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Datasets: The National Child Development Survey (NCDS)

The origins of the NCDS lie with the Perinatal Mortality Survey, which was sponsored by the National Birthday Trust Fund and which aimed to discover the social and obstetric factors associated with child mortality; NCDS was the second in a series of 4 such studies. Since its creation in 1958, the NCDS has become a continuing, multi-disciplinary longitudinal study. The NCDS originally gathered information from all the babies born (roughly 17,500) in one week in March. Subsequent cohorts were carried out when its members were aged 7, 11, 16, 23, 33, 42 and 46. The next survey will take place in 2008, when the cohort members reach the age of 50.  Information topics include family circumstances and health during the childhood era, and employment and housing throughout adulthood. To access the data, visit the following webpage at the UK data archive:

http://www.data-archive.ac.uk/orderingdata/downloadOrder.asp