| Demographic_Background |
Core demographics |
Age, sex, ethnicity, hukou, birth place, migration history for main respondent and spouse. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
| Family_Information |
Family structure |
Household roster, parents, children, siblings, intergenerational links, co-residence, living arrangements. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
| Family_Transfer |
Intergenerational transfers |
Time and financial transfers to/from parents, parents-in-law, children, and other relatives. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
|
| Health_Status_and_Functioning |
Self-reported health & functioning |
Self-rated health, chronic conditions, ADL/IADL, pain, depression screening, cognitive tests. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
| Health_Care_and_Insurance |
Health care utilization & insurance |
Enrolment in health insurance schemes, outpatient visits, inpatient stays, OOP spending. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
|
| Household_Income |
Household income & expenditures |
Total household income from wages, self-employment, agriculture, transfers; major expenditures and public transfers. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
| Individual_Income |
Individual income & assets |
Individual-level labour income, private transfers, asset income, and debts. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
| Housing_Characteristics |
Housing & dwelling |
Housing tenure, dwelling quality, construction materials, facilities, and neighborhood characteristics. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
|
| Child |
Children |
Detailed roster of biological, step, and adopted children, including demographics, location, and contact. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
|
|
| Parent |
Parents |
Information on respondents’ parents and parents-in-law: survival, health, support exchanges. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
|
|
| HHmember_or_Household_Member |
Household members |
Constructed dataset of all household members, with IDs consistent across waves. |
✓ |
|
✓ |
|
|
| Other_HHmember |
Other household members |
Loop dataset for other household members not captured in main parent/child loops. |
|
✓ |
|
|
|
| Community_PSU |
Sampling units |
Primary sampling unit identifiers (community / PSU), used for survey design and clustering. |
✓ |
✓ |
|
|
|
| Sample_Infor |
Sample information |
Response status, refresh-sample markers, death indicators, and interview dates by wave. |
|
|
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
| Weights |
Survey weights |
Cross-sectional (and biomarker) weights for each wave; panel weights need to be constructed by users. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
| Work_Retirement_and_Pension |
Labour, retirement & pensions |
Employment status, job history, retirement status, pension coverage and benefit receipt. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
| Sibling_and_Spousal_Sibling |
Extended kin network |
Constructed datasets on respondents’ siblings and spouses’ siblings, including demographics and location. |
|
|
✓ |
|
|
| Exit_Interview_or_Exit_Module |
Exit interviews |
Interviews with proxies for deceased or permanently incapacitated respondents (health, care, economic consequences). |
|
✓ |
|
|
✓ |
| Verbal_Autopsy |
Cause-of-death module |
Detailed verbal-autopsy module to assign probable cause of death based on symptoms and events before death. |
|
✓ |
|
|
|
| COVID_Module |
COVID-19 shock |
Questionnaire on COVID-19 exposure, prevention, behavioural changes and economic impacts. |
|
|
|
|
✓ |
| Biomarker |
Physical measurements |
Height, weight, waist circumference, blood pressure, grip strength, lung function, balance, walk speed. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
|
|
| Blood |
Venous blood assays |
Laboratory blood biomarkers (e.g., hsCRP, HbA1c, lipids, creatinine, cystatin C) for a subsample. |
✓ |
|
✓ |
|
|
| Cognition_HCAP |
Cognition & HCAP sub-study |
Extended cognitive battery and HCAP sub-sample for detailed neurocognitive assessment. |
|
|
|
✓ |
|
| Pension_Detail |
Pension institutions & schemes |
Detailed institutional questions on different pension schemes and eligibility (government, enterprise, rural, etc.). |
|
|
|
✓ |
|
| Insider |
Internal interview information |
Interviewer-facing internal variables, alerts, or flags specific to the 2018 wave. |
|
|
|
✓ |
|
| Interviewer_Observation |
Interviewer observations |
Interviewer-rated information on respondent cooperation, cognitive status, and interview conditions. |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |
✓ |