Child Wellbeing in the UK

I saw an article in the Guardian entitled, why are British children so unhappy? (www.guardian.co.uk/society/shortcuts/2012/jun/27/why-british-children-so-unhappy ), and it focused on a study/ report by unicef that reported about the levels of child wellbeing in the UK and how it was rated to be the lowest of 21 counties (from across the industrialised world). I was intrigued by the authors laying blame at the hands of country policy and on commercialism as I have never really seen these as big issues or I should say more accurately that I don’t see them as the driving force. That country policy and advertising affect the people within a country is not in doubt however I see these as reactions to an already deep seated problem and not the cause.

 However maybe I am being a bit naïve, since commercialism is not quite the same as materialism and it seems that more people are blaming this. The UK’s children seem to be provided for with commercial goods of a very expensive nature. The parents seem plagued by needing to provide labelled goods, media devices and a steady supply of the latest gadgets, games and clothing for their children (www.savechildhood.net/the-evidence.html ), as well as a roof over their heads and food in their bellies  and yet I am still unconvinced that reducing advertising aimed at children is the answer. In fact I would suggest that advertising whether aimed at children, or not, that implies to the parents that their children might want this or that, should want this or that, will need this or that is actually driving parents to buy things that their children neither desire nor need. This is not to say that children are not asking for things but that their reasons for asking my just be to gain the attention of their parents rather than the goods for which they are asking.

The report on Child wellbeing laid no blame on anything or anyone, in fact it gave no explanations as to what they thought may have caused the problem. And as with many charities and newspaper reports the lack of well-presented source data is annoying in the extreme. I have read the entire document on child wellbeing found here, www.unicef.org.uk/Latest/Publications/Child-well-being/  and sadly am none the wiser as to why they are blaming commensalism.

What I do see though is an almost uniform lower ranking for the UK in each category compared to other countries. I do find it interesting that the entire document shows the data as a comparison. There is no finite level for which a child needs are to be met that is acceptable. And from a scientific point of view this is interesting.

 For instance if you look at material wellbeing, the countries are ranked in one criteria according to the percentage of children living in households where the income is less that 50% of national median, (median = is the numerical value separating the higher half of a sample) and much as it makes some kind of sense I would have thought that the ability to feed oneself and your family might be a better measure and are they really then saying that that is not possible on that level of income? Unlikely I think. So then is it the comparison of what a family has to its neighbour that is the issue?

In fact many would say that actually yes this is a factor. To know that others in the near vicinity have more, people with whom they are in constant contact, causes them to envy, to feel they should have more, to feel the need to provide it. And if this is so then the constant reminders of peoples wealth on TV and in the media may well play a much larger part in the problem than you might think, however the continuing and widening divide in wealth within an area may well provide the answer as to why people are continually trying to provide material goods for their children.

It is also interesting that this article picked up on a difference in the amount of time that parents spend with their children. It picked up on the longer working hours in this country as contributing factor and although this keeps people from being at home surely the answer is for one parent to work part time instead of them both having full time jobs. I dare say everyone is now screaming that they couldn’t afford to do that which is why they don’t, and that kind of brings me back to materialism question or is it poverty?

But maybe it’s a bit more subtle than that. It seems to me that with the ever increasing levels of work related stress in this country that actually even when the parents are at home they are not ready, willing or able to converse with their children. So is it the hours they work or the stress that they are under that has caused many parents to not talk with their children or is it that  many parents do not leave the office outside the home and are doing work in their evenings as well as during the day. Either way it is the children who are suffering and with an increasing number being diagnose with mental health issues, 1 in 10 children diagnosed between the ages of 5 and 16, this is something that needs to change. (www.guardian.co.uk/society/shortcuts/2012/jun/27/why-british-children-so-unhappy )