Abstract
This chapter continues to study the question of scalability of the child and youth well-being concepts, indicators, and composite indices posed in Chap. 7. That is, can CWI well-being concepts, indicators, domains of well-being, and composite indices be applied and interpreted at subnational levels? Chapter. 7 addressed this question at the level of the 50 individual US states. This chapter zooms in on regional areas within states, such as counties and groups of counties. Lee et al. (2009) studied this question at the level of six counties (Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, and Santa Clara) that comprise the San Francisco Bay Area and for each of the individual counties and made comparisons of the resulting child and youth well-being indices with the corresponding CWI for the state of California. Fu et al. (2009) updated this analysis and extended it to include the county of Los Angeles, California. To illustrate the data limitations and challenges encountered at the substate regional level of analysis of child and youth well-being as well as the potentials of such analyses, this chapter describes and reports a number of findings from those articles/reports, especially from Fu et al. (2009).
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Notes
- 1.
Detailed analyses were also made for each of the six counties of the Bay Area (Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, and Santa Clara).
- 2.
As shown in Chap. 3, conclusions about trends in child well-being can depend on the specific indicators and domains used in the composition of the summary indices. Thus, this study based on 16 indicators has bounded generalizability in that its conclusions could be altered when data for a more comprehensive set of indicators become available for study. Our prior experience gives us confidence, however, that the indicators and methodology used herein can capture major trends up or down in child well-being.
- 3.
For details on the definitions, units, and data sources of the Key Indicators used in this study, the Kidsdata.org website (http://www.kidsdata.org/) may be consulted.
- 4.
The other economic indicator, housing affordability, displays trends that are more variable and affected by a number of factors besides family income. Accordingly, we did not develop projections for this indicator.
- 5.
For details on the calculation procedures and accompanying Excel file on projection calculations, please contact the authors.
- 6.
Results are largely presented graphically. However, the graphs are based on numerical calculations for each Key Indicator, domain-specific, and composite index.
- 7.
The two sets of indices (each based on the full and limited set of indicators, as shown in Fig. 8.2) trend quite similarly for each of the three groups, suggesting that these six indicators are not peculiar in trends as compared to its full equivalent. However, the trends should be interpreted with caution since they are based on a smaller set of indicators that lack any measure from the education domain.
- 8.
In the race/ethnic-specific domain CWIs, the following indicators were not considered due to the lack of relevant data: Asthma hospitalization rate (African-Americans, Asians, and Latinos in Marin County; African-Americans in San Mateo County) and youth suicide rate (African-Americans, Asians, and Latinos in Marin County). Also juvenile felony rates for the entire population were used for all race/ethnic groups since race/ethnic-specific data for the indicator were not available.
- 9.
“Today” refers to the fall of 2009 when these projections were conducted.
- 10.
It should be noted that, although the projections were calculated in 2009, the latest available child poverty data are for 2007; therefore, our projections are for recent years for which data are not yet available (2008 and 2009) and for 3 years into the future through 2012.
References
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Hernandez, D. J., & Macartney, S. E. (2008, January 29). Child well-being 1985–2004: Black-White and Hispanic-White gaps narrowing, but persist. Report presented at the New America Foundation, Washington, DC.
Land, K. C., Lamb, V. L., & Mustillo, S. K. (2001). Child and youth well-being in the United States, 1975–1998: Some findings from a new index. Social Indicators Research, 56(3), 241–318.
Land, K. C., Lamb, V. L., Meadows, S. O., & Taylor, A. (2007). Measuring trends in child well-being: An evidence-based approach. Social Indicators Research, 80(1), 105–132.
Land, K. C. (2009). The 2009 foundation for child development child and youth well-being index (CWI) report, including: An update of the CWI for the years 1975–2007. Projections of the CWI for 2008, and A Special Focus Report on Anticipating the Impacts of a 2008–2010 Recession. New York: Foundation for Child Development.
Lee, J., Lamb, V. L., & Land, K. C. (2009). Composite indices of changes in child and youth well-being in the San Francisco Bay Area and the state of California, 1995–2005. Child Indicators Research, 2(December), 353–374.
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Fu, Q., Lamb, V.L., Land, K.C. (2012). Scalability of the CWI: Substate Regional Indicators and Composite Indices. In: Land, K. (eds) The Well-Being of America's Children. Children’s Well-Being: Indicators and Research, vol 6. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4092-1_8
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