What did taking part involve?

We interviewed mothers and fathers to help us build a full picture of each child’s life. This included mothers and fathers who live apart from their baby’s other parent, whatever involvement they had with their baby.

We invited one parent, usually whoever spends the most time with the baby, to complete an interview, usually done in person with an interviewer.

We asked the other parent to complete a separate shorter interview. This was shorter as we only needed to ask some questions once per baby or household. These interviews were done online, in person and sometimes by telephone.

Ipsos, an independent research organisation, carried out these interviews.

When did Generation New Era fieldwork happen?

We interviewed mothers and fathers when their baby was around 9-12 months old, to understand health and development in the first year of life.

In England, Wales and Scotland, interviewing started in Autumn 2023. Interviews finished by end of June 2024.

In Northern Ireland, interviewing started in April 2024. Interviews finished by the beginning of September 2024.

In total, 1918 families took part: 1005 families in England, 273 in Wales, 319 in Scotland and 321 in Northern Ireland.

1850 mums and 1256 dads took part.

What did the interview cover and what did we find?

Answering questions about yourself and your baby

We asked you about your baby, your experiences as a mother or father, and about you and your family.

1) About your baby

We asked you about your baby’s:

• Health: three quarters of the babies were in very good health and didn’t have any longstanding health conditions.
• Behaviour and development: for example, we found out that more than ¾ of babies spent some of their day watching screens.
• Sleep: on average the babies woke up 3 time a night and slept for 10 hours a night.
• Diet: nearly ¾ of babies had been breastfed at some point
• Activities they do with you: parents most often played with toys, cuddled and talked to their babies throughout the day.

2) About your experiences as a mother or father

We asked you about:

• Your home and family: we found the average age of parents was rising (e.g. around 20 years ago 4 in 10 first time mums were over 60, whereas in Generation New Era this was now 6 in 10).
• Your work situation (including any maternity or paternity leave)
• Your health and wellbeing: most parents were satisfied with their lives and more than 9 in 10 parents said they felt very or fairly competent caring for their child. 
• Your baby’s pregnancy and birth: we found that nearly all babies were born in hospital, and 13% had to spend time in a neonatal unit after birth.
• Your relationship with your baby: parents found some aspects of parenting challenging, for example over 50% worried they were doing enough for their baby.
• The support you receive from people in your life
• Any services you or your baby use
• Any childcare arrangements: 2 in 5 families relied on relatives to look after their baby, and this was most often the child’s grandparents.

3) About you and your family

We also asked some wider questions about you and your family, including:

• Any other children you have
• Family finances
• About the area you live in
• Key information about your child’s other parent and any partners

You can find out more about what we found in our ‘Learning from Generation New Era’ booklet which families will receive in October-December 2024.

Adding information from administrative records

Government departments and agencies, such as the NHS, routinely collect administrative records about all of us to help plan and provide services.

We would like to add information from health, education and social care records about you and your child to your study responses. This makes the study even more useful for researchers and policymakers, who will use this information to improve public services for everyone. This was covered as part of your interview.

Find out more by clicking the ‘Adding more information about you’ button below.

Giving a saliva sample

We asked some parents and their babies to add genetic information to the study, to help understand how genes influence people’s lives, and how genes and the environments people experience work together.

You can read more about what being part of research about genes involves by clicking the button below.

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What happens next?

We hope to invite you to take part every few years to find out how your child is getting on as they get older.

It will always be up to you to decide whether you want to take part. Future surveys are dependent on further funding for the study.