GROWING UP IN SCOTLAND: THE CIRCUMSTANCES AND EXPERIENCES OF 3 YEAR OLD CHILDREN LIVING IN SCOTLAND IN 2007/08 AND 2013

Chapter 6 Parenting Support

The Early Years Framework (Scottish Government, 2008a) acknowledges the central importance of parenting and family capacity in delivering improved outcomes for children and families by making this one of the four core strands. In so doing, the Framework highlights the importance of providing parents with appropriate and integrated support which will, amongst other things, allow them "to develop the skills needed to provide a nurturing and stimulating home environment free from conflict" and "meet a range of needs they [parents] may have" (Scottish Government, 2008a: 11). Supporting parents is not just about providing greater access to the right sort of formal services, informal social support networks also play a significant part in helping parents in their role. The importance of informal support for families with multiple disadvantages, but particularly with low incomes, has already been recognised in previous GUS research (Mabelis and Marryat, 2011; Bradshaw et al, 2009; Bradshaw et al., 2008). Low social support has been associated with poor maternal mental health, a factor linked to poorer child outcomes (Marryat and Martin, 2010). In addition, strong maternal social networks have been shown to protect children living in persistently low incomes from poorer wellbeing (Treanor, 2015).

This chapter compares differences in attitudes and experiences related to parenting support. In particular, it provides insight into parents' access to informal support and their attitudes towards seeking and accessing support. This chapter therefore presents an important and influential part of the environment within which children are growing up.

6.1 Informal support

Previous research has demonstrated the importance of sources of informal support for help, information and advice on child health concerns. Participants were asked how easy it would be for them to find someone at short notice to look after the cohort child for a few hours during the day. The results for each cohort are shown in Table 6.1.

The majority of parents in both cohorts found it very or fairly easy to arrange this sort of short notice childcare. However, parents in BC2 found it less easy than those in BC1. 77% of parents in BC1 said it would be very or fairly easy to arrange this sort of care compared with 68% of parents in BC2. In contrast, 26% of parents in BC2 said it would be very or fairly difficult compared with 17% in BC1. These differences are statistically significant.

Table 6.1 How easy or difficult would it be to find someone to look after the cohort child for couple of hours during the day at short notice, by cohort

	BC1	BC2
	%	%
Very easy	40	32
Fairly easy	37	36
Neither easy nor difficult	6	5
Fairly difficult	11	15
Very difficult	6	11
Unweighted bases	4193	5019

Tested on category 5 'very difficult': differences by cohort p < .001

As Table 6.2 shows, to some extent the relationship between income and ease of arranging short notice childcare is similar in both cohorts. For each, parents in lower income households were more likely to say they found arranging short notice childcare 'very difficult'. In BC1, the difference is very slight - only around 2 percentage points. In BC2, it is a little more pronounced - 8% amongst parents in the highest income group compared with 14% in the lowest income group. These differences are statistically significant. Nevertheless, there is no corresponding linear pattern amongst those who found it 'very easy'. That is, higher income parents were not any more likely to find arranging this childcare very easy than lower income parents were, in either cohort. The main change to note is that the higher level of difficulty in arranging this type of care amongst parents in BC2 is evident in each income group. For example, among the lowest income group the proportion of parents who found it very difficult increased from 8% in BC1 to 14% in BC2 and among the highest income group from 6% in BC1 to 8% in BC2.

Table 6.2 How easy or difficult would it be to find someone to look after the cohort child for couple of hours during the day at short notice, by equivalised household income (quintiles) and cohort

	Lowest quintile	2nd quintile	3rd quintile	4th quintile	Highest quintile
	%	%	%	%	%
BC1
Very easy	37	45	42	37	38
Fairly easy	35	32	37	43	37
Neither easy nor difficult	7	6	5	4	5
Fairly difficult	13	10	10	10	14
Very difficult	8	5	5	5	6
BC2
Very easy	33	30	33	34	29
Fairly easy	33	37	37	40	41
Neither easy nor difficult	6	6	5	4	5
Fairly difficult	14	15	16	12	16
Very difficult	14	12	10	9	8
Unweighted bases - BC1	783	803	761	858	721
Unweighted bases - BC2	981	778	814	776	1021

Tested on category 5 'very difficult': differences by income p < .05; differences by cohort p < .001; cohort*income p = NS.

In terms of parental level of education (Table 6.3), again the main change to note is that the higher level of difficulty in arranging this type of care amongst parents in BC2 is evident in each sub-group. For example, 7% of parents with a degree-level qualification or equivalent in BC1 found it very difficult compared with 10% of parents in the same group in BC2. Similarly, amongst parents with no qualifications, the proportion who found it very difficult to arrange short notice care increased from 9% in BC1 to 13% in BC2. The pattern by education level in each cohort is similar to income in that social differences are a little more evident in BC2 than BC1. In BC2 those educated to Standard Grade or below are more likely to have found arranging this care 'very difficult' than those with Higher Grade qualifications or above though the pattern is not completely linear (the group most likely to report it being 'very difficult' was those who had lower Standard Grades or equivalent). This pattern is less evident in BC1 where there is less variation in the proportion who found it very difficult by level of education. Differences in the relationship by income in each cohort are statistically significant.

Table 6.3 How easy or difficult would it be to find someone to look after the cohort child for a couple of hours during the day at short notice, by parental level of education and cohort

	No qualifications	Lower Standard Grades or VQs or Other	Upper level SGs or Intermediate VQs	Higher grades and upper level VQs	Degree level academic and vocational qualifications
	%	%	%	%	%
BC1
Very easy	44	46	42	44	34
Fairly easy	26	35	35	37	40
Neither easy nor difficult	6	5	5	6	6
Fairly difficult	13	8	11	10	13
Very difficult	9	5	7	4	7
BC2
Very easy	37	36	34	35	28
Fairly easy	31	31	34	35	40
Neither easy nor difficult	3	6	5	5	5
Fairly difficult	13	10	12	15	17
Very difficult	13	16	15	10	10
Unweighted bases - BC1	200	206	804	1379	1597
Unweighted bases - BC2	164	217	714	1428	2318

Tested on category 5 'very difficult': differences by income p < .001; differences by cohort p < .01; cohort*level of education p < .05

In both cohorts, mothers aged 40 or older found it more difficult than younger mothers to organise this sort of care. In BC2, 36% of those aged 40 or older said it would be very or fairly difficult compared with 21% of mothers under 20 and around 25% of those aged between 20 and 39 (Table 6.4).

Differences by age are statistically significant in both BC1 and BC2. In all age groups, mothers in BC2 reported greater difficulty than those in BC1, following the pattern seen above in other sub-groups. There was a similar relationship between access to short-notice childcare and maternal age (at child's birth) in both cohorts.

Table 6.4 How easy or difficult would it be to find someone to look after the cohort child for couple of hours during the day at short notice, by maternal age at child's birth and cohort

	Under 20 years old	20 to 29 years old	30 to 39 years old	40 or older
	%	%	%	%
BC1
Very easy	47	43	38	24
Fairly easy	30	35	39	44
Neither easy nor difficult	8	6	5	3
Fairly difficult	11	10	12	18
Very difficult	4	5	6	11
BC2
Very easy	39	33	31	22
Fairly easy	32	36	38	36
Neither easy nor difficult	7	5	5	5
Fairly difficult	13	14	16	22
Very difficult	8	11	11	14
Unweighted bases - BC1	221	1565	2229	155
Unweighted bases - BC2	217	1979	2573	227

Tested on category 5 'very difficult': differences by maternal age - BC1 p < .001/BC2 p < .001; differences by cohort p < .001; cohort*maternal age p = NS.

Comparison by area deprivation again shows that within each sub-group parents in BC2 reported a greater level of difficulty arranging this care than did parents in BC1 (Table 6.5). For example, amongst those living in areas in the most deprived quintile, 5% of parents in BC1 said it would be very difficult compared with 10% of parents living in similar areas in BC2. By comparison with the other measures of socio-economic status, there is not a particularly strong relationship between ease of arranging this care and area deprivation. Indeed, for BC2, differences by area deprivation are not statistically significant. In BC1, parents living in the two most deprived areas are slightly less likely than those living in areas in the three least deprived quintiles to find arranging short notice care both very easy and very difficult. However, differences are very small.

Table 6.5 How easy or difficult would it be to find someone to look after the cohort child for a couple of hours during the day at short notice, by area deprivation (quintiles) and cohort

	1 Most deprived	2	3	4	5 Least deprived
	%	%	%	%	%
BC1
Very easy	37	38	40	46	41
Fairly easy	41	41	37	32	33
Neither easy nor difficult	5	4	6	5	7
Fairly difficult	11	11	10	11	12
Very difficult	5	5	7	6	7
BC2
Very easy	30	32	31	33	35
Fairly easy	39	39	40	35	31
Neither easy nor difficult	6	5	5	5	5
Fairly difficult	15	15	15	16	13
Very difficult	10	9	10	11	15
Unweighted bases - BC1	905	884	873	698	833
Unweighted bases - BC2	1011	1064	1031	936	943

Tested on category 5 'very difficult': differences by income - BC1 p < .001/BC2 p = NS; differences by cohort p < .001; cohort*area deprivation p = NS.

There are several key findings in this section. First, parents in BC2 were more likely than those in BC1 to say they would find it very difficult to organise someone to look after the child for a few hours at short notice. This increased difficulty happened for parents across all socio-economic sub-groups. Second, parents in more disadvantaged circumstances - as measured by lower income levels and lower educational qualifications - tended to have greater difficulty organising this type of care than those in more advantaged circumstances. Though despite being more likely to have lower incomes and qualifications than older mothers, younger mothers had less difficulty organising this care than older mothers did.

The question used for this analysis will provoke parents to think of informal sources of support in the first instance. These are usually more flexible, available and convenient for the sort of last minute, short duration childcare which is referenced. However, the question does not ask parents to exclude other more formal sources they may use for this sort of scenario. As such, if parents have a regular childcare arrangement with a nursery or childminder they may have reasonably taken these into consideration when answering the question. Previous GUS research has shown that parents in more advantaged circumstances use a wider range of providers for childcare and are more likely to be using a mix of formal and informal providers (Bradshaw and Wasoff, 2009) than those in more disadvantaged circumstances. Many disadvantaged parents thus have a narrower pool of resources to draw on which may explain their greater difficulty in arranging short notice care for the child. However, the trend is reversed for younger mothers. Despite being more likely to live in more disadvantaged households, they were less likely than older mothers - who tend to live in more advantaged households - to have difficulty arranging short notice care. A large part of this reversal is explained by the living arrangements of younger mothers. Those in the youngest age groups are significantly more likely to live with their own parents - the child's grandparents - than older mothers are. Whilst this is also more common amongst lower income and lower educated families, it is particularly pronounced for younger mothers. When the child was aged 3, 14% of mothers in BC2 aged under 20 at the child's birth lived in the same household as one of the child's grandparents compared with 3% of mothers aged 40 or older and just 1% of mothers in their thirties. This greater, immediate access to grandparents for these mothers is likely to make arranging short notice care easier.

It is not only short notice childcare that appears to have been more difficult to arrange for parents in BC2, similar trends are also seen in relation to arranging more regular, planned childcare. Parents in BC2 said they found it less easy to arrange regular childcare than those in BC1 - 35% of parents in BC1 found it very easy compared with 31% of parents in BC2.^[16] There is no evidence that this is because mothers in BC2 have more limited social networks or are more socially isolated than parents in BC1.^[17] The change is perhaps therefore more likely to be due to a combination of increased pressures on, and resulting lower availability of, formal childcare providers as well as other demands on the time of informal providers. For example, the increase in full-time working among main carers (see paragraph 3.4) suggests that mothers in BC2 may have less time to provide childcare for their peers than was the case in BC1. In addition, an increase in the average age of retirement during the period between cohorts (ONS, 2013) means that a greater number of grandparents of children in BC2 were likely to still be working when the child was aged 3, impacting on their availability for childcare.

6.2 Attitudes to support with parenting

In both cohorts, parents have been asked the extent to which they agreed or disagreed with a range of statements about help-seeking behaviour and accessing support.^[18]

• "If you ask for help or advice on parenting from professionals like doctors or social workers, they start interfering or trying to take over."
• "Professionals like health visitors do not offer parents enough advice and support with bringing up their children."
• "If other people knew you were getting professional advice or support with parenting, they would probably think you were a bad parent."
• "It's difficult to ask people for help or advice unless you know them really well."
• "It's hard to know who to ask for help or advice about being a parent."

Agreement with the statements suggests reluctance to seek help or support either through formal services or informally. For example, if you agree that when you ask for help or advice from professionals they start interfering and trying to take over, this would suggest you are more likely to feel uncomfortable seeking help and advice from these formal sources.

Parents in both cohorts were not asked these questions at the same age point. For parents in BC2, the child was aged 3 - as with all other data in this report. However, parents in BC1 were asked when the child was aged 4.^[19] This difference in age, and the associated additional experience of parenting (particularly in cases where this is the only child in the family) may affect responses to these items. In earlier analysis of GUS data from BC1, Mabelis and Marryat (2011) compared parental attitudes to formal support when the child was aged 10 months and 4 years. This analysis showed that whilst the majority of parents (between 53% and 62% depending on the question) retained the same attitudes over time - suggesting that for most, experience of parenthood doesn't change their perspective on formal support - a reasonable proportion of parents did show a change in attitude. This has implications for the comparison between cohorts. However, the intervening period for the comparison in Mabelis and Marryat (2011) was three years. In this instance, there is only one year of parenting experience separating the cohorts. Thus whilst any differences between the cohorts should be treated with some caution, we nevertheless believe there is merit in the comparison.

Table 6.6 shows the proportion of parents who agreed or disagreed with each statement by cohort. In both cohorts parents were most likely to agree that it was difficult to ask people for help unless you know them really well and least likely to agree with the first statement, concerning interference from professionals. However, there is a notable change between cohorts which is evident in all statements. Parents in BC2 were less likely than those in BC1 to say they neither agreed nor disagreed and more likely to disagree.^[20] For example, 61% of parents in BC1 disagreed with the first statement on interference compared with 73% of parents in BC2. These differences are statistically significant. Nevertheless, it is those parents who agree with the statements - indicating a wariness of and reluctance to use sources of support - that are of particular concern and the proportion agreeing to the statements shows little change between cohorts.

Table 6.6 % of parents who agreed or disagreed with each statement by cohort

	Strongly agree	Agree	Neither	Disagree	Strongly disagree	Unwtd bases
If you ask for help or advice on parenting from professionals like doctors or social workers, they start interfering or trying to take over
BC1 %	2	7	30	51	10	3785
BC2 %	2	8	17	57	16	4977
Professionals like health visitors do not offer parents enough advice and support with bringing up their children
BC1 %	2	14	34	45	5	3793
BC2 %	3	16	20	51	10	4996
If other people knew you were getting professional advice or support with parenting, they would probably think you were a bad parent
BC1 %	3	22	24	47	5	3882
BC2 %	2	20	15	53	10	5014
It's difficult to ask people for help or advice unless you know them really well
BC1 %	3	30	17	46	3	3888
BC2 %	3	26	12	53	6	5015
It"s hard to know who to ask for help or advice about being a parent
BC1 %	2	23	18	53	4	3885
BC2 %	3	21	11	59	7	5014

Tested on 'strongly disagree'. Differences by cohort on all items are statistically significant p < 0.001

To provide an overview of differences in attitudes to help-seeking and support a summary measure was created indicating reluctance to help-seeking. A count was made of the number of statements each parent agreed to (including strongly agreed). Those who agreed to two or more statements were classed as reluctant to seek help.

In BC2, 29% of parents were categorised as reluctant to seek help (Table 6.7). This included 16% who agreed with two statements, 8% who agreed with three statements, 4% who agreed with four statements and 1% who agreed with all five statements. There was no statistically significant difference between cohorts in the proportion classed as reluctant to seek help or in the number of statements parents agreed to.

Table 6.7 Is parent classed as reluctant to seek help and number of statements parent agreed to, by cohort

	BC1	BC2
	%	%
Is parent classed as a reluctant help-seeker?
No	70	71
Yes	30	29
Number of statements parent agreed to
0	45	46
1	25	25
2	15	16
3	9	8
4	4	4
5	2	1
Unweighted bases	3717	4955

Tested on category 5 'very difficult': differences by cohort p < .001

Table 6.8 shows the extent to which reluctant help-seeking varied between parents with different household income. Similar to the findings from earlier GUS analysis (Mabelis and Marryat, 2011), reluctance was more common amongst parents in more disadvantaged circumstances than amongst those in more advantaged circumstances with the proportion of reluctant parents decreasing as level of advantage increased. This pattern is clear in both cohorts. For example, parents in the lowest income quintile were around twice as likely to be in the reluctant group than those in the highest income group (for BC2, 39% compared with 18%). Differences by income are statistically significant. The proportion of parents in each income group within each cohort classed as reluctant help seekers is very similar. Indeed, differences by cohort are not statistically significant.

Table 6.8 % of parents classed as reluctant to seek help, by cohort and equivalised household income (quintiles)

	Lowest quintile	2nd quintile	3rd quintile	4th quintile	Highest quintile
	%	%	%	%	%
BC1	44	29	27	21	20
BC2	39	32	25	23	18
Unweighted bases - BC1	656	719	687	781	639
Unweighted bases - BC2	968	764	803	766	1012

Differences by income p < .001; differences by cohort p = NS; cohort*income p = NS.

Table 6.9 compares the proportion of parents classed as reluctant to seek help by level of education and cohort. The pattern is similar to the previous table. In both cohorts, parents with lower qualifications are more likely to show reluctance towards help-seeking. Differences by level of education are statistically significant. There is little change evident amongst education sub-groups between cohorts.

Table 6.9 % of parents classed as reluctant to seek help, by cohort and parental level of education

	No qualifications	Lower Standard Grades or VQs or Other	Upper level SGs or Intermediate VQs	Higher grades and upper level VQs	Degree level academic and vocational qualifications
	%	%	%	%	%
BC1	48	37	37	30	21
BC2	47	42	35	30	21
Unweighted bases - BC1	153	168	707	1241	1442
Unweighted bases - BC2	160	211	707	1411	2294

Differences by level of education p < .001; differences by cohort p = NS; cohort*education age p = NS.

Differences by maternal age are again similar (Table 6.10). Younger mothers in both cohorts are more likely to be classed as reluctant to seek help. Differences by maternal age are statistically significant. Comparing parents within each age group across cohorts shows there has been almost no change in the proportion in each sub-group who are reluctant to seek help.

Table 6.10 % of parents classed as reluctant to seek help, by cohort and maternal age at child's birth

	Under 20 years old	20 to 29 years old	30 to 39 years old	40 or older
	%	%	%	%
BC1	43	31	26	25
BC2	43	33	23	22
Unweighted bases - BC1	173	1366	2028	132
Unweighted bases - BC2	213	1958	2538	223

Differences by maternal age p < .001; differences by cohort p = NS; cohort*maternal age p=NS.

In both cohorts, parents living in more deprived areas are more likely to be classed as reluctant to seek help than those living in less deprived areas (Table 6.11). For example, in BC2, 20% of parents living in areas in the least deprived quintile showed reluctance towards help-seeking compared with 39% of those living in areas in the most deprived quintile. Differences by area deprivation are statistically significant. As with prior comparisons, there has been no change in the proportion in each sub-group classed as reluctant to seek help. Differences by cohort are not statistically significant.

Table 6.11 % of parents classed as reluctant to seek help, by cohort and area deprivation (quintiles)

	1 Most deprived	2	3	4	5 Least deprived
	%	%	%	%	%
BC1	39	38	27	23	21
BC2	39	35	26	22	20
Unweighted bases - BC1	698	627	775	802	815
Unweighted bases - BC2	932	923	1015	1051	1001

Differences by area deprivation p < .001; differences by cohort p = NS; cohort*maternal age p = NS.

In summary, attitudes to seeking help don't appear to have changed between the cohorts. However, as noted earlier, the attitudes were measured at when children in each cohort were slightly different ages. This difference may have affected the results. A measure taken at the same age point would provide a more robust comparison.