







































AUSTRALIAN POPULATION STUDIES  2021 | Volume 5 | Issue 2 | pages 15–28 

 

© Kerr et al. 2021. Published under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial licence 3.0 Australia  
(CC BY-NC 3.0 AU). Journal website: www.australianpopulationstudies.org 

Measuring area-level disadvantage in 
Australia: development of a locally 
sensitive indicator 

Jessica A. Kerr*  Murdoch Children’s Research Institute; University of Melbourne; University of Otago 

Suzanne Mavoa  Murdoch Children’s Research Institute; University of Melbourne 

Ralf-Dieter Schroers  Deakin University; University of Canberra 

Serryn Eagleson  FrontierSI 

Daniel J. Exeter  University of Auckland 

Alison Watkins  University of Canterbury; Auckland University of Technology 

Lukar Thornton  Deakin University; University of Antwerp 

*Corresponding author. Email: jessica.kerr@mcri.edu.au. Address: Murdoch Children’s Research 

Institute, The Royal Children’s Hospital, 50 Flemington Road, Parkville, Victoria 3052, Australia 

Paper received 27 July 2021; accepted 1 November 2021; published 29 November 2021 

Abstract 

Background 

In Australia, the Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA), which includes the Index of Relative 

Socioeconomic Disadvantage (IRSD), captures the socioeconomic characteristics of areas. Because 

SEIFA rankings are relative to the country or state, the decile categorisations may not reflect an 

area’s socioeconomic standing relative to areas nearby. 

Aims 

The aim of the research was to explore whether IRSD rankings could be re-ranked to become locally 

sensitive. 

Data and methods 

Using existing SEIFA data to redistribute the membership of current decile IRSD groups, we tested 

three methods to re-rank all SA1 areas relative to the nearest areas capped at: (1) the nearest 99 

neighbours, (2) a population threshold of 50,000 (3) a distance threshold of 10 km. 

Results 

The reclassification of SEIFA IRSD deciles was largest (up to 8 decile points of change) when 

comparing the nearest neighbour and population threshold local methods to current state-based 

rankings. Moreover, compared to using current national and state SEIFA IRSD rankings, the use of 

local rankings resulted in more evenly distributed deciles between cities, regional, and remote areas. 

Conclusions 

Because SEIFA IRSD rankings are used to allocate resources and health services, we encourage the 

combined use of a state and local ranking to refine areas considered the most disadvantaged. 

Key words 

Disadvantage; deprivation, neighbourhood; local; area-level; Australia. 

  

   

http://www.australianpopulationstudies.org/
mailto:jessica.kerr@mcri.edu.au


16 Kerr et al. Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 

 

 

1. Introduction 

Using data from the 1981 UK Census, Townsend established that area-level circumstances are an 

important measure of deprivation independent of poverty or individual socioeconomic position (SEP) 

(Townsend 1987). Deprivation was defined as “…observable and demonstrable disadvantage relative 

to the local community or the wider society or nation to which an individual, family or group 

belongs” (Townsend 1987 p. 125). Therefore, in comparison to individual level measures of socio-

economic position such as income, education and occupation, area-based measures more commonly 

capture neighbourhood deprivation or disadvantage by aggregating social and material conditions of 

residential areas (e.g., % residents unemployed, % residents that own a car) into a single figure 

estimate. Such area-level socioeconomic conditions are often strongly associated with health 

outcomes both at the individual- and population-level, including long-term illness and mortality 

(Galobardes et al. 2004; Meijer 2013; King et al. 2006). These effects can accumulate over the life 

course, influencing an increased allostatic load (i.e., cumulative biological risk) and subsequently 

health status in adulthood (Cornaz et al. 2009; Gustafsson et al. 2014).  

Following Townsend’s pioneering work, contemporary area-level socioeconomic indicators are 

measured in a variety of ways including composite indexes derived from census (Atkinson et al. 2014; 

Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions 2000; Norman et al. 2019; Townsend et 

al. 1988) or routinely collected administrative data (Exeter et al. 2017; Noble et al. 2006; Smith et al. 

2015). In Australia, the Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) are used to determine the relative 

socioeconomic characteristics of different areas in Australia (ABS 2011; ABS 2016b). This set of 

indexes is a product developed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics using data gathered in the five-

yearly census. Broadly, to determine the collective socioeconomic characteristics of people living in 

an area, advantage and disadvantage are defined by people’s access to social and material resources, 

including their ability to participate in society (ABS 2011). 

Constrained by census questions, each of the four SEIFA indexes is a weighted combination of 

selected variables (see Data and Methods) measuring the aggregated attributes of the area’s 

residents. Much of the methodological discussion in relation to such indexes in Australia and 

internationally relates to the choice of variables that make up each index or the size of the area-level 

unit being explored (Jordan et al. 2004). This latter issue is the well-recognised modifiable areal unit 

problem (MAUP) where the scale, or aggregation, one uses to analyse the information can produce 

different or distorted findings (Brunsdon & Comber 2020). Indexes can also be problematic for areas 

with very diverse neighbourhoods, such as the Australian Capital Territory (ACT). Indeed, the ACT 

Government has highlighted that SEIFA critically underestimates disadvantage in the ACT (ACT 

Government 2012) because in the ACT many disadvantaged households are adjacent to advantaged 

households (due to mixed tenure housing policy), which SEIFA does not capture because it averages 

across larger geographic areas (Tanton et al. 2015).  

Many issues related to small-area measures of disadvantage have been discussed by Allik and 

colleagues (Allik et al. 2020). However, a largely unrecognised problem for Australia’s SEIFA indexes 

and other international examples (Atkinson et al. 2014; Exeter et al. 2017; Townsend et al. 1988) is 

that the current rankings, and subsequent decile groups, are based on relative rankings across the 

whole country or within each individual state or territory. Therefore, indexes based on relative ranks 



Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 Kerr et al. 17 

 

within a country or state may not reflect an area’s standing relative to its neighbours and nearby 

areas. Consequently, regional areas are ranked against both regional and urban areas (and vice 

versa) and regional areas with low-levels of disadvantage relative to other nearby areas cannot be 

distinguished because their level of deprivation is ranked relative to all other areas within the state 

or within the country.  

The use of the decile groups (as recommended by the ABS (2011, 2016b)) makes it difficult to isolate 

the most disadvantaged areas relative to neighbouring areas and may misrepresent the levels of 

disadvantage present, especially in regional areas of Australia. The ABS recognise some of these 

limitations and note that users should be cautious when using the current SEIFA indexes for very 

remote areas of Australia (ABS 2011). The use of state-based relative rankings and resulting decile 

groups can also be problematic for localities bordering states or territories.  

These limitations are important because place and health research relies on, and often assumes, 

locally sensitive measures of socioeconomic disadvantage. This is important to resolve as it is critical 

to employ suitable area-disadvantage indicators that are meaningful (Hugo 2007). Researchers and 

policy makers rely heavily on the SEIFA indexes to inform local and national policy development, to 

determine areas in need of funding and essential services, and to inform research examining 

relationships between area-level SEP and various social- and health-related outcomes (ABS 2011). 

Therefore, there are potentially major consequences to misinterpreting local socioeconomic 

disadvantage and misdirecting resources. 

We direct interested readers to previous research that considers small area data zones (Allik et al. 

2020; Noble et al. 2006; Zhao and Exeter 2016), and to researchers who are beginning to consider 

relative or local ‘neighbouring disadvantage’ within definitions of deprivation (Cox et al. 2007; Graif 

et al. 2016; Pearson et al. 2013; Zhang et al. 2011; Zhang et al. 2013). However, most relevant to our 

own concept is Rae’s alternative approach to measuring neighbourhood deprivation within the 

United Kingdom (Rae 2009). Advocating an approach to better understand the relationships areas 

have with their wider neighbours, Rae developed a method to assess deprived areas as integrated 

neighbours rather than isolated entities. Despite its use in evidence-based policy development across 

England, the UK Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) lacked metrics specific to locally sensitive spatial 

dimensions. By calculating the mean value of IMD for three different levels of adjacent 

neighbourhoods, Rae developed a Nearest Neighbour IMD as an alternative method to interpret 

local level area deprivation.  

Similarly, we contend that the current use of SEIFA rankings and the subsequent decile groups is 

limited for locally sensitive research questions and policy decisions. The shortcomings cannot be 

overcome through limiting and re-ranking areas within local government areas due to issues that 

would be introduced through edge-effects. Similar discussions have been had in Australia where the 

late Professor Graeme Hugo (Hugo 2007) previously advocated a move away from the traditionally 

employed administrative units in order to define more relevant spatial units when considering social, 

economic and environmental planning purposes. This work led to the restructuring of the statistical 

geography of Australia with the intention of using topography and built environments to 

homogenously group people with like characteristics. For example, in rural areas it is common for 

communities to form around the intersection of major roads and such a community should be kept 



18 Kerr et al. Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 

 

 

together for analysis. In urban areas, a similar approach has been undertaken where topographic 

features such as roads and rivers can unite or divide an area – depending on the number of crossing 

points (bridges/traffic lights). To define the statistical geography, criteria were assigned by an expert 

panel with a weighting (high, medium or low) to facilitate the drawing of the spatial boundaries (ABS 

2003; Eagleson et al. 2003). The intention of the restructured statistical geography based on Mesh 

Blocks (the smallest area defined by the ABS) was to allow flexibility (e.g., customised units) of data 

aggregation for the output of demographics and calculation of indexes by both researchers and 

policy makers. However, whilst broad land use characteristics, counts of dwellings and population 

have been published at the Mesh Block scale, SEIFA output remains confined to larger administration 

areas (e.g., SA1 or SA2). 

Due to limited data availability on the Mesh Block scale, we explored whether SEIFA at the SA1 level 

could be re-ranked to become locally sensitive. Overall, research directly related to SEIFA indicators 

is remarkably scarce. By developing methods to re-rank the Index of Relative Socioeconomic 

Disadvantage (IRSD), we aimed to redistribute the membership of current decile groups to establish 

a locally sensitive indicator of relative disadvantage for Australia. In this proof-of-concept approach, 

to investigate whether existing SEIFA IRSD rankings could be redistributed to become locally 

sensitive, we explore three methods by re-ranking areas relative to:  

(1) the nearest administrative (SA1) areas capped at the nearest 99 neighbours (nearest neighbour), 

(2) the nearest areas capped at a population threshold of 50,000 (population threshold), and 

(3) the nearest areas capped at a distance threshold of 10km (distance threshold).  

Unlike the approach used by Rae (2009), our measure does not alter or recalculate the SEIFA scores 

allocated to areas, but simply re-ranks them. Ultimately our vision is for a local IRSD ranking to be 

tested, adapted, and adopted for wide use to inform relevant policy and research within Australia. 

2. Data and methods 

2.1 Description of current SEIFA IRSD rankings 

The construction of the IRSD rankings have been outlined in detail elsewhere (ABS 2011, 2016b). 

Briefly, SEIFA scores are derived for almost all Statistical Area Level 1 (SA1) units across Australia 

(n=55,028), with a few excluded mainly due to issues such as low population size (ABS 2016a). SA1s 

are built from whole Mesh Blocks and are intended to remain relatively stable over time, although 

the boundaries are updated when there has been substantial population growth in given areas. SA1s 

are the smallest geographical unit for the release of SEIFA with an average population size of 400 

residents (range 200 to 800 residents) (ABS 2016a). By nature of design, SA1s outside of cities are 

often smaller in population and larger in geographical coverage.  

The 2016 version of the IRSD score for each SA1 is a weighted combination of 16 census-collected 

variables that indicate levels of social and material disadvantage at the SA1 level. Scores have been 

standardised to have a mean of 1,000 and a standard deviation of 100. For an area to receive a score 

of 1,000, all 16 indicators must be equal to the national average. With this score, SA1 areas are 

ranked on a continuum and then allocated to decile groups from 1 (most disadvantaged, i.e., a high 

proportion of relatively disadvantaged people in this area) to 10 (least disadvantaged). ABS 



Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 Kerr et al. 19 

 

recommend using these index rankings and deciles, rather than the numerical score. The rankings 

and decile groups are made available at a national level and at a state/territory level. 

2.2 Methods to re-rank SEIFA IRSD 

To achieve a more locally sensitive IRSD, membership of decile groupings was redistributed by re-

ranking each SA1 across Australia according to the three methods described below (code currently 

available from authors upon request). To test our concept, we employed arbitrary cut off points for 

each method described below. It is important to note that each of these methods rely on first 

generating a geometric centroid for each SA1 polygon (ArcGIS – points forced to be inside polygon) 

and that the measures are not restricted to state borders (i.e., a neighbouring SA1 could be on the 

other side of the state boundary). 

Method 1: Re-rank SA1s according to neighbours (nearest neighbour) 

To explore whether existing SEIFA IRSD rankings (that are derived from nearly all SA1 units across 

Australia) could be re-ranked to become locally sensitive, this first method scored each SA1 against 

its 99 nearest neighbours (total of 100 inclusive of the SA1 that the nearest 99 was measured from). 

Once generated, the 99 nearest neighbours, i.e., 99 points in closest proximity, were identified using 

R and the ‘knearneigh’ function (R package ‘spdep’) and an origin-destination matrix was created. 

The scores for each SA1 were given a fixed rank based on how each SA1 scored in relation to its 99 

nearest neighbours. This process resulted in the creation of new membership of decile groups 

relative to the SA1s nearest neighbours.  

Method 2: Re-rank SA1s according to population (population threshold) 

In Method 2, we constructed a nearest-neighbour matrix similar to Method 1, with a threshold of 

minimum 50,000 residents, rather than 99 neighbours. This was achieved using R and the ‘knn.index’ 

function of the ‘FNN’ package, by iteratively identifying nearest neighbouring areas and summing up 

corresponding population values, until the value of at least 50,000 was reached. The final SA1 

neighbour added may cause the total to slightly exceed this threshold.  

Method 3: Re-rank SA1s according to distance (distance threshold) 

Nearest neighbours were identified within a distance of 10km measured from the centroid of the SA1 

polygon. This was implemented through applying the ‘dnearneigh’ function (R package ‘spdep’), 

identifying neighbour points by Euclidean distance (10km). For this method, the minimum number of 

neighbouring areas was set at 30. This means that areas that have <30 SA1s within 10km are not 

included in this distance-based ranking. 

Thus, updated decile groups are available at the national and state level (ABS generated) and the 

local level (generated using these three methods above). Comparisons of these decile groups were 

undertaken and graphs produced using Stata v16.1. 

  



20 Kerr et al. Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 

 

 

3. Results 

We provide detail on the variations by state in the distribution of SA1s to decile groups according to 

the national, state and three local methods in Figure 1. Further details of the IRSD score breakdown 

within decile categories for each of the ranking methods is available from the authors on request.  

Data presented in Figure 1 demonstrates subtle and sometimes large differences in the distribution 

of SA1s to decile groups depending on the ranking method used. Whilst at times the overall 

distribution seems to not have shifted a large amount, a more detailed look at the changes in Figure 

2 illustrates the degree to which the decile membership of SA1s can shift when using the various 

local methods compared to the state-based decile groups using the state of Victoria as an example 

(possible range -9 to +9). For the nearest neighbour and population threshold methods some SA1s 

differed by up to 8 decile categories, indicating that their decile group would vary greatly depending 

on the use of state or local decile groups. For the distance threshold method, the differences at the 

tail ends of the distribution were not as great. National and state decile groups were also compared 

in the same way for Victoria (not presented) and it is clear that the distribution does not shift as 

meaningfully between state and national decile groupings, as it does between the state and the 

three local decile groups. 

Figure 1: State-based differences in the percentage of SA1 in each decile of disadvantage using the 

national, state, and local ranking methods 

Source: authors’ calculations.  



Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 Kerr et al. 21 

 

 
(a) Nearest neighbour decile grouping     (b) Population-based decile grouping 

 
                                                  (c) Distance-based decile grouping 

Figure 2: Distribution of shift in decile group membership between state decile groups and local decile 

groups within Victoria  

Source: authors’ calculations. Note: values represent how far a SA1 shifted in terms of decile group 

Table 1 presents the percentage of each state’s SA1s that were in both the state and local nearest 

neighbour most disadvantaged decile. The combined use of a state and local ranking is important for 

resource allocation purposes as it allows further refinement of areas considered the most 

disadvantaged. For SA1s in major city regions, excluding the ACT (82%), less than half of the SA1s 

categorised as most disadvantaged according to the state rankings were also in the local nearest 

neighbour most disadvantaged decile. These percentages were generally higher in inner regional and 

outer regional areas, but still suggested that between half and three quarters of the SA1s were in the 

most disadvantaged decile when combining both the state and nearest neighbour rankings 

compared to just the state-based ranking. 

  



22 Kerr et al. Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 

 

 

Table 1: Number and percentage of SA1s in state’s most disadvantaged decile (Decile 1) that were also in 

the most disadvantaged decile (Decile 1) for the local nearest neighbour measure 

 Major city Inner regional Outer regional 

State No. of SA1s 
in State 
Decile 1  

No. of SA1s 
in Nearest 
neighbour 
Decile 1 

No. (%) of 
SA1s in State 
Decile 1 that 
are also in 
Nearest 
neighbour 
Decile 1 

No. of SA1s 
in State 
Decile 1 

No. of SA1s 
in Nearest 
neighbour 
Decile 1 

No. (%) of 
SA1s in State 
Decile 1 that 
are also in 
Nearest 
neighbour 
Decile 1 

No. of SA1s 
in State 
Decile 1 

No. of SA1s 
in Nearest 
neighbour 
Decile 1 

No. (%) of 
SA1s in State 
Decile 1 that 
are also in 
Nearest 
neighbour 
Decile 1 

ACT 101 105 83 (82.2%) 0 0 0 - - - 

NSW 1071 1090 501 (46.8%) 438 366 267 (61.0%) 219 127 118 (53.9%) 

NT - - - - - - 2  32 2 (100%) 

QLD 418 566 207 (49.5%) 385 213 183 (47.5%) 229 170 124 (54.1%) 

SA 256 216 96 (37.5%) 33 64 24 (72.7%) 95 51 47 (49.5%) 

TAS - - - 94 89 64 (68.1%) 39 48 33 (84.6%) 

VIC 889 811 319 (35.9%) 353 276 204 (57.8%) 119 72 68 (57.1%) 

WA 307 339 141 (45.9%) 68 62 51 (75.0%) 79 44 44 (55.7%) 

Source: authors’ calculations 

Figure 3: Remoteness area differences in the percentage of SA1s in each decile of disadvantage using the 

national, state, and local ranking methods 

Source: authors’ calculations. 

  



Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 Kerr et al. 23 

 

Using the national and state rankings, over one third of major city SA1s are within deciles 8 to 10 (the 

least disadvantaged) whereas for inner regional, outer regional and remote areas over one third of 

SA1s are within deciles 1 to 3 (the most disadvantaged) (Figure 3). For each of these four areas, the 

distribution of SA1s within decile categories is more even when using the local ranking methods. We 

are cautious to make conclusions on the very remote SA1s given the unique characteristics of these 

areas. A visual example of the change in decile rankings for SA1s within and around the inner 

regional city of Bendigo in Victoria by comparing the national, state and local ranking methods is 

presented in Figure 4. This highlights a substantial reclassification of SA1 deciles using the local 

ranking methods in a single regional township and results presented earlier indicate this is likely to 

be replicated elsewhere. 

 
Figure 4: Comparison of the national, state, and local decile groupings around Bendigo (Victoria) 

Source: authors’ calculations. 

4. Discussion 

Area-based measures of disadvantage are critical for resource allocation, advocacy, and equitable 

planning (Salmond & Crampton 2012), and therefore it is imperative to accurately reflect relative 

levels of disadvantage. Current indicators of area-level disadvantage in Australia rank areas based on 

two separate geographic levels, national and state/territory. In this study we created a third, local, 

level for ranking the SEIFA disadvantage index and proposed three approaches to achieve this.  

The methods we proposed in this research utilised existing SEIFA data and expanded upon current 

approaches to ranking areas to better capture relative disadvantage. We focused on Australian data 

since the large geographic area of Australia and distribution of the population across this large area 

makes this issue even more pertinent, particularly outside of major cities as demonstrated by our 

findings against the categories of remoteness. However, we also note that international measures of 



24 Kerr et al. Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 

 

 

deprivation and disadvantage potentially suffer similar limitations (Allik et al. 2020; Braveman et al. 

2005; Greco et al. 2019; Quick & Luan 2021) and whilst many ideas have been put forward to address 

these (mostly in relation to the creation of the composite indexes themselves), we believe our local 

ranking approach provides a unique contribution. Thus, as a proof of concept, we created three local 

ranking methods and reallocated the decile categorisation used in the SEIFA IRSD based on these 

new rankings. After this initial conceptualisation and validation work, we anticipate future research 

will further develop and refine the most appropriate local measure. 

Our results highlight noticeable differences in the local rankings decile categories allocated to SA1s 

compared to that provided by national and state level rankings. Current SEIFA indicators may guide 

resource allocation, and with a high number of areas considered to have high levels of disadvantage 

under the state and national ranking system, it likely means that not all areas will be provided with 

the level of support required. By combining the state and local nearest neighbour ranking (as an 

example), a lower number of SA1s were considered most disadvantaged in comparison to using the 

state measure alone. Consequently, using this combination ranking may help to refine and identify 

priority areas with the greatest need of resource allocation. This may be particularly important in 

smaller regional local government areas where social support mechanisms may be underfunded, 

meaning that the prioritisation of resource allocation is critical (Parliament of Australia 2006).  

We provide proof of concepts for three unique methods to rank area-level disadvantage at a local 

level in Australia. Unlike the currently available IRSD state decile groupings, our options for local 

groupings are less subject to edge-effects as they can cross state boundaries. Furthermore, we 

demonstrate that our methods improve the ability to distinguish areas of disadvantage relative to 

other nearby areas and populations, particularly outside of major cities.  

We acknowledge that the methods and thresholds selected could be altered in a number of ways. 

Conclusions reached can depend on the input data and, similar to MAUP (Brunsdon & Comber 2020; 

Openshaw 1979; Openshaw 1984), the results of this study are specific to the methods and 

thresholds we used. To promote progress toward the development of more standardised methods 

for the measurement of local area-level disadvantage in Australia, we propose that research be 

undertaken to test alternative approaches. These could include further exploring the use of k-means 

clustering techniques to generate typology of deprivation classes that may be applied locally within 

urban and rural settings across Australia.  

Based on our best judgement, we employed arbitrary cut off points for what constitutes a local 

neighbourhood (e.g., 99 neighbouring areas; areas within a 10km radius; nearest 50,000 population). 

All three methods were based on the distance to the centroid created for the nearest neighbour 

decile grouping, when in fact the road layout and presence of physical boundaries may create 

barriers between the SA1s. Using Mesh Blocks, it may have been possible to create an estimate of 

the population-weighted centroid which may alter results slightly for some of the more sparsely 

populated and therefore geographically larger SA1s in regional and remote areas. Additionally, 

because we set the minimum number of neighbouring areas at 30 for the distance-based decile 

groupings, we acknowledge that this method of re-ranking does not work as well in more sparsely 

populated areas and those near natural barriers such as coastlines.  



Australian Population Studies 5 (2) 2021 Kerr et al. 25 

 

In this study we use decile categorisation but do not address related problems. Categorisation of 

exposures measures can cause a wide range of issues (Lamb & White 2015) and, as recently 

highlighted by Allik et al. (2020), it is important to recognise that values near to the cut-off points 

between categories could easily belong to another category. This limitation means that caution is 

needed when using of decile categorisation as the deciding factor motivating a policy intervention. 

5. Conclusions 

The relationship between space and place is complex. While data collection systems and technology 

for processing data have evolved, we still need better ways to understand disadvantage and the 

process for equitable distribution of resources that help reduce the impact of socioeconomic 

disadvantage. The current methods demonstrate that relative levels of socioeconomic disadvantage 

at the national or state level differ to that at a local level. Because current rankings make it 

challenging to isolate disadvantaged areas relative to neighbouring areas, policy decisions relating to 

the distribution of health and other services may be misguided. As a first step to improve this 

limitation, we offer three methods to better measure local disadvantage throughout Australia and 

we encourage researchers to trial these in future research. Rather than replacing current SEIFA 

rankings, we envision these local ranking will complement existing national or state rankings. 

Key messages 

• Australia’s area-based socioeconomic indexes (SEIFA) rank areas relative to country or state. 

• To better reflect disadvantage relative to nearby areas, we developed local rankings. 

• Results are presented for three newly developed local rankings for Australia. 

• We encourage the combined use of a state and local rankings for resource allocation, to ensure 

that the most disadvantaged areas are not overlooked. 

Acknowledgments 

JAK is supported by a Melbourne Children’s LifeCourse postdoctoral fellowship, funded by Royal 

Children’s Hospital Foundation grant #2018-984. LifeCourse acknowledges all collaborators, cohort 

representatives and participants; https://lifecourse.melbournechildrens.com/contact/ for further 

details. SM was supported by an Australian National Health and Medical Research Council Early 

Career Fellowship #1121035. This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies 

in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. Research at the Murdoch Children’s Research 

Institute is supported by the Victorian Government’s Operational Infrastructure Support Program. 

The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and may not reflect those of their 

organisational affiliations, nor of other collaborating individuals or organisations. 

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