abstract: 'The authors investigate the accuracy of young women''s retrospective

  reporting on their first substantial employment in three major,

  nationally representative U.S. surveys, examining hypotheses that longer

  recall duration, employment histories with lower salience and higher

  complexity, and an absence of ``anchoring{''''} biographical details will

  adversely affect reporting accuracy. The authors compare retrospective

  reports to benchmark panel survey estimates for the same cohorts.

  Sociodemographic groups-notably non-Hispanic white women and women with

  college-educated mothers-whose early employment histories at these ages

  are in aggregate more complex (multiple jobs) and lower in salience

  (more part-time jobs) are more likely to omit the occurrence of their

  first substantial job or employment and to misreport their first job or

  employment as occurring at an older age. Also, retrospective reports are

  skewed toward overreporting longer, therefore more salient, later jobs

  over shorter, earlier jobs. The relatively small magnitudes of

  differences, however, indicate that the retrospective questions

  nevertheless capture these summary indicators of first substantial

  employment reasonably accurately. Moreover, these differences are

  especially small for groups of women who are more likely to experience

  labor-market disadvantage and for women with early births.'
affiliation: 'Shattuck, RM (Corresponding Author), Univ Maryland, Maryland Populat
  Res Ctr, 2105 Morrill Hall, College Pk, MD 20742 USA.

  Shattuck, Rachel M., Univ Maryland, College Pk, MD 20742 USA.

  Rendall, Michael S., Univ Maryland, Sociol, College Pk, MD 20742 USA.

  Rendall, Michael S., Univ Maryland, Maryland Populat Res Ctr, 2105 Morrill Hall,
  College Pk, MD 20742 USA.'
author: Shattuck, Rachel M. and Rendall, Michael S.
author-email: rachel.m.shattuck@gmail.com
author_list:
- family: Shattuck
  given: Rachel M.
- family: Rendall
  given: Michael S.
booktitle: SOCIOLOGICAL METHODOLOGY, VOL 47
da: '2023-09-28'
doi: 10.1177/0081175017723397
editor: Alwin, DF
files: []
issn: 0081-1750
keywords: survey recall; life-course; first employment; retrospective reporting
keywords-plus: 'MEASUREMENT ERROR; PROGRAM PARTICIPATION; DATA QUALITY; UNEMPLOYMENT;

  PANEL; BIAS; RELIABILITY; RECALL; MEMORY; WORK'
language: English
number-of-cited-references: '50'
pages: 307-344
papis_id: 7dcb7d3f05cbf92da6433b117c449ccb
ref: Shattuck2017retrospectivereporti
series: Sociological Methodology
times-cited: '7'
title: RETROSPECTIVE REPORTING OF FIRST EMPLOYMENT IN THE LIFE-COURSES OF US WOMEN
type: Article; Book Chapter
unique-id: WOS:000432396600014
usage-count-last-180-days: '1'
usage-count-since-2013: '2'
volume: '47'
web-of-science-categories: Sociology
year: '2017'