Multinational Time Use Study: Harmonized Activity Diaries from 30 Countries

Over a million diary days from more than 100 national-scale surveys are harmonized into a single standardized format. The Multinational Time Use Study (MTUS) allows analysis of time spent in 41 work and leisure activities over the last 55 years across 30 countries. It was first developed by Jonathan Gershuny and expanded by Juana Lamote de Grignon, incorporating data from HETUS, ATUS, and other national projects.

Use Cases

• Analyze trends in unpaid domestic work based on harmonized activity categories over 55 years.
• Compare leisure time allocation across 30 different countries using standardized diary data.
• Study the evolution of paid work hours using data from over 100 national-scale surveys.
• Model time-use patterns by demographic groups based on the common series of background variables.

Strengths

• Harmonizes data from over 100 surveys into a single standardized format.
• Covers 30 countries and a time span of 55 years.
• Includes over a million diary days of individual-level data.
• Standardizes time spent per day across 41 distinct activity categories.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data may reflect geographic and temporal bias inherent to the source surveys.

Provenance

Source

Harmonized from national-scale surveys including the Harmonised European Time Use Survey (HETUS) and American Time Use Survey (ATUS).

Collection Method

Harmonization of randomly sampled diary data from original surveys into a common format.

Time Range

Spans the last 55 years (specific start year not provided).

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-20 08:57:13; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Covers 30 countries.