Authors

• The Office of Ombudsman for Children

Keywords

bullying, childhood, children, early childhood, friends, interpersonal relations, parents, trust

Abstract

The Child Barometer 2016 charted how 6-year-old Finnish children felt about trust. Views on trust were surveyed on terms of social relations, emotions, and bullying.

With regard to social relations, the children were asked about the number of friends they had, whether they received praise, and whether their parents and kindergarten teachers listened to them. The children were also asked if they would ask an unfamiliar adult for help if they lost their parents in a store, and which things they felt they were good at. Regarding bullying, the children were asked what they thought bullying was, and whether adults in the kindergarten would help if a child was bullied. Emotions were charted by asking the respondents in which situations they had a fun time or an unpleasant time with their family. Furthermore, the children were asked what made them happy and what made them sad. Finally, the children described what they would tell a foreigner about Finland.

The background variables included the child's age, regional variables, the number of parents/guardians in the household, number of children in the household, mother's level of education, father's level of education, household gross income, and whether and how long the child had been in kindergarten before pre-school.