World Values Survey 1995, Wave 3

The sample was designed to be representative of the entire adult population, i.e. 18 years and older, of your country. The lower age cut-off for the sample was 18 and there was not an upper age cut-off for the sample. Population: Total non-institutionalized population of the Russian Federation, 18 years and older, without citizens living in the Far North and in inaccessible regions of Siberia.

Five-stage area probability sample:
(1) The country is divided into 4 strata. For each stratum the desired number of respondents is defined proportional to population size.
(2) Within each stratum 50 primary sampling units (administrative districts) are selected at random proportional to size.
(3) Within each primary sampling unit secondary sampling units (towns and rural Soviets as administrative subdistricts) are selected randomly
(4) Within each secondary sampling unit third sampling units (voting districts in the towns, villages belonging to a rural Soviet in the rural areas) are randomly selected. The total number of third sampling units was 186. (5) Within each third sampling unit households were selected at random from a household register (fourth sampling unit).
(6) Within each household the respondent is randomly selected using the "Kish-selection-grid": all adult family members are listed in a certain order, first males from the oldest to the youngest, than females from the oldest to the youngest; the respondent is selected by a selection key which is randomly composed for each possible type of household composition (fifth sampling unit). Selection is done: 41% Male and 59% Female. 75% Urban and 25% Rural. The sample size is N=2040.

Universe: The universe includes the adult population of Russia residing in 89 regios and republics. The Far North and inaccessible regions of Siberia, military bases and prisons are not included. Primary sampling units: Administrative rayons in regions, krays and republics are used as the primary sampling units (PSUs). Each rayon is a geographically localized territory which in general contains both urban and rural settlements. Either a town or a rural settlement may be a center of rayon. Usually, but not always, it is the largest settlement in a rayon. If a rural settlement is the center of a rayon itself generally consists only of rural settlements and is referred to the category of rural rayhons. Separate towns which are considered by official statistical institutions as rayons are also included in the set of primary sampling units. These towns are not part of rayons though they are situated in the rayon's territory. Sometimes they may also include some suburbs. So separate towns and rural rayons may be considered as two poles of a scale which contains all various rayhons of Russia (primary sampling units, PSUs). On the continuum between these poles there are rayons of mixed type containing urban and rural sttlements of different sizes. Population size of different rayons may vary from 4-5 thousand to several hundred thousand or even several million of people in cities considered as separate rayons. If population size is less than 10.000 the rayon is linked to an adjacent one in a stratum. All PSUs are presented in the form of data base of more than 2.000 records with each record corresponding to one rayon or separate town (later referred to as rayons). The record for each rayon (PSU) contains the following data:

• unique identification number and rayon title,

• code and title of a region,

• central town population size,

• rayon population size
  All data are based on annual statistical reports (Chislennost RSFSR na 1 janvarya 1990) and 1989 census information. Primary sampling units stratification: PSUs stratification is based on two variables: geographical placement and status of the rayon center. All primary sampling units are grouped in strata consisting of homogeneous rayons. Strata are formed so that each stratum has approximately the same population size. They may consist of from one to several dozen PSUs depending on PSUs population size. In this sample the stratum population size is equal approximately 3.000 thousand (tab.1). Two cities in Russia Moscow and St. Petersburg have population size exceeding stratum population size. They form so called self-representing strata. The geographic placement of a rayon is defined by corresponding economic and geographic zone. According to statistical institutions Russia is divided into 11 economic and geopraphic regions. But for sample construction this division seems to be too fractional and can prevent forming strata of equal size in each zone. The main goal for using the geographic factor as a stratification variable is the uniform spreading of PSUs through Russia territory. For these reasons economic and geographic regions in Russia wre grouped in four zones:

• Zone 1 - North and Center of European part of Russia (unites Northern, North Western + Kaliningrad obl., Central and Volgo-´Vjatsky regions of Russia).

• Zone 2 - South of Wuropean part of Russia (unites Tsentralno-Chernozjemny, Povolzhsky and North- Caucasian regions of Russia).

• Zone 3 - Ural and West Siberia (two economic regions)

• Zone 4 - East Siberia and Far East (two economic regions). For economic and geographic division in Russia seven factors are used: nature and resources, population, industry, power engineering, area industry distribution, agriculture, transport and communicftions ( Economicheskaya geographiya SSSR. Moskva, Vishaya shkola, 1983). 11 regions were aggregated in four zones on the basis of two first factors: nature and resources and population. The second variable of PSUs stratification is the status of the rayon center. It is formed on officially accepted statistical classification by type and population size:

• rural settlement,

• urban settlement with populatiton size:

  • below 20.000
  • between 20.000 and 50.000
  • between 50.000 and 200.000
  • between 500.000 and 1000.000
  • more than 1000.000

Remarks about sampling:

• Final numbers of clusters or sampling points: 186
• Sample unit from office sampling: Household