Scottish Social Attitudes 2019: technical report

7. Analysis variables

Most of the analysis variables are taken directly from the questionnaire and are self-explanatory.

National Statistics Socio-Economic Classification (NS-SEC)

The most commonly used classification of socio-economic status used on government surveys is the National Statistics Socio-Economic Classification (NS-SEC). SSA respondents were classified according to their own occupation, rather than that of the 'head of household'. Each respondent was asked about their current or last job, so that all respondents, with the exception of those who had never worked, were classified. The seven NS-SEC categories are:

• Employers in large organisations, higher managerial and professional
• Lower professional and managerial; higher technical and supervisory
• Intermediate occupations
• Small employers and own account workers
• Lower supervisory and technical occupations
• Semi-routine occupations
• Routine occupations

The remaining respondents were grouped as 'never had a job' or 'not classifiable'.

Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD)

The Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD)^[8] 2020 measures the level of deprivation across Scotland – from the least deprived to the most deprived areas. It is based on 38 indicators in seven domains of: income, employment, health, education skills and training, housing, geographic access and crime. SIMD 2020 is presented at data zone level, enabling small pockets of deprivation to be identified. The data zones are ranked from most deprived (1) to least deprived (6,976) on the overall SIMD 2020 and on each of the individual domains. The result is a comprehensive picture of relative area deprivation across Scotland.

The analysis in this report used a variable created from SIMD data indicating the level of deprivation of the data zone in which the respondent lived in quintiles, from most to least deprived.^[9]

The Scottish Government urban-rural six-fold classification

The 6-fold version of the urban-rural classification is included on the dataset (Ur6fold). Areas in this version are classified as follows:

Area type

1. Large Urban Areas: Settlements of 125,000 or more people

2. Other Urban: Settlements of 10,000 to 124,999 people

3. Accessible small towns: Settlements 3,000 to 9,999 people and within 30 minutes' drive of a settlement of 10,000 or more

4. Remote small towns: Settlements of 3,000 to 9,999 people and with a drive time of over 30 minutes to a settlement of 10,000 or more

5. Accessible rural: Areas with a population of less than 3,000 people and within a 30 minute drive time of a settlement of 10,000 or more

6. Remote rural: Areas with a population of less than 3,000 people and with a drive time of over 30 minutes to a settlement of 10,000 or more