WiLCAS 2014 (Women's Life Choices and Attitudes Survey) is a nationally representative survey of women in Bangladesh between the ages of 20 and 39, designed to investigate how improved access to secondary schooling for women impact upon long-term outcomes related to employment, migration, marriage, childbirth and investment in children.
The survey is being conducted by the University of Kent and the University of Malaya in collaboration with DATA, Bangladesh (Data Analysis and Technical Assistance).
In the first phase of the survey, the enumeration team visited, between May and July 2014, all households included in the rural sample of the 2010 Bangladesh Household Income and Expenditures Survey which included at least one woman aged between 16 and 35 in 2010, and a random 50% of households in the same sample without any women in this age group. In addition, the enumeration team conducted a census of 75 urban primary sampling units (PSU) in Bangladesh, and 20 households were randomly chosen from each to be included in the survey.
For each household included in WiLCAS 2014, the team implemented a short household questionnaire and an individual questionnaire for each female household member between the ages of 20 and 39. The individual questionnaire included modules on education, marriage, childbirth and child-related investments, social networks, subjective well-being, aspirations, and attitudes towards traditional norms.
The first phase of the survey generated a sample of 7,974 households and 6,293 female respondents (for whom individual questionnaire was implemented) located in 478 different primary sampling units.
For the second phase of the survey, a random sample of 1,500 individuals were drawn from the pool of sisters of the first-phase female respondents who were alive, resident elsewhere and aged between 20 and 39 years. The sisters were traced to their current households, and a household questionnaire together with an individual questionnaire implemented for each of them.