DOI: 10.5255/ukda-sn-5537-1
title: 1970 British Cohort Study County Data, 1986-2012: Special Licence Access
title: 1970 British Cohort Study: Special Licence Access
title: BCS70

description: &lt;i&gt;BCS70 County Data, 1986-2012: Special Licence Access&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br&gt; This dataset contains geographic county data from the BCS70 follow-up surveys conducted between 1986-2012, which are held under SNs 3535, 3833, 5558, 5585, 6557 and 7473. &lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; These geographic county data are only available under a Special Licence, which has more restrictive access conditions than the standard End User Licence (EUL) used for the main BCS70 datasets (see 'Access' section below). Please contact the HelpDesk for further details. Users who make a successful application for the county data will also need to download the main EUL BCS70 datasets listed above to match the counties to them. &lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; For the third edition (June 2016) a small number of primary identifiers (BCSID) have been changed to realign them to previous sweeps of data. See the documentation for full details of the work done. Data coverage has also been extended to 2012.&lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; &lt;i&gt;Background&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br&gt; The &lt;i&gt;1970 British Cohort Study&lt;/i&gt; (BCS70) began in 1970 when data were collected about the births and families of babies born in the United Kingdom in one particular week in 1970. The first wave, called the &lt;i&gt;British Births Survey&lt;/i&gt;, was carried out by the National Birthday Trust Fund in association with the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. Its aims were to examine the social and biological characteristics of the mother in relation to neonatal morbidity, and to compare the results with those of the &lt;i&gt;National Child Development Study&lt;/i&gt; (NCDS), which commenced in 1958 (held separately at the UK Data Archive under GN 33004). Participants from Northern Ireland, who had been included in the birth survey, were dropped from the study in all subsequent sweeps, which only included respondents from Great Britain.&lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; Since BCS70 began, there have been seven full data collection exercises in order to monitor the cohort members' health, education, social and economic circumstances. These took place when respondents were aged 5, in 1975 (held under SN 2699), aged 10, in 1980 (SN 3723), aged 16, in 1986 (SN 3535), aged 26, in 1996 (SN 3833), aged 30, 1999-2000 (SN 5558), and aged 34, in 2004-2005 (SN 5585). The first two sweeps (at 5 and 10 years) were carried out by the Department of Child Health at Bristol University. During these times, the survey was known as the &lt;i&gt;Child Health and Education Study&lt;/i&gt; (CHES). The 16-year survey was carried out by the International Centre for Child Studies and named &lt;i&gt;Youthscan&lt;/i&gt;. A supplementary survey of head teachers (held separately under SN 5225) was also conducted at the time of the 16-year follow-up in 1986. The Social Statistics Research Unit (SSRU) became involved with the BCS70 study at this time, and eventually changed its name to the Centre for Longitudinal Studies (CLS), based at the Institute of Education, University of London. As well as BCS70, the CLS now also conducts the NCDS series. &lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; With each successive attempt, the scope of BCS70 has broadened from a strictly medical focus at birth, to encompass physical and educational development at the age of 5, physical, educational and social development at the ages of 10 and 16, and physical, educational, social and economic development at 26 years and beyond.&lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; &lt;i&gt;Response and Deaths datasets:&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br&gt; A separate dataset covering response to BCS70 over waves is available under SN 5641, &lt;i&gt;1970 British Cohort Study Response Dataset, 1970-2012&lt;/i&gt;. There is also as separated dataset covering deaths of cohort members available under SN 8006, &lt;I&gt;1970 British Cohort Study Deaths Dataset, 1970-2014: Special Licence Access&lt;/I&gt;. Users are advised to order these studies alongside the other waves of BCS70.&lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; &lt;i&gt;Sub-sample surveys&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br&gt; In addition to the full cohort studies, four sub-sample surveys have been carried out. The first two, carried out in 1972 and 1973 and collectively named the &lt;i&gt;British Births Child Survey&lt;/i&gt;, (held under SNs 2666 and 2690) followed sub-samples of the original cohort at ages 22 months and 42 months. The sub-samples consisted of all twins in the original cohort, the 'small-for-dates' and 'post-mature' births, and a 10% random sample of the original cohort. The third sub-sample survey (not currently held at the UKDA) was carried out in 1977 when 1,917 non-respondents from the five-year survey were traced and interviewed in an attempt to assess the effect of non-response. In 1992, when the cohort members were aged 21 years, a 10% sample survey (held under SN 4715) was carried out, that focused on adult literacy and numeracy problems as well as the transition from school to work.&lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; Further information about the BCS70 can be found on the &lt;a href="http://www.cls.ioe.ac.uk" title="Centre for Longitudinal Studies"&gt;Centre for Longitudinal Studies&lt;/a&gt; website.&lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; A related study, &lt;i&gt;Coding of Text Data from BCS70 at 10 and 16 Years: Health Care Utilisation of School Aged Children, 1970-1986&lt;/i&gt;, is also held under SN 4126. The aim of this project was to code text variables from BCS70 files, selected from the 10- and 16-year follow-ups to provide information about health care utilisation by the target age group.&lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; &lt;i&gt;How to access genetic and/or bio-medical sample data from a range of longitudinal surveys:&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br&gt; A useful overview of the governance routes for applying for genetic and bio-medical sample data, which are not available through the UK Data Service, can be found at &lt;a href="http://www.metadac.ac.uk/data-access-through-metadac/" title="Governance of data and sample access"&gt;Governance of data and sample access&lt;/a&gt; on the METADAC (Managing Ethico-social, Technical and Administrative issues in Data Access) website.&lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt; &lt;br&gt;