are collected all year
For 2012 ATUS respondents, CPS final interviews occurred between August 2011 and October THIS HAS IMPLICATIONS FOR LINKING.
You will never be able to link ALL ATUS respondents to a specific month. Here’s what I mean. Say we want to link to the 2012 ASEC. Only a subset of ATUS respondents in 2012 could have participated in the 2012 ASEC.
This also has implications for weighting. ATUS weights are for the entire sample. If only a subset of ATUS respondents is eligible to link to the ASEC and not all of them do (non-response, migration in), weights should be adjusted to deal with non-response.
Final CPS Interview
ASEC 2012
Final CPS Interview
Eligible to Link to 2012 ASEC
2012 ATUS Respondents

10. ATUS/CPS Linking Variables
Linking keys
ATUS-X name RENAME ATUS-X
HRHHID_CPS HRHHID
HRHHID2_CPS8 (2004+) HRHHID2
HRSERSUF_CPS8 (2003 & 2004) use to create HRHHID2
HRSAMPLE_CPS8 (2003 & 2004) use to create HRHHID2
HUHHNUM_CPS8 (2003 & 2004) use to create HRHHID2
LINENO_CPS PULINENO
See ATUS user’s guide for the mechanics
Other helpful variables Variables to check links
MONTH_CPS AGE_CPS8
YEAR_CPS SEX_CPS8
CASEID RACE_CPS8
LINENO

11. Enter CPSIDP! IPUMS makes both CPS and ATUS data available
CPSIDP is on both CPS and ATUS data files provided by IPUMS
Simple to merge ATUS and CPS data

12. Example: Link ATUS respondents to most recent CPS Volunteer Supplement (September 2002-2009)
CPS supplement data files
Decide whether you want to link to most recent (MIS 5-8) or earlier in the CPS rotation pattern (MIS 1-4)
Keep only respondents whose HRMONTH=9 & HRMIS>=5 & HRMIS<=8
Perform 1 to 1 merge with ATUS data file and each CPS file separately
Merge on CPSIDP
Each respondent should link to only one September data file with these restrictions
While selected ATUS respondents should be in this supplement, you won’t find them all because of movement into households and non-response
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
ATUS-X data file ( )

13. Back to Weights
IPUMS Time Use documentation on adjusting ATUS weights so that cases in linked file are representative
atusdata.org/atus/linked_docs/linked_generic.pdf
Alternative approach would be to adjust ATUS weights using IPF