Section III: Detailed particulars of household members
18. Age
What is [person]'s age? Enter in completed years. If [person]'s age is less than one year, enter 00 in the column.
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Section 3: Particulars of household members
Before collecting information about household members, the definition of head of household and usual household member should be well appreciated. Therefore, the concept of household given in section 2 of chapter two should be appropriately understood.
A. Usual member of a household
A person is said to be a usual member of the household if he/she lives at least six months of the year continuously with the household. In addition, a person is considered to be a usual member of the household if he/she has the intention to live with the household forever even though he/she lived with the household less than six months. Persons who left their household temporarily for less than six months are considered as usual member of their households. However, persons are not considered as usual members of the household if they left their households for six months or more, or who left their households for less than six months but have the intention to leave for more than six months.
The following members of the household are considered usual household members:
a. All persons who lived with the household for at least six month during the census year.
b. All persons who have the intention to stay with the household for six months or more even though they stayed with the household for less than six months. For example, if a woman married a man and went to live in her husband's home during the census year, she is considered as a usual member of her husband's household even if she has lived in her husband's home for less than six months. Similarly, if a person got a job and went to live with another household forever, he is considered as the usual member of this new household where he is found during the census even if he has been living with this new household for less than six months.
c. House maids who usually stay the nights with the household and who do not have another residence.
d. Persons who left the household temporarily for less than six months. For example, persons who are on annual leave, persons who went to another place for holiday, inpatient persons, persons who went to visit relatives and persons who went to other places for business.
e. All persons who do not have permanent residence and who live with the household during the census. For example, if individuals do not have permanent residence but they live in various houses, they are considered to be usual member of the house hold where they are found on the enumeration day.
f. Students. Students who left their households, relatives or usual place of residence to attend school in regular schools, colleges, universities, etc. should be counted in the place where they are attending school. During the enumeration, if the students went back to their households or relatives due to a school break, they should be enumerated as usual members of their households. Students who are attending school by hiring service houses or who live with relatives away from their usual households, they should be enumerated in the area where they actually live during the census even though they commute weekly or monthly to bring their ration or to visit their households. However, students who commute daily to attend school are considered usual members of their households.
Orphanages, boarding school students, inmates of correctional facilities and other collective quarters
An inmate of an orphanage, boarding school (including universities and colleges which have lodging facilities), correctional facility or other collective quarters (e.g. homes for the elderly, monasteries, etc.) should be enumerated as a member of the collective quarters during the census. However, persons who are temporarily detained in a police station or in another temporary prison facility should be counted as usual members of their households regardless of the length of stay in these places.
B. Visitors
A visitor is any relative or non-relative person who is not a usual member of the household but spent the census night in the household.
C. Head of household
A head of household is a person who is a usual member (male or female) in the household acknowledged as head by the other members. If a man has two or more wives who live in separate households, he will be enumerated as head of the household with his oldest living wife (first married) if he is recognized as head. Other wives will be enumerated with their households as head or member of the households.
Column 13: Serial number of members of the household and visitors
The questionnaire has space to list up to ten members of a household. If the number of the members of the household is greater than ten, it is necessary to use an additional questionnaire. In this situation, the serial numbers given in column 13 (01-10) are corrected as 11, 12, 13, etc. until all members and visitors are listed.
Column 18: What is (name's) age in years?
The correct age in completed years of each member of the household during the enumeration should be recorded in the boxes provided in this question. Age in completed years means recording the completed years by ignoring the months and days after the completed years. For example, if the age of a person is 15 years, 11 months and 29 days, only "15" should be recorded. If the age of an infant is less than one year, code 00 should be recorded in this column, and if the age of a person is 97 years or older, code "97" should be recorded in the space provided under this column.
Expect to meet persons who do not know their age exactly or who are not willing to tell their age. In this case, great effort should be made to determine the exact age of each member of the household if it is possible. Techniques for determining age are given below.
Probing age by mentioning historical events
It may be necessary to estimate the age of a person by asking the respondent if there was a national or local historical event that occurred when the person was born or by asking the respondent the age of the person when the event occurred or by asking the respondent how long before the person was born did the event occur. For example, if the age of a person was 10 during the eruption of the Ethiopian revolution in 1974, the age of the person in 1994 is almost 30 years (1994 ? 1974 +10 = 30) and this number should be recorded in the given boxes. Therefore, it is possible to estimate the age of a person by relating the year in which the person was born with the year the historical event occurred. A list of the years in which the main historical events occurred is attached in appendix 1.
Computing age based on members who know their ages
Some of the members of the household or neighbors may know their ages. In this case, it is possible to estimate the age of a person based on the ages of the persons who do
It may be possible to estimate the ages of the members of the household if the exact age of a person among the members is known. For example, if the age of the first child of a household is known to be 13 years, it is possible to estimate the age of his mother to be at least 31 years. This estimation is based on the expectation that mothers usually give birth to their first baby at the age of 18 and the age of the mother can be estimated as 18+13 = 31 years. It may be possible to estimate the ages of the persons who are relatives by comparing the age of one person to others. For example, mothers give birth to their children usually in two year intervals. The age of an older child may be 9 years if the age of the younger child is exactly 7 years. Sometimes older people exaggerate their ages. The ages of these people can be estimated by considering the ages of their first child and their grandchildren. Therefore, as far as it is possible, appropriately estimate the age of the member and record the age if the exact age of one member of the household is known. In addition to this, it is possible to estimate the age of a member of the household if he/she knows the age at marriage and the number of years after marriage up to the time of the census.
Some people want to tell their ages in ending 0 or 5. Even though the respondent may tell the ages ending in these digits, enumerators should make great effort to determine the exact ages of the members by using the above probing techniques. The exact ages of some people may of course be 10, 15, 20, 25, etc.
Parents may easily remember the exact ages of their babies and children under age 10 and these ages should be appropriately recorded in completed years. Sometimes it is not possible to determine the ages of infants easily, and in this case great effort should be made to estimate the appropriate age by applying the above probing techniques
Using the appropriate probing techniques, the age in completed years of each member of the household should be recorded in the space provided in column 18.
Remark: It is necessary to mention the name of each member of the household when it is indicated in the question wording. For example, for a member of the household named Bekelech, the question "What is name's age in years?" should be asked as "What is Bekelech's age in years?"