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Background

Barnardos decided to gain a snapshot of what Ireland is actually like for children and their parents with the intention of both informing our work on behalf of children and to contribute to a national conversation about childhood. To this end we commissioned a poll, conducted independantly by Behaviour and Attitudes, seeking the views of 400 parents and 200 young people on a range of issues affecting childhood today.

Campaign Dates

Autumn 2007

 

 What we did

• Commisioned a survey exploring different areas of childhood such as general perceptions of childhood, safety, bullying, risky behaviours (alcohol and drugs) and new technologies.
• We launched these figures and widely disseminated them. Some key findings were:
  
  - 8 out of 10 parents think their children are less safe compared to when they were growing up but the same number think childhood today is better. Bullying emerges as the top concern for parents and children alike.
  
  -8 out of 10 children agree that childhood today is better than in previous generations. Parents and children both cite their top reasons for this as: more money, more 'toys/games/stuff', more opportunites.
  
  -3 out of 10 children aged five to nine years old have a television in their own bedroom and 1 in 7 children aged one to four have a TV in their bedroom.
  
  -Over half the parents polled think they have a better relationship with their children than they had with their own parents. Six out of ten parents think parents in Ireland generally do not spend enough time with their children while 72% of parents think work patterns in Ireland are impacting negatively on children.
  

So what happened?

• Continuously use the results to support our recommendations for change.
  

Useful Documents

Childhood 2007 Poll survey findings

Childhood 2007 Poll supporting explanations

Barnardos Chief Executive, Fergus Finlay's speech from the launch

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