FIELD NOTES ON ADMINISTERING SHOCK MODULES

摘要

Increasingly panel household questionnaires in developing countries will include a shock module to collect information on past shocks experienced by the household. Still, very little information is available on what one needs to take into consideration when designing these modules. This note discusses field experiences gained from piloting a shock module in the Kagera Region of Tanzania. Pilots were conducted with two fundamentally different designs of shock modules. We discuss the advantages and disadvantages of using a structural form shock module, which walks the respondent through a list of shocks, and compare it to using a reduced form one, which probes for welfare changes over time.