scholarly journals Genetic thinking and everyday living: On family practices and family imaginaries

2017 ◽  
Vol 65 (4) ◽  
pp. 865-881 ◽  
Author(s):  
Petra Nordqvist

This article is concerned with exploring how ideas about genes and genetic relationships are rendered meaningful in everyday life. David Morgan’s concept family practices has significantly shaped sociological enquiries into family lives in recent decades. It represents an important step away from a sociological focus on family as something you ‘are’ to family as something you ‘do’. With a focus on family as a set of activities, it however functions less well to capture more discursive dimensions of family life. Combining a focus on family as practice with an attention to discourse, the article concentrates specifically on ‘genetic thinking’ – the process through which genetic relationships are rendered meaningful in everyday family living. The study draws on original data from a study about families formed through donor conception, and the impact of such conception on family relationships, to show that genetic thinking is a salient part of contemporary family living. The article explores the everyday, normative assumptions, nuances and understandings about genetic relationships by exploring five dimensions: having a child; everyday family living; family resemblances; traits being ‘passed on’; and family members working out accountability and responsibility within the family. Showing the significance of genetic thinking in family life, the article argues for a more sustained sociological debate about the impact of such thinking within contemporary family life. The article also argues for the need to develop a sociological gaze more sensitive to the relationship between family as a set of activities and the feelings, imaginations, dreams or claims with which they are entwined.

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Blanca León-Nabal ◽  
Cristina Zhang-Yu ◽  
José Luis Lalueza

The COVID-19 pandemic has sharpened the inequalities in our societies. In Spain, we observed that the impact on schooling varied according to socioeconomic, gender and sociocultural variables. In this article, we present a case analysis illustrating the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on schooling in early educational grades (ages 3–6), which leads us to focus on school-family relationship. First, we present some studies that show the inequalities in education during the lockdown period, the digital divide faced by both schools and families and how digital mediation impacts school-family relationships. Then we will introduce our study, which aims to explore the uses, potentials and limitations of an app intended to facilitate the relationship. Our study took place during September 2020-January 2021, when social restriction persisted. It took the form of a telematic ethnography in which we monitored the meetings of the Early Childhood Education teachers and their interaction with the families via an app-based communication tool. Results have allowed us to identify that most conversations are initiated by the school and their aim is to show families the classroom activities. We have also observed some advantages regarding the use of this app: communication can become more direct and immediate, and teachers have developed strategies to foster proximity in this relationship, as well as to respond inclusively to diversity. Regarding the challenges, we identified the lack of involvement of some families, the need to transform the roles played by families and children, and the difficulty to maintain personalized relationships.


2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 363-377 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mel Hall ◽  
Rachael Levy ◽  
Jenny Preece

Families are pivotal in terms of facilitating children’s language development, including their ability to read. However, to date, there is little research designed to understand how shared reading operates within the realm of everyday family practices. Drawing on data from a study which set out to explore shared reading practices in the home, this article considers reading within the context of the family and everyday family life. In-depth interviews were carried out with 29 parents of pre-school children to investigate shared reading practices within a socially and culturally mixed sample. This study revealed that the relationship between shared reading practices and family practices is recursive. In particular, building on the seminal work of Finch reading was seen to be a specific feature of family practice and routine, and acts as a form of family display. Furthermore, this article demonstrates how shared reading contributes toward the ways in which structure and agency may operate in a family setting. Constructing reading as a family practice and a form of display makes an important contribution to understandings of home literacy practices and behaviors. This article concludes that endeavors to engage families with shared reading therefore require a comprehensive understanding of family life and family practices and the role of shared reading within.


2005 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 133-140 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jo Wray ◽  
Linda Maynard

Aims: Firstly to assess maternal perceptions of the impact of congenital or acquired cardiac disease on the child, parents, and siblings, and secondly to determine whether there were differences between different diagnostic groups, or between those with and without other health problems, with a view to informing the development of a cardiac liaison nursing service for children. Methods: A postal survey of 447 families of children with congenital or acquired cardiac disease. Results: Completed questionnaires were received from 209 (46.8 percent) families. The cardiac lesion was perceived to have a negative impact on many areas of family life for about one fifth of the sample, particularly in those families where the child was perceived to be more ill. Family relationships, however, were affected in a very different way, with 43 percent reporting that family members had become closer, and only 8 percent that they had been “pulled apart” by the condition of their child. There were a number of differences in the perceived impact of the cardiac malformation on school and family life between children with different diagnoses, with this being particularly evident for families of the patients who had undergone transplantation. When the sample was divided according to the presence or absence of other problems with health, however, many of these differences between the diagnostic groups disappeared. Conclusions: Irrespective of the severity of the disease, the presence of a cardiac malformation has an impact on everyday life for a significant number of children and families, particularly if associated with other problems with health. Implications for targeting resources to reduce morbidity in these children and families are discussed.


1996 ◽  
Vol 168 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-93 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jane Roberts

BackgroundClinical practice suggests that partners of psychotherapy patients often have powerful feelings about the therapy and therapist. The repercussions of psychotherapy on those close to the patient are rarely considered. A small exploratory study was therefore conducted.MethodAll patients who had completed at least two months of weekly psychodynamic psychotherapy in 1990 at an out-patient unit of a psychiatric hospital (n = 35) and had a partner with whom they were living at the time of starting therapy (n = 23) were contacted. Eight gave permission for their partner to be contacted directly. All eight partners agreed to participate in a semi-structured interview exploring their perceptions of the effects of the therapy on a number of family relationships. The impact of the process of the study was also investigated by means of a questionnaire sent to all partners some weeks after the interview.ResultsConsiderable changes were perceived to have taken place in association with therapy affecting not only the relationship between the couple but also their parenting relationship, the children, and at times members of the extended family. Partners' views about the direction of such changes seemed to influence other perceptions about the therapy.ConclusionsThe repercussions of individual psychotherapy may well spread extensively within a family. This further blurs the boundary between individual and family therapy, both theoretically and clinically. Research procedures are themselves a major intervention and may have a considerable emotional impact on participants.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Subhadra Evans ◽  
Antonina Mikocka-Walus ◽  
Anna Klas ◽  
Lisa Olive ◽  
Emma Sciberras ◽  
...  

The present study uses a qualitative approach to understand the impact of COVID-19 on family life. Australian parents of children aged 0-18 years were recruited via social media between April 8th and April 28th, 2020, when Australians were experiencing social distancing/isolation measures for the first time. As part of a larger survey, participants were asked to respond via an open-ended question about how COVID-19 had impacted their family. A total of 2,130 parents were included and represented a diverse range of family backgrounds. Inductive template thematic analysis was used to understand patterns of meaning across the texts. Six themes were derived from the data, including: 'Boredom, depression and suicide: A spectrum of emotion'; 'Families are missing the things that keep them healthy'; 'Changing family relationships: The push pull of intimacy'; 'The unprecedented demands of parenthood'; 'The unequal burden of COVID-19'; and 'Holding on to positivity'. Overall, the findings demonstrated a breadth of responses. Messages around loss and challenge were predominant, with many families reporting mental health difficulties and strained family relationships. However, not all families were negatively impacted by the restrictions, with some families reporting positive benefits and meaning, including opportunities for strengthening relationships, finding new hobbies, and developing positive characteristics such as appreciation, gratitude and tolerance.


Family Law ◽  
2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Lamont

This chapter explores the nature of family life and the role of the law in family relationships to identify the particular challenges facing family lawyers. In particular, it considers how the law interacts with family life, how family relationships are identified in law, and what role the law plays in regulating family behaviour. The diversity and personalised experience of ‘family’ means that the role of the law in these processes is complex. There are two central issues facing family lawyers. First, the identification of a relationship as being one of ‘family’ for the purposes of the law is an important label, and may give rise to specific rights and obligations, even if the particular relationship bears no significance for the individual. Secondly, identifying the nature of the rights and obligations arising from a family relationship is central to determining the significance of the relationship.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (S1) ◽  
pp. 71-71
Author(s):  
Sarah Ronis ◽  
Kurt Stange ◽  
Lawrence Kleinman

OBJECTIVES/SPECIFIC AIMS: (1) To propose an iterative decision-making model of care planning for CSHCN. (2) To identify targets warranting measurement in future studies of SDM in care planning for CSHCN. METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: Conceptual model developed by a multidisciplinary team iteratively considering the complex relationships among diverse factors affecting care planning for CSHCN, informed by clinical and implementation science experience and a scoping literature review of medical and cognitive sciences literature addressing interpersonal decision-making, communication, negotiation, and trust among children, their parents, and their clinicians. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: Decision-making interventions in pediatrics tend to focus narrowly on single acute decisions, providing minimal guidance for decisions related to chronic disease management over time. Few models account for the role of the child in the decision-making process, despite their ongoing development. Therefore, we propose a model of shared decision-making in the context of managing chronic illness in children that recognizes all actors and can support both the design of clinical care and research. This model—The SDM Learning Loop Model—highlights the dynamic iterative nature of exchanges between and among the clinical team and the parent-child dyad and recognizes the child as the center of each decision-making cycle. The model accounts for key practice, family, experiential, and emotional contexts influencing the decision-making encounter. In this model, change in child health status and developmental capacity resulting from a given cycle’s care plan will directly influence the relationship between clinician and parent-child dyad (eg, mutual trust, attunement) and impact each party’s engagement in the next round of decision-making. The relationship between experience and outcome stimulates learning. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE OF IMPACT: Our proposed SDM Learning Loop Model suggests that increasing the shared nature of decision making is not only likely to optimize care planning, but creates “buy-in” that can both reinforce the impact of positive outcomes, and moderate the negative impact on relationships when the outcome is other than desired. We hypothesize that this model can guide care planning and shape research to the benefit of both clinical outcomes and clinician-family relationships. Future work should focus on the development and validation of measures to account for the experiential and emotional contexts in which such decisions are made, and the outcomes of care in this population.


Author(s):  
Jirawat Anuwichanont ◽  
Panisa Mechinda

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: normal; margin: 0in 0.5in 0pt; mso-pagination: none;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Times New Roman&quot;,&quot;serif&quot;; color: black; font-size: 10pt;">Numerous empirical studies have extensively investigated perceived value as a unidimensional measure in the product and service setting. However, research scholars argued that this unidimensional conceptualization lacks validity and assumes that consumers have a shared meaning of value. Moreover, this unidimensional measure fails to give marketing practitioners specific direction on how to improve value. Thus, the multi-dimensional conceptualization of perceived value including five dimensions (quality, emotional response, monetary price, behavioral price and reputation) was employed to investigate service loyalty in the spa industry. This study aims to examine the relative effects of perceived value dimensions on satisfaction and trust and the impact of satisfaction and trust on loyalty. The moderating effects of destination equity are also taken into account. The empirical results support the significant impact of quality, emotional response, monetary price, reputation on satisfaction and trust as hypothesized. In contrast, no support was found on the link between monetary price and trust and between behavioral price and satisfaction and trust.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Consistent with previous studies, the impact of satisfaction and trust on loyalty constructs were significantly supported. The moderating effect of destination equity on the relationship between satisfaction and loyalty was significantly apparent. In contrast, no support for the moderating effect of destination equity on the influence of trust on loyalty was found. Implications of the results are discussed.</span></p>


2011 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 377-392 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrée Fortin ◽  
Martin Doucet ◽  
Dominique Damant

This study examines the relationships among variables that were likely to mediate the effects of exposure to domestic violence on children’s internalizing problems (i.e., children’s appraisals of domestic violence and their perceptions of family relationships). The study was conducted with 79 children exposed to domestic violence, including 41 boys and 38 girls, aged between 9 and 12 years old. Indicators used for children’s appraisals of violence were attribution of blame and perceived threat. Children’s perceptions of family relationships were based on their levels of parentification and the degree of their loyalty conflicts. A path analysis was used to verify the predictive model’s pathways and to test the multiple mediator effects. Findings confirm the contribution of mediating variables and also reflect the association between self-blame and children’s parentification. The results stress the relevance of evaluating the combined role of different potential mediators to provide a better understanding of the impact of domestic violence on children.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (10) ◽  
pp. 4325
Author(s):  
Hang Jiang ◽  
Peng Jiang ◽  
Peiyi Kong ◽  
Yi-Chung Hu ◽  
Cheng-Wen Lee

Since the implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative, China’s total amount of outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) has increased each year and this has caused its relationship with carbon emissions (CO2e) to receive great attention recently. Forecasting China’s CO2e accurately by considering the impact of OFDI is important since the government can use it to formulate an appropriate emissions plan to fulfill its carbon reduction commitments. Because the relationship between OFDI and CO2e has nonlinear characteristics, a nonlinear grey multivariable model with fractional-order accumulation (NFGM(1,N)) was proposed in this study. To enhance the prediction accuracy, an optimization process was used to determine the parameters. The outcomes of the variable fractional order showed that fractional-order accumulation can better extract the grey information hidden in the original data, which confirmed the principle of new information priority. The result of the power coefficient indicated a nonlinear relationship between the CO2e and OFDI. Based on the prediction performance, the prediction accuracy of the NFGM(1,N) model was proven to be superior to those of the ARMA model, linear regression model, the GM(1,1), GM(1,N), and FGM(1,N) models. The empirical results also revealed that OFDI increased the CO2e in China. The relationship between the CO2e and OFDI exhibits a U-shaped development based on further predictions for the 2018–2030 period. Finally, some suggestions for long-term CO2e reduction plans were provided in this paper.


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