The Living in Australia study
Welcome to the Living in Australia study for 2012!
Australia has become part of an international move to have a better understanding of the needs of its people. This type of knowledge is crucial for good decision making, planning and support for Australians. The Living in Australia study is designed to meet this need.
Having begun in 2001, the study is known as the Living in Australia study and is sometimes referred to in the media as the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia study (HILDA).
In this study we collect and analyse information from thousands of different families and individuals across Australia. We ask questions about life in Australia including your employment, family relationships, education and wellbeing. This allows researchers to find out, for example, how one area in your life can affect other areas and how people remain the same or change over time. It can also show us how external factors such as Government decisions and world events affect our lives.
Ultimately this study is a source of information to those making economic and social welfare decisions for all Australians.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your commitment to the Living in Australia study. This study is held in very high regard as seen by extensive coverage in the media and its wide use in publications.
What's new in 2012?
We feel an overwhelming sense of pride and gratitude to you, our Living in Australia members, as we approach the twelfth year of the HILDA study. The distinct and truly indispensible results of the HILDA study continue to provide a valuable source of information to those making economic and social welfare decisions - decisions that affect us all.
This year the HILDA project has a new focus which looks at education, skills and abilities. Along with these new questions, we will also be asking you many of the questions you are familiar with from previous years.
Understanding how your responses change to these key questions is one of the most important components of the HILDA study. These are the questions that paint the picture of how Australian households evolve and how even the big and small changes in our lives affect us all.
Interviews
In the next few weeks an interviewer from Roy Morgan Research, the research company conducting the interviews, will visit you to answer any questions you may have. Alternatively, please feel free to contact us.
contact usNew to the survey?
If you are visiting this website for the first time we hope you will have a look at some of the background information about the survey. We hope it contains all the information you need to know.
find out moreA message from Mark Wooden, the Project Director of the HILDA study
Professor Mark Wooden
Project Director, HILDA study
Melbourne Institute of Applied
Economic and Social Research
As most of you would be aware, the HILDA (or Living in Australia) study began over a decade ago in 2001. At that time there were many who said HILDA would not last more than a few years, let alone survive a decade. Ordinary Australians, they said, would not be willing to participate in this study year after year.
You, however, have proved the critics wrong.
By your willingness to spend between 30 and 60 minutes each year speaking to one of our interviewers, you have helped ensure that the HILDA study is now one of the prime sources of information that governments and researchers alike turn to when they want to understand what is happening in the lives of Australians.
Some of you, I know, often ask why we keep coming back when your lives don't change much. First, it is just as critical to know about lives that don't change much as it is to know about Australians leading more eventful lives. Second, many of you are probably unaware just how much your life has changed when you look back over a decade.
On behalf of all Australians, I thank you for your participation to date, and I hope you will continue to let our interviewers into your homes and lives (if ever so briefly) for many years to come.
