Welcome to the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study

The Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (WLS) is a long-term study of a random sample of 10,317 men and women who graduated from Wisconsin high schools in 1957. The WLS provides an opportunity to study the life course, intergenerational transfers and relationships, family functioning, physical and mental health and well-being, and morbidity and mortality from late adolescence through middle age. WLS data also cover social background, youthful aspirations, schooling, military service, labor market experiences, family characteristics and events, social participation, psychological characteristics, and retirement.

Survey data were collected from the original respondents or their parents in 1957, 1964, 1975, 1992, and 2004; from a selected sibling in 1977, 1994, and 2005; from the spouse of the original respondent in 2004; from the spouse of the selected sibling in 2006; and from widow(er)s of the graduates and siblings in 2006. Data are currently available from all collection rounds except the widows. These will be available in the future. Please join the WLS list serv by sending an email to WLSannounce-request@ssc.wisc.edu with a subject line of "Subscribe", and visit this site frequently to ensure you are aware of any updates.

The Wisconsin Longitudinal Study is supported by the Behavioral and Social Research Program of the National Institute on Aging.

NEWSupplementary Data and Documentation

View the Documentation Page to access supplementary documents for data collected about the respondents.

Data Updates

February 18, 2008 - The WLS 12.22 data set is now available. Summary scores with means imputed for missing components have been added to 1993 Grad, 1994 Selected Sibling, 2004 Grad and 2005 Selected Sibling modules. There are some corrections and updates to previously released variables. Please see Change Notice #29 for details.

View all data update notices

NEW -- "The Class of 1957 in their Mid-60s: A First Look"
(text only)
(with variable names embedded in the text)

Pilot Grant Opportunity: The Center for Demography of Health and Aging (CDHA) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison will award three pilot grants to investigators using the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (WLS) data for scholarly research. For mor information, please visit the page for the Pilot Grant Program.

WLS Handbook

The Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (WLS) Handbook is a useful resource for researchers who want to use WLS data. The handbook is designed to direct readers to appropriate sources of the WLS data, methodology, and documentation information.

Download the WLS handbook