IJPDS International Journal of Population Data Science

A new study examining residential mobility in children and young people has found that children living in disadvantaged neighbourhoods are experiencing higher frequencies of house moves, 75% of which were to areas with similar or higher levels of deprivation. These results suggest that those living in deprived areas face a cycle of poverty that is difficult to escape and sheds light on the socio-economic challenges that affect children growing up in Wales.

The number of children experiencing destitution in the UK has almost tripled in the last five years and South Wales has been particularly affected. Whilst child poverty rates continue to grow, previous studies have shown that children’s experience of poverty is heavily shaped by where they live and the stability of their local neighbourhood. Living in persistent poverty can severely impact a child’s health and wellbeing along with their cognitive, social and emotional development. Understanding the dynamics of residential mobility is therefore crucial for policymakers to generate well-informed, targeted and effective child-focussed interventions that can be implemented in the places that need them most.

Through the use of large-scale administrative data held in the Secure Anonymised Information Linkage Databank (SAIL), researchers were able to build a detailed address history for 923,531 children and young people, to examine house moves from birth to age 18. Results showed that almost 60% of house moves occurred between the ages of 0 and 5, a time when children experience some of the key developmental phases of their lives. Some children were found to have resided in more than 14 dwellings before the age of 18. Not only are children moving frequently, but rates of residential mobility were also found to cluster predominantly in areas of high deprivation.

The study enhances our understanding of where children live in Wales, their residential mobility patterns and how those patterns are influenced by socio-economic circumstances. Understanding the dynamics of residential mobility is essential for developing strategies to improve the local environment in which children live, support upward social mobility and improve the long-term well-being and development of children growing up in Wales.

Lead author Jo Davies added, “This study has demonstrated the value of using longitudinal data to provide valuable insights into the mobility patterns of children and young people growing up in Wales. Understanding where children live and the characteristics of their environment is the first step in understanding how those environments can be improved.”

 

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Jo Davies, Data Scientist, Swansea University

Davies, J., Bailey, R., Mizen, A., Pouliou, T., Fry, R., Pedrick-Case, R., Stratton, G., Johnson, R., Christian, H., Lyons, R. and Griffiths, L. (2024) “Residential mobility amongst children and young people in Wales: A longitudinal study using linked administrative records”, International Journal of Population Data Science, 9(1). doi: 10.23889/ijpds.v9i1.2398.