PART 2: CHILDREN'S RELATIONSHIPS

Relationship with Parents

Relationship with Fathers

Measure

The percentage of children aged 9-17 who report that they find it easy to talk to their father when something is really bothering them.

Key findings

  • In 2006, 78% of children aged 9-17 reported that they find it easy to talk to their mother when something is really bothering them (see Table 24).

Differences by gender, age and social class

  • In 2006, the percentage of children reporting that they found it easy to talk to their father when something was really bothering them was higher among boys and younger children (see Table 26):
    • 67.1% of boys, compared to 52.1% of girls;
    • 78.4% of 9-year-olds, compared to 51.1% of 15-17 year-olds.


Table 26: Percentage of children who report that they find it easy to talk to their father when something is really bothering them, by gender, age and social class (2002 and 2006

    2002     2006  
  Boys Girls Total Boys Girls Total
Total 64.0 50.4 56.2 67.1 52.1 59.8
Age
9 years - - - 79.3 77.5 78.4
10-11 years 79.7 64.4 71.3 80.0 66.1 72.2
12-14 years 66.1 51.4 57.8 72.0 54.7 63.7
15-17 years 53.2 43.7 47.5 58.5 42.9 51.1
Social class
SC 1-2 63.2 51.4 56.1 68.0 54.4 61.4
SC 3-4 64.7 50.9 56.8 68.4 51.6 60.1
SC 5-6 65.3 49.0 56.4 66.3 52.8 59.3

Source: HBSC Survey

Differences by geographic area

  • Children in the South-East region are more likely (61.4%) to report that they find it easy to talk to their father when something is really bothering them, while children in the Mid-West region are least likely (57.3%) to do so (see Table 27).

Table 27: Percentage of children who report that they find it easy to talk to their father when something is really bothering them, by NUTS Region (2006)

  2006
Border 59.0
Midlands 57.9
West 59.4
Dublin 60.5
Mid-East 58.9
Mid-West 57.3
South-East 61.4
South-West 58.9
Overall 59.8

Source: HBSC Survey

International comparisons

  • From the 2006 HBSC Survey, using the ages of 11, 13 and 15 only to draw international comparisons, 62.9% of Irish children reported that they found it easy to talk to their father when something was really bothering them (see Figure 8). This is higher than the HBSC average of 61.7%.
  • Among all 40 countries and regions that used this HBSC item, the lowest percentage for this indicator was found among children from the USA (46.8%) and highest among children from Slovenia (77.2%). Overall, Irish children ranked 18th.
  • Among the 35 countries and regions that used this HBSC item in 2002, Irish children ranked 24th (58.7%).

Figure 8: Percentage of children who report that they find it easy to talk to their father when something is really bothering them, by country (2006)

figure 8

Source: HBSC Survey

 

Technical notes
All data presented are drawn from self-report, self-completion questionnaires completed by children in schools. Thus, they are subject to potential biases in relation to self-presentation and memory. These measures may suffer from social desirability bias.

Percentage differences are presented for descriptive purposes only and may not reflect a statistically significant finding.

Social class (SC) is classified into one of the following groups (introduced in 1996 by the CSO), defined on the basis of occupation:

SC I: Professional
SC 2: Managerial
SC 3: Non-manual
SC 4: Skilled manual
SC 5: Semi-skilled
SC 6: Unskilled

NUTS is an acronym for the EU Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics. This classification was legally established by EU Regulation No. 1059/2003 on 29 May 2003. In Ireland, NUTS is classified hierarchically as Level 1 - Ireland; Level 2 - Regions; and Level 3 - Regional Authorities. The 8 Regional Authorities in Ireland (NUTS 3 regions) were established under the Local Government Act, 1991 (see Appendix 2).

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