Background
In developed countries, longitudinal studies have provided a great deal of in formation, enabling researchers and policy makers to determine the degree to which various factors affect opportunities for personal and community development over a person’s lifetime. For example, research has demonstrated the importance of factors such as birth weight, the mother’s health, nutrition, housing, pre-school education and work history in individual and community development. Such studies have not been done often in developing countries for various reasons, including institutional capacity.
Many of the topics on which the Children of the Millennium study will focus are consistent with the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (
www.un.org/millenniumgoals). Besides providing information and contributing to the development of policies to benefit children, the project will help build professional and institutional capacity in the countries where we work, which will be useful for future applied empirical research, especially longitudinal studies.
Study design
The study was initially designed to be done mainly through surveys of the children, their parents and representatives of their communities. The first round of questionnaires was done in 2002 with the two cohorts of participating children. In 2006 and 2007, the second round of questionnaires was done with the same children who were surveyed in 2002. The original sample was selected at random in 20 localities in 14 regions of Peru, but the need to follow up with the children wherever they moved resulted in a considerable expansion of the number of localities and regions included in the second survey. Based on comparison with other national samples that are known to be representative, it is estimated that the Children of the Millennium sample represents 95 percent of children (excluding the wealthiest 5 percent). The loss rate in the second round was 3.5 percent of the children who were interviewed in the first round. The third round of surveys is scheduled for mid-2009.
The topics to be included in the questionnaires were defined after a systematic and detailed review of the international literature on poverty and child development. Key information gathered by the questionnaires includes demographic, socioeconomic and cultural characteristics of the families, including the size of the family, native language and educational level of family members; public services available in the home; income and expenses; availability of assets and social capital; strategies for dealing with adversity, such as redistribution of spending within the family; access to, use of and quality of public and private services such as health, education and social protection and anti-poverty programs; and perceptions of the psychosocial well-being of the individual and the family. The study also gathered anthropometric data (height and weight) for the children, as well as indicators of their cognitive development and school performance.
The qualitative component of the study began formally in 2007, focusing on the transitions experienced by the children (for example, starting school or becoming involved in child labor); how the children and others around them view their well-being, especially in relation to whether they feel safe or at risk and their sense of self-worth; and access to, use of and quality of public and private services and programs that affect the children’s welfare and the transitions they experience. The study focuses on the children and promotes their active participation in the research. This has included gathering data from a subset of the participating children through various means, including in-depth interviews, focus groups and various participatory activities. Researchers worked with these children in 2007 and expect to do so again in 2008, making the study’s qualitative and quantitative components longitudinal
For both the quantitative and qualitative information, strict and detailed protocols have been developed for data gathering, entry, cleanup and storage to facilitate the use of this information in various types of analysis (for example, manuals have been developed for training interviewers, the consistency of the responses was reviewed before data entry, and data from a sample of questionnaires was entered twice to verify the quality of data entry). All of the instruments used were subjected to strict controls to ensure equivalency among countries, and they were pilot tested locally before being finalized so as to ensure maximum validity. All interviewers in both the qualitative and quantitative studies underwent extensive training to ensure that the protocol for administering the surveys was followed correctly. Where appropriate, the surveys were done in an indigenous language; all others were done in Spanish. Data processing and analysis were done with various programs, including MS Access for data entry; Epi-Info, SPSS and STATA for quantitative analysis; and Atlas.ti for qualitative analysis.
While the study’s qualitative component is new, previous studies also took a qualitative approach or combined qualitative and quantitative methods.
The project also includes studies for monitoring and analysis of social policies benefiting children, to provide a more complete overview of national, regional and local commitments to children; policy implementation; budget allocations and whether they benefit children as expected; whether the children, their parents or guardians and the community have access to services; and how these services could be improved. Analysis of social policies is combined with the results of the qualitative, quantitative and mixed studies for a better understanding of the impact of policies on children’s development.
Research, communication and advocacy on policies and programs
One main objective of the project is to disseminate the principal results of the Children of the Millennium studies to various audiences, including researchers and students in the research areas, as well as individuals and organizations involved in decisions involving the design, evaluation or review of public policy on children’s issues. Communications and advocacy strategies have been designed for each target group. These activities and outputs include news releases, working documents and bulletins, traveling photo exhibits, video documentaries, meetings with key stakeholders and this Web portal. These activities and materials are meant to establish collaborative relationships with key stakeholders for the development of social policies. This participation should eventually lead these stakeholders to actions or initiatives benefiting children, which should in turn suggest topics for further research, so that the cycle of research, communication of results and policy development begins again.
This component includes the coordination of policy studies, especially the monitoring of policies for children (including budgets), and the implementation of policies benefiting children (evaluating the use of research in these policies). This component also includes reciprocity with communities and individuals who participate in the research, by providing feedback about the results to individuals and reports on the research to the appropriate local authorities.
In the medium term, these activities will enable us to establish a community of researchers and decision makers on children’s policy who will meet periodically to discuss empirical studies and explore their policy implications. This will build bridges between individuals and institutions that will ultimately result in greater knowledge and better policies. This work follows international trends that encourage the development of social policies based on empirical evidence.
Ethic
The design and procedures of the Children of the Millennium study have been approved by two ethics committees: the Oxford University Ethics Committee (CUREC) and the Ethics Committee of the Nutritional Research Institute; and the survey was formally authorized by the Peruvian government through the Ministry of Health.
No field survey is done without written consent of the parents and/or the children themselves. No conditions are placed on the participation of the children or their family members, and nothing is asked in exchange. Families and community authorities are free to decide whether or not to respond to the questionnaire.
All videos, photographs and audio recordings of testimonials of children and adults that appear in the project materials have been authorized in writing by those involved after being informed of the likely use of those materials.
Questionnaires and Access to Niños del Milenio data
