Questionnaire Text

Questionnaire form view entire document:  text  image

Section A: Information for persons in the household -- ask of everyone
[Section A of this form, each question has 10 answer rows for writing individual answers for up to 10 individuals in the household. Only the first is shown here, which is exactly the same as the other nine.]


P-05. Marital status

_ What is (the person's) present marital status? Write only one code per person in the box. If both civil/religious and traditional marriage, indicate civil/religious.
1 = Married civil/religious
2 = Married traditional/customary
3 = Polygamous marriage
4 = Living together like married partners
5 = Never married
6 = Widower/widow
7 = Separated
8 = Divorced
If categories 5-8 go to (P-06).

Questionnaire instructions view entire document:  text  image

Question P-05 -- Marital status

"What is (the person's) PRESENT marital status?"

Only one code should be given. We are interested in the marital status on the census night.

If, for example, a widow remarried before the census night she is classified as married not widowed, but if she married after the census night she is classified as widowed. If however she was widowed, remarried and is now separated from her second husband, she is separated.

The number of times a person has been married is not captured.

Read out all the categories from the questionnaire.

The given classifications on marital status are sufficient, but sometimes you will have to probe. When a person is married you must ask how he or she is married (codes 1-3).

If a person married under both traditional/customary and civil law, civil takes precedence.

A man with more than one wife should indicate "polygamous" rather than civil or customary marriage. The wives indicate category 1 or 2, as they cannot have two husbands. More guidelines about how to treat polygamous households appear in Appendix 5.

[P. 38]

Couples who are not married to each other but live together as if they are married, belong to category 4. This category is for people who live in every respect as a married couple except that they have not undergone a marriage ceremony. Only male/female couples should indicate this category -- the census does not collect data on gay couples.

For children write 5 -- "Never married". If a person says "single" they must choose from categories 4-8.

Now we get our first "skip". People who are not married or living together as married, i.e. all those who fall under categories 5-8, do not need to answer the next question, which is P-05a, so they skip Question P-05a and go to P-06.


Rules for marital status in relation to polygamy:

A. Women cannot have multiple husbands, and women can never have marital status 3 (polygamous).

B. In a polygamous marriage, the man declares his marital status as 3 (polygamous): each of his wives declares her marital status as either 1 (civil/religious marriage) or 2 (traditional/customary marriage). Note that wives in polygamous marriages cannot have marital status 4 (living together).

C. In a non-polygamous marriage, each partner can have marital status of 1 (civil/religious marriage) or 2 (traditional/customary marriage) or 4 (living together).

D. If a man has multiple wives, his marital status must be 3 (polygamous).

E. Each of a polygamous man's wives should make her spouse number person point to the man, and the man's spouse person number should point to the first of his wives.

F. It is possible to have a polygamous man with no spouses or with a single spouse in the household.

In the situation where there is a compound ("kraal") consisting of several huts, each of which has its own separate cooking and eating areas, the people in each of these huts would be enumerated as separate households.

For example, a man lives in his compound with his 3 wives and his son 's family (total of 4 huts). There would be 4 households here to enumerate, and 4 questionnaires filled out. The hut where the husband stayed on census night would have a head (him, marital status 3) and a spouse (the wife from that hut, marital status 1 or 2), and spouse person numbers pointing to each other; each of the other 2 wives' huts would just have a head (the wife, marital status 1 or 2) with spouse person number = 99 (spouse not present in the household), and other occupants (children, etc). The son 's family would also be its own household.

None of these questionnaires should be linked (via barcode on the last page), since they are all separate households. Questionnaires linking /continuation only occurs when a single household has more than 10 people (or 20, or 30, etc.).

When a man lives with his wives in the same household and they share the same cooking/eating facilities, then they would all be enumerated as one household, with one questionnaire. The man would have marital status 3; his spouse person number would point to the first wife. Each wife would have marital status 1 or 2, and her spouse person number would point to the man.

This caters for polygamy while still adhering to the definition of a household, which is not based on financial support.