Recently, the Global MICS Team met in New York for the 11th Global MICS Consultation, held in September immediately following the UNICEF Data for Children Forum. This latest consultation was almost entirely dedicated to discussing the next generation of the standard MICS questionnaires. A number of new modules and refinements to the existing modules were agreed upon as a result of discussions over two days. Changes to questionnaires and protocols considered at present include new areas of work such as Child Functioning and Disability, Victimization, Learning Assessment and Water Quality Testing, as well as refinements to several modules, including the Maternal and Newborn Health and the HIV/AIDS modules.
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Many of these changes will be field-tested in Belize in late November. The test will be hosted and implemented by the Statistical Institute of Belize (SIB) in collaboration with the Global MICS Team and the UNICEF Belize country office. Belize is ideal for the field test as the implementing partner, SIB, has experience with two previous rounds of MICS, and is currently implementing their national MICS5 survey. Fieldworkers of the national MICS will be used as interviewers for the MICS field test – which will ensure that the field test will be conducted by well-trained interviewers with fieldwork experience.
Quantitative and qualitative techniques will be used during the field test to examine how a number of new modules and refinements to existing modules perform in the MICS framework. Quantitative data will be collected for two different versions of the questionnaires, by utilizing a split-sample design that will allow the comparison of results generated by alternative versions of selected modules. Additional qualitative data, collected through cognitive interviewing and other techniques, will be used to examine the validity of various questions in the questionnaires, as well as to understand how respondents conceptualize specific terms, topics and questions.
Data and results will be analyzed in January of 2016, with results released in the first quarter of the year through the MICS methodological paper series.