A review of ethnicity measures for social research

Abstract

This working paper is a review of issues associated with measuring ethnicity and using
ethnicity measures in social science research. The review is orientated towards
researchers who undertake secondary analyses of large-scale micro-level social science
datasets. The paper begins with an outline of two main approaches used in social surveys
to measure ethnicity, the demographic perspective and the ethnic identity perspective. We
provide examples of the ethnicity measures used in some of the UK’s key social survey
data resources. We discuss the importance of intersectionality in the analysis of ethnicity,
because ethnicity measures are often associated with other important differences between
individuals. We also describe approaches to the use of ethnicity measures in crossnational
comparative research. We conclude that researchers should always use existing
measures that have agreed upon and well documented standards, and which will facilitate
comparability and replication. We also strongly advise researchers not to develop their
own ethnicity measures without strong justification, or use existing measures in an unprescribed
or ad hoc manner. We advise that researchers should routinely undertake
sensitivity analyses. We also encourage researchers to carefully consider the possible
relationships between ethnicity and other important variables in order to avoid spurious
interpretations of the effects of ethnicity.

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Identifiers

ORCID for Teresa McGowan: orcid.org/0009-0002-9231-3743

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