The leader of Fife Council has admitted the local authority has not managed to bring social deprivation under control.
His words came as Fife was named as the fourth worst-affected region in the country when it came to families facing deprivation.
A new report, A Wider Lens by the think-tank Demos, revealed around 24,000 families in Scotland face severe disadvantage.
Researchers conducted a regional analysis of 28,000 households in Scotland, looking at seven disadvantages, including low income, worklessness, no qualifications and ill health.
Families facing four or more disadvantages were considered ‘severely disadvantaged.’
In Fife 5% of families fell into this category, something council leader Alex Rowley said needed to be redressed, with a shift towards a more preventative approach.
He said: ”The continuing levels of social deprivation and poverty in areas of Fife shows that despite the best intentions and millions of pounds of investment, we have not been able to address the severe disadvantage that exists in some of our communities.
”We are investing more resources in early years to support the most disadvantaged families and children to try to break that cycle of deprivation and we are examining policy and spend in this area to more effectively measure the stated outcomes we are trying to achieve.
”For too long councils and all levels of government have spent more resources helping people cope and there needs to be a shift to a more preventative approach.”
Glasgow was revealed to be the worst-affected area, with over 1 in 10 families facing severe disadvantage three times the national average.
South and North Lanarkshire also fell foul of the measurement, with 7% and 5%, respectively, of families considered ”severely disadvantaged”. The national average was 4% of families and Grampian came in as the least disadvantaged area.
Tayside came in at number nine in the rankings, with 3% of families classed as severely disadvantaged.
Louise Bazalgette, author of A Wider Lens, said: ”This report goes beyond a simplistic understanding of disadvantage, recognising that hardship is about a lot more than low income.
”It provides insight into the struggle thousands of families across Scotland go through on a daily basis coping with poverty, worklessness and poor health.
”The extent of severe disadvantage in some areas of Scotland shows the scale of the challenge for some local authorities, who need to find effective ways to work with families facing a complex set of problems at a time of dwindling public resources.”
The research also found that unmarried households with children are six times more likely to be severely disadvantaged than married households and 15% of families with children are workless, compared with 24% of working-age households without children.
Households experiencing severe disadvantage are also more likely to live in large urban areas and social rented housing.