Parsons, Samantha; Platt, Lucinda; (2019) Growing up lonely? Exploring the social outcomes of three generations identified with special education needs or disabilities in childhood. (Social Policy Working Paper 08-19). LSE Department of Social Policy: London, UK.

Text GrowingUpLonely_LSEwp08-19_Parsons_Platt.pdf - Other Access restricted to UCL open access staff Download (1MB)

Abstract

Social isolation and loneliness currently have high prominence on the political agenda in the UK. While social isolation can affect anyone and at all stages across the life-course, some are more vulnerable than others. One risk factor for poorer social outcomes is disability, which is itself often compounded with social disadvantage. We draw on data from three British longitudinal studies to examine social outcomes of those identified with special educational needs or disabilities when they were teenagers. We compare three different generations, born between 1958 and 2000/02, across a range of measures of social engagement and social support experienced in their 50s, 20s and teens, respectively. This gives us insight both into the long-term consequences of childhood disability for social engagement and social support, but also enables us to evaluate for the younger cohorts the early indications of such future lifecourse patterns. We find substantial differences in social support and social engagement among 50-year olds. Moreover, despite successive governments agreeing that those with disabilities deserve a better deal out of life, today’s disabled youth and teenagers also experience greater social isolation than their non-disabled contemporaries. We discuss the implications of our findings.

Download activity - last month

Export as CSVXMLJSON

Download activity - last 12 months

Export as XMLJSONCSV

Downloads by country - last 12 months

Export as XMLJSONCSV

Archive Staff Only

View Item