Behavioural Surveillance Surveys - The Wisdom of Whores

Section 1: Background characteristics
The questionnaire begins by asking background
questions that help to establish rapport
between the interviewer and the respondent.
Q101. Do not ask this question. Circle the
appropriate code indicating the respondent’s
sex. This question will not appear in a
questionnaire designed for a target group such
as female sex workers since the entire sample
is the same gender.
Q102 and Q103 are included to obtain the
best estimate of the respondent’s age. If the
respondent does not know his/her age or
his/her birthday, probe using one or more of
the following techniques:
• ask the respondent if he/she has any
written records which might include a year
of birth,
• ask the respondent if anyone else around
would know his/her age,
• if the respondent has a child/children, ask
if he/she knows his/her approximate age
at the birth of the child. Then, ask for the
child’s age. Calculate the respondent’s age
by adding the child’s age to the
respondent’s age at birth of the child.
If none of the above techniques succeed,
ask the respondent to estimate his/her age.
Q104, Q105, Q106 are all included to
assess level of education/literacy. The most
desirable information is the number of
completed years of education, however, many
people cannot say immediately how many
years of school they have finished. Most
people who have been to school can say
which level or year they finished, but this
information has little meaning outside the
country and the categorical data cannot be
averaged. When reporting characteristics
of the sample, the analyst wants to be able
to provide the average years of education
completed by the entire sample. Thus, the
report might say, “The males in this sample
averaged 8.2 years of schooling while the
females averaged 4.9 years.” You will first
ask if the respondent has ever attended school
(Q104). If yes, you next ask for the highest
level of school completed (Q105). Finally,
you ask for the total number of years of
education completed up to now. You may
have to calculate the number of years with the
respondent’s help. If the respondent never
attended school, you skip to Q107.
Q107, Q108. The purpose of these two
questions is to find out something about
migration patterns in terms of length of time in
the area and travel out of the area. Insert into
question 107 the name of the village, town,
city, or neighborhood in which the interview
is taking place. If the respondent has lived in
the locale of the interview for less than one
year (12 months), write in 00 in the space
provided. In 108, the one-month period refers
to a continuous period of one or more
months. This means that a respondent who
has spent one week away in, for example,
January, two weeks away in March and one
more week away in August has NOT been
away for a continuous period of one month
during the previous 12 months. Note also that
the reference period is “the last or previous 12
months” and not the last calendar year. In
some settings, survey staff may be interested
in more detailed information on migration.
For instance, identifying cities to which
respondents travel, differentiation between
the capital city and other cities, identifying
international migration, etc. These kinds of
additional questions might be added if the
survey team thinks they would be appropriate
for the particular target group in question.
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A PPEN DI X 2 B EHAV I OR A L SURV EI L L A NC E S U R V EY S