Family environment

A series of topic areas were evaluated to broadly represent the environment in which children and their families function in Iowa. These include:

Most children in Iowa (85%) over the age of 4 participated in some activities such as clubs, team sports, band or a religious group. Parents indicated that they were very supportive of their children in extra curricular events. The parents of four out of five children (80%) said they almost always attend their child's events/activities, and only eight percent said they either sometimes (6%) or never (2%) attended. Ninety percent of children had parents who reported knowing all or most of their child's friends.

Over half of children watched more than 10 hours of television a week, and 10 percent watched over 20 hours per week. Ten percent rarely or never watched TV. About two-thirds of children always ate at least one meal a day with at least one parent or guardian. This differed significantly, however, by age. The vast majority (84%) of the youngest children (0-4) always ate at least one meal with a parent or guardian but this declined to only one-third (32%) of those ages 15-17. Almost two-thirds of children ages 15-17 worked for pay during the previous four weeks (not including chores or baby sitting in the home).

Iowa parents viewed parenting as less aggravating than parents nationally. A series of four questions were used to categorize the level of aggravation parents felt toward their child. The questions asked: 1) how hard their child was to care for compared to other children, 2) if parents felt that things their child does bother them a lot, 3) if parents felt that they were giving up more of their life for their child than they expected, and 4) the frequency with which they felt angry with their child. Seven percent of Iowa's children had parents who reported being highly aggravated toward their child. This compares favorably with national figures indicating that 10 percent of parents were highly aggravated with their children.[11]

Almost nine out of ten children lived in a household that was headed by parents who were married (80%) or in a marriage-like relationship (7%). For over nine out of ten of these children, (93%), they were in a household where the spouse/partner was the biological or adoptive parent of the child. The remainder of the children lived in households where the parent was divorced (7%), widowed (1%), separated (2%), or never married (4%). More than four out of five children lived in a household where the parent rated the quality of their relationship with their spouse/partner as either excellent (44%) or very good (40%). Only three percent were in a household where the relationship was rated as fair or poor.

About one in twelve children (8%) were in households where the parent rated his or her own health as fair (6%) or poor (2%). For about seven out of 10 children, the parent rated his or her health as excellent (28%) or very good (41%). One in ten children lived in a household where substance abuse was reported to be a problem. For seven percent, drug or alcohol abuse was a small problem, and for three percent it was a big problem.