Data on Surveys - Data Library Services

at the University of Manitoba Libraries

Introduction: The Libraries provides access to Public Use Microdata Files (PUMF), which contain anonymized responses to questionnaires from surveys. These surveys are used for secondary analysis. Knowledge of statistical software (i.e. SPSS and SAS) and statistical procedures is generally necessary in order to use this data. Most of the survey data comes from two sources: Statistics Canada and the International Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR). For these sources, the use of the survey data is restricted to current faculty, students and staff of the University of Manitoba for non-commercial purposes. There are also many other sources of survey data available. Some have restricted access, and some are freely accessible. See the Data Library Services web pages for more information

Table of Contents:
Statistics Canada survey data
The Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR)
Miscellaneous surveys
Accessing Data
Many surveys can now be analyzed online
Identifying survey data Citing format for surveys
Help, training and scholarships for the use of surveys

Statistics Canada Survey Data (Data Liberation Initiative):
(http://www.statcan.gc.ca/english/Dli/collection.htm)

• The Libraries provides access to Statistics Canada survey data through our subscription to the Data Liberation Initiative (DLI). The DLI allows us to access those surveys for which Statistics Canada produces a Public Use Microdata File (PUMF).
• The DLI Collection website provides information on available surveys, release dates, acronyms, etc. From this site, you can download a great deal of documentation, such as questionnaires, codebooks, user guides, etc., but not the data. Only the DLI contact (Data Librarian) is allowed to download the data from the Statistics Canada ftp server.
• The Statistics Canada catalogue can be searched to help identify surveys, or products based on surveys, that might be of interest.
• Exceptions: Most business surveys and most longitudinal surveys do not have a PUMF. Many longitudinal surveys are now available through the Data Research Centre at the downtown campus, but access to this data is much more restricted. Contact them for details.
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Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) (http://www.icpsr.umich.edu)

• The Libraries subscription to this organization provides access to nearly 100,000 data sets, from over 130 countries, covering a wide range of topics and subjects. To get a sense of the scope, look at the Special Topics Archive, which includes: child care, demographic, general social surveys, health, homicide, education, aging, criminal justice, substance abuse & mental health, etc.
• To identify appropriate surveys, the Data Access and Analysis section of the ICPSR website has a search form which allows users to search for a subject / keyword, or browse by subject, etc. This same section provides access to a list of "Other Methods of Finding Data," which includes a Social Sciences Variables database, ICPSR popular data and the Bibliography of Data Related Literature may help to identify appropriate surveys.
• Before using data from this site, you may want to look at the Data Use Tutorial.
• ICPSR Direct allows qualified users (current faculty, students and staff of the University of Manitoba, upon registration) to download data directly from the ICPSR site.
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Miscellaneous Surveys:

• Canadian Election Surveys: 1965-2008 / Queens University. SPSS zipped format. Public.
• Equality, Security and Community (ESC Survey) / Institute for Social Research. York University. SPSS format. Public.
• Joint Canada/United States Survey of Health (JCUSH) /Statistics Canada and the National Center for Health Statistics (U.S.). SPSS format. Public.
• Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) / Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). SAS, SPSS or txt formats. Public.
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• Equinox provides access to many Statistis Canada surveys. You can request specific variables from avaible surveys, or you can request all variables. It loads the data onto a site, then sends you an email to with a password necessary to access this site.
• ICPSR Direct allows qualified users (current faculty, students and staff of the University of Manitoba, upon registration) to download data directly from the ICPSR site.
• Online - data files can be downloaded from the campus ftp server. This requires that you have a current Unix account, knowledge of ftp procedures, and knowledge of SAS or SPSS syntax files.
• CD-ROMs - a few surveys have been released on cd-rom, but they generally require much work with the syntax files, and often the data is revised after the release of the cd-rom.
• Data Library Services - time permitting, we can download and write survey data to a cd-rom, for qualified users. If requested the data can be imported into SPSS format.
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Analyzing Survey Data. Many Surveys Can Now be Analyzed Online:

• ICPSR Data Analysis has now loaded over 200 surveys in SDA format. Restricted access.
• Statistics Canada Census Microdata files. can be accessed through the Canadian Census Analyser, at the Univeristy of Toronto, in SDA format. Restricted access.
• World Values Survey / World Values Survey Organization (1981-1990-1995). Public access.
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• Statistics Canada’s Online Catalogue of Products and Services Often, the abstract of a publication will identify the name of the survey upon which the article is based.
• The Data Access and Analysis section of the ICPSR website has a search form which allows users to search for a subject / keyword, or browse by subject, etc. This same section provides access to a list of "Other Methods of Finding Data," which includes a Social Sciences Variables database, ICPSR popular data and the Bibliography of Data Related Literature may help to identify appropriate surveys.
• The University of Toronto Data Library provides information about surveys. Their Major Collections webpage links to pages of data by broad subjects, such as: crime, education, election, ethnicity, income, health, etc. They also have keyword search page.
• Queens University Social Science Data Centre has a search page that allows users to search for keywords in the title of surveys, or in the questionnaires. Queens also has a Surveys by subject page which lists surveys by broad subjects, such as: crime, drugs, economics, education, etc.
• Canadian Health Surveys 1950-1997 /Ora Kendall, Tammy Lipskie & Shauna MacEachern. Chronic Diseases in Canada v.18, no.2 1997.

Searching for survey data, examples:

Example 1: Let’s say that you have a broad subject area, “Canadian Elections surveys”:

• The Canadian Election Study website provides access to the data and documentation for the 1997, 2000 and 2004 federal elections, in SPSS format.
• The Institute for Social Research website provides access to the data and documentation for the 1984 through 2000 federal elections, in SPSS format.
• The ICPSR archives the Canadian Elections surveys, back to 1965. To locate the files, go to the “Data Access and Analysis page, and search for “Canadian elections.” To download from this site, you must register, which is free if you are a faculty, student or staff of the University of Manitoba, because the Libraries subscribes to this archive.
• Alternatively, you may contact Data Library Services to arrange access to these surveys.
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• The Statistics Canada Online catalogue searched for keyword “victimization” yields many results, but most of these are relating to the General Social Surveys 18 (2004), and 13 (1999).
• Going to the University of Toronto Data Library Major Collections web site and proceeding to the General Social Surveys page, you will see that Survey 13, 1999, deals with victimization. You can access all the documentation from this site, to see the exact questions, frequencies, etc. You should notice as well that the subject of the General Social Surveys is repeated every five years, so survey 3, 1988, and survey 8, 1993, deal with personal risk, as does the 1993 Violence Against Women survey. GSS 18, 2004, Victimization, is expected to be released in late 2005.
• To find the documentation on the Violence Against Women survey, go to the University of Toronto Data Library Inventory of Holdings, enter “violence and women”, and Submit Query. This survey will be the first on the results. Click on “Full” to get a listing of online documentation for this survey.
• Contact Data Library Services to arrange access to this survey
• Let’s say that you decide to compare your findings to data from outside Canada:
• If you find that you would like to look at foreign surveys dealing with victimization, go to the ICPSR Proceed to Data Access and Analysis, enter the word “victimization” and click on the Search button. You will get several hundred results.
• 3995 National Crime Victimization Survey, 1992-2003, can be downloaded or you may do online analysis, look at related literature, etc. Go a bit further down the list, and you will see 3803 International Crime Victimization Survey (ICVS), 1989-2000.
• To download the data or do online analysis, you must register, which is free if you are a faculty, student or staff of the University of Manitoba, because the Libraries subscribes to this archive.
• Alternatively, you may contact Data Library Services to arrange access to these surveys.
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• Looking for a very specific topic, one place to start would be Queens University’s Social Science Data Centre, because they have a keyword search tool, which allows users to search for words in questions from surveys. Go to this site at enter “gambling” into the “Keyword(s) from Question Text” box, and then click on the “Submit Query” button. Doing so yields three results:
  -cads94 … “Last twelve months: other form of gambling”…
  -cads94 … “Past 12 months: participated in gambling not mentioned …
  - hius00 … HHLD typical month - Gambling...
  Two questions are from the 1994 Canadian Alcohol and Drugs Survey, and one is from the 2000 Household Internet Use Survey. You might want to find something more current, so try another site.
• Statistics Canada’s Online Catalogue can be used to search all their products and services. Entering “gambling” into this search form yields 22 results. One of these is “Against the odds: a profile of at-risk and problem gamblers” which is an article from Canadian Social Trends (Summer 2004, no.73). The abstract from this article indicates that “It uses data from the Canadian Community Health Survey (Mental Health and Well-being).” Now that we have identified a survey of interest, we can look for more information on this survey.
• The University of Toronto Data Library Service Major Collections site is very useful for accessing documentation about surveys. Click on “Health data”, where you will find a link to the Canadian Community Health Survey. Looking at wave, 1.2 (which deals with Mental Health and Well-being), click on the Data Dictionary and frequencies link to open a 922 page listing of individual variables and corresponding frequencies. Click on the Acrobat Search icon to search this document, and you should get 34 references to “gambling”, starting on page 543 through 559. Look at the other documentation, such as the questionnaire, to get the exact questions asked. You may also want to look at other variables within this dataset for possible cross-tabulations of interest (i.e. age, gender, income, etc.)
• Contact Data Library Services to access this survey.
• Let’s say that you decide to compare your findings to data outside Canada:
• A good place to start is the ICPSR. Proceed to “Data Access and Analysis”, and search for “gambling” to get 52 results. One of these, 2778 Gambling Impact and Behavior Study 1997-1999 [United States] looks intriguing. You can get a description, download, do online analysis, or look at related literature. When you start to look at this survey, you will find that it deals with gambling behavior (type of gambling), family/marital status, financial information, criminal activities, substance abuse, etc
• To download the data or do online analysis, you must register, which is free if you are a faculty, student or staff of the University of Manitoba, because the Libraries subscribes to this archive.
• Alternatively, you may contact Data Library Services to arrange access to this survey.
• Return to Table of Contents