Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

Current Twin Studies in Germany: Report on CoSMoS, SOEP, and ChronoS

This article summarizes the status of three recent German twin studies: CoSMoS, SOEP, and ChronoS. The German twin study on Cognitive Ability, Self-Reported Motivation, and School Achievement (CoSMoS) is a three-wave longitudinal study of monozygotic and dizygotic twins reared together, and aims to investigate predictors of and influences on school performance. In the first wave of the data collection ...

Predictors of Refugee Adjustment: The Importance of Cognitive Skills and Personality

In light of the recent worldwide migration of refugees, determinants of a more or less successful integration are heavily discussed, but reliable empirical investigations are scarce and have often focused on sociodemographic factors. In the present study, we explore the role of several individual characteristics for refugee adjustment in the areas of (a) institutional, (b) interpersonal and (c) intrapersonal ...

Coping With Unemployment: The Impact of Unemployment Duration and Personality on Trajectories of Life Satisfaction

Unemployment is a major life event that causes an enormous drop in people's life satisfaction. However, there is substantial variability in people's ability (or inability) to cope with the experience of unemployment. In the present study, we examined the causes of individual differences in trajectories of life satisfaction when people were faced with unemployment by taking into account the ...

Beyond the Heritability of Life Satisfaction – The Roles of Personality and Twin-Specific Influences

In a behavior genetic design, we investigated individual differences in life satisfaction and its relation to personality with respect to both internal and external influences. We questioned the absence of shared environment and examined the specific contribution of additive and non-additive genetic influences. We also tested for twin-specific environmental influences in a total sample of 1,308 dyads ...

The Complexity of Personality: Advantages of a Genetically Sensitive Multi-Group Design

Findings from many behavioral genetic studies utilizing the classical twin design suggest that genetic and non-shared environmental effects play a significant role in human personality traits. This study focuses on the methodological advantages of extending the sampling frame to include multiple dyads of relatives. We investigated the sensitivity of heritability estimates to the inclusion of sibling ...

The Nature and Extent of Job Separations in Germany: Some New Evidence from SOEP

This paper analyses job separations in Germany using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel spanning from 1984 to 2003. Based on detailed reasons for job separation and different SOEP samples, the paper attempts to establish the nature of job separations in Germany. It brings to light some patterns of separations that have hitherto been unexplored. The findings of the study suggest, among others, ...

A Practical Guide for the Computation of Domain-Level Estimates with the Socio-Economic Panel (And Other Household Surveys)

There is a huge interest in deriving and comparing socio-economic indicators across societal groups and domains. The indicators are usually derived from population surveys like the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) by direct estimation. Small sample sizes in the domains can limit the precision of these estimates. For example, while SOEP may be a suitable database for determining mean income in Germany, ...

Migration and the Inter-Industry Wage-Structure in Germany

A Hitchhiker's Guide to the World's Household Panel Data Sets

This article describes four household panel data sets: the American Panel Study of Income Dynamics, the German Socio-Economic Panel, the British Household Panel Study, the Canadian Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics and the Cross-National Equivalent File.

Social Exclusion and Market Fragmentation (WP5, Chapter 4)