An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it's official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you're on a federal government site.

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Bureau of Labor Statistics > National Longitudinal Surveys > Home

NLSY79: Multiple Respondent Households

The NLSY sample design selected as respondents all individuals ages 14-21 who resided in 1978 in a surveyed household. As a result, the 12,686 civilian and military respondents interviewed in 1979 originated from 8,770 unique households; 2,862 households included multiple respondents. The relationship of each civilian youth respondent to other respondents originating from his/her household is identified within the NLSY documentation by a set of variables, e.g., 'Relationship to Youth of 1st through 6th Other Interviewed Youth in R's Household' (R1.50 - R1.61). The variable, 'Household Identification Number' (R1.49), links respondents to the households they occupied at the time of the 1979 interview.

The primary types of relationships that existed between respondents within multiple respondent households at the time the surveys began were those of sibling and spouse. Table 3 presents, for these two relationships, the numbers of respondents and family units available for analysis during the initial survey year and in 1992. As of the 1992 survey, 4,806 respondent members of a sibling pair were interviewed; 2,149 family units (of the 2,448 identified in 1979 as having one or more sibling pairs) had at least one member of the sibling pair interviewed.

Numbers of NLSY Civilian Respondent Pairs Interviewed in 1979 & 1992

                Respondent
                  Members            Family Units   
Type of Pair    1979    1992         1979   1992
Siblings    5863    4806         2448   2149
Two Siblings    3386    2744         1693   1572
Three Siblings  1725    1427          575   446
Four Siblings   604 519       151   116
Five Siblings   130  99        26    13
Six Siblings     18  17         3     2
Spouses         334 216       167   120

Last Modified Date: October 16, 2001