ABSTRACT
Regular surveys and longitudinal studies are the two designs that most explicitly focus on social change processes, but they do so in different and complementary ways. Regular surveys provide information on net change at the macro-level, while longitudinal studies provide information on the much larger volume of gross changes (or flows) at the microlevel (see Chapter 7). Longitudinal studies are often initiated when regular surveys or other sources reveal new trends that they cannot fully describe or explain (especially if they do not contain a panel element). The longitudinal study is unique in its ability to answer questions about causes and consequences and hence to provide a basis for substantiated explanatory theory.
