scholarly journals Older parents and filial support obligations: a comparison of family solidarity norms between native and immigrant populations in Italy

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-32
Author(s):  
Marco Albertini ◽  
Debora Mantovani

Abstract Although older migrants in Southern Europe are increasing in number, relatively little attention has been paid to their care needs and resources. The availability of informal care is an important determinant of wellbeing in later life and norms regulating filial obligations have an important role in affecting the quality and quantity of support received. Using data from a qualitative survey conducted in Italy, this article sheds light on the social norms regulating filial obligations towards older parents among natives and three groups of immigrants: Maghrebis, Chinese and Filipinos. The results indicate a number of commonalities between the four different groups considered, such as: the principle of delayed reciprocity at the basis of filial support obligations; a gender bias in attributing the most psychologically, physically and time-demanding caring obligations to adult daughters and daughters-in-law; and a preference for intergenerational residential autonomy shared by Italian, Filipinos and, to a lesser extent, Maghrebi respondents. At the same time, numerous differences emerge between natives and immigrants, and between immigrant groups. The most significant differences are observed regarding: the possibility of resorting to a paid care-giver, which is more common among Italians and, to a lesser extent, Filipino respondents; and a stronger gender bias among the Chinese and Maghrebi groups, i.e. they attribute the majority of personal care responsibilities to daughters and daughters-in-law.

2017 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 161-193 ◽  
Author(s):  
FRANCESCA FIORI ◽  
ELSPETH GRAHAM ◽  
ZHIQIANG FENG

ABSTRACTThis paper contributes to understanding housing adjustments in later life by investigating the role of four key lifecourse transitions experienced by older individuals and their households, namely changes in health, retirement, union transitions and adult children leaving the household. Using data from a representative sample of the Scottish population for the decade 2001–2011, the study examines who moves and, for movers, whether they adjust their housing size in response to changes in their personal and household circumstances. In particular, the study explores diversity in housing consumption at older ages by investigating whether the triggers of upsizing or downsizing differ across tenure groups. The majority of older adults in Scotland do not change their place of residence during the study decade. For the minority who do move, all four lifecourse transitions are significant triggers for residential relocation but there is considerable diversity across the two major tenure groups in the influence of household changes on their housing consumption adjustments. In both tenure groups, however, the presence of children in the household is associated with upsizing and is a significant impediment to downsizing. Given the relative rootedness of older parents with co-resident adult children and their propensity to upsize rather than downsize if they move, our findings raise concerns over the interdependencies between younger and older generations in the housing market.


2011 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 371-394 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hendrik Jürges ◽  
Kerstin Schneider

AbstractAfter primary school, German pupils are given a secondary school track recommendation. This recommendation and the actual track choice are strongly associated with later life outcomes. Using data from the German PISA 2000 extension study, we analyze the effect of relative age on track recommendations and actual choice. Younger pupils and boys are less likely to be recommended to and enrolled in the academic track (Gymnasium), the most attractive track in terms of later life outcomes. Flexible enrollment and grade retention partly offset these effects. We find no convincing evidence that postponing the recommendation by lengthening primary school by 2 years reduces the age or gender bias.


2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 144-154
Author(s):  
Musa Saimon

The way people use language determines and (or) reflects their experience in their social context; the use of everyday language becomes a lens through which people behave and see their world and at other time it is the social practices that influence certain choices of language used by community members. For that reason research on how languages affect women’s image in different speech communities is highly needed for the sake of saving women’s face. This brought to the attention the concept of language and gender in applied linguistics whose focus is on how language use and labelling is associated with gender differences. And those language forms that show gender bias are known as sexist expressions. Drawing on the above scenario, the present study explores sexist expressions in Nyakyusa language using data collected from four Nyakyusa speaking people as key informants through mobile phone interviews. Data were analysed thematically in which I generated themes from coded and categorised data. Findings show that Nyakyusa exhibits elements of sexism through five forms of sexist expressions namely referential gender, social gender, lexical gender, proverbs and idioms and agreements. The researcher calls for creation of awareness among Nyakyusa speech communities for reformation of sexist expressions.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elissa Kozlov ◽  
Meghan McDarby ◽  
Paul Duberstein ◽  
Brian D Carpenter

Abstract Background and Objectives Adult children collaborate with older parents on care needs, yet later-life families are often uncertain about how to approach these conversations. Using the McMaster Model of Family Functioning as a framework, we developed a web-based tool for later-life families to enhance communication, knowledge, and problem solving around parent preferences for care. Research Design and Methods Participants were older adult parents aged 65+ and at least one of their adult children. Families answered questions about the parent’s care preferences via a web-based survey. Responses were aggregated in a tailored PDF that was distributed to each participant. Descriptive statistics were calculated to examine recruitment, retention, and satisfaction with the program. Repeated measures analyses of variance were calculated to determine preliminary efficacy of the intervention. Results This study included 142 participants across 49 families (n = 49 older adult parents, n = 93 adult children). Of them, 75.4% completed all three phases of the study while 18.3% completed two phases and 6.3% completed only one phase. Seventy-four percent of participants reported being satisfied or very satisfied with the intervention. At baseline, most families were modestly incongruent in their ratings of future care preferences. Participants reported increased conversations about care across the course of the study (F(1.71,179.32) = 42.18, p < .001). Discussion and Implications This study demonstrated that a web-based intervention to enhance intergenerational communication is feasible, acceptable, and has preliminary efficacy to improve intergenerational communication. Despite recruitment challenges, similarly designed web-based resources may improve accessibility and scalability of intergenerational communication-enhancing interventions.


2016 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-49 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcus Green

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to compare the supportive capacity of social networks of older lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual (LGBT) and heterosexual adults using data from Understanding Society. The principal research objective is to discern whether the companionship and community networks of older LGBT adults compensate for weaker kinship networks. Design/methodology/approach – Understanding Society has data on the frequency of interaction with and proximity to family, friends and the wider community to quantify supportive capacity. Bivariate analyses reveal similarities and differences in network supportive capacity between older LGBT and heterosexual adults. Findings – The study finds that older LGBT adults have significantly weaker kinship networks than do older heterosexual adults. Further to this, the companionship and community networks of older LGBT adults do not compensate for weaker kinship networks. Social implications – In essence, this means that many older LGBT adults have weak social networks which increases the likelihood of receiving little or no social contact and informal support which may have implications for their physical and mental well-being. This could be especially problematic for individuals who have care needs where in the context of England, the provision of state funded social care is patchy. Originality/value – This study contributes evidence to an under researched area of social network analysis. Little research has explored the social networks of older LGBT adults compared with older heterosexual adults; specifically the supportive network capacity of different types of network.


2020 ◽  
Vol 81 (3) ◽  
pp. 120-126
Author(s):  
Jennifer Brady

Purpose: To explore dietetic practitioners’ perceptions of their education and training in the knowledge, skills, and confidence to understand social justice issues and to engage in socially just dietetic practice and social justice advocacy. Methods: An online semi-qualitative survey sent to Canadian dietitians. Results: Most respondents (n = 264; 81.5%) felt that knowledge- and skill-based learning about social justice and social justice advocacy should be a part of dietetic education and training. Reasons given by respondents for the importance of social justice learning include: client-centred care and reflexive practice, effecting change to the social and structural determinants of health, preventing dietitian burnout, and relevance of the profession. Yet, over half of respondents either strongly disagreed or disagreed that they were adequately prepared with the knowledge (n = 186; 57.4%), skills (n = 195; 60.2%), or confidence (n = 196; 60.5%) to engage in advocacy related to social justice concerns. Some questioned the practicality of adding social justice learning via additional courses to already full programs, while others proposed infusing a social justice lens across dietetic education and practice areas. Conclusions: Dietetic education and training must do more to prepare dietitians to answer calls for dietitians to engage in social justice issues through practice and advocacy.


Author(s):  
Guoliang Yang ◽  
Zhihua Wang ◽  
Weijiong Wu

Little is known about the relationship between social comparison orientation and mental health, especially in the psychological capital context. We proposed a theoretical model to examine the impact of ability- and opinion-based social comparison orientation on mental health using data from 304 undergraduates. We also examined the mediating effect of the four psychological capital components of hope, self-efficacy, resilience, and optimism in the relationship between social comparison orientation and mental health. Results show that an ability (vs. opinion) social comparison orientation was negatively (vs. positively) related to the psychological capital components. Further, the resilience and optimism components of psychological capital fully mediated the social comparison orientation–mental health relationship. Our findings indicate that psychological capital should be considered in the promotion of mental health, and that the two social comparison orientation types have opposite effects on psychological capital.


2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (6) ◽  
pp. 386
Author(s):  
Jennie Gray ◽  
Lisa Buckner ◽  
Alexis Comber

This paper reviews geodemographic classifications and developments in contemporary classifications. It develops a critique of current approaches and identifiea a number of key limitations. These include the problems associated with the geodemographic cluster label (few cluster members are typical or have the same properties as the cluster centre) and the failure of the static label to describe anything about the underlying neighbourhood processes and dynamics. To address these limitations, this paper proposed a data primitives approach. Data primitives are the fundamental dimensions or measurements that capture the processes of interest. They can be used to describe the current state of an area in a multivariate feature space, and states can be compared over multiple time periods for which data are available, through for example a change vector approach. In this way, emergent social processes, which may be too weak to result in a change in a cluster label, but are nonetheless important signals, can be captured. As states are updated (for example, as new data become available), inferences about different social processes can be made, as well as classification updates if required. State changes can also be used to determine neighbourhood trajectories and to predict or infer future states. A list of data primitives was suggested from a review of the mechanisms driving a number of neighbourhood-level social processes, with the aim of improving the wider understanding of the interaction of complex neighbourhood processes and their effects. A small case study was provided to illustrate the approach. In this way, the methods outlined in this paper suggest a more nuanced approach to geodemographic research, away from a focus on classifications and static data, towards approaches that capture the social dynamics experienced by neighbourhoods.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Jia Chen ◽  
Xiaochen Zhou ◽  
Nan Lu

Abstract Older parents in China rely heavily on their adult children for instrumental assistance. In different multi-child families, multiple offspring may co-operate in providing instrumental support to older parents in distinct ways in terms of how much support they provide on average and how much differentiation exists between them when they provide such support within a family. We aimed to identify different within-family patterns in relation to multiple offspring's instrumental support to an older parent in Chinese multi-child families, and to investigate potential predictors for different within-family patterns. Using data from the China Family Panel Studies (2016), we had a working sample of 5,790 older adults aged 60+ (mean = 68.54, standard deviation = 6.60). We employed latent profile analysis (LPA) to classify within-family patterns and multinomial logistic regression to investigate predictors. Our findings identified three within-family patterns: dissociated (59.10%), highly differentiated (29.60%) and united-filial (11.30%). Older parents in the highly differentiated families tended to be older, mothers, divorced/widowed and to have poorer physical health compared to their counterparts in the dissociated families. In contrast, the composition characteristics of multiple adult children played more important roles in determining the united-filial within-family pattern. The united-filial families were more likely to have fewer adult children, at least one adult daughter and at least one co-residing adult child.


2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 578-578
Author(s):  
Adam Spira ◽  
Katie Stone

Abstract Sleep is a significant contributor to health and wellbeing across the lifespan, especially in later life. Poor sleep is common among older adults and can be both a risk factor for and consequence of numerous physical and mental health-related outcomes. In this symposium, we will present novel results from four studies that will advance understanding of the biological, psychological, and social factors that may contribute to or result from poor sleep in older adults. Specifically, Study 1 will present findings tying objectively measured sleep to performance on cognitive tasks administered using ecological momentary assessment (EMA) in the day-to-day lives of older adults with or without mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Study 2 will examine associations of personality dimensions and facets with insomnia symptoms in well-functioning older adults. Study 3 will examine psychological pathways linking parent-child relationships to subjective and objective sleep characteristics among older parents. Finally, study 4 will examine use patterns of cannabis for the treatment of sleep problems in older adults, and the ways in which this might differ from patients using cannabis for other reasons (e.g., pain). Together, this symposium will highlight novel links of an array of factors with sleep health in the aging population and their implications for prevention. Sleep, Circadian Rhythms and Aging Interest Group Sponsored Symposium.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document