Survey on the Vitality of Official-Language Minorities (SVOLM)

Status:	Active
Frequency:	One Time
Record number:	5099

This survey pertains to the vitality of Canada's official-language minorities, namely anglophones in Quebec and francophones outside of Quebec. The information collected allow for a more in-depth understanding of the current situation of individuals who belong to these groups on subjects as diverse as instruction in the language of the minority or access to different services in the language of the minority (i.e., health care), as well as language practices both at home and outside of the home.

Detailed information for 2006

Data release – Scheduled for the Fall of 2007

• Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s)  (in PDF format)
• Description
• Data sources and methodology

---

Description

In the spring of 2003, the Canadian government unveiled its Action Plan for Official Languages which will be reviewed in 2007. In order to obtain an overview of the current situation of francophone and anglophone minorities in areas such as family life, education, health, early childhood and language use in the public sphere, the Official Languages Branch of the Privy Council Office approached Statistics Canada about conducting a post-censal survey on the vitality of official language minorities.

The survey has two main objectives. First, it will collect information about areas that are top priorities for official language minority communities such as education, health and economic development. Second, it will produce information that will assist various departments and agencies in policy development and program implementation.

The information collected by the survey will not only shed light on the situation of official language minorities relative to their demographic, social, economic and cultural capital, but also offer a better understanding of their practices and their linguistic life. It will improve our understanding of the linguistic trajectory of members of official language minority communities from early childhood to adulthood, the language dynamics in exogamous families, the motivations behind parents' transmission of their mother tongue to their children and their choice of school system. In addition, the survey will collect statistics on the various subject areas related to language use in the public sphere, such as minority language access to health care, government services, retail and wholesale businesses, professional and non-professional associations, and the workplace. These statistics will provide information about whether members of official language minority communities are able to live their lives in their own language.

The survey questionnaire covers the following topics: household demographics and relationships, respondent's parents' mother tongues and educational experience, respondent's mother tongue and language skills, schooling, linguistic trajectory from childhood to adulthood, sense of belonging and subjective vitality, child's family background, child's use of languages at home, knowledge of official languages, daycare and school attendance, linguistic dynamic of child with friends, individual or parental reading habits, child's participation in various activities, use of television and the internet, access to health care services in the minority language, civic participation, volunteering and social support, language use in the public sphere, linguistic practices in leisure activities, geographic mobility, economic activity, language practices at work and income.

Because these statistics will be used to assess the goals of the Action Plan for Official Languages, they will be used by different federal departments and agencies. Also, numerous university researchers and community organizations will use these statistics to obtain an overview of the current situations of minorities and to shed more light on certain situations.

Collection period: Autumn 2006

Subjects

• Languages
• Use of languages

---

Data sources and methodology

• Target population
• Instrument design
• Sampling
• Data sources
• Error detection
• Disclosure control

Target population

The survey's target population consists of two groups: persons under age 18 in households where at least one parent belongs to the official language minority, and persons aged 18 and over who belong to the official language minority in the ten provinces and in the three territories together. Persons living in collective dwellings and on Indian reserves are excluded.

Respondents to the Survey on the Vitality of Official-language Minorities (SVOLM) are selected from the sample of the population that completed the long questionnaire in the 2006 Census, which was held in May 2006. The selection was based on answers to the questions on mother tongue, knowledge of official languages and language spoken most often at home. This ensures that the survey covers all the people belonging to the official-language minority.

Instrument design

Even if the survey is made up of two collection universes, that is (1) adults aged 18 years old and over and (2) children aged less then 18 years old for whom the parent (who is the respondent) belongs to the province's official-language minority, only one questionnaire has been developed. It contains three parts:
- One common part for both samples (modules ID, HLD, EPX, KOL, EDU, TRJ, SEN, INC);
- One part for the child sample (modules ENF, SPO, FAM, LPM, CLO, FRA to FRE, LPA, LEC, ACT, UTI);
- One part for the adult sample (modules PAR, HLT, COM, VOL, SOC, PUB, LEI, MOB, ECO, WRK).

Indeed, only one questionnaire is administered to a sample of adults (aged 18 and over) and to parents belonging to the province's official-language minority for a sample of children (aged under 18). The adult sample respondents have to provide information on the common part of the questionnaire and on the adult part, and the child sample respondents respond to the common part and the child part. This approach allows an approximately 40 minute interview, at the same time reducing the respondent burden. Wherever possible, to facilitate comparison, the questions that make up the various modules have been taken from other Statistics Canada surveys or other surveys on official languages.

The questionnaire content reflects the information needs of a certain number of federal government partners. The final content was determined based on results of a series of qualitative tests and from a pilot test. The pilot test was used to evaluate the questions, the consistency among them, the format of the questionnaire, as well as collection, interviewing and computer-assisted telephone interviewing procedures.

Sampling

This is a sample survey with a cross-sectional design.

Respondents to the Survey on the Vitality of Official-language Minorities (SVOLM) are selected from the sample of the population that completed the long questionnaire in the 2006 Census, which was held in May 2006. The strata are generally defined by the cross-classification of the provinces and the age as defined by the Census. In New Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario, sub-provincial regions were also used to create strata. The age groups considered are 0-4, 5-11, 12-17, 18-24, 25-44, 45-64 and 65 years of age and over. The three territories will be regrouped to form two strata: one of people aged 0-17 years and the other of those 18 years and over.

In order to determine the sample size in each stratum, a targeted minimum proportion and coefficient of variation (CV) were fixed. Some parameters were estimated using the 2005 pilot test, such as the response rate and the percentage of persons who report a change in their mother tongue, official language knowledge or home language.

The sampling design used for the SVOLM is a two-phase stratified design. In the first phase, 2006 Census long form questionnaires are systematically distributed to approximately every fifth household across Canada. In two provinces (Newfoundland and Prince Edward Island), the 2006 Census short form is also used. In the second phase, respondents from the first phase who are official language minorities are divided into their strata and a systematic sample of people is chosen from each stratum. In addition, in order to do an optimal allocation of the sample, the concentration of official language minorities in each region is included in the stratification.

The total sample size is approximately 52,000 potential respondents. Of these individuals, approximately 30,000 are selected for the adult sample and 22,000 for the child sample.

Data sources

Data collection for this reference period: 2006-10-10 – 2006-12-23

Responding to this survey is voluntary. Data are collected directly from survey respondents.

Data were collected by computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) in the fall of 2006. Respondents were sent an introductory letter to their home address and this was followed-up by a telephone call to collect the data, with regional office interviewers conducting the 40 minute interviews. The parent responds for his or her child in the case of the children's interview, which targets individuals less than 18 years of age. The respondent can also be a step-father or step-mother. The child is selected according to the parent's linguistic minority group. If the selected parent happens to be absent for the duration of the survey, that person's spouse may respond in his or her place for the selected child only if he/she belongs to the linguistic minority group. There will not be any proxy responses for the adult survey.

View the Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s)  (in PDF format)

Error detection

The first phase of error detection will be done during data collection. Several types of edits, such as edits for inconsistencies or improbable responses, are built into the computer-assisted questionnaire. When interviewers are faced with such an edit, they are able to confirm with the respondent the validity of the answer given. Also, the interviewer's supervisors will review completed questionnaires to look for inconsistencies. These will be discussed with the interviewer who conducted the interview and the respondent will be called back if necessary.

The second phase of error detection will be conducted during data processing. Data processing will include data validation where, among other actions, multiple responses will be blanked out and processed with the other missing responses. Editing will also be done.

Edit rules will be developed to identify and correct inconsistencies between responses within each section of the adult and child questionnaires. For most of the situations corresponding to inconsistencies an automated correction will be specified, depending on other responses provided. Once this step is completed, a macro-level verification will be done by analyzing frequency distributions to identify anomalies, for example missing categories or unusually large frequencies.

Disclosure control

Statistics Canada is prohibited by law from releasing any data that would divulge information obtained under the Statistics Act that relates to any identifiable person, business or organization without the prior knowledge or the consent in writing of that person, business or organization. Various confidentiality rules are applied to all data that are released or published to prevent the publication or disclosure of any information deemed confidential. If necessary, data are suppressed to prevent direct or residual disclosure of identifiable data.

---

You need to use the free Adobe Reader to view PDF documents. To view (open) these files, simply click on the link. To download (save) them, right-click on the link. Note that if you are using Internet Explorer or AOL, PDF documents sometimes do not open properly. See Troubleshooting PDFs. PDF documents may not be accessible by some devices. For more information, visit the Adobe website or Contact Us for assistance.