A new version of the ESS8 integrated file (edition 2.3) was published on 24 November 2023.

The new release is due to some corrections in the education variables for Norway.

For more information, see version information for the ESS8 integrated file on the ESS Data Portal.

The ESS Data and Documentation section has been updated with a cumulative data file for the first nine rounds of the ESS. The cumulative data are available from the ESS Cumulative Data Wizard, where users can customise their own subsets of data in different formats. The ESS Cumulative Data Wizard gives access to cumulative data from countries that have been included in the integrated ESS files in two or more rounds. All variables that have been asked in more than one round are included in the cumulative data file.

A new edition (2.2) of data for ESS round 8 was published on the 10th of December 2020.

The new release is due to some minor corrections in the Hungarian and Lithuanian data.

ESS8 edition 2.2 data and the updated ESS8 Data Documentation Report (edition 2.2), are available from the ESS Data Portal.

A new edition of ESS8 integrated sample design data file (1.1) is now available for download in the ESS8 - 2016 Data Download section.

The new release is due to amendments made in variables PSU and PROB.

An integrated sample design data file (SDDF) was published 12th of December 2018 and is available in SAS, STATA and SPSS format, along with a PDF file describing the structure and use of the SDDF.

The file is available from the ESS8 - 2016 Data download section and edition 1.0 includes the following countries: Austria, Belgium, Switzerland, Czechia, Germany, Estonia, Spain, Finland, France, United Kingdom, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Iceland, Italy, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russian Federation, Sweden and Slovenia.

All rounds of the ESS have been updated in a major upgrade of the ESS data and documentation 01.12.18. For an overview of the changes in variables and country data, see version notes for ESS1, ESS2, ESS3, ESS4, ESS5, ESS6, ESS7 and ESS8 respectively.

The ESS Cumulative Data Wizard, where users can customise their own subsets of data in different formats, will be updated with all eight rounds of the ESS within the next two weeks.

Vigilant ESS users have detected an error in the Norwegian ESS8 data file (in the integrated ESS8 data file), where variable A6 (PPLHLP) is a duplicate of A5 (PPLFAIR).

A data file containing the corrected variable is available for download on the ESS8 - 2016 Data Download page. The variable will be corrected in future updates of the integrated ESS8 data file.

In the meantime, we advise our users to update the data by replacing PPLHLP in the ESS8 - integrated file, edition 2.0 with PPLHLP in the corrected file ESS8NO_PPLHLP.sav (for SPSS syntax example, see below. In this example, note that the data files are stored locally in folder "ESS" on the C: drive):

GET FILE "C:\ESS\ESS8e02.sav".
UPDATE
/FILE=*
/FILE="C:\ESS\ESS8NO_PPLHLP.sav"
/BY cntry idno.
EXE.
SAVE OUT "C:\ESS\ESS8e02_Update.sav".

We are pleased to announce that the second edition of data and documentation for ESS Round 8 was released on Wednesday 30 May 2018. In this second edition, data and documentation for an additional 5 countries are included: Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Portugal and Spain.

Edition 2.0 includes data from the following countries: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russian Federation, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom.

The release also includes data from the Interviewer's questionnaire, MTMM data, Contact form data, Interview time data, and Media Claims data for Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russian Federation, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom.

ESS round 8 includes rotating modules on the topics: "Welfare attitudes" (also fielded in ESS round 4) and "Public attitudes to climate change".

Data from Sweden has been temporarily removed due to anonymisation issues. The Swedish data will be included in the next release of ESS8 data and documentation, scheduled for ultimo May 2018.

13 respondents from the Netherlands were listed with incorrect interview start times (year - INWYYS and month - INWMMS). The issue will be corrected in future editions of the integrated ESS8 data file. See below for suggested temporary solution to the problem:

SPSS:
DO IF (cntry="NL" and (idno  =  11412450 or idno = 51730697)).
RECODE inwmms (12=1).
END IF.
DO IF (cntry="NL" and (idno = 11311397 or idno = 41021909)).
RECODE inwmms (11=10).
END IF.
DO IF (cntry="NL" and (idno = 41022709)).
RECODE inwmms (12=10).
END IF.
DO IF (cntry="NL" and (idno = 30850991 or idno = 30951443 or idno = 41031660)).
RECODE inwyys (2017=2016).
END IF.
DO IF (cntry="NL" and (idno = 21230530 or idno = 21410770 or idno = 41142114 or idno = 61410524 or idno = 61420138)).
RECODE inwyys (2016=2017).
END IF.

Stata:
replace INWMMS = 1 if IDNO == 11412450 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWMMS = 1 if IDNO == 51730697 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWMMS = 10 if IDNO == 41022709 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWMMS = 10 if IDNO == 11311397 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWMMS = 10 if IDNO == 41021909 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWYYS = 2016 if IDNO == 30850991 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWYYS = 2016 if IDNO == 30951443 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWYYS = 2016 if IDNO == 41031660 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWYYS = 2017 if IDNO == 21230530 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWYYS = 2017 if IDNO == 21410770 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWYYS = 2017 if IDNO == 41142114 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWYYS = 2017 if IDNO == 61410524 & CNTRY == "NL"
replace INWYYS = 2017 if IDNO == 61420138 & CNTRY == "NL"

SAS:
if cntry="NL" and idno in(11412450,51730697) then do;
    INWMMS=1;
end;
if cntry="NL" and idno in(41022709,11311397,41021909) then do;
    INWMMS=10;
end;
if cntry="NL" and idno in(30850991,30951443,41031660) then do;
    INWYYS=2016;
end;
if cntry="NL" and idno in(21230530,21410770,41142114,61410524,61420138) then do;
    INWYYS=2017;
end;