@article{33506,
  author = {William Axinn and Arland Thornton and Li-Shou Yang and Yu Xie},
  title = {Mother{\textquoteright}s Reports of Children{\textquoteright}s Family Formation Behavior},
  abstract = {<p>In this article we explore methods for using mothers{\textquoteright} interviews to gather data on their\&nbsp;children{\textquoteright}s family formation experiences. These methods constitute a cost-efficient means\&nbsp;of gathering data for models of family background that include both intergenerational and\&nbsp;sibling influences. To judge the utility of these methods, we examine the quality of<br />
mothers{\textquoteright} reports across a range of their children{\textquoteright}s family formation behaviors. The\&nbsp;dimensions of reporting quality we analyze include completeness, precision, and accuracy\&nbsp;of mothers{\textquoteright} reports. We use unique data from personal interviews with mother{\textendash} child pairs\&nbsp;to test the accuracy of these mothers{\textquoteright} reports. The results demonstrate that, with some<br />
behaviors, a flexible data collection approach can gather complete, precise, and accurate\&nbsp;information on an entire sibling set by interviewing mothers. Our examination of data\&nbsp;quality also suggests important limits on the use of this approach. The quality of mothers{\textquoteright}\&nbsp;reports depends on the subject matter, with mothers providing lower quality reports of<br />
their children{\textquoteright}s cohabitation behavior compared to their children{\textquoteright}s marital, childbearing,\&nbsp;and divorce behavior.</p>
},
  year = {2002},
  journal = {Social Science Research},
  volume = {31},
  pages = {257-283},
  language = {eng},
}