Saengtienchai, Chanpen
. “Archiving Qualitative Data on Aging: Experiences of the University of Michigan Data Archives.” Elderly in Asia Report No. 97-45. September 1997.
The present paper describes general problems facing the archiving of qualitative data and the experience with developing a specific archive at the Population Studies Center of the University of Michigan. The Population Studies Center Focus group Archive is believed to be one of the first of its kind. It is a product of the project “Rapid Demographic Change and the Welfare of the Elderly”. Data in the archive consist of transcripts of focus group discussions held in 4 countries in Asia: Taiwan, Singapore, Philippines and Thailand. The focus groups were part of a comparative study of the elderly in Asia and were held with elderly participants and with adults who had an elderly parent in each of the collaborating countries. The guidelines encompassed a large number of topics relevant to the welfare of the elderly including living arrangement, support exchanges with children/kin, social contact with kin, economic situation, and health status.