Tracking beyond Borders: Experience of the Mexican Family Life Survey

Erika Arenas, University of California, Los Angeles
Graciela M. Teruel, Universidad Iberoamericana
Luis Rubalcava, Spectron Desarrollo S.C. and Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas (CIDE)
Christian Herrera, University of California, Irvine

There is little evidence of the existence of longitudinal study designs that incorporate following-up movers once they cross national boundaries; tracking international movers has been considered to this date too expensive and the potential success rates far too unclear to attempt any follow-up. In this paper, we present some evidence on how tracking was possible in the Mexico-U.S. case, based on the experience of the Mexican Family Life Survey (MxFLS). We assess the usefulness of tracking in survey designs and introduce the protocols implemented by the MxFLS team to track respondents who immigrated to the United States.