Development of the Indicator Sets for Evaluating the Environment for Child-rearing and It’s Application: Focused on Physical Environment of Local Governments in Seoul

Abstract

This research aims to develop indicators to evaluate physical environment for child-rearing of local governments in Seoul. Local governments will be evaluated by using the developed indicators. Therefore, assessment items were derived by literature survey about physical environment for child-rearing and interviews with child care policy experts and urban planners. For an empirical analysis, a statistic of each assessment items in local governments is set in four levels by a normal distribution theory and natural break method. The score of each assessment are also calculated. The result of research tells that Jung-gu is the best local government for the physical environment for child-rearing. By the assessment of physical environment for child-rearing, which considers total fertility rate and density of early child, the seven local governments such as Gangdong-gu, Gangseo-gu, Guro-gu, Seongdong-gu, Seongbuk-gu, Songpa-gu, Eunpyeong-gu have a high ratio of total fertility and high density of early children, however physical environment isn’t good. These seven local governments need more effort to improve the physical environment for child-rearing because of the high demand of child care. The research has a meaning that the assessment indicator about physical environment for child-rearing has developed, which is possible to achieve continuous objectivity and monitoring by a statistic from Seoul, and the improvement direction for physical environment for child-rearing for local governments in Seoul is provided by the developed indicator.