The altruism of pre-adolescent children’s perspectives on ‘worry’ and ‘happiness’ in Australia and England

Abstract

This article presents the perspectives of Australian and English children on the broad terms worry, happy and change. Utilizing a qualitative methodology, the study engaged with pre-adolescent children (‘tweens’) on the issues affecting them in the modern world. Participants were drawn from a large regional secondary school in Eastern Australia and a comparable regional secondary school in England. Students completed an open-ended questionnaire. In both contexts, many of the children identified specific personal and predominantly social priorities. In their responses, the children tended towards features in their lives that reflected the high importance of individual relationships. The factors that give rise to the identified importance of the family relationship reveal their prioritization of the conditions in their lifeworld. The children demonstrated an acute and sophisticated knowledge of their local community and the global world. They identified local and global issues as they impacted on them personally.