Inventaire d'enquêtes Demostaf

The data used in population studies are in large part based on the answers people give to questions they are asked in censuses or surveys. The reliability of responses is consequently an important issue. Even when there is no deliberate attempt to give wrong information, memory lapses - which may occur in any circumstance - can pose problems (on this, see Nadia Auriat's Ph.D. thesis published by INED). Women are generally considered to be more trustworthy than men for providing data on births and other pregnancies, being more directly involved in these events. Veronique Hertrich, studying a population in Mali, shows here that this is not always the case, and that in another field - marriage histories - men's responses may also prove more reliable than those of women.