Understanding children’s well-being:A national survey of young people’s well-being

27 January 2010

Bob Reitemeier

Chief ExecutiveThe Children’s Society

Gwyther ReesThe Children’s Society

Jonathan BradshawUniversity of York

Well-being: overview

The State of Britain’s Children

The evidence base is improving• Every Child Matters indicators• Opportunity for All• Equality and Human Rights Commission

indicators for children and young people• Surveys: Tellus, BHPS, FACS, MCS, etc• International sources: HBSC, PISA, EU SILC

Arguably subjective well-being the least developed domain

Attempt to fill the gap

British Household Panel Survey – 11-15

year olds

Well-being and life satisfaction

HBSC 2005/06: Children who report high life satisfaction95.0090.0085.0080.0075.00

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Why well-being matters

Promotion (and distribution) of well-being can be seen as a fundamental goal of any society

UN CRC “the primary consideration in all actions concerning children must be in their best interest and their views must be taken into account”

Well-being has been shown to vary between nations and over time. Need to understand why.

Subjective well-being can be an important indicator of underlying issues

The research programme

Aims

Understand the concept of well-being taking full account of young people’s perspectives

To establish self-report measures and use these to

Identify the reasons for variations in well-being

Monitor changes in well-being over time

Survey development

2005 survey – 11,000 young people

Development of framework

Identification and testing of questions

2008 survey (administered by Ipsos MORI)

Survey overview

Random sample of mainstream primary and secondary schools in England

Covers Years 6, 8 and 10 (10- to 15-year-olds)

One class randomly selected in each school

Total sample of just under 7,000 – over 2,000 in each of the three age groups

Survey content

Secondary questionnaire - about 140 items Primary questionnaire – about 100 items

Four broad areas: Measures of overall well-being Single measures for 21 aspects of well-being

(e.g. family, local area) More detailed questions on particular aspects of

subjective and psychological well-being Demographics and socio-economic

Overall subjective well-being

Overall well-being

Distinction between:

Happiness• Happiness with life as a whole

Life satisfaction (more of a cognitive assessment) • Cantril’s ladder • Huebner’s life satisfaction scale (7 items)

Overall well-being Composite

measure

Most young people happy and satisfied

But around 7% of young people relatively unhappy

Variations in well-being

What factors can explain variations in overall well-

being?

Individual characteristics

Factors considered: Age** Gender** Disability** Religious affiliation* Ethnicity* Country of birth

Low explanatory power (3%-4%). Age most significant factor

Age and gender variations

8.17.5 7.2

7.9 7.8 7.6

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Year 6 Year 8 Year 10

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Family factors

Factors considered: Poverty** Family structure* Number of siblings

Very low explanatory power (1% to 2.5%)

But, query re: poverty measures

Sub-groups

7.7 7.2 6.7 6.2

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Wholesample

No paid job Disabled Not livingwith

parents

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Cumulative effects

Factors considered: disability, poverty, change in family structure

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Number of factors

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Other explanations for

variations

Role of environmental factors.

Three examples: Change in family structure Experiences of being bullied Quality of family relationships

Change in family structure

10% of secondary school sample had experienced a change in the adults they lived with over the last year

Significant link with overall well-being (average score 6.8 compared to 7.7 for whole sample)

Reduced significance of variations in well-being across different family structures

Being bullied

7.67.2

6.5

8.0

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Never Hardly ever Sometimes Often

Frequency of being bullied in last 12 months

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Family relationships

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Agree Neither Disagree

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‘My family gets along well together’

Summary

Explaining variations in well-being: Individual and family factors explain relatively

little Poverty – needs further exploration Recent life events may play a more significant

role – stronger focus in future research Other environmental factors such as quality of

relationships show stronger associations

Components of well-being

Understanding Children’s Well-Being

Competing theories

Different explanations: ‘Bottom-up’ approach (situational)

• Demographics, socio-economic, life events• Domains >> overall well-being

‘Top-down’ approach (personality)• Temperament, instrumental• Overall well-being >> domains

Potential value of both approaches

21 aspects

Survey included single questions (on a scale from 0 to 10 of happiness with 21 different aspects of young people’s lives)

Derived from:• Cummins - Australia• Casas – Spain• Young people’s ideas from 2005 survey

Aspects (1)

How happy are you ... Mean%

unhappy

about the home you live in 8.7 4.9%

with your friends 8.6 4.6%

with your family 8.6 5.7%

about the groups of people you belong to 8.2 5.1%

about getting on with the people you know 8.2 4.9%

about how you enjoy yourself 8.2 5.2%

about the things you have 8.1 5.7%

Aspects (2)

How happy are you ... Mean%

unhappy

with your health 8.0 7.7%

about doing things away from your home 8.0 7.2%

with the things you want to be good at 7.8 7.5%

about communicating with people 7.8 7.6%

about the amount of freedom you have 7.8 10.5%

about how safe you feel 7.6 8.6%

about the amount of choice you have in life 7.6 10.6%

about how you spend your time 7.6 8.9%

Aspects (3)

How happy are you ... Mean%

unhappy

about what may happen to you later on in your life

7.4 10.4%

about the school that you go to 7.3 13.2%

with your local area 7.2 13.8%

with your confidence 7.0 16.0%

about your school work 6.9 11.9%

with your appearance 6.8 17.5%

Age variations

0

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2

3

4

5

6

7

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10

Friends Safety Family School

Aspect

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Year 6

Year 8

Year 10

Gender variations

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10

School work Safety Family Appearance

Aspect

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Female

Male

Unhappiness with appearance

13%

23%

28%

11%14% 14%

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10%

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25%

30%

Year 6 Year 8 Year 10

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Associations with overall well-being

Top seven aspects: Family Amount of choice Material possessions Expectations of the future Home environment Leisure Freedom

Cummins

Personal well-being index:• Standard of living • Future security• Relationships • Health• Safety• Achievements in life• Community connectedness

Explains 47% variation in overall subjective well-being

Huebner

Brief multi-dimensional student life satisfaction scale:• Family• Living environment• Friends• Self• School

Created measures to approximate to items 2 and 4Explains 50% variation in overall subjective well-

being

Alternative model

Based on 2005 survey:• Family• Amount of choice• Material possessions• Safety• Health• School work• Leisure• Friends• Local area

Explains 54% variation in overall subjective well-being

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No change

Change

Change in family structure -

associations

Summary

Substantial variations in well-being re: different aspects

Importance of family, freedom/choice, expectations of the future, home and possessions

Concepts of well-being may vary according to age – both in comparison with adults and between different age groups

Next steps

Why well-being matters

The concept of well-being provides a means of understanding what is important for young people’s lives. It is a means of ensuring that young people’s views are heard.

2008 survey establishes a base line for future exploration

Well-being research can have important practical applications in terms of informing how to improve young people’s lives

Next steps

Four further publications over the next year on specific aspects of well-being

Application of well-being indicators within The Children’s Society to measure impact

Next wave of the survey in 2010 - first step in beginning to identify trends in young people’s well-being in England over time. To include• Better measures of family economic factors• Personality• Wider range of life events

Questions