Scotland's People Annual report: Results from 2009 Scottish Household Survey

Annex 2 Glossary

This Annex includes an alphabetical list of terms used within the report. Definitions for those terms and, in some cases, further explanation of the term are provided.

Childcare

Households which include children aged 15 or under are asked what forms of childcare they have used in the past year for their child. A single child is randomly selected where more than one qualifying child is in the household. A distinction can be made between formal and informal types of childcare:

• Formal Childcare - includes registered child minder; local authority nursery; private nursery; playgroup; crèche; before school care; after school care; holiday club/care.
• Informal Childcare - includes me and/or other adults living here; other household members (including children); child's mum or dad (but not living here); grandparent(s); another relative; friend(s).

Current economic situation

The household respondent is asked to select which of the following categories best describes the current situation of each member of the household:

• Self-employed
• Employed full-time
• Employed part-time
• Looking after the home or family
• Permanently retired from work
• Unemployed and seeking work
• At school
• In further/higher education
• Government work or training scheme
• Permanently sick or disabled
• Unable to work because of short-term illness or injury
• Pre-school/not yet at school
• Other

SHS data on the economic situation of members of the household reflects the view of the respondent to the 'household' part of the interview, and so may not conform to official definitions of employment and unemployment, for example. The SHS cannot provide estimates of unemployment that are comparable to official statistics of unemployment. ⁷⁹ Therefore, the SHS cannot be used as a source of unemployment rates or average earnings. Please see the 'Correspondence and enquiries' section at the end of this report for details of Scottish Government contacts who deal with unemployment rates and average earnings statistics.

Distance between home and work and between home and school

The distance between home and work (and home and school) are calculated using postcode data collected as part of the main survey and travel diary sections of the SHS. These are the estimated distances as the crow files, based upon the grid co-ordinates of the centres of the postcodes (or whatever types of area were recorded) of the home, place of work and school. Further information on the methods used within the travel diary are available through the Transport and Travel Statistics website. ⁸⁰

Economic activity, qualifications and training

The SHS is not directly comparable with the Labour Force Survey ( LFS) which is the official source of employment, qualifications and training data in the UK. Compared with the LFS, the SHS under-estimates the level of employment and over-estimates both unemployment and economic inactivity. This is due to the fact that current economic situation in the SHS is asked in a single question whereas in the LFS it is determined by a selection of other questions.

The SHS also underestimates the number of people with a qualification of some sort, as the LFS covers all possible levels of qualifications. The LFS is the preferred source of estimates on employment, qualifications and training as it uses internationally agreed definitions and is used for international comparisons including OECD indicators.

Highest Level of qualification

The highest level of qualification has been classified as follows:

• Grade, Standard Grade or equivalent - Includes: O Grade, Standard Grade, GCSE, GCE O level, CSE, NQ Access 3 Cluster, Intermediate 1, Intermediate 2, Senior Certificate, GNVQ/ GSVQ Foundation or Intermediate, SVQ Level 1, SVQ Level 2, SCOTVEC/National Certificate Module, City and Guilds Craft, RSA Diploma or equivalent.
• Higher, A Level or equivalent - Includes: Higher Grade, Advanced Higher, CSYS, A Level, AS Level, Advanced Senior Certificate. GNVQ/ GSVQ Advanced, SVQ Level 3, ONC, OND, SCOTVEC National Diploma, City and Guilds Advanced Craft, RSA Advanced Diploma or equivalent.
• HNC/ HND or equivalent - Includes: HNC, HND, SVQ Level 4, RSA Higher Diploma or equivalent
• Degree, Professional qualification - Includes: First degree, Higher degree, SVQ Level 5, Professional qualifications e.g. teaching, accountancy
• Other qualification
• No qualifications
• Qualifications not known

Please see the 'Correspondence and enquiries' section at the end of this report for details of Scottish Government contacts who deal with economic activity, qualifications and training statistics.

Household economic situation

Household economic situation refers to economic situation of the highest income householder ( HIH) and/or their spouse or partner. The variable is derived from the question that asks about the economic activity of members of the household. Household economic situation variable includes the following categories:

• Single working adult
• Non-working single
• Working couple
• Couple, one works
• Couple, neither work

As mentioned previously (see Current Economic Situation), SHS data on the economic situation of the household reflects the view of the respondent to the 'household' part of the interview, and so may not conform to official definitions of employment and unemployment, for example.

Household income

The term net annual household income refers to income ( i.e. after taxation and other deductions) from employment, benefits and other sources that is brought into the household by the highest income householder and/or their spouse or partner. This includes any contribution to household finances made by other household members ( e.g. dig money).

The definition is not the same as that used by other Government surveys such as the Family Resources Survey. These measure the income of all household members. Income data from the SHS should not, therefore, be compared with other sources without careful consideration of the methods used in compiling the data. ⁸¹ The SHS is not designed to provide reliable statistics on average income or average earnings. The current income information collected through the SHS is only intended to provide estimates by income band. The SHS asks for income only for use as a 'background' variable when analysing other topics, or for selecting the data for particular sub-groups of the population (such as the low paid) for further analysis. ⁸²

Household members

For the purposes of the SHS, a household is defined as one person, or a group of people, living in accommodation as their only or main residence and either sharing at least one meal a day or sharing the living accommodation.

The respondent for the first part of the interview must be the household reference person, a person in whose name the accommodation is owned or rented or who is otherwise responsible for the accommodation.

In households that have joint householders, the household reference person is defined as the highest income householder ( HIH), that is, the person with the highest income. If householders have exactly the same income, the older is taken as the household reference person.

Adult is used to refer to those aged 16 and over (except where otherwise stated). Children are aged under 16 years.

References to working age population throughout the publication refer to the traditional working age definition (females aged 16-59 and males aged 16-64). As the data covers up to 2009, it does not take into account recent changes to the female state pension age introduced in 2010.

In each household, one of the eligible adult members of the household is randomly selected to take part in the second half of the interview. Eligible adults are adult household members who have not been living apart from the household continuously for the previous six months. This might include adults working away from home, in the Armed Forces or in prison. The person selected is referred to as the random adult. The household respondent is automatically the random adult in one-adult households and may be the same as the household respondent in households with more than one adult.

Household type

The SHS uses eight household types defined as follows:

• A single adult household contains one adult of working age and no children.
• A single parent household contains one adult of any age and one or more children.
• A single pensioner household contains one adult of pensionable age and no children. Pensionable age is 60 for women and 65 for men.
• A small family household contains two adults of any age and one or two children.
• An older smaller household contains one adult of working age and one of pensionable age and no children, or two adults of pensionable age and no children.
• A large adult household contains three or more adults and no children.
• A small adult household contains two adults of working age and no children.
• A large family household contains two adults of any age and three or more children, or three or more adults of any age and one or more children.

Housing tenure

The SHS collects information on the ways in which households occupy their accommodation and from which organisation or individual their accommodation is rented, where this is the case. These are combined into a housing tenure variable, which is shown in the annual report broken down into four categories, namely:

• owner occupied, which includes households who own outright and those buying with a mortgage or loan.
• the social rented sector, which includes households renting from a local authority and all households renting from a Housing Association or Co-operative.
• the private rented sector, which includes households renting from an individual private landlord.
• other tenure, which includes any other category of tenure such as living rent free.

Income imputation

While in general the level of missing data throughout the SHS is minimal, one section of the questionnaire is substantially affected by missing information. In the section on household income, approximately one-in-three of respondents either refuse to answer the questions or are unable to provide information that is sufficiently reliable to report, for example, because there are no details of the level of income received for one or more components of their income.

Statistical analysis of data gathered in the survey on the characteristics of households where income is available, allows income data to be imputed for households where income data is missing. Income imputation is a process whereby complete information given by 'similar' households is used for respondents that have missing income information. Income is collected as a variety of different components, such as income from employment, benefits and other sources, which are summed to create total net household income. Income was imputed for each component using either Hot Deck imputation, where the sample is divided into subgroups based on relevant characteristics, or Predictive Mean, where a statistical model is constructed and the value is predicted using this model. After imputation, income data is unavailable for between 3%-4% of households. Please contact the SHS project team if you would like further information on the imputation process.

Long-standing limiting illness, health problem or disability

The question ' Could I just check, do you have any long-standing illness, health problem or disability that limits your daily activities or the kind of work you can do? By disability as opposed to ill-health, I mean a physical or mental impairment, which has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on your ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities.' was asked of the random adult respondent to establish the prevalence of long-term illness among the adult population. ⁸³ The respondent's own assessment of what constitutes a long-standing illness, health problem or disability was used rather than a medical assessment of illness.

It should be noted that that this data is not directly comparable to reports relating to the period 1999-2002. During this period, the SHS Annual Reports used data from the household respondent about each household member. From 2003, the survey results were extracted from the question asked to the random adult directly.

Marital status

The random adult is asked to confirm their marital status using the following categories:

• Single/never been married
• Cohabiting/living together
• Married and living with spouse
• In a same-sex civil partnership
• Separated
• Divorced
• Dissolved civil partnership
• Widowed
• Bereaved civil partner

Where these have been used in the report to analyse results, these categories have been combined as:

• Single/never been married
• Cohabiting/living together
• Married/civil partnership
• Separated/divorced/dissolved civil partnership
• Widowed/bereaved civil partner

Positive and negative aspects of neighbourhoods

Respondents to the SHS are asked spontaneously to mention any aspects of their neighbourhood, if any, they particularly like. Their answers are coded using a list comprised of 31 'likes' and 34 'dislikes'. These positive and negative aspects have been grouped in the analysis as follows:

Positive aspects:

• Pleasant environment - Includes: Area well maintained; Safe/slow traffic; Clean/tidy place to live; No pollution/fresh air; Good quality houses/investment potential; Pace of life/quality of life; Nicely landscaped/open spaces; Convenient shop/other amenities; Good outlook/view; Like house; Like area/living here; Privacy; Rural/green/countryside/seaside; No/little traffic.
• Safe environment - Includes: Safety, security or accessibility measures ( CCTV, warden, concierge etc); Safe area/low crime.
• Good amenities - Includes: Friendly people; Good local shops; Good local leisure facilities; Good local schools; Good facilities for young people.
• Sense of community/friendly people - Includes: Quiet/peaceful; Good neighbours; Family/friends here; Community spirit.
• Other - Includes: Accessible/good location/handy; Always lived here/been here a long time; Affordable/prices/sell well.

Negative aspects:

• Unpleasant environment - Includes: Area poorly maintained/run down; Lack of privacy; Problems with road/pavements/drainage; Pollutions/smells/problem with industry; Inadequate street lighting; Poor outlook/view; Problems with dogs; Vandalism and graffiti; Environmental noise; Parking problems; Too much traffic; Litter/rubbish; Property/gardens in poor condition.
• Unsafe environment - Includes: Unsafe area/crime; Lack of policing.
• Poor amenities - Includes: Lack of amenities (doctor, bank post office, etc.); Poor local shops; Poor local leisure facilities; Poor local schools; Nowhere for children to play.
• No sense of community/Problem residents/substance abuse - Includes: Bad reputation, 'rough' area, problem residents moving in; Problems with neighbours; Drug abuse and dealing; Alcohol abuse; Young people hanging about/nothing for young people to do.
• Other - Includes: No jobs/investment, poverty; Environment - weather, hills, flooding etc; Too much being built; Too expensive; Too far from the town/city/shops.

Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation

The Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation ( SIMD) ⁸⁴ identifies the most deprived areas across Scotland. It is based on 38 indicators across seven individual domains, namely: income, employment, health, education, skills and training, housing, geographic access and crime.

SIMD is derived at data zone level, enabling small area concentrations of deprivation to be identified. The data zones are ranked from most deprived (1) to least deprived (6,505) on the overall SIMD and on each of the individual domains. The result is a comprehensive picture of relative area deprivation across Scotland.

The classificatory variable used in the analysis contained in the report is based on the 2009 version of SIMD. In the tables, the data zones are grouped as the 15% most deprived data zones and the rest of Scotland. Occasionally deciles (from the 10% most deprived data zones to 10% least deprived) ⁸⁵ or quintiles (from the 20% most to the 20% least deprived data zones) ⁸⁶ are used.

Socio-economic classification ( NS- SEC)

National Statistics Socio-economic Classification ( NS- SEC) ⁸⁷ is an occupationally-based classification which, in line with all official statistics and surveys, is used in the SHS. The eight-fold analytic version of NS- SEC has been used.

Respondents' occupations and details of their employment status (whether an employer, self-employed or employee; whether a supervisor; number of employees at the workplace) have been used to create the following classifications:

• Higher managerial and professional occupations.
• Lower managerial and professional occupations.
• Intermediate occupations.
• Small employers and own account workers.
• Lower supervisory and technical occupations.
• Semi-routine occupations.
• Routine occupations.

Urban Rural Classification

The Scottish Government six-fold urban/rural classification of Scotland is used throughout this report. This classification is based on settlement size and remoteness (measured by drive times) allowing more detailed geographical analysis to be conducted on a larger sample size. The classification being used in this report is the 2009-2010 version. ⁸⁸

The areas in which respondents live have been classified as follows:

• Large urban areas - settlements of over 125,000 people.
• Other urban areas - settlements of 10,000 to 125,000 people.
• Accessible small towns - settlements of between 3,000 and 10,000 people and within 30 minutes drive of a settlement of 10,000 or more.
• Remote small towns - settlements of between 3,000 and 10,000 people and with a drive time of over 30 minutes to a settlement of 10,000 or more.
• Accessible rural - settlements of less than 3,000 people and within 30 minutes drive of a settlement of 10,000 or more.
• Remote rural - settlements of less than 3,000 people with a drive time of more than 30 minutes to a settlement of 10,000 or more.

Table A 1 shows the percentage of households in each area type.

Table A 1: Number of households by Scottish Government 2009-2010 Urban Rural Classification

2009 data

	Unweighted Frequency	Weighted Frequency	Weighted Percent
Large urban areas	5,038	5,715	40.3
Other urban areas	4,227	4,333	30.6
Small accessible towns	1,169	1,105	7.8
Small remote towns	762	529	3.7
Accessible rural	1,587	1,548	10.9
Remote rural	1,393	944	6.7
Total	14,176	14,174	100

Volunteering

This section of the questionnaire was revised for the 2006 survey in order to gather greater information on individuals' experience of volunteering and barriers that may prevent them from participation. Respondents were asked to give a 'yes' or 'no' response to a question on whether they had given up any time to help clubs, charities, campaigns or organisations in the last 12 months. This question was followed up by a question asked of those who said no to the first, which gave a list of types of groups and organisations and asked for which, if any, the respondent had undertaken any work or activities on a voluntary basis. The list of options was revised substantially in 2007. The third question asked if there were any other types of organisations not on the list for which respondents had given up their time. Respondents who did not answer 'yes' to the first question, or who answered 'none' to the first question but 'yes' to the second or third question were classed as having taken part in voluntary activities.

Youth Activities

The Scottish Government is interested in the extent to which young adults and children are involved in a range of activities. Those households for which there is someone aged between 8 and 21 are asked a series of questions within the SHS on whether they take part in a series of activities regularly. These activities are:

• Any music or drama activities such as playing in a band or a theatre group;
• Any other arts activities such as a photography or art club including classes;
• Any sports or sporting activity whether played competitively or not;
• Any other outdoor activities such as walking, angling, bird-watching, etc;
• Any other groups or clubs such as a youth club or youth group, scouts, chess club, bridge club, etc;
• Representing young people's views or involvement in youth politics ( e.g. Youth Forum or Dialogue Youth);
• Mentoring or peer education; and,
• None.