Families and households
Family type and average family size, by ethnic group of head of family unit
Table 1: Family type
| Ethnic group | Family type, row percentages |
|||
| Single Person | Couple, no dependent children | Couple, dependent children | Lone parent | |
| White British | 36 | 35 | 20 | 9 |
| Other White | 45 | 30 | 18 | 7 |
| Mixed White and Caribbean | 42 | 8 | 21 | 29 |
| Mixed White and African | 44 | 12 | 23 | 21 |
| Mixed White and Asian | 43 | 21 | 22 | 14 |
| Other Mixed | 48 | 18 | 19 | 15 |
| Indian | 30 | 30 | 33 | 7 |
| Pakistani | 24 | 19 | 45 | 11 |
| Bangladeshi | 20 | 14 | 52 | 14 |
| Other Asian | 40 | 21 | 32 | 7 |
| Black Caribbean | 41 | 14 | 16 | 28 |
| Black African | 44 | 9 | 25 | 22 |
| Other Black | 43 | 13 | 23 | 21 |
| Chinese | 56 | 21 | 17 | 6 |
| Other | 43 | 18 | 28 | 11 |
| All groups | 37 | 33 | 20 | 10 |
Source: LFS household data sets October-December 2004 to April-June 2008, weighted proportions
Table 1 illustrates differences in family types across the different ethnic groups. We can see that single people made up over a third of White British families but were more common among most of the minority groups, partly due to the different age structure of the groups. Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Indian families were less likely, however, to be single person families. Instead around two-third of families for these groups were couple families either with or without dependent children. Lone parent families made up around a quarter of Mixed White and Black Caribbean, Black Caribbean and Black African families. This compares with an average across all groups of one in ten families.
Graph 1: Average family size, by ethnic group of head of family unit
Source: LFS household data sets October-December 2004 to April-June 2008, weighted proportions
Graph 2: Percentage of families with 4 or more people
Source: LFS household data sets October-December 2004 to April-June 2008, weighted proportions
Graphs 1 and 2 illustrate differences in family size across the different ethnic groups. They show that average family size was lowest among the Chinese, while nearly half of Bangladeshi families contained four or more people.
All tables and graphs are extracted from the Equality and Human Rights Commission Research Report: Platt, L. (2009) Ethnicity and family: relationships within and between ethnic groups(1)
Web addresses
(1) http://www.equalityhumanrights.com/uploaded_files/raceinbritain/ethnicity_and_family_report.pdf
