Head Start Impact Study (HSIS), 2002-2008 with Center Analysis File [United States] (ICPSR 36968)
Version Date: Apr 3, 2018 View help for published
Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s)
United States Department of Health and Human Services. Administration for Children and Families. Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation;
Michael Puma, Chesapeake Research Associates;
Stephen Bell, Abt Associates;
Ronna Cook, Ronna Cook Associates;
Camilla A. Heid, Westat
Series:
https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR36968.v2
Version V2 (see more versions)
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Summary View help for Summary
Since its beginning in 1965 as a part of the War on Poverty, Head Start's goal has been to boost the school readiness of low income children. Based on a "whole child" model, the program provides comprehensive services that include preschool education; medical, dental, and mental health care; nutrition services; and efforts to help parents foster their child's development. Head Start services are designed to be responsive to each child's and family's ethnic, cultural, and linguistic heritage.
In the 1998 reauthorization of Head Start, Congress mandated that the United States Department of Health and Human Services determine, on a national level, the impact of Head Start on the children it serves. This legislative mandate required that the impact study address two main research questions:
- What difference does Head Start make to key outcomes of development and learning (and in particular, the multiple domains of school readiness) for low-income children? What difference does Head Start make to parental practices that contribute to children's school readiness?
- Under what circumstances does Head Start achieve the greatest impact? What works for which children? What Head Start services are most related to impact?
The Head Start Impact Study addresses these questions by reporting on the impacts of Head Start on children and families during the children's preschool, kindergarten, and first grade years. It was conducted with a nationally representative sample of nearly 5,000 three- and four-year old preschool children across 84 nationally representative grantee/delegate agencies in communities where there are more eligible children and families than can be served by the program. The children participating were randomly assigned to either a treatment group (which had access to Head Start services) or a comparison group (which did not have access to Head Start services, but could receive other community resources). Data collection began in the fall of 2002 and ended in spring 2006, following children through the spring of their first grade year. Baseline data were collected through parent interviews and child assessments in fall 2002. The annual spring data collection included child assessments, parent interviews, teacher surveys, and teacher-child ratings. In addition, during the preschool years only, data collection included classroom and family day care observations, center director interviews, care provider interviews, and care provider-child ratings.
The study examined differences in outcomes in several domains related to school readiness: children's cognitive, social-emotional, health, and parenting outcomes (e.g., reading to the child, use of spanking and time out, exposing children to cultural enrichment activities, safety practices, parent-child relationships). It also examined whether impacts differed based on characteristics of the children and their families, including the child's pre-academic skills at the beginning of the study; the child's primary language; whether the child has special needs; the mother's race/ethnicity; the primary caregiver's level of depressive symptoms; household risk; and urban or rural location.
The Head Start Impact Study differs from other evaluations of early childhood programs in that it:
- represents children from the majority of Head Start programs,
- represents a scaled-up federal program,
- represents the full range of quality within the national program,
- employs a randomized control design, the strongest design for testing impacts,
- examines all domains of children's school readiness, as well as parenting outcomes,
- follows children through their early years of elementary school, and
- compares children who have access to Head Start to a control group that includes many children in center-based and other forms of early childhood education programs.
The Third Grade Follow-up to the Head Start Impact Study builds upon the existing randomized control design in the Head Start Impact Study (HSIS) in order to determine the longer-term impact of the Head Start program on the well-being of children and families through the end of third grade. The data collection for the Third Grade Follow-up to the Head Start Impact Study was conducted during the spring of the children's third grade year (2007 and 2008). In addition to the child assessments, parent interviews, teacher surveys, and teacher-child-ratings used for the Head Start Impact Study (HSIS) data collection, a principal survey was added to collect school data, including school demographics, and characteristics and quality indicators for schools, teachers and classrooms. As part of the third grade child assessment, self-reported data also was collected on the child's perception of his/her academic and social skills.
Both studies, for different grade levels, examined differences in outcomes in several domains related to school readiness: children's cognitive, social-emotional, health, and parenting outcomes (e.g., use of spanking, exposing children to cultural enrichment activities, and parenting styles). It also examined whether impacts differed based on characteristics of the children and their families, including the child's pre-academic skills at the beginning of the study; the child's primary language; whether the child has special needs; the mother's race/ethnicity; the primary caregiver's level of depressive symptoms; household risk; and urban or rural location.
This collection also includes the Center Analysis file, which contains data from a variety of publicly available data sources and provides information about the HSIS centers' communities, including population and household characteristics, crime statistics, labor, and housing data. The Center Analysis file is a new file for the collection to be accessed only through the VDE.
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Restrictions View help for Restrictions
This data collection may not be used for any purpose other than statistical reporting and analysis. Use of these data to learn the identity of any person or establishment is prohibited.
Public Use Files: The Head Start Impact Study documentation is public use and is available for download. Documentation includes the User Guide, Questionnaires and Codebooks.
Restricted Use Files: To protect respondent privacy, the Head Start Impact Study data are restricted from general dissemination. Access to parts of this study requires a signed User Agreement. To obtain the file(s), researchers must agree to the terms and conditions of the Restricted Data Use Agreement, found via ICPSR's online Restricted Data Contracting System, by clicking the "apply online for access to the data" link above.
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Date of Collection View help for Date of Collection
Data Collection Notes View help for Data Collection Notes
The User Guide provides descriptive and technical information about the Head Start Impact Study data files. It begins with an overview of the study, methodology, sampling procedures, response rates, weights and variance estimation. It contains information about the HSIS data collection instruments, measures, and covariates and subgroup variables. In addition, the User Guide provides information on data collection procedures, data preparation, file structure, use of the data weights, and sample programs for using the data in SAS or SPSS. Users seeking additional information on the HSIS study design, implementation, and findings are encouraged to refer to the HSIS Final Report and the Technical Report.
For additional information see the Head Start Impact Study Program Web site.
Study Purpose View help for Study Purpose
The primary purpose of the Head Start Impact Study is to determine whether Head Start has impacts on participating children and their parents and whether any impacts vary among different types of children and families. Impact is measured as a difference between the outcomes observed for Head Start participants and what would have been observed for these same individuals had they not participated in Head Start.
The Third Grade Follow-up was conducted in order to determine the longer-term impact of the Head Start program on the well-being of children and families through the end of third grade.
Study Design View help for Study Design
The study was designed to separately examine two cohorts of children, newly entering three- and four-year-olds. This design reflects the hypothesis that different program impacts may be associated with different age of entry into Head Start. Differential impacts were of particular interest in light of a trend of increased enrollment of the three-year-olds in some grantee/delegate agencies presumably due to the growing availability of preschool options for four-year-olds. Consequently, the study included two separate samples: a newly entering three-year-old group (to be studied through two years of Head Start participation i.e., Head Start year and age four year, kindergarten and first grade), and a newly entering four-year-old group (to be studied through one year of Head Start participation, kindergarten and first grade).
Baseline data was collected through parent interviews and child assessments in Fall 2002. Data collection included annual spring child assessments, parent interviews, teacher surveys, and teacher-child ratings. In addition, during the preschool years only, data collection included classroom/family day care observations, center director interviews, care provider interviews, and care provider-child ratings. Finally, data collection also included administrative data regarding the centers conducting the Head Start program which were included in the study.
Third Grade Follow-up data was collected through parent interviews and child assessments in the spring of 2007 and spring of 2008. Data collection included child assessments, parent interviews, teacher surveys, and teacher-child ratings (similar to the original HSIS study). In addition, school principal survey data was collected. Outcome measures were developed in four domains: child cognitive development, child social-emotional development, health, and parenting practices.
The Center Analysis file was created to provide information about the HSIS centers' communities. This file included data sourced from a number of public data sources, and covers population and household characteristics, crime statistics, labor, and housing data.
Sample View help for Sample
The Head Start Impact Study is based on a nationally representative sample of both Head Start programs and children. First time applicants to Head Start in fall 2002 were randomly selected from a nationally representative sample of Head Start programs. The study used a multi-stage sampling process to select a representative group of Head Start programs. The children were randomly assigned to the Head Start group or the control group.
For a detailed sampling description, users should refer to the Head Start Impact Study Final Report.
Time Method View help for Time Method
Universe View help for Universe
All newly entering three- and four-year-olds in all Head Start programs operating in 2002-2003, except those serving only special populations (i.e., programs serving primarily migrant or seasonal farmworkers and their families, American Indian or Alaskan Native tribal populations, or Early Head Start children), very new programs, or programs in communities that did not have more children eligible for Head Start than could be served with the existing number of funded slots.
Unit(s) of Observation View help for Unit(s) of Observation
Data Type(s) View help for Data Type(s)
Mode of Data Collection View help for Mode of Data Collection
Description of Variables View help for Description of Variables
The measures used in this study fall into three categories:
- (1) child and family demographics and other characteristics collected at baseline that were used as covariates in the impact analyses and also used to form child and family subgroups,
- (2) child and family outcomes measures (i.e. the variables on which program impacts were estimated), and
- (3) characteristics of the preschool and early elementary school experiences of the participating children.
Public data sources were also used to gather information regarding the HSIS centers and their surrounding communities.
Response Rates View help for Response Rates
Response rates for each instrument by data collection period, cohort (three- or four-year old cohort), and status (treatment or control group) are provided in the User Guide.
Presence of Common Scales View help for Presence of Common Scales
All assessments and other outcome measures are described in the HSIS Final Report.
HideOriginal Release Date View help for Original Release Date
2018-02-08
Version History View help for Version History
2018-04-03 Public release of DDI files for variable searchability.
2018-02-15 The citation of this study may have changed due to the new version control system that has been implemented. The previous citation was:- United States Department of Health and Human Services. Administration for Children and Families. Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, Michael Puma, Stephen Bell, Ronna Cook, and Camilla A. Heid. Head Start Impact Study (HSIS), 2002-2008 with Center Analysis File [United States] . ICPSR36968-v2. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2018-04-03. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR36968.v2
2018-02-12 Updating the release level.
2018-02-08 ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:
- Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.
Weight View help for Weight
Weights are attached to each child in the files. Cross sectional weights are provided for each data collection period. In addition three sets of longitudinal weights were created at the end of data collection. Longitudinal weights are to be used with children with assessments at two or more time points (LONGCHTRWT2), children with assessments at three or more time points (LONGCHTRWT3), or children with a teacher survey and teacher child rating in both kindergarten and first grade (LONGTSTRIMWT). The final program and center weights are also provided.
Careful consideration should be given to the choice of a weight for a specific analysis since it depends on the type of data analyzed. Each set of weights is appropriate for a different set of data or combination of sets of data. A general description of the types of weights available for use is provided in the User Guide. For a more detailed description about the weights, users should refer to the HSIS Technical Report.
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The public-use data files in this collection are available for access by the general public. Access does not require affiliation with an ICPSR member institution.
One or more files in this data collection have special restrictions. Restricted data files are not available for direct download from the website; click on the Restricted Data button to learn more.