Description
The consent and SES page was the first and only web activity page to be completed by parents in the web study. The page had two functions: firstly, to allow parents to give informed consent for their twins to participate in the web study; and secondly to gather background family SES information.
The page would appear immediately after a parent logged in for the first time, using the login details supplied to them by TEDS. It was designed to be completed by just one parent of the twins, and it could only be completed and submitted once. If a parent did not submit the form on first logging in, it would continue to appear on subsequent logins until it was submitted. Having been submitted, it would not appear again - if the parent subsequently logged in again, they would be presented with a simple feedback message instead of the consent/SES page.
The web site was programmed so that, in each family, twins would not be able to start their own web activities until the parent consent page had been submitted. Parents and twins were each given their own distinct logins. If a twin logged in before parental consent had been submitted, they would be presented with a simple feedback message and would not be able to continue. A twin logging in after parental consent had been submitted would be able to start their web activities immediately.
In the initial mailing for the web study, families were sent a paper information sheet (pdf) describing the study. To help ensure that parents gave informed consent, a web version of the information sheet (pdf) was also provided, via a link on the consent page. This link remained available on the feedback page presented to parents on subsequent logins.
Linked to the web information sheet, read-only versions of the four twin environment and wellbeing questionnaires were also provided, to allow parents to preview them. However, parents were not able to view the twin cognitive tests.
The Consent and SES Questionnaire
The content of the page used for parent consent and the SES questionnaire is reproduced below. Note that the style and general appearance are not accurately reproduced, but the text and the form fields are as in the original. In the body of the text, [TwinA] and [TwinB] would be substituted with the actual twin forenames for the logged-in family.
TEDS 16 Year Web Study
If you would like to take part in the TEDS 16 Year Web Study please:
- read the information sheet
- tick the two boxes to give your consent
- answer the 5 short questions that follow
- click on the button at the bottom of the page
Once you have given consent in this way, [TwinA] and [TwinB] will be able to use their own logins to gain access to the web activities. They should complete the activities without help and with as little distraction as possible.
Thank you very much for your help and interest. If you have any further questions, please e-mail us on teds-project@kcl.ac.uk or call us on FREEPHONE 0800 317029.
In the mocked-up page above, the "continue" button does not work, but in the real version the button performed the following functions:
- Check that the page rules have been obeyed (see below)
- If so, submit the consent and questionnaire data to the server
- Then proceed to a feedback page, informing the parent that their data were submitted and that their twins would now be able to log in to start the activities.
Page Rules
To ensure that the consent form and SES questionnaire were always completed correctly, the page enforced the following validation rules. These rules were checked on clicking the "continue" button. If any of the rules were broken, a pop-up reminder message would appear and the page would not be submitted.
- The first two tick boxes (indicating consent) MUST be ticked, regardless of answers to questions 1-5.
- Question 1 must not have been left with the "please select" response
- Questions 2 and 3 must not have been left with the "please select" response, unless the box is ticked for "no female parent".
- Questions 4 and 5 must not have been left with the "please select" response, unless the box is ticked for "no male parent".
- The two tick boxes for "no female parent" and "no male parent" could not both be ticked, unless questions 2 and 3 were answered, or unless questions 4 and 5 were answered.
Note that questions 1 to 5 do have a "prefer not to answer" response available, and this is treated as a valid response for the rules above.
Coding of Responses
For each of the 5 main questions in the SES questionnaire, parents selected a response from a drop down list as shown above. Each response has a raw response value and a coded "score" value, used for the corresponding ordinal dataset variable. These raw responses and codes are set out in the tables below.
Household income
| Dataset variable: | - | pphhinc |
|---|---|---|
| Response text | Raw response code | Score |
| Please select | 0 | (missing) |
| Under £5,000 | 1 | 1 |
| £5,000 to £9,999 | 2 | 2 |
| £10,000 to £14,999 | 3 | 3 |
| £15,000 to £19,999 | 4 | 4 |
| £20,000 to £24,999 | 5 | 5 |
| £25,000 to £29,999 | 6 | 6 |
| £30,000 to £39,999 | 7 | 7 |
| £40,000 to £49,999 | 8 | 8 |
| £50,000 to £74,999 | 9 | 9 |
| £75,000 to £100,000 | 10 | 10 |
| Over £100,000 | 11 | 11 |
| I prefer not to answer this question | 12 | (missing) |
Qualification levels (mother and father)
| Dataset variables: | - | ppmohqual, ppfahqual |
|---|---|---|
| Response text | Raw response code | Score |
| Please select | 0 | (missing) |
| No qualifications | 1 | 1 |
| GCSEs with grades D - G | 2 | 2 |
| O-levels with grades D or E (or grades 7 - 9) | 3 | 2 |
| CSEs with grades 2 - 5 | 4 | 2 |
| 1 to 4 GCSEs with grades A - C | 5 | 3 |
| 1 to 4 O-levels with grades A - C (or grades 1 - 6) | 6 | 3 |
| 1 to 4 CSEs with grade 1 | 7 | 3 |
| 5 or more GCSEs with grades A - C | 8 | 4 |
| 5 or more O-levels with grades A - C (or grades 1 - 6) | 9 | 4 |
| 5 or more CSEs with grade 1 | 10 | 4 |
| School Certificate (pre-1951) | 11 | 4 |
| 1 A-level pass (grades A - E) | 12 | 5 |
| 2 or more A-level passes (grades A - E) | 13 | 6 |
| Higher School Certificate (pre-1951) | 14 | 6 |
| First degree (e.g. BA or BSc) | 15 | 7 |
| Higher degree (e.g. MA, PhD) | 16 | 8 |
| Postgraduate certificate or diploma (e.g. PGCE) | 17 | 8 |
| Other qualifications obtained outside the UK | 18 | (missing) |
| I prefer not to answer this question | 19 | (missing) |
Employment categories (mother and father)
The scores are based on the SOC-2000 categories.
| Dataset variables: | - | ppmosoc, ppfasoc |
|---|---|---|
| Response text | Raw response code | Score |
| Please select | 0 | (missing) |
| Unemployed | 1 | (missing) |
| Student at school, college or university | 2 | (missing) |
| Manager, director or senior official | 3 | 1 |
| Science, engineering or IT professional | 4 | 2 |
| Teacher, lecturer, research or education professional | 5 | 2 |
| Qualified professional such as doctor, accountant, solicitor, architect or clergy | 6 | 2 |
| Technician | 7 | 3 |
| Nurse or qualified therapist | 8 | 3 |
| Armed forces, police or protective services | 9 | 3 |
| Artistic or literary, design or media, or sports occupation | 10 | 3 |
| Business or finance worker | 11 | 3 |
| Public services | 12 | 3 |
| Administrator | 13 | 4 |
| Secretary, PA, receptionist, clerical work | 14 | 4 |
| Agricultural or horticultural trades | 15 | 5 |
| Skilled trades or crafts (building, electrical, mechanical, printing, chef, etc) | 16 | 5 |
| Childcare, healthcare or veterinary assistant | 17 | 6 |
| Leisure or travel services | 18 | 6 |
| Hairdressing, housekeeping and other personal services | 19 | 6 |
| Retail, sales and customer services | 20 | 7 |
| Factory work or machine operator | 21 | 8 |
| Driver or transport operator | 22 | 8 |
| Labourer | 23 | 9 |
| Postal worker, courier or messenger | 24 | 9 |
| Goods handling, porter, shelf filling, storage | 25 | 9 |
| Security guard, attendant, school patrol, traffic warden | 26 | 9 |
| Cleaning, laundering, refuse collection | 27 | 9 |
| Kitchen worker, bar staff, waiter or waitress | 28 | 9 |
| None of the above | 29 | (missing) |
| I prefer not to answer this question | 30 | (missing) |
Item Variables
The table below presents a list of the raw data items that were generated on the web server and downloaded in the raw data file. The first column also shows the dataset variable names for those items that have been retained in the dataset.
| Dataset variables | Explanation | Values |
|---|---|---|
| ppconsent | Parental web consent given (both boxes ticked) | 1=yes, 0=no |
| - | Date of submission of parental web consent [not in dataset] | date values |
| - | Household income response category | 0-12: see table above |
| pphhinc | Household income ordinal score | 1-11: see table above |
| - | Mother (female parent) qualification level response category | 0-19: see table above |
| - | Father (male parent) qualification level response category | |
| ppmohqual | Mother (female parent) ordinal qualification score | 1-8: see table above |
| ppfahqual | Father (male parent) ordinal qualification score | |
| - | Mother (female parent) employment response category | 0-30: see table above |
| - | Father (male parent) employment response category | |
| ppmosoc | Mother (female parent) ordinal employment SOC score | 1-9: see table above |
| ppfasoc | Father (male parent) ordinal employment SOC score | |
| - | No female parent present | 0=no, 1=yes |
| - | No male parent present |