Children’s Understandings of Well-being

Tobia Fattore is a Lecturer in the Department of Sociology, Macquarie University. His current research is in the broad areas of the sociology of childhood, sociology of work and political sociology.  As well as his ongoing research interest in the sociological basis of children's well-being, his work also includes a study of children's work in developed economies that explores how transformations in employment structures have created different opportunities for children for social integration. He is also a coordinating researcher on the multi-national study Children’s Understandings of Well-being - Global and Local Contexts’ which involves a qualitative investigation into how children experience well-being from a comparative and global perspective, to explore the relative importance of local, regional and national contexts for children’s well-being. Jan Mason is Emeritus Professor at the Western Sydney University, where she was Foundation Professor of Social Work, 1995 to 2010.  She was also Foundation Director of the Childhood and Youth Policy Research Unit and then the Social Justice and Social Change Research Centre at the University. Jan's employment prior to her university career, in various positions in the NSW Department of Community Services, informs her academic work. Her research focuses on linking theory, policy and practice on children’s issues. She has published on child welfare and protection, child and family policy, child-adult relations, children's needs in care, kinship care, child well-being and researching with children. She is a member of the Board of the International Society for Child Indicators (ISCI) and an Expert Adviser to the research project, 'Children’s Understandings of Well-being: Global and Local Contexts’. Dr. Elizabeth Watson is a retired academic who most recently was Adjunct Research Fellow in the School of Social Sciences and Psychology and, before that, with the Social Justice andSocial Change Research Group at the University of Western Sydney (now Western Sydney University). She taught for many years at UWS. She has a particular interest in research methods, methodology, epistemology and ethics, especially in exploring ways of researching collaboratively with more marginalised groups. Her recent research has been in a number of social policy areas – children’s well-being, kinship care, care and caring work, including men’s caring work, and women’s human rights. Over the last 13 years, she has collaborated with both Jan Mason and Tobia Fattore in a number of research projects, of which the research underpinning this book has been the most significant.   

Preface.- Introduction.- Part I.- Chapter 1. Tracing Conceptualizations of Well-Being: Locating the Child in Well-Being Discourse.- Chapter 2. Researching Children’s Understandings of Well-Being.- Part II.- Chapter 3. Overviewing a Child Standpoint on Well-Being.- Chapter 4. Agency, Autonomy and Asymmetry in Child–Adult Relations.- Chapter 5. Safety and Ontological Insecurity: Contesting the Meaning of Child Protection.- Chapter 6. Self, Identity and Well-Being.- Part III.- Chapter 7. Activities as Autonomy and Competence: The Meaning and Experience of Leisure for Well-Being.- Chapter 8. Money, Markets and Moral Identity: Exploring Children’s Understandings and Experiences of Economic Well-Being.- Chapter 9. Children’s Health and Well-Being.- Part IV.-Chapter 10. Findings and Conclusions on Well-Being from the Unique Vantage Point of Children.- Appendix.

“Academics and postgraduate students will appreciate its disciplinary contribution and advancement of the field of child well-being; practitioners and policy makers will find use in its practical application and tangible outputs that can be used to improve the lives of children. Fattore et al.’s (2016) Child Standpoint Theory is likely to become a key epistemological and theoretical framework for understanding children’s well-being.” (Shazly Savahl,Applied Research in Quality of Life, Vol. 12, 2017)