People in New Zealand report strong sense of belonging to family

In the 2021 General Social Survey, people reported a high sense of belonging to their families with an average rating of 9.2 out of 10, Stats NZ said today.

"People who reported a strong sense of belonging to family were also more likely to have higher life satisfaction, and higher family wellbeing scores than the national average," wellbeing and housing statistics manager Sarah Drake said.

"The 9.2 rating was relatively unchanged from the 9.1 reported the last time the data was collected in 2016, showing that family continues to be an important source of social connection."

Average ratings for sense of belonging to neighbourhood increased from 6.5 in 2016 to 6.6 in 2021, driven by a higher proportion of people giving ratings of 9 or 10 out of 10.

People's ratings of their sense of belonging to a company or organisation decreased from 8.0 in 2016 to 7.8 in 2021, driven by more people giving a low rating of between 0 and 4 on a 0 to 10 scale.

Wellbeing statistics: 2016 has the previously published data.

New measures provide information on family functioning

In 2021, the General Social Survey included new questions on family functioning, in order to give a fuller picture of how families interact and support each other. 'Family' means different things to different people and is self-defined by people participating in the survey.

The new 'family functioning' measures showed that 97 percent of people agreed or strongly agreed that in times of crisis they could turn to each other for help and support. This compared with 92 percent who agreed or strongly agreed they could confide in each other.

The six family functioning measures can be combined into a general functioning score, to give an indication of how a family is doing overall. Life satisfaction and family wellbeing tended to be higher for people with higher family functioning scores.

Family provide important social support

"Social support is important for wellbeing. Our survey results show that when people need help or support, family are often the first people they ask," Ms Drake said.

In 2021, 80 percent of people found it easy or very easy to ask for support if they had the flu for a few days and needed to stay in bed, and 78 percent found it easy or very easy to ask for help if they were away and needed help with things like collecting their mail or feeding their pet. These were the easiest types of support to ask for.

Some demographic groups found asking for help harder than others. People in one-parent families found asking for help if they had a flu harder than other family types or the total population, 66 percent said they would find it easy or very easy to ask for help if they needed to stay in bed for a few days.

Financial support was the hardest type of support to ask for. Just under half (48 percent) of the population reported that they would find it easy or very easy to ask for support if they or their partner needed $2,000 in an emergency.

Pacific peoples (28 percent), people in one-parent families (28 percent), and people with a household income of $30,000 or less (33 percent) were among the least likely to find it easy or very easy to ask for $2,000 in an emergency.

Levels of social support can affect people's life satisfaction and family wellbeing. People who found it easy or very easy to ask for support had a higher average family wellbeing and life satisfaction than those who found it hard or very hard.

For example, people who found it easy or very easy to talk to someone if they felt down or depressed had an average family wellbeing of 7.9 compared with people who found it hard or very hard who had an average rating of 7.2 out of 10.

Note: social support data was last collected in 2014. Due to updates to the order questions were asked, results are not directly comparable. The GSS data collection began on 1 April 2021, a year after the first COVID-19 lockdown, and finished early on 17 August 2021 following the first community outbreak of the Delta variant.