E - Fertility characteristics
(For all women ages 15 and older)
[Questions 20 to 23 were asked of women age 15+ years old]

22. What was the date of birth of your last child (born alive)?

E. Fertility characteristics (for all females aged 15 and older)

The purpose of question 20-23 is to obtain information allowing research on fertility and relevant characteristics related to population growth. They are also designed to obtain information about the level of and past trends in mortality rates in the population of Guatemala.

To investigate such important questions requires you to be sensitive and extremely clever during the interview.

Ask question 20-23 of all females aged 15 years or older, regardless of their civil status.

[p. 82]

If possible, ask these questions of the girls and women directly. They may sometimes forget to declare live-born children who died, and those who are still alive. Keep this in mind to avoid any omissions.

Important: It has been noted that some enumerators assume that unmarried women do not have children and thus they do not ask them the pertinent questions. This approach is incorrect and results in poor-quality data that cannot be used to study population growth.

Question 22: what was the date of birth of your last live-born child?
Ask this question of all females aged 15 years or older regardless of their civil status.

[p. 84]

1. How to ask the question:
Ask, "What was the date of birth of your last live-born child?"

2. How to record the answer:
For girls and women who have had one or more live-born children, write the day, month, and year of birth of the last-born child.

For girls and women who have not had "live-born" children, mark an "X" in box 0, "has not had children."

If the respondent does not know the date of birth of the last live-born child, do everything you can to obtain at least the month and year of birth. As a last resort, if you cannot get the month, try to obtain the year of birth.

If the respondent does not know even the year of the birth of the last live-born child, mark an "X" in the space next to the word "year."

3. Example:
[This box contains question 22 of the section VI, "people in the census household."]