all projects

Family education and family counselling

Services for families in Germany

Client

Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth

Year

2021

Download PDF

What family education and family counselling services are available in Germany? How are these services implemented? And which target groups are reached by them? These questions are answered by the study "Family Education and Family Counselling in Germany" for the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth (BMFSFJ). For this purpose, an online survey was conducted in which about 2,200 family education and counselling institutions participated. To determine changes in the services offered and in the structure of participants, the results of the survey were compared with a study from 2006.

Type of services and their reach

Family education imparts knowledge on family-relevant topics, for example in parent-child groups, in open offers such as parent cafés or outreach offers. The institutions surveyed implemented around 70,000 such family-related prevention offers in 2019.

In contrast, family counselling focuses on individual counselling services. Family counselling strengthens families in coping with acute or threatening educational, relationship and family problems. In 2019, the focus was on topics such as separation and divorce, stressful situations due to family conflicts and questions about parenting.

The 2,188 family education and family counselling institutions surveyed reached around 1.6 million people with their services in 2019. In addition, there were around 630,000 individual counselling cases.

Target groups of family education and family counselling services

Single parents, but also couple families and families with children between one and three years of age make particularly frequent use of the services offered by the institutions surveyed. Expectant parents and families with an immigration background make less use of the services. Fathers also use the services much less frequently than mothers.

Family education and family counselling services reach people from all social classes. In the facilities surveyed, the majority of people with low and middle social status make use of the services. Families with few resources or from disadvantaged backgrounds can particularly benefit from family education and family counselling services.

More offers in educational guidance

In recent years, a new field of activity has been established: Educational guidance services strengthen parents in supporting their children on their educational path and thus counteract unequal educational opportunities. Overall, they were implemented in four out of ten institutions in 2019. Every tenth institution is also planning to expand educational support services.

To the Study „Family Education and Family Counselling in Germany“ (PDF, in German)

Authors: Dr. David Juncke, Klaudia Lehmann, Johanna Nicodemus, Evelyn Stoll, Ulrich Weuthen

Our work on this topic

Take a look at our latest projects and activities.

Evaluation of the infant nutrition preventive programme

ongoing
| Project

For the Association of Private Health Insurance, Prognos supports and evaluates the develop-ment of the “Early happiness: Discovering nutrition together” programme.

Christian Böllhoff on the parental allowance debate

2023
| Company news

Family policy in the spotlight: “We do not need short-winded politics that disrupt and divide,” writes head of Prognos in his SPIEGEL guest article.

Success Factor Family

ongoing
| Project

With the “Success Factor Family” business programme, the BMFSFJ, together with the leading associations of the German economy and the DGB, is committed to a family-conscious work-place.

Inflation – extra burden and relief for family households

2022
| Project

Calculations on inflation-related additional private household expenditure and the work of the Federal Government's relief package.

Report on all-day education and childcare services for primary school children

ongoing
| Project

By the year 2027, Germany will need around 470,000 additional all-day places for primary school-aged children. On behalf of the Family Ministry, we examined how this will be achieved.

No generational conflict: Young and old are primarily looking for security.

2022
| Project

Study compares “boomers” and Generation Z: high need for security for young and old alike.

Evaluation of childcare services in NRW

ongoing
| Project

On behalf of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia’s Ministry for Children, Family, Refugees, and Integration, Prognos is evaluating the changes that the amended Children's Education Act (KiBiz) will have on day care.

Learning from the Corona crisis

2021
| Project

Experiences and new impulses for company reconciliation policy.

The situation of single or separated parents

2021
| Project

The 43rd Family Research Monitor presents new figures, facts and study results on the situation of single and separated parents in Germany.

ZDF Germany Study 2019

2019
| Project

On behalf of ZDF, we examined the external living conditions for families and senior citizens in Germany's 401 districts and independent cities.

Care Perspective. Reorientation of the elderly care profession

2019
| Project

The annual expenditure of social long-term care insurance will continue to increase in the coming decades according to the results of a Prognos study for the Bertelsmann Foundation.

Society 5.0

2018
| Project

Implications of digitalisation for areas of life like work, health and mobility – that is the topic of “Society 5.0,” the short study carried out by Capgemini and Prognos.

ZDF Germany Study 2018

2018
| Project

Where is the best place to live in Germany? Prognos investigated this question on behalf of ZDFzeit.

Learning from the world: handling of cultural diversity

2018
| Project

How can living together in cultural diversity succeed? On the occasion of the award of the Reinhard Mohn Prize 2018, Prognos was commissioned by the Bertelsmann Stiftung to conduct international good-practice research on this question.

Competence Office for Effective Family Policy

2023
| Project

Together with the Allensbach Institute, Prognos formed the Competence Office for Effective Family Policy. The Competence Office worked on behalf of the BMFSFJ, conducting research and advising on current issues of family policy.

Future Family Report 2030

2016
| Project

This expert report looks at various scenarios. It shows that continued development of family policy has a positive impact on the economy as a whole.

Pension Perspectives 2040

2015
| Project

How high the pensions will be for a typical employee depends, among other things, on the occupation and the place of residence. This is the result of recent research by Prognos for GDV.

Cost-benefit analysis of family-friendly corporate policy

2010
| Project

The model calculation for selected Swiss companies shows that the immediate positive effects of a family-friendly personnel policy outweigh the costs.

About us

Prognos – Providing Orientation.

Prognos is one of the oldest economic research centres in Europe. Founded at the University of Basel, Prognos experts have been conducting research for a wide range of clients from the public and private sectors since 1959 – politically independent, scientifically sound.

Learn more