Family income and young adolescents’ perceived social position: associations with self-esteem and life satisfaction in the UK Millennium Cohort Study

Bannink, R., Pearce, A. and Hope, S. (2016) Family income and young adolescents’ perceived social position: associations with self-esteem and life satisfaction in the UK Millennium Cohort Study. Archives of Disease in Childhood, 101(10), pp. 917-921. (doi: 10.1136/archdischild-2015-309651) (PMID:26957529) (PMCID:PMC5050283)

Abstract

Background: Self-esteem and life satisfaction are important aspects of positive mental health in young people, and both are socially distributed. However, the majority of evidence is based on socioeconomic characteristics of the family. As children enter adolescence and gain independence, perceptions of their own social position are likely to influence mental health. Design and objectives: Using data on 11-year-olds from the UK Millennium Cohort Study, we investigated associations of both family income and young adolescents’ perception of their social position with self-esteem and life satisfaction. We hypothesised that there would be differences in the impact of perceived social position on positive mental health when investigating the full scale scoring distribution or the bottom of the distribution. Therefore, we estimated proportional odds for having greater positive mental health (across the distribution of scores) and ORs for poor outcomes (lowest 10% scores). Results: The likelihood of greater self-esteem and life satisfaction increased with income; similarly, the risk of having poor self-esteem and life satisfaction increased as income decreased. Young adolescents who perceived their family as poorer than their friends (instead of about the same) were less likely to have greater self-esteem and life satisfaction and were more likely to have poor outcomes. Young adolescents who perceived their family as richer were more likely to have poor self-esteem, but were not less likely to have greater self-esteem. For life satisfaction, young adolescents who perceived their families as richer were less likely to have greater and more likely to have poor life satisfaction. Conclusions: Policies to redistribute income in families with children are likely to benefit the mental health of young people. However, it is also important to consider the impact of social comparison on young people's mental health as they enter adolescence.

• Item Type: Articles
• Additional Information: AP is funded by a Medical Research Council Population Health Scientist fellowship (MR/J012351/1). Research at the UCL Institute of Child Health and Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children receives a proportion of the funding from the Department of Health’s National Institute for Health Research Biomedical Research Centres funding scheme.
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Pearce, Dr Anna
• Authors: Bannink, R., Pearce, A., and Hope, S.
• College/School: College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences > School of Health & Wellbeing > MRC/CSO SPHSU
• Journal Name: Archives of Disease in Childhood
• Publisher: BMJ Publishing Group
• ISSN: 0003-9888
• ISSN (Online): 1468-2044
• Published Online: 19 September 2016
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2016 Bannink, R. et al.
• First Published: First published in Archives of Disease of Childhood 101(10):917-921
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons License