title: The influence of parental education and other socio-economic factors on child car seat use.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The behaviour of parents in ensuring car passenger safety for their children is associated with socio-economic (SE) status of the family; however, the influence of parental education has rarely been researched and the findings are contradictory. The aim of the study was to clarify whether parental education influences the use of a child car seat during short rides.
  
  
  METHODS
  A cross-sectional survey was carried out in outpatient clinics for children's healthcare across Slovenia. 904 parents of 3-year-old children participated in the study; the response rate was 95.9%. A self-administered questionnaire was used. A binary multiple logistic regression was applied to assess the association between parental unsafe behaviour as dependent variable, and education and other SE factors as independent variables.
  
  
  RESULTS
  14.6% of parents did not use a child car seat during short rides. Families where mother had low or college education had higher odds of the non-use of a child car seat than families where mother had a university education. Single-parent families and those who lived in areas with low or medium SE status also had higher odds of the non-use of a child car seat.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Low educational attainment influences parents' behaviour regarding the non-use of a child car seat. Low parental education is not the only risk factor since some highly educated parents also have high odds of unsafe behaviour. All parents should therefore be included in individually tailored safety counselling programmes. SE inequalities could be further reduced with provision of free child car seats for eligible families.
authors.affiliation: National Institute of Public Health, Centre for Health Research and Development, Trubarjeva 2, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia.
authors.forename: Mateja
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Rok Simon
authors.affiliation: National Institute of Public Health, Centre for Health Research and Development, Trubarjeva 2, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia.
authors.forename: Aleš
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Korošec
authors.affiliation: Institute of Occupational Safety, Chengdujska c. 25, 1260 Ljubljana-Polje, Slovenia.
authors.forename: Marjan
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bilban
keywords: child restraint systems; educational status; preschool children; socioeconomic factors