EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Introduction
This report uses data from the Growing Up in Scotland study ( GUS) to explore families' experiences of living in Scotland's neighbourhoods, to examine parents' views on different aspects of their local area and to consider the relationship between area characteristics and parenting behaviours. The findings in this report are drawn mainly from data collected in the neighbourhood module which was run in the third wave of fieldwork (undertaken between April 2007 and May 2008) - when children in the birth cohort were aged just under 3 years old and those in the child cohort were just under 5 years old - although information from the first two waves of GUS is also used.
Satisfaction with local area and facilities
- Eighty-one percent of parents are very or fairly satisfied with the area where they live.
- Satisfaction levels varied according to area characteristics being higher amongst those parents living in areas of lower deprivation and those in rural areas, and lower amongst those living in areas of high deprivation and in urban locales.
- The facilities used most often by parents were GPs, community health services and playgrounds and parks.
- A majority (88%) of parents in both cohorts reported having a public park or playground within 10 minutes walk of their home. This varied significantly by area urban-rural characteristics from 95% in small accessible towns to only 57% in remote rural areas.
- Parents were asked whether they had access to a list of services and facilities. People living in rural areas were less likely to have access to other services including childcare, health and leisure facilities than were those in urban areas.
- Areas of higher deprivation also suffered from a lack of childcare, health and leisure facilities. This was most striking in relation to childcare services. However, these areas were more likely to benefit from other services such as Credit Unions and advice centres
- Satisfaction with local facilities was generally high. Overall, 31% of respondents were highly satisfied, 26% reported medium satisfaction and 44% of respondents had low satisfaction. Parents living in deprived areas, and those in social housing were most likely to report low area satisfaction.
- Local health and education services were rated highest by parents, whereas facilities for children and young people were rated lowest.
- Accordingly, facilities for young children were those seen as being most in need of improvement - selected by one-fifth of respondents. Housing and levels of crime were also identified as key local issues which required attention.
Social networks
- Three-quarters of parents in both cohorts had a satisfactory friendship network with a similar proportion having a satisfactory family network. A little over half (57%) had both satisfactory networks and only 10% in the birth cohort and 8% in the child cohort had neither.
- Older mothers were less likely to have satisfactory family networks than were younger mothers. Some of this difference may be accounted for by differences in the number of, and frequency of contact with, the child's grandparents amongst the older group.
- Generally speaking, more disadvantaged circumstances were associated with less satisfactory networks. Parents in lower-income households, those in socially-rented accommodation, and those living in area of high deprivation were less likely to have satisfactory networks than were parents in higher income households, owner-occupied accommodation or living in less deprived areas.
- Individual rather than area characteristics appeared to be more important. Maternal age, household income, and tenure were all significantly and independently associated with having a satisfactory friendship network.
- Maternal age was also significantly associated with having a satisfactory family network, as was tenure.
Area child-friendliness
- Overall, most parents said their local area was moderately or very child-friendly. Only 20% of parents in the birth cohort perceived their neighbourhood to have low child-friendliness
- More deprived areas were generally perceived by parents to be less child-friendly; 43% of parents living in the most deprived areas said their area had low child-friendliness compared with 5% in the least deprived areas.
- Parents in rural areas rated their neighbourhoods more highly in terms of child-friendliness than did parents in urban areas; 38% of parents in remote rural areas said their area had high child-friendliness compared with 14% in large urban areas.
- Ratings of neighbourhood satisfaction and of local facilities matched those of child-friendliness. Thus parents who were dissatisfied with their neighbourhood and who gave local facilities a poor rating were also negative about the area's child-friendliness.
- The multivariate analysis revealed that living in a rural area, higher levels of neighbourhood satisfaction, a positive rating of local facilities, having a satisfactory friendship network, and residing longer at the current address were all significantly and independently related to a higher perceived notion of area child-friendliness.
Area characteristics and parenting behaviours
- Area urban-rural characteristics were significantly associated with differences in parents' engagement in most of these behaviours. Rurality or remoteness was positively associated with a greater variety of parent-child activities, attendance at a parent-child group and willingness to seek help and support.
- The existence or not, of social networks is also key. Parents who reported more satisfactory networks engaged in more activities with their child, and were more open to seeking help and support as well as being more likely to do so than were parents with fewer satisfactory networks.
- Parents' perceptions of their local area in terms of neighbourhood satisfaction, ratings of local facilities and child-friendliness were generally not associated with variations in parenting behaviour. However, higher perceptions of the quality of local facilities were weakly related to a greater participation in parent-child activities and a willingness to seek parenting advice and support.
Conclusion
There is clear evidence that the differences and similarities between services in different types of neighbourhoods matter to parents. Parents in different neighbourhoods have very different objective conditions which impact on how they see their area. This is reflected in overall satisfaction with the area, and, in urban areas, parents' perceptions and use of services as well as their sense of its child-friendliness.
The findings here suggest that improvements to facilities for children and young people, particularly in more deprived areas, would seem to not only have benefits for child health through increased opportunity for outdoor play, but also for parents' satisfaction with their local area and it's child-friendliness. Furthermore, the consistently significant, and generally positive, impact of having satisfactory networks on parenting behaviours and perceptions of the local community would suggest that measures which seek to improve parents' informal networks through area-based programmes or interventions would have wider benefits on child outcomes.