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Asking about Race: Survey Question Design for Respondents
with Multiple Race Identities
Kristen Miller & Stephanie J. Willson
National Center for Health Statistics
On August 9, 2002 the Council of the American Sociological Association issued a
statement entitled “The Importance of Collecting Data and Doing Social Scientific
Research on Race.” This document outlines the reasons why race is a valid and critical
subject for scientific investigation. The organizing theme of the argument focuses on the
centrality of race to major social institutions. Specifically, race serves as one basis for
action in many realms of society, including mating and marriage, tracking and
opportunities within education, and collective behavior and social movements.
While it may seem unwarranted for the American Sociological Association to
release such a document – afterall, race is a primary focus of study within sociology –
recent outside appeals have called for scientists to stop collecting data on race altogether.
This petition centers around difficulties inherent in the scientific pursuit of understanding
race. There are two prominent arguments supporting this position. The first argument,
advanced by scholarly and civic leaders, suggests that collecting data on race continues to
promote division between people. If physical differences between people were not
highlighted, those differences will eventually become insignificant. This would be one
step toward creating a “color blind” society in which the allocation of resources would
not be contingent upon one’s race.
The second argument, and probably the most significant for this paper, is one that
questions the scientific integrity of the concept of race in the first place. Many
disciplines now understand “race” as a concept with no clear, firm, consistent, or
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