Household and family concepts in Danish population registers and surveys

Abstract

During the 1970's Danmarks Statistik developed a system of statistical data based on centralized administrative registers. In addition to vital statistics, the Population Statistics Register provides detailed statistical information on the size and structure of families and households. Furthermore, flow data can document the changes which a family experiences during its lifetime.

A review of household and family concepts used in the Population Statistics Register reveals that the family concept corresponds to the conjugal family concept with two exceptions; single persons are considered as a family and couples living in a consensual union without common children are not counted as one family. The household concept corresponds to the household-dwelling concept.

A comparison between statistics based on the Population Register and a multi-purpose survey using the economic family concept, revealed a fairly close correspondence between estimates of the number of different family types, if adjustments are made for conceptual differences. Surveys can, however, supplement register-based statistics with data on consensual unions which are only partially registered in the Population Statistics Register. Thus, surveys can be used to supplement and validate register-based data and vice versa.