4427.0 - Young People with Disability, 2012  
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 30/04/2014  First Issue
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SOCIAL PARTICIPATION

In the SDAC, social participation questions were only asked of children with disability aged 5-17 years. This means that it is not possible to compare their participation with children who had no disability in this survey, nor is it possible to report on very young children below the age of 5 years.

Most children with disability (90%) had received visits from family and friends in their homes or had spoken to them on the phone (68%) in the last three months. Their involvement in school could also be presumed to mean they had social contact with others on a regular basis.

Australia has a strong culture of participation and achievement in sport and the SDAC collects information on physical activity for recreation, exercise and sport. The data shows that, of all children with disability aged 5-17years, 65% had participated in physical activities for recreational and exercise purposes in the last 12 months while 57% had been involved in sport (Graph 6).

Children with profound/severe core activity limitation were less likely than those with moderate/mild core activity limitation to be participating in physical activities for exercise or recreational purposes (58% and 67% respectively).


Graph 6: Children with disability aged 5-17 years, by whether participated in physical activities