Questionnaire Text

Questionnaire form view entire document: text image

05. Age
How old is [respondent]?

Write age in completed years.
If under one year, write "00".
More than 97 years, write "97".
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Questionnaire instructions view entire document: text image

B. Questions for all the people
This part involves all people who slept in the household the night before census day. The questions in this part are also found in the short questionnaire.
The questions in this part must be asked to every person following the order set. You must follow the flow of questions as arranged and read the question as written in the questionnaire. For more explanation, refer explanations in part 3.7 (how to ask questions).
Part "B" of the questionnaire contains the following questions:

Question 5: How old are you/they?
Write and shade the exact age of every person, meaning the age she/he arrived at his/her last birthday. If the members of household do not know his/her age, try to ask him/her more about the month and year she/he was born. This will prevent the respondent from saying the easy numbers like 25, 30, 45, etc. instead of 24, 26, 29, 31, 44, 46, etc. For children under one year old, write "00" and shade codes "0" and "0".
It is important to get the exact age of every person. If the exact age is not known, it will be necessary to estimate the age of that person. To get good estimates, several information known are to be used. For example, children who cannot walk yet are usually below one year, children who are starting to lose their milk teeth are usually of 6 years, puberty age starts from 13 to 16 years for boy and 12 to 15 for girls.
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To help you get close estimates, use major national and district events calendar given. For children under the age of 5, usually they have clinic cards which will help to know their age if unknown.
Remember that there are people who provide false information or estimate of their age. If such a situation arises, use the guidelines above to get the information which will help you estimate the age of this person. This is because age is very important statistic about people.
Don't estimate someone's age based on appearance. A person may look younger or older depending on the lifestyle and living standards. If the living conditions are poor, this person will look older though he/she is not. By all means, try to get correct answers or acceptable ones, meaning they match the information given by the person.
For example, if a woman of 65 years tells you she had a child two years ago or a woman of 22 years old says she has a child of 15 years the information is not true as it is not acceptable biologically. In this case, you must look at the woman's age again and interview her more to get information that will help you know the correct age.
Note: A child younger than 1 year is filled in using "00" and shading in the appropriate space provided, and a person age 97 and older will be filled in using "97" and shading in the space provided.
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Answers about age must be written in two digits. For example, for a child under one year write code "00" then shade digits "0" and "0". For a child of one year write code "01" and shade digits "0" and "1". For a person of 97 years and above write code "97" and shade digits "9" and "7".