Life History Calendar is a new study in which we ask our Understanding Society participants to build a timeline of important events in their lives such as education, jobs, relationships and children.
Why are we asking you to complete the Life History Calendar?
By using your Life History Calendar, you’ll be building a detailed picture of the things that have happened in your life. The calendar will show important life events and transitions, like starting work, moving house, starting a new partner relationship, or having a child.
We are asking participants to fill in their calendar, so we can see where big life events happen and how they impact other parts of our lives. For example, how does having a child relate to moving house or changing jobs? Collecting detailed information on key life events will help enhance our understanding of these significant life transitions.
The study aims to get a detailed picture of Understanding Society participants’ biographies through building a visual calendar of important events and transitions that occurred in their lives.
I have already told you about these events in the annual survey. Why are you asking about these again?
Other research has shown that asking people to record their life in a visual way helps them remember more than they would if they complete a survey. Visual calendars help people relate different events to each other and see where there are gaps. For example, remembering about moving house might also bring up a memory about changing jobs, as both things happened at a similar time. Using a visual calendar stimulates our memory to think about different things, not just one thing.
In contrast to the survey, the Life History Calendar facilitates better recall accuracy by means of a graphical presentation of timelines with visual cues. This visual method has been proven to aid memory and collect more detailed, more accurate and more reliable life-history data than question lists because it allows respondents to relate events with each other, detect gaps and inconsistencies between events and timings.
What kind of information does the calendar collect?
We would like you to include information about central life events such as partnerships, children, employment, education and health. For each event, you will be asked to recall when it happened, and if applicable, how long it lasted and when it finished. We will be building a picture of your life, but it’s up to you how much you want to share with us.
How do I access the Life History Calendar?
To access the Life History Calendar, please click on the following link (or copy and paste the link in your browser):
To log in to your calendar, you will need to enter your unique login code and password which you will find in the letter/email we have sent you recently. After you’ve entered the details, press Login.
You will then be asked to enter your date of birth. This is so we can check that the right person is completing the calendar.
No. When you add other people’s names into the calendar you can use their real names, or you can use a nickname, first name only, or just initials – it’s up to you. The names you add to your calendar will never be shared with anyone else.
Can I keep my calendar?
Yes. Once you have completed your calendar you will be able to download it. The calendar will show your key life events in a timeline. Here’s an example:
How is the data collected from the calendar?
The calendar and the data collected is stored on a secure server at the Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER), University of Essex. All data is held within an infrastructure that is certified to the internationally agreed standard for Information Security (ISO27001: 2013).
Who can confirm compliance with GDPR?
A specific policy statement concerning support for and compliance with the Data Protection Act 2018, incorporating the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) can be found here.
The Economic and Social Research Council is the primary funder of the study
The Study is led by a team at the Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) at the University of Essex.
