Grandparental partnership status and its effects on caring for grandchildren in Europe

Grandparents are important childcare providers, but grandparental relationship status matters. According to several studies, caregiving is reduced after grandparental divorce, but differential responses by grandmothers versus grandfathers have often been glossed over. To explore the effects of relationship status on grandparental care, we analysed data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) comparing four grandparental relationship statuses (original couple, widowed, divorced, and repartnered) with respect to grandmothers’ and grandfathers’ provision of care to their birth children’s children. When proximity, kinship laterality, and grandparents’ age, health, employment, and financial status were controlled, divorced grandmothers without current partners provided significantly more childcare than grandmothers who were still residing with the grandfather, those who had new partners unrelated to the grandchildren, and widows without current partners. Grandfathers exhibited a very different pattern, providing substantially less grandchild care after divorce. Grandfathers in their original partnerships provided the most grandchild care, followed by widowers, those with new partners and finally those who were divorced. Seemingly contradictory findings in prior research, including studies using SHARE data, can be explained partly by failures to distinguish divorce’s effects on grandmothers versus grandfathers, and partly by insufficient controls for the grandmother’s financial and employment statuses.

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Grandchild Caring and Late-Life Depression: A Comparative Longitudinal Study in China and Europe

Journal of Family Issues ◽

10.1177/0192513x211050327 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 0192513X2110503

Author(s):

Yazhen Yang

Keyword(s):

Older Persons ◽

Depression Score ◽

Theoretical Development ◽

Future Research ◽

Care Provision ◽

Late Life Depression ◽

Causal Pathways ◽

Grandchild Care ◽

Share Data ◽

The Impact

The impact of grandparenting on the grandparents’ health has been relatively under-studied. This study examined country differences in the effects of grandchild care provision on the grandparents’ depression in Italy, Spain, China, Denmark and Sweden using the longitudinal Harmonised CHARLS and SHARE data collected between 2010–2015. Controlling for the grandparents’ depression in 2011, grandmothers providing non-intensive grandparental care in Sweden in 2013 reported lower depression score in 2015 compared to those who did not provide any care in 2013. Chinese grandfathers, Italian and Swedish grandmothers who provided intensive grandchild care reported lower depression score compared to their counterparts who did not provide any grandchild care. This study indicates that the Structural Ambivalence Theory can only partially explain the findings, suggesting further theoretical development in this area. Future research can focus on identifying the causal pathways between grandparenting and wellbeing, and the implications of such pathways for older persons’ wellbeing worldwide.

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Does the interaction between partnership status and average progesterone level predict women’s preferences for facial masculinity?

10.1101/376350 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Lisa M DeBruine ◽

Amanda C Hahn ◽

Benedict C Jones

Keyword(s):

Open Data ◽

Relationship Status ◽

Progesterone Level ◽

Combined Effects ◽

Biological Factors ◽

Data Set ◽

Facial Masculinity ◽

Psychological Science ◽

Partnership Status ◽

Women’S Preferences

AbstractMany studies have attempted to identify biological factors that reliably predict individual differences in women’s preferences for masculine male faces. Marcinkowska et al. (2018, Hormones & Behavior) recently reported that women’s (N=102) preferences for facial masculinity were predicted by the interaction between their relationship status (partnered versus unpartnered) and average progesterone level. Because previous findings for between-women differences in masculinity preferences have often not replicated well, we attempted to replicate Marcinkowska et al’s result in an open data set from another recent study that had not tested this hypothesis (Jones et al., 2018 Psychological Science). In this sample of 316 women, we found that facial masculinity preferences were predicted by the interaction between women’s relationship status and average progesterone level, consistent with Marcinkowska et al’s results. Together, these findings suggest that the combined effects of relationship status and average progesterone level may predict facial masculinity preferences relatively reliably.

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Changes in Grandparenting During the Pandemic and Effects on Mental Health: Evidence From England

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igab046.1240 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. 319-319

Author(s):

Giorgio Di Gessa ◽

Valeria Bordone ◽

Bruno Arpino

Keyword(s):

Quality Of Life ◽

Mental Health ◽

Older People ◽

Regression Models ◽

Care Provision ◽

Grandchild Care ◽

More Care ◽

Provision Of Care ◽

English Longitudinal Study

Abstract Policies aiming at reducing rates of hospitalisation and death from Covid-19 encouraged older people to reduce their physical contacts. For grandparents in England, this meant that provision of care for grandchildren was allowed only under very limited circumstances. To date, evidence on changes in grandparenting during the pandemic is scarce and little is known about whether and to what extent reduction in grandchild care provision impacted grandparents’ mental health. Using pre-pandemic data from Wave 9 (2018/19) and the second Covid-19 sub-study (November/December 2020) of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, we first described changes in grandparenting since the start of the pandemic. Then, using regression models, we investigated associations between changes in grandparenting and mental health (depression, quality of life, life satisfaction, and anxiety) during the pandemic, while controlling for pre-pandemic levels of the outcome variables. Almost a third of grandparents reported that the amount of grandchild care during the pandemic reduced or stopped altogether, whereas 10% provided as much or more care compared to pre-pandemic levels, mostly to help parents while working. Compared to grandparents who provided grandchild care at some point during the pandemic, those who stopped altogether were more likely to report poorer mental health, even taking into account pre-pandemic health. A reduction in grandparenting was only marginally associated with higher depression. Although policies to limit physical contacts and shield older people reduced their risks of getting ill from Covid-19, our study shows the consequences of stopping childcare provision in terms of poorer mental health among grandparents.

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Leisure Activities and the Subjective Well-Being of Older Adults in Croatia

GeroPsych ◽

10.1024/1662-9647/a000179 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 31 (1) ◽

pp. 31-39 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Ljiljana Kaliterna Lipovčan ◽

Tihana Brkljačić ◽

Zvjezdana Prizmić Larsen ◽

Andreja Brajša-Žganec ◽

Renata Franc

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

Leisure Activities ◽

Leisure Activity ◽

Later Life ◽

Perceived Health ◽

Well Being ◽

Hierarchical Regression ◽

Subjective Well Being ◽

Convenience Sample ◽

Financial Status

Abstract. Research shows that engagement in leisure activities promotes well-being among older adults. The objective of the current study was to examine the relationship between subjective well-being (flourishing) and leisure activities (total number of different activities in the previous year) in a sample of older adults in Croatia, thereby considering the variables of sex, marital status, financial status, and self-perceived health. The differences in the examined variables between the groups of older adults who reported to be engaged in new activities with those who did not were also examined. The sample of N = 169 older adults aged 60 years and above was drawn from a convenience sample of adult internet users in Croatia. Participants reported their self-perceived health and the number of leisure activities they engaged in over the previous year as well as completing the Flourishing Scale. Hierarchical regression analyses indicated that older adults who were engaged in more various leisure activities, who perceived better financial status, and who were married reported higher levels of flourishing. A comparison of the two groups of older adults with and without engagement in leisure activities showed that those engaged in at least one leisure activity were more likely to be women, reported higher levels of flourishing, and perceived their own financial status as better. This study indicated that engaging in leisure activities in later life might provide beneficial effects for the well-being of older adults.

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Suicide Attempts During Adolescence: Systematic Hospitalization and Crisis Treatment

Crisis ◽

10.1027//0227-5910.20.1.41 ◽

1999 ◽

Vol 20 (1) ◽

pp. 41-48 ◽

Cited By ~ 11

Author(s):

Jérôme Ottino

Keyword(s):

Attempted Suicide ◽

Suicide Attempts ◽

Psychiatric Treatment ◽

Health Workers ◽

Inpatient Unit ◽

Theoretical Hypothesis ◽

Initial Resistance ◽

Provision Of Care ◽

Suicidal Crisis

This paper deals with an inpatient unit that recently opened in Geneva, specializing in the treatment of patients aged 16-21 years who had attempted suicide or felt the desire to commit suicide. This particular center was established because of the significant weaknesses found in the provision of care to adolescents who had attempted suicide. Despite the growing interest of health workers in this area of study over recent years, the frequency of suicide among the young has not decreased and there are numerous recurrences of the suicide attempts. Further, all efforts to improve the adolescents' compliance with psychiatric treatment have failed to date. The number of drop-outs from treatment is still very high. Thus, the objectives of our inpatient unit are as follows: (1) to overcome initial resistance to treatment and to improve long-term compliance; (2) to decrease the number of recurrent attempts as a consequence of the above, thus increasing life expectancy; (3) to offer the adolescents who have tried (or have contemplated) committing suicide an improved quality of life, after first helping them overcome the suicidal crisis. To achieve these goals, the therapeutic team of the unit proposes short stays during which the work with the adolescents consists of a very intensive psychoanalytic-oriented crisis intervention. Numerous practical aspects of our therapeutic approach in the inpatient unit are related here in detail, always with reference to our theoretical hypothesis.

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