What are the advantages of a longitudinal survey?
Most surveys provide a “snapshot” of the group being surveyed; that is, a picture of a situation at a specific point in time. A longitudinal survey, on the other hand, involves surveying the same group of people over a period of time. By linking records for the same panel of respondents over time, a longitudinal survey permits the study of relationships between factors measured in one period (e.g., aspirations, attitudes, behaviours, and achievement) with outcomes measured in future time periods (e.g., educational attainment, occupational outcomes, earnings). Another advantage of a longitudinal survey is that respondents are interviewed frequently and are required to recall only recent events, thus improving data quality. Reports of attitudes and motivations for behaviours, for example, would be different if measured retrospectively than they would be if measured closer to the time they occur. In this respect, interviewing YITS respondents every two years will help to avoid recall bias
