Nicholas Biddle

Health Assimilation Patterns Amongst Australian Immigrants

This paper compares the health of Australian immigrants with that of the Australian-born population and examines the extent to which differences vary with time since migration. Health is measured using self-reports of chronic diseases from three national health surveys. Probit models are used to estimate the health effects of immigrant arrival cohorts, years since migration and country of birth. We find that the health of Australian immigrants is better than the Australian-born population, but the longer immigrants spend in Australia, the closer their health approximates that of the Australian-born population. There are variations for different immigrant groups and for particular chronic diseases.

The Relationship between Wellbeing and Indigenous Land, Language and Culture in Australia

Abstract A consistent finding in the literature on Indigenous peoples is the importance of the sustainability of land, language and culture. All three are related, with the maintenance of one helping to protect the others. This paper uses a nationally representative, cross-sectional survey of the Indigenous Australian population to look at the factors associated with individual measures of sustainability. Geography matters for those in remote areas who are much more likely to have participated in hunting, fishing and gathering than those in non-remote areas and somewhat more likely to be learning an Indigenous language. However, those in remote areas are somewhat less likely to have participated in Indigenous cultural production. Participation in the mainstream economy is not necessarily a barrier to these aspects of wellbeing as those with high levels of formal education were more likely to speak, understand or be learning an Indigenous language. While important in their own right, such aspects of sustainability also have the potential to directly contribute to narrower measures of social and emotional wellbeing. A positive relationship was found between the sustainability of Indigenous land, language and culture and an Indigenous persons subjective emotional wellbeing.

The labour market status of Australian students: who is unemployed, who is working and for how many hours?

This paper looks at the factors associated with the decision by school students in Australia to work part‐time. I find substantial variation in the probability of working across the eight Australian states and territories, as well as by remoteness. Those who live in households with low income are less likely to work. A person’s ancestry is also associated with variation in the probability of working, as is the type of school they attend. This paper also looks at unemployment amongst school students. In addition to Indigenous Australians, one group of students found to be substantially more likely to be unemployed are those who live in a household where no one else is employed. Other authors have found that those who spend long hours at work have been found to achieve poorly across a number of outcomes. The biggest differences in the probability of working long hours are associated with the industry in which the student works.

Measures of indigenous social capital and their relationship with well-being.

OBJECTIVE To provide the first estimates of a comprehensive measure of social capital for the Indigenous population and to link the indicators to well-being. DESIGN Observational study-based. SETTING Household survey. PARTICIPANTS Nationally representative sample of 7823 Indigenous Australians aged 15 years and over who were usual residents of private dwellings. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE Whether or not the respondent felt happy in the last 4 weeks all or most of the time (happiness), and whether or not they felt so sad that nothing could cheer them up at least a little bit of the time over the same period (sadness). RESULTS There were no consistent differences in social capital measures between Indigenous men and women, nor were there consistent differences between the remote and non-remote population. High levels of social capital were, however, associated with higher subjective well-being. CONCLUSION Social capital is both an indicator and determinant of well-being. It was possible to derive an index of social capital for Indigenous Australians that had a strong positive association with self-reported happiness and a negative association with self-reported sadness. However, the analysis also showed that there are a set of related domains of social capital, rather than there being a single underlying concept.

Estimating the Accuracy of Geographic Variation in Indigenous Population Counts

Abstract The ABS 2006 Post-Enumeration Survey was extended to include a sample of localities from the whole of Australia, thereby providing an estimate of census net undercount reflective of the enumeration in remote Indigenous settlements for the first time. The results revealed substantial undercounting of the Indigenous population in certain jurisdictions. At the same time, census counts in many locations were substantially higher than demographic factors could account for. The analytical and policy issues that arise from this revolve around a simple question: what credence can we give to observed spatial patterns of Indigenous population change? This paper seeks to provide an answer by establishing the spatial relationship between population change and net migration at the small area level. This reveals the detailed geography of census undercount and ‘overcount’ with the former common in remote areas and the latter most evident in regional towns and cities. The findings raise important policy issues about the proper interpretation of Indigenous population change data and the nature of estimates used to determine fiscal resourcing for Indigenous policies and programs.

The Relationship between Community and Individual Measures of Wellbeing: comparisons by remoteness for Indigenous Australians

ABSTRACT For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (Indigenous) Australians, the wellbeing of the community in which one lives and/or has an ongoing attachment to is an important aspect of individual health and wellbeing. In non-Indigenous policy discourse, the main way to summarise community-level wellbeing is through indices of socioeconomic outcomes that can be used to rank regions or areas within regions. While these have been produced for the Indigenous population, they only capture one particular aspect of community wellbeing. The analysis presented in this paper extends our knowledge of place-based community wellbeing by looking at the presence or absence of particular facilities, barriers to accessing services, and neighbourhood or community problems. Indigenous Australians in remote areas were less likely to report the presence of a number of facilities and more likely to report barriers to accessing government services. However, there were no consistent differences in the reporting of neighbourhood and community problems—some types of problems had a higher incidence in non-remote areas (e.g. theft and dangerous or noisy driving), whilst other problems were higher in remote areas (alcohol, illegal drugs and violence). Indices of these variables were also found to be associated with individual emotional wellbeing, providing prima facie evidence of the link between community and individual measures.

Recent Change in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Population and Housing Geographies

The intercensal period (2006–2011) was a time of significant policy and population change in Indigenous affairs. The aim of this paper is to document the changing distribution of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population and housing geographies over that period. We use the Indigenous Region structure developed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics to show that Indigenous Australians grew at a rate that significantly outstrips the non-Indigenous population with an increasing concentration of the Indigenous population on the urban eastern seaboard and particularly among older people. We present results that show that for certain measures, the housing situation of the Indigenous population in 2011 had improved relative to the Indigenous population in 2006. A smaller proportion of Indigenous households were estimated to live in an overcrowded dwelling compared with Indigenous households in 2006. There were also significant increases in the per cent of Indigenous households that owned or were purchasing their own home. Other results might be seen as less positive with community housing (a tenure type identified as having benefits in both qualitative and quantitative analysis) declining in importance. In net terms though, Indigenous households continue to experience a high degree of housing need. Compared with other households, they were 3.7 times as likely to live in an overcrowded dwelling.

School (non-)attendance and ‘mobile cultures’: theoretical and empirical insights from Indigenous Australia

Abstract Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (Indigenous) Australians are significantly and substantially less likely to be attending school on a given day than their non-Indigenous counterparts. This has been shown to have long-term consequences for the development of the mainstream literacy and numeracy skills associated with formal schooling, as well as later school and employment outcomes. Reducing this gap is a key focus of government education policy within Australia. Hampering the design of effective policy, however, is the lack of a robust empirical and theoretical framework to explain school (non-)attendance that not only builds on existing research, but also reflects the specific circumstances and aspirations of Indigenous students and their families. This article applies mixed-methods quantitative and qualitative techniques to explore what Indigenous student (non-)attendance in Australia might tell us regarding the relationship between highly marginalised student groups and formal education systems. A robust understanding of these geographically and socio-culturally situated school (non-)attendance patterns and processes allows us to build on and contribute to human capital, critical, resistance, and other behavioural theories of formal education and draw parallels for other population sub-groups globally, especially those that display ongoing patterns of high geographic mobility. Our analysis suggests that absenteeism amongst marginalised and/or highly mobile populations, may be most usefully conceived of as a manifestation of structural incompatibilities between formal schooling systems and the life projects and circumstances of these school-aged children and their families.

Indigenous Family Formation

Following a detailed review of Indigenous data issues and sources, this chapter comprises a two-pronged approach to understanding the families of the contemporary Indigenous population of Australia. We begin by exploring Indigenous marriage patterns in twenty-first century Australia. We then turn to the implications of fertility trends for family structures. We draw on available data to explore the timing and quantum of Indigenous fertility and to identify changes in the recent past. While we highlight how underlying fertility patterns contribute to family form, our analysis of standard demographic data is limited by a number data of issues. In the second part of the analysis, we therefore turn to alternative data sources to explore in detail contemporary family living arrangements among Indigenous peoples and the key characteristics of Indigenous families. Our analysis of fertility and families highlights important regional differences. We close by exploring priorities for future research in this area and implications of family structures and dynamics for demography and social policy.

Estimating small-area Indigenous cultural participation from synthetic survey data

Abstract Lack of data on the spatial distribution of the social conditions of Australias Indigenous peoples has created difficulties in the allocation of government and community programs. Small-area estimation methods can overcome this lack of data, but typically require access to a unit record file. However, strict confidentiality rules applied to these unit record files may hinder the development of these models. In Australia, unit record data for the Indigenous population is analysable only using Australian Bureau of Statistics servers remotely. This study looks specifically at this issue and offers a solution to the problem of confidentiality restrictions by using a synthetic database. The results show that reasonable small-area estimates of social conditions for Indigenous Australians can be derived from a small-area estimation (spatial microsimulation) model using a synthetic database. While this application is for Australia, the method developed can be used for any small-area model requiring unit record data that are not available due to confidentiality restrictions.