Children's Autonomy and Parents Responsibility in Urban Spaces

Children’s autonomy and parents responsibility in urban spaces

Abstract:

The aim of the proposed communication is to demonstrate that, despite the increasing attention to children’s autonomy and the arising of policies devoted to this principle, a decrease in spaces of responsibility awarded to children is occurring, so that they have limited decisional power, a restricted use of public spaces, fewer “unsupervised” relationships within peer groups, dependency on adults and mandate to adults in their courses of action. The hypothesis of increasing risk of dependence of 9-12 years old children from adults’ control is based on a research focused on Turin area, part of a national project on children’s autonomy and adult’s responsibility.

Analysis pointed at the different ways in which autonomy/dependence ratio, referred to the children’s space management, is declined by adults, either in domestic or in public spaces. Variations are considered depending on children’s gender and age, family social condition and type of neighbourhood of living. Different degrees of authonomy and responsibility are related to different family social condition.

As regards methodology, 46 in-depth interviews were carried out to 9-12 years old children son’s/daughter’s school grade and their parents contacted through two selected school, located in two different neighbourhoods and characterized by a different class composition. Four focus group, involving teachers of the two schools have been realized.