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Parental warmth and disciplineIn waves 1 and 3, primary carers of children in the older(K) cohort were asked questions about parental warmth,such as hugging their children for no particular reasonor praising them for doing something well. Primary carerscontinued to have warm relationships with their childrenbut with appropriate adjustments for age. There weresmall decreases in the frequency with which primarycarers hugged their children, which was most likely dueto increased independence of the children in solvinglife’s difficulties rather than the primary carers’ decreasingwillingness to hug them. Primary carers continued topraise their children when they did something well.In wave 3 primary carers were asked additional questionsabout whether they enjoyed listening to their child andhow often they felt close to the child when the child washappy or upset. Responses showed that 86.2 per cent ofprimary carers always or often enjoyed listening to theirchild, 96.9 per cent felt close to their child when the childwas happy and 95.4 per cent felt close to their child whenthe child was upset.The proportion of primary carers always making sure thattheir children did what was asked of them increasedfrom 39.7 per cent in wave 1 to 45.8 per cent in wave 3.The vast majority of primary carers always asked wheretheir children were going when they left the house(89.6 per cent) and always knew where they were whenthey were playing away from home and who they werewith (94.0 per cent).Major life eventsMajor life events have a significant impact not only onthe people involved but on those around them as well; interms of this study, events occurring to a family membermay affect other or even all family members, includingthe child. As discussed in the Key Summary Report fromwave 1, the more major life events a child experiencesin a single period (in this case, the previous 12 months),the greater the risk of clinically significant emotionalor behavioural difficulties. Zubrick et al., 2005 foundthat where fewer than three stressful events occurred,around 15 per cent of 4 to 11 year-olds were at high riskof emotional or behavioural difficulties. This increased to25 per cent for families who experienced between threeand six stressful events, while the percentage of childrenat risk of difficulties rose to 42 per cent in families whoexperienced seven or more stressful events.In all three waves of Footprints in Time, primary carerswere asked questions about events that might havecaused significant stress. These events might have broughtpositive or negative experiences but all had a potentialto cause significant impact on the family. Additionally, oneevent might affect each family member differently. Forexample, a mother might be excited about starting a newjob and bringing in extra income, but the accompanyingchange in the life of the family as a whole might be quiteunsettling for the child.Looking at the data across the three waves makes itpossible to gauge the potential effect of major life eventson the Footprints in Time children. The average numberof events experienced in wave 1 was 4.06; in wave 2 itdecreased to 3.86; and it rose again to 4.13 in wave 3.Table 37 shows the percentage of the sample thatexperienced fewer than three, between three and six, orseven or more life events.The proportions of people experiencing zero to two, threeto six or seven or more events remained relatively constantacross the three waves. About one-third experienced zeroto two events, about half experienced three to six andabout one-sixth experienced seven or more (Table 37).Table 37: Number of major life events experienced atwaves 1–3, per centNumber of events Wave 1 Wave 2 Wave 30 to 2 31.7 34.9 30.13 to 6 49.6 50.3 53.67 or more 18.6 14.8 16.4Number ofrespondents1,539 1,471 1,333These findings raise the question of whether it is thesame families falling into the same categories eachyear or whether families experience major life events atdifferent rates each year. It is possible to investigate this bylooking at the pattern of movement between the threecategories. Of the children for whom there was data forall three waves (n=1,241), 5.4 per cent fell into differentcategories each year. The largest number of children(16.8 per cent) lived in families who experienced threeto six events in all three years. The second largest groupwas those who experienced zero to two events in all years(8.8 per cent). Only 3.3 per cent experienced seven ormore major life events in all three years, meaning a totalof 28.9 percent were in the same category in all threewaves. About one-third (32.1 per cent) experienced sevenor more events in at least one year.50 Footprints in Time: The Longitudinal Study of Indigenous Children | Key Summary Report from Wave 3