Policy Research Working Paper10695Recording the Time DivideA Comparative Study of Smartphone- and Recall-Based Approaches to Time Use MeasurementTalip KilicGayatri KoolwalWilbert Drazi VundruThomas DaumHannes BuchwaldGreg SeymourPeter MvulaAlister MunthaliMonice KachinjikaDevelopment Economics Development Data GroupFebruary 2024 Public Disclosure AuthorizedPublic Disclosure AuthorizedPublic Disclosure AuthorizedPublic Disclosure AuthorizedProduced by the Research Support TeamAbstractThe Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development issues. An objective of the series is to get the findings out quickly, even if the presentations are less than fully polished. The papers carry the names of the authors and should be cited accordingly. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper are entirely those of the authors. They do not necessarily represent the views of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/World Bank and its affiliated organizations, or those of the Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent.Policy Research Working Paper 10695Based on a randomized survey experiment in Malawi, this study examines how innovative techniques in time use data collection could sidestep measurement concerns with tradi-tional recall-based time use measurement. The experiment assigns random samples of households, and adult men and women within, to one of two treatment arms on time use measurement: a traditional 24-hour recall time use diary, and a self-administered smartphone-based pictorial time diary, known as the TimeTracker app, for real-time data collection. Compared to the recall arm, participation in employment and unpaid domestic and care work is shown to be higher in the smartphone arm for both men and women. The resulting estimates of gender gaps, while continuing to be large, are narrower in the smartphone arm, except for care work where the estimated gender gap increases. The recall treatment leads to substantial underre-porting of activities after 6 pm, which otherwise accounts for nearly 30 percent of daily reported time in the smart-phone arm. Likewise, the extent of simultaneous activities, particularly among women, is markedly lower in the recall arm. The overall reported time is, however, higher in the recall arm due to the minimum 15-minute duration that was used for recording activities the 24-hour recall diary, while over one-third of activities lasted less than 15 minutes in the smartphone arm. The analysis also shows that using stylized time use questions with a 7-day recall, as opposed to a 24-hour recall diary, results in an even greater overesti-mation of reported time in employment and unpaid work.This paper is a product of the Development Data Group, Development Economics. It is part of a lar...
