A ppendix III
Glossary of technical terms and definition
Age Participation Index
A measure of the proportion of young people who enter Higher Education, this effectively estimates the share of 17 year olds in the population who can be expected to enter HE for the first time before their 21 st birthday.
Blue Badge holders
The Blue (formerly Orange) Badge Scheme provides a national arrangement of on-street parking concessions enabling people with severe walking difficulties who travel either as drivers or passengers to park close to their destinations. The Scheme also applies to registered blind people and people with severe upper limb disabilities who regularly drive a vehicle but cannot turn a steering wheel by hand.
Body Mass Index
Body mass index ( BMI) is the most widely used measure of obesity. BMI is defined as weight (kg) divided by the square of height (m 2).
Cerebrovascular Disease
Stroke.
Disability
The definition of disability given in the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 is as follows: 'A person has a disability… if he has a physical or mental impairment which has a substantial and long-term adverse affect on his ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities'. Information on disability currently collected by the Scottish Executive is, however, based on different definitions, which have varied depending on the reason for which the data has been collected. The Scottish Executive is currently working towards a harmonised definition of disability for its core surveys.
Economic activity rate
A measure of the proportion of people of working age (16-64 for men, 16-59 for women) who are in work or actively seeking work. This includes registered unemployed people.
Economic inactivity rate
A measure of the proportion of people of working age not in work, or not seeking work for a variety of reasons, including participation in education, ill health, disability, early retirement, or domestic or caring responsibilities.
Employment rate
A measure of the proportion of people in employment in relation to the population of working age.
Ethnicity
The categories used in the question on ethnicity in the 2001 Census were as follows:
White: Scottish, Other British, Irish, Any other White background;
Mixed: Any Mixed background;
Asian: Asian Scottish or Asian British, Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Chinese, Any other Asian background;
Black, Black Scottish or Black British: Caribbean, African, Any other Black background;
Other ethnic background: Any other background.
The Scottish Executive are currently conducting a review of Census ethnicity classifications and more details on the review can be found on the OneScotland website at: http://www.onescotland.com/onescotland/osmc_display_leveldown.jsp?pContentID=168&p_applic=CCC&pElementID=102&pMenuID=10&p_service=Content.show&
Fertility Rates
General Fertility Rate: The number of births per 1,000 women aged 15-44.
Total Fertility Rate: The average number of children that a group of women would expect to have if they experienced the observed age-specific fertility rates in each of their childbearing years.
Flexible working
A range of working patterns including part-time work, job-share, term time working, annualised hours, compressed week, etc, arrangements.
Full-time work
Normal working hours of 30 or more hours a week.
Gender earnings ratio
Women's average earnings expressed as a proportion of men's average earnings.
Highest Income Householder
The highest income householder is taken as the household reference person for the first part of the Scottish Household Survey interviews. This must be a person in whose name the accommodation is owned or rented or be otherwise responsible for the accommodation.
Households Below Average Income - relevant income definitions
Total household income: Total income from all sources including from Tax Credits, before deductions of income tax and National Insurance.
Net household income: Total income after deductions for income tax and National Insurance contributions.
Net disposable household income: Total income after deductions for income tax, National Insurance contributions, council tax, pension contributions and maintenance payments.
Equivalised net disposable household income: 'Equivalised' income is used to allow comparisons of living standards between different household types. Income is adjusted to take account variations in size and composition of the household. This adjustment reflects the fact that a family of several people requires a higher income than a single person in order for both households to enjoy a comparable standard of living. The key assumption is that all individuals in the household benefit equally from the combined (equivalised) income of the household. There are several different equivalence scales. The household income estimates contained in this report use the McClements equivalisation scale. There are distinct equivalence scales used for income before housing costs ( BHC) and income after housing costs ( AHC).
Before housing costs: Net disposable income, equivalised using the before housing costs equivalisation scale. Certain incomes in kind are included such as free school meals and TV licences for over 75s.
After housing costs: Net disposable income with income as for BHC but with rent/mortgage payments, water charges, structural insurance premiums, ground rent and service charges deducted. This is equivalised using the after housing costs equivalisation scale.
Relative low income: Individuals living in households whose equivalised income is below 60% of GB median income in the same year.
Individual Incomes definitions
Total individual income: Equal to gross income, defined as income from all sources received by an individual, plus tax credits.
Net individual income: Income from all sources received by an individual net of income tax and National Insurance contributions.
Disposable individual income: includes Housing Benefit, Council Tax Benefit and property income from letting and sub-letting (apportioned across household adults where appropriate), and deducts National Insurance contributions, income tax payments, childcare costs, travel to work costs, parental contributions to students living away from home, maintenance and child support payments (which are deducted from the income of the person making the payment), and housing costs (including Council Tax, all costs apportioned across household adults where appropriate).
Ischaemic Heart Disease
Coronary heart disease.
Long term unemployed
People who have been unemployed for a year or more.
Low Pay Threshold
Two-thirds of male median earnings.
Mean earnings
Average earnings.
Median earnings
The median represents the mid-point of a distribution, with half of the sample less than or equal to the median, and half of the sample greater than or equal to the median.
MOSAIC classification
Scottish MOSAIC is a neighbourhood classification system developed by Experian. It draws on a large number of Census variables, augmented by some published non-Census information, to generate a way of discriminating between postcodes in terms of housing and population types, and densities. The system has 12 broad groups, subdivided into 47 types. The whole of each postcode is allocated to whichever MOSAIC category appears the most appropriate, on the basis of the overall statistics for the postcode. This 'geo-demographic' system has been used in the sampling for the SHS.
Part-time work
Normal working of hours of less than 30 hours a week.
Receptions for fine default, etc
'Receptions' are not equivalent to 'persons received'. Where a person has several sentences imposed on him by one court in one day this is counted as one reception. However, where custodial sentences are imposed on the same person by two or more courts in one day, two or more receptions are counted. Where a person is reconvicted while serving a sentence and a further custodial sentence is imposed on him this too is regarded as a further reception.
Regression analysis
Regression analysis aims to summarise the relationship between a 'dependent' variable and one or more 'independent' variables. It shows how well a respondent's score on the dependent variable can be estimated from knowledge of their scores on the independent variables. This technique takes into account relationships between the different independent variables (for example, between education and income, or social class and housing tenure). Regression is often undertaken to support a claim that the phenomena measured by the independent variables cause the phenomena measured by the dependent variable. However, the causal ordering, if any, between the variables cannot be verified or falsified by the technique. Causality can only be inferred through special experimental designs or through assumptions made by the analyst. All regression analysis assumes that the relationship between the dependent and each of the independent variables takes a particular form. In logistic regression, it is assumed that the relationship can be adequately summarised by an S-shaped curve, where the impact of the dependent variable of a one-point increase in an independent variable becomes progressively less the closer the value of the dependent variable approaches 0 or 1.
Standard industrial classification
A Standard Industrial Classification ( SIC) is used in classifying business establishments and other statistical units by the type of economic activity in which they are engaged. The classification provides a framework for the collection, tabulation, presentation and analysis of data and its use promotes uniformity.
Standard occupational classification
The current Standard Occupational Classification system has been in use since 2000 and is currently being reviewed. This is a system for classifying occupations according to the kind of work performed i.e. job, and the competent performance of the tasks and duties i.e. skill.
Unemployment rate
A measure of the proportion of people unemployed in relation to the population of working age. There are two measures of unemployment typically used. The official claimant count includes only those people claiming unemployment related benefits. The International Labour Organisation ( ILO) measure of unemployment covers people who are out of work, want a job, have actively sought work in the previous four weeks and are available to start in the next fortnight, or out of work and have accepted a job that they are waiting to start in the next fortnight.