Table of Contents
Well functioning families are vital to the wellbeing of individuals, their immediate communities, and broader societal groups. The ability of families to function well depends not only on their individual members, but also their physical and social contexts, including communities and wider organisations.
The 2002 NATSISS survey provides information on family and community life for the Indigenous population. It is one of the few nationally representative surveys of the Indigenous population that provides this kind of information and thus makes an important contribution to our understanding of these important aspects of the life of Indigenous Australians.
Collecting information in surveys on family and community life is always a challenge but is particularly difficult for some sections of the Indigenous population. This is in part because of the lack of congruence between the kinship terminology and concepts of local kin systems and those of the mainstream Anglo-Celtic system for many ‘tradition-orientated’ Indigenous people. [1] It is also a result of many Indigenous households and families being larger and structurally more complex than for the non-Indigenous population. There are also differences in the dynamics underlying the structure and composition of households in mainstream and local Indigenous societies.
At the outset, it is important to keep in mind that virtually all measures examined in the 2002 NATSISS that relate to living standards or wellbeing are highly relevant to family and community life or wellbeing. Personal heath status and health risk behaviours are prime examples, since family and community wellbeing is strongly linked with the wellbeing of individual family members.
Housing quality is another example of a variable that has a big impact on family and community wellbeing. As Taylor & Kinfu (in this volume) indicated, family needs represented one of the most commonly mentioned reasons for moving that respondents provided in the 2002 NATSISS. The fact that 52 per cent of respondents lived in houses needing ‘more bedrooms’ reveals the inadequate living conditions experienced by the majority of Indigenous families (see Sanders in this volume).
Despite the relevance of so many measures to family and community life, this chapter restricts attention to the more direct measures of family and community contained in the survey. In this chapter we first discuss the reasons for collecting data on family and community life. This is followed by an outline of the measures of family and community life used in the 2002 NATSISS. Examples of the utility of two of these measures (child care use and the incidence of ‘stolen generation’ experiences) are then discussed. The final section discusses aspects of family and community life that may be valuable additions to future social surveys of the Indigenous population.
As a basic unit of society, families have the key responsibility of caring for their members. This includes helping children and adults alike to be—or become—healthy, well adjusted and productive members of society and supporting elderly, infirm or disabled members. Such functions are complex and multi-faceted and involve the meeting of basic needs of family members, as well as the transmission of pro-social values. While there is no universally accepted definition of healthy functioning, it tends to be linked to meeting needs:
of a physiological nature
for educational/cognitive development (e.g. achievement, competence, mastery, independence)
relating to psychosocial wellbeing (e.g. development of a sense of acceptance, belonging, trust and love, self-esteem, concerns beyond the self), and
that have a spiritual dimension, including the development of a sense of purpose and meaning in life.
Communities are higher-order systems whose responsibilities also lie in promoting the wellbeing of individuals within them, both directly and indirectly, through supporting families to fulfill their responsibilities and providing opportunities for all members to participate in community life. Fulfilment of these responsibilities is important not only for the wellbeing of individuals and their families but also for national and international wellbeing. At the same time, family and community wellbeing depends on the wellbeing and contributions of their members, as well as those of higher order systems.
Clearly, then, research into family and community life is important for the identification of potential or existing resources and deficits or challenges confronting these social units, their individual members, and broader social systems. Ultimately, such research is important for the development and monitoring of the effectiveness of policies that are directed towards ensuring that individuals live in safe, supportive environments that enable them to reach their potential, adopt health-promoting lifestyles, participate in community life, and develop or maintain a sense of purpose and meaning in life.