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THE GROWING UP in Ireland survey found that most of Ireland’s 20-year-olds are stressed, living at home, and worried about housing and climate change.
Financial security and a good job were their priorities for the next 10 years, but only a minority attached high importance to having a long-term relationship (29&) or having a child (14%) by the age of 30.
These are among the four findings from the Growing Up in Ireland survey, which asks how 20-year-olds are faring in important areas of their lives since they were last interviewed at 17 or 18 years old.
The key findings analyse information from 5,191 twenty-year-olds interviewed between August 2018 and June 2019, and will be launched by the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs Dr Katherine Zappone, at the 11th Annual Growing Up in Ireland Research Conference.
The ‘Growing Up in Ireland, Key Findings’ report says that those aged 20 years old this year “were transitioning to adulthood in a period of strong economic recovery”.
“They were born in the boom years of the late 1990s but spent their middle childhood and early adolescence living in the depths of recession. Findings on their experiences from age 9 to age 20 will help to inform those involved in the development of policies and services for children and young people about their lives and their support needs.”
Most 20-year-olds still lived at home and were financially dependent on their parents.
Over two-thirds of 20-year-olds said they still lived with their parents, with most still depending on them financially, especially for basic living expenses. About 8% were experiencing financial strain (difficulty or great difficulty making ends meet), with higher figures for those from the lowest-skilled social classes (10%) or among those whose families experienced financial strain when they were 17/18 years old (14%).
When it comes to education, at 20 years of age 62% of the young people were in further or higher education; 6% were in training; 21% were working full-time and 6% were working part-time; 5% were not in employment, education or training.
On politics, over two-thirds reported they had registered to vote at the time of the survey, over one-third said they had volunteered in the past six months, and over half said they engaged in some type of political activism in the last year, such as signing a petition, wearing a badge or posting material online.
On what they were most concerned about, the 20-year-olds surveyed indicated high levels of concern about general issues such as climate change and poverty. Access to housing in Ireland was the issue causing most concern to 20-year-olds, particularly among those from less advantaged backgrounds.
A desire for financial and employment security featured strongly in their aspirations for themselves in the next ten years: 73% rated being financially secure as highly important and 72% rated having a good job as highly important.
Only a minority attached high importance to having a long-term relationship or having a child by the age of 30 (29% and 14% respectively).
Most 20-year-olds reported their general health as very good or excellent. Almost 16% of 20-year-olds said they had an ongoing chronic physical or mental health problem, illness or disability, increasing from 14% at age 17/18. The most prevalent of these were mental, behavioural or neurodevelopmental disorders.
Overweight and obesity levels had increased since they were 17/18 years old (27% were overweight/obese at age 17/18 rising to 36% by age 20).
Obesity rates were higher for young women than young men (16% and 9%, respectively, were classified as obese at age 20). Levels of physical inactivity were also higher for young women than for young men.
About 15% of 20-year-olds smoked daily and another 23% smoked occasionally, while almost all young adults drank alcohol (93%). Nearly a quarter of 20-year-olds used cannabis occasionally or more often.
The majority of young adults often used constructive strategies to cope with stress, such as talking to friends (51%), spending time on hobbies or listening to music (50%) or discussing the situation with their family (37%).
About one-quarter of 20-year-olds experienced relatively high levels of stress and depressive symptoms. This was more common among young women than young men (32% vs 23% with clinically significant depressive symptoms and 29% vs 21% with above-normal stress).
Young people who had problems with depressive symptoms at earlier ages and those whose mothers had depressive symptoms had a higher risk of depressive symptoms at age 20.
Mothers remained generally positive about their relationships with their sons and daughters. According to mothers, the most common sources of disagreement was helping around the house (57%).
Nearly seven out of ten 20-year-olds were in further or higher education or training at 20 and the vast majority (87%) had taken a course since leaving second-level school.
Participation in higher education was high among 20-year-olds (almost 70%) but entry rates were lower among those whose mothers had not completed second level (48%), among those who had taken the Leaving Certificate Applied programme (10%) and those in the lowest fifth of Leaving Certificate points (38%).
Most 20-year-olds were positive about their second-level education, but many highlighted a lack of preparation for the world of work and adult life. Overall, 62% said school had been a lot of benefit in giving them reading/writing skills and 60% said it had been a lot of benefit in helping them make friends.
However, 39% felt that school had been of no help in preparing them ‘for adult life’; 45% felt it had been of no help in ‘preparing for the world of work’. Early school leavers were more likely to be ‘not in education, training or employment’ (NEET): 32% compared to 5% overall.
On the importance of jobs, 20-year-olds were most likely to give a very high rating to the job being interesting (61% young men and 65% young women); job security (46% young men and 58% young women); the job being a good step on a career ladder (33% young men and 40% young women) and work that was useful or helpful to others (29% young men and 43% young women).
Dorothy Watson, one of the report authors, said that the key findings “paint a generally positive picture of the lives of 20-year-olds and their engagement with the wider world”.
They had a high rate of participation in post-school education or training; they were generally in good health and most used constructive strategies to deal with stress.
Among the concerning findings were a relatively high rate of depressive symptoms; a higher rate of obesity than when they were aged 17/18 and marked inequalities in educational outcomes by family background.
Launching the Key Findings report, the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs Dr Katherine Zappone said: “Growing Up in Ireland (GUI) is a critical element in the formation of new evidence based policy making in Ireland and these reports offer a window into the rich and unique data provided by GUI.
She said the report highlights “the impact of socio-economic inequalities, and these are issues that warrant our close attention and concerted efforts from a policy perspective”.
“This evidence from GUI supports the commitment of my Department to focus on the issues of prevention and early intervention in key national strategies.”
Growing Up in Ireland is the national longitudinal study of children, funded by the Department of Children and Youth Affairs (DCYA) with a contribution from The Atlantic Philanthropies.
The study is managed by the DCYA in association with the Central Statistics Office (CSO) and overseen by an interdepartmental governance structure. It is carried out by a consortium of researchers led by the Economic and Social Research Institute (the ESRI) and Trinity College Dublin.
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Research sponsored by business belongs to business & is directed by business.
Education that educates students how to question, research and challenge is more useful.
“business not yet dictating entirety of education & research claims new survey”
Whoever carried out the survey mustn’t have known a single iota about research funding. These broad brush figures tell us nothing. Funding structures differ around the world and how industrial funding is viewed differs. The more prestigious the research group the less funding they’ll get from industry as they don’t want their research to be viewed as biased. Also the more not for profit funding that is available, the less there is need for industrial funding. So a country that is invested in research will rank poorly on this scale. I think ranking bottom speaks volumes for the quality of Irish research and reflects the government and charitable financial support both domestic and European that it is given.
Reads like an excuse Laura.
Been at the bottom is that a reflection that companies dont rate Ireland good enough to invest in for research except for the tax break?
As a researcher myself in an Irish university most of the research is funded through national or European grants so this story doesn’t tell the whole truth. South Korea probably don’t get much nationalfunding and have to get commercial funding. Therefore we are not that dependent on businesses to fund our research as well as universities here being capable of funding patents for new ideas and supporting researchers to start spin-out companies rather than immediately selling their ideas.
We don’t allow stem cell research
Which is stupid
All stem cell research or just stem cell research from embryos? Because scientists have now found different ways of extracting stem cells, e.g. from a placenta. I don’t see why there’d be an ethical embargo on these new sources…
All stem research, if I (or any member of my family) suffered third degree burns or lost the use of my legs or be diagnosed with Alzheimer’s (which is in my family) I wouldn’t care where they came from I’d just sign straight on the dotted line and so would any parent.
With you there retort. Not sure it is a bad thing to keep big business at arms length.advice is one thing financial input influencing direction is another. I am old enough now to appreciate the relevance of an arts degree. The question still remains are we a society or an economy?
Isn’t the whole point of it all that it remains UNBIASED research and education, what?? we going to have studies that say “criminal behaviour on the rise” says Tayto crisps
in short ladies and germs, keep the bankers out of schooling look what they did to employment !!
More industry investment would be good, but the low level achieved here in comparison to Asian economies may be more a reflection of increased state funding in Europe. Do grants from the Health Research Board, Science Federation of Ireland etc count as ‘industry’ funding in this study I wonder? The trend now is for industry to establish labs in collaboration with universities with salaried staff, and so infrastructural support needs to be accounted for as well. Measuring personal grant awards alone is not an accurate assessment of private funding at university level
100 years ago Universities worldwide operated like this.
We teach…
50 years ago Universities worldwide operated like this.
Governments believe we should teach….
While in Ireland Universities operated like this
We teach….
10 Years ago Universities worldwide operated like this.
Industry believes we should teach….
While in Ireland Universities operated like this
We teach….
Today Universities worldwide operate like this.
We work with Industry to develop new economic opportunities in fields such as….
While in Ireland Universities operate like this
We teach….
If Irish Universities had 50 years ago switched their thinking from teaching to working with industries there would not have been the need to set up the Industry loved Institutes of Technology. For example the Polymer (Plastic) Engineering in Athlone IT, or Product Design in Carlow IT, and other courses that are offered in Universities in other countries, but “resigned” to IT’s in Ireland. While the Irish Universities persist with Arts qualifications for teachers & civil servants, in other words people who will never work in industry, and so never contribute to Irish exports except for students leaving the country.
Korea’s goliath corporations (your Samsungs, LGs etc) hire straight out of the universities and provide jobs of such high social status that I wouldn’t be surprised if third level institutions just let them write their curricula. It’s also worth noting that Korea’s education system was designed from day one to provide industry with intelligent managers and well trained workers. It’s to be expected that there’d be some synergy between them.
The thing that bugs me about this is that it ignores a huge aspect of university subjects: the arts, humanities, social sciences, and law. Why would industry fund research in these areas as they have nothing to do with what they do? But just because these subjects don’t attract industry investment doesn’t mean they’re not important.
Does this mean that big business doesn’t have much regard for our graduates?
Business thinks that the people running the universities are a shower of muppets.
The debacle in cork university is a prime example, €140k on taxis, over 1 million on room hire in 2011.
These people have no business experience and cannot control spend.
It would be a waster of money.
John,
The fact the Ireland is not a centre of decision making for many of the firms operating here says more about what big business thinks.
John,
The fact the Ireland is not a centre of decision making for many of the firms operating here says more about what they think.
Only certain types of research are susceptible to industry bias eg: Climate change, and some Health research etc. These things do need unbiased funding but industry funding technology research into creating the next Samsung Galaxy phone has been good for Korea.
Meanwhile in Ireland we can only hope to get a few mid level jobs as a call centre for your phone bill.
We need to realise that not everyone can be a software engineer and that real home grown design & manufacturing can make a resilient economy. What will happen when India starts to produce more software engineers and they already have the factories to make the product? We’ll be the ones running the call centre…….
I agree with some of the comments that not all research should be industry focused not industry paid for…. HOWEVER, coming bottom of a list for raising industry funding for R&D is NOT a good sign nor something that should be applauded. A good balance between the two should be found as not all research can be publicly funded which we should remember is the only alternative to private funding!
You can see our research on http://www.EnergyElephant.com and we work with Universities to answer problems in the real world!
I think “research” is the key word here. Ireland seems unable to play the research game and this needs to be addressed first.
Is it lack of understanding of R&D or is it the lack of speed in the actual process of getting the R&D carried out?
While the quality of the graduates is not in question the productivity might be!
I don’t agree with your comment. Recently enough Ireland was placed on the top 5 list of countries to watch in the Nature journal which is one of the most prestigious journals in science. In my opinion we are punching well above our weight for the level of funding coming in. This article doesn’t address that there are two ways to ascertain funding, commercial and national/European grants. With commercial funding it can be very difficult to publish your work in a journal as it is held up by patents therefore government funding is the best way to get finance and freely publish your work.
http://www.siliconrepublic.com/innovation/item/33158-nature-journal-names-irelan
I accept that but Ireland could be doing more R&D other than the pharma and IT sectors.
R&D really is only profitable for industries such as pharma and biomedical sectors and these are the companies that can afford paying for graduates with PhDs and masters. These industries need to constantly invent and innovate as their patents have a 20 year life before they are released to public for other companies to create generic versions. I don’t know what you mean when you say R&D in other areas
It means big business is too clever to get involved in one of the most corrupt countries in the world
Oh, please. Hyperbole much?
Perhaps you should blame the EU for crowding out private-industry research funding. Except that Irish unis are no longer good at drawing down the billions available from “Brussels”.
So the real culprit must be Chuck Feeny sloshing money around the place…
Headlining “worst in the world” is surely alarmist and more than a mild overstatement considering the study only looked at 30 countries…
This survey dont surprise me one bit,the academic and socialist ethos was all fine and dandy for the last century,but nowadays and into the future, its hard headed realism that is needed most,and the top spot presence of South Korea and Singapore just confirms this, they could also include Israel, its one of the reasons we have always had high unimployment and emmigration here,as a country the lack of a local enterprise culture here is one if our biggest failings,the fact that we have to rely on FDI for nearly every job created is a glearing example of our failure to invest in educating people to provide their own employment,so that jobs are created in the local communities and are able to supply the goods and services that are now provided by foreign imports,socialist airy fairy certainly is no substitute.
I accept that John but I feel Ireland could be involved in other types of R&D away from Pharma and IT and this is the reason I am asking why?
have your say