Almost all test persons answered question 5a) with "yes". Only the test persons 06 and 15 state that they did not attend kindergarten or a similar institution in their early childhood. Both test persons are "very sure" that they did not.
Of particular interest at this point was the understanding of the concept of a "day-care center" and what "regularly attended" means to the test persons in connection with a day-care facility.
Four test persons (TP 02, 06, 09, 11) associate a kindergarten with the term day-care center. Six test persons associate the term with a kindergarten or a childcare facility where children are looked after all day:
- "This will probably take longer." (TP 10)
- "A childcare facility. And it sounds like you could take it there all day."(TP 03)
- "Basically, something akin to kindergarten. But this can also mean that smaller children are accepted there, not only from 3 [years] as usual. And day-care also means longer childcare hours."(TP 05)
Test person 05 understands the term to mean an institution in which smaller children could also be cared for. Three other test subjects (TP 04, 13, 14) also associate a day-care facility with the care of very small children
"who are not yet independent. Who are not yet walking around and still need diapers" (TP 13),
"thus 2 to 5 years" (TP 04).
Test person 12 associates this term with an after-school day-care center
"with homework help and such". Test person 15 uses the term:
"Either there is a day-care center, that is an after-school care center for me. Or there is a kindergarten that runs until noon" (TP 15).
In understanding a "regular" visit to a childcare facility, the test persons are all very close. For eleven test persons (TP 01, 02, 06, 07, 08, 09, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15) a "regular" visit means every (week) day:
- "Five times a week. Monday to Friday." (TP 02)
- "Monday to Friday. For half a day." (TP 06)
- "Monday to Friday." (TP 15)
Test person 03 answers:
"In my case it was Monday to Friday. That's why I didn't give it much thought". She adds, however, that
"even twice a week, because the mother works twice a week" could be regular. But her first thought was also the daily visit to a childcare facility. For test person 05, regular means
"either every day or at least most of the week", similar to test person 12, who understands regular to mean
"several times a week".
It can be summarized that the question did not cause any problems for the test persons. They interpret the terms "day-care center" and "regularly attended" in a similar way.
