Living with dying and disabilism: death and disabled children

This paper explores the ‘offensive presence’ death has sometimes represented in disability studies. The paper focuses on interviews with three mothers of children with the label of life‐limiting and life‐threatening impairments and positions their experiences within the current policy context for disabled children in England. The narratives are part of a wider on‐going study funded by the Economic and Social Research Council ‘Does Every Child Matter, post‐Blair? The interconnections of disabled childhoods’ (RES‐062‐23‐1138). Findings include: (i) families experience social isolation and poverty; (ii) support from services is lacking and/or inappropriate; (iii) families worry about the future and the (physical, social and emotional) costs of care. The paper concludes by suggesting that social oppression theories of disability have much to offer in terms of challenging the disadvantage disabled children and their families’ experience during life and in death.     

Continuity and Change in Mothers' Favoritism Toward Offspring in Adulthood

The importance of parental favoritism in childhood and adulthood has been well documented; little is known, however, about changes over time in such within‐family differentiation. Drawing on theories of life course processes and developmental psychology, the authors used 7‐year panel data collected from 406 older mothers about their relationships with 1,514 adult children to explore patterns of favoritism regarding caregiving and emotional closeness. The findings demonstrated continuity in patterns of mothers' favoritism. Mothers tended to prefer the same children across time, particularly regarding preferred caregivers. It was anticipated that children's social‐structural characteristics, similarity to their mothers, structural position in the family, and support provision to mothers would predict favored child status across time; however, only similarity and support processes were strong and consistent predictors of change and continuity in patterns of mothers' favoritism.     

A Longitudinal Examination of Support,Self‐Esteem,and Mexican‐Origin Adolescent Mothers' Parenting Efficacy

Guided by a risk and resilience framework, this study used a prospective longitudinal, multiple‐reporter design to examine how social support from a mother figure during pregnancy interacted with Mexican‐origin adolescent mothers' self‐esteem to inform their parenting efficacy when their children were 10 months old. Using reports of perceived social support by adolescent mothers (M_age = 16.24, SD = 0.99) and their mother figures (M_age = 40.84, SD = 7.04) in 205 dyads, and controlling for demographic factors (i.e., adolescent age, adolescent nativity, family income, mothers' educational attainment, adolescent – mother coresidence) and adolescents' social support from a significant other, the findings indicated that social support during pregnancy was positively associated with adolescent mothers' future parenting efficacy when adolescent mothers had relatively lower self‐esteem. The findings were consistent for adolescents' and mothers' reports and emphasize the value of social support from a mother figure among adolescent mothers with lower self‐esteem. Implications for interventions are presented.     

‘My Parents told us that they will always Treat my Brother Differently Because he is Autistic’ – Are Siblings of Autistic Children the Forgotten Ones?

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) does not only affect the child alone, but the family unit as well. This qualitative study explored the impacts of ASD on the relationship between parents and their neuro-typical children and how the neuro-typical children cope with the impacts of having an autistic sibling in the family. Utilising principles of the social relations theory, five Singaporean families (n = 10) consisting of five mothers and five neuro-typical children were interviewed. Both the mothers and the neuro-typical children were seen to be equal agents in influencing the interactions with each other, and contributed in maintaining the close relationship through various strategies. Findings revealed that having an autistic child in the family imposed certain constraints and additional responsibilities for the family members. Despite so, the neuro-typical children coped well with such constraints. The in-depth data highlight the value of considering both the agency of mothers and the neuro-typical children and how they bidirectionally influence each other while sharing the caregiving roles for the autistic child in the family. It is strongly recommended for practitioners to incorporate elements of child's agency when expanding their scope of psychosocial intervention work with the neuro-typical children.     

Acceptance and Caregiving of Married and Divorced Custodial Mothers and Fathers

The study examined whether differences in gender and family status affect parental caregiving disposition and acceptance of children among parents of children in mid-childhood. The number of participants were 122 divorced-custodial fathers, 107 married fathers, 85 divorced-custodial mothers, and 82 married mothers (n?=?398). A comparison among four groups of parents revealed the following gender differences: mothers scored higher on anxious caregiving and parental acceptance than fathers, and lower on avoidant caregiving. Regression analysis indicated that the higher the caregiving avoidance or anxiety, the lower the parental acceptance. Family status moderated parental acceptance, as avoidant caregiving was associated with reduced parental acceptance among married parents, but not among divorced custodial parents. The finding that avoidant caregiving was not associated with reduced acceptance among divorced custodial parents implies that their parental acceptance behaviors toward their children are affected by their parental status as sole custodial parent, and the associated responsibilities, rather than by gender.     

Developing Responsive Preventative Practices: Key Messages from Children's and Families’ Experiences of the Children's Fund

As part of the prevention and social inclusion agenda, the Children's Fund, set up in 2000, has developed preventative services for children at risk of social exclusion. Drawing on a large qualitative dataset of interviews conducted in 2004/05 with children, young people and their parents/carers who accessed Children Fund services, this article analyses key practices and approaches valued by children and parents. These included: specialist support tailored to individual support needs, family‐oriented approaches, trusting relationships with service providers, multi‐agency approaches and sustainability of services. Finally, the article draws out key lessons for the future development of preventative services.     

Perceptions of Children’s Parental Preferences in Lesbian Two‐Mother Households

This study explores how lesbian mothers perceive their 3½‐year‐old children’s parental preferences in families in which one mother is genetically linked to the child. Thirty lesbian couples (60 women) were interviewed about their children’s parental preferences, their explanations of why preferences for one parent existed (or not), and their affective and behavioral reactions to such preferences. Many women acknowledged that their children, as infants, preferred their birth mothers due to biological factors (i.e., breastfeeding) or differential time spent with the child. Despite this initial preference, most women perceived little stability in children’s preferences over time, such that children preferred both mothers equally. Findings support the power of “social motherhood” in fostering maternal connections that transcend biological relatedness over time.     

Chronic and Proximate Depression Among Mothers: Implications for Child Well‐Being

This article uses data from the Fragile Families and Child Well‐Being Survey (N = 2,427) to examine the association between the chronicity and timing of maternal depression and child well‐being. Maternal depression, particularly chronic depression, is linked to internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors in children, and children have worse behaviors when mothers report proximate depression. Children of depressed and nondepressed mothers have similar cognitive outcomes. Results also suggest that boys are more vulnerable to maternal depression than girls and that socioeconomic advantage does not buffer children from the consequences of maternal depression. Given that impairments in early childhood may place children on disadvantaged life‐course trajectories, early intervention and treatment of depressed mothers may help ameliorate social disparities.     

Coping and Helping to Cope: Perspectives of Children of Palestinian Political Detainees

This qualitative study investigates how children of Palestinian political detainees in Israeli detention cope with their fathers' absences. Researchers conducted 16 semi‐structured interviews with children, mostly aged 15 and older in the West Bank. Three themes are discussed that emerged from the interview data: how children cope with their sadness; the children's perspectives on community support; and older children's support to siblings and parents. Practitioners can support children by providing counselling to mothers and organising interventions, which give children the opportunity to connect. It is important that the agency of the older children is taken into account and built upon.     

Perceived Need for Psychosocial Services in the Context of Political Violence: Psychological Distress Among Israeli Mothers with Young Children

The current study investigated the association between mothers’ perceived need for psychosocial services due to exposure to political violence, and theirs and their children’s psychological distress. A representative sample of 904 Israeli mothers of young children aged 2–6 were asked to fill out a questionnaire about exposure to war and other types of trauma, psychological distress, social support, and perceived need for help. The results showed that mothers who reported a need for psychosocial services due to exposure to political violence had higher levels of exposure to political violence, depressive symptoms and more emotional problems in their young children than mothers who reported no need for help. Those who reported a need for psychosocial services also had less social support even when all other variables are controlled. Furthermore, Arab mothers and mothers with low family income perceived a greater need for psychosocial services. The implications of this study are relevant for policies of outreach to vulnerable groups in situations of ongoing political violence.     

The essence of being connected: the lived experience of mothers with young children in newer residential areas

Parenthood is a significant life transition and a time of increased social support need. In newer residential areas, a lag in social infrastructure and family relocation can influence potential isolation of families with young children. This qualitative study explored the lived experiences of being connected to local communities for mothers with children aged 0–5 years. Family insights were obtained through in-depth interviews with 12 mothers who were primary caregivers, homeowners and living in newer residential areas in outer suburban Perth, Western Australia. For mothers with young children, being connected to the local community appears to be shaped from their past and present lived experience as well as future aspirations. Connectedness evolves and may develop more slowly in newer communities where social relationships and networks are often recently formed. ‘Interaction’, ‘knowing what's going on’ and ‘help is nearby if you need it’ were identified as the essential themes of connectedness for mothers and families in this study. Belonging was identified as an incidental theme as not all mothers who felt connected felt like they belonged. The findings provide insight for professionals and agencies working with families with young children as well as planners of newer residential areas.     

Interpreting the needs of lone mothers

This article focuses on the relationship between welfare services in some districts of the municipality of Venice and their lone-mother clients. First, it outlines briefly the panorama of Italian support policies. As there is no national law on social assistance, but a variety of fragmentary and complex local systems of rights, the social rights of lone mothers have to be examined at the local level. The article then attempts to reconstruct the de factopolicies for lone mothers in a welfare system that has no provisions specifically for lone mothers. It interprets discursive and ideological dimensions of social policies from the social workers' viewpoint, highlighting the mechanisms by which the welfare programmes and practices define the needs of lone mothers. It outlines the dynamics of negotiation in the welfare services, which try to reconcile the legislative and administrative norms with the social workers' professional practices and the perceived claims of lone mothers. Despite the Veneto region's universal law on social assistance, access to economic support tends to be determined selectively on the basis of a 'qualifying need'. Interpreting lone mothers' claims to qualifying needs along psycho-social and educational dimensions serves to transform their expressed claims into needs that can be dealt with institutionally. Social workers' image of the two subculturesof lone mothers influences their attitudes and the strategies they set in motion for lone mothers. Lone mothers are provided with a broader range of discretionary support than other users of welfare services, as social workers perceive their problems as more complex and pressing. Social workers' discretion in supporting lone mothers in maternity and in accommodating paid employment and family responsibilities compensates for the gaps left by national and local welfare policies.     

Motivations for Providing and Utilizing Child Care by Grandmothers in South Korea

The purpose of this study was to construct a conceptual understanding of the motivations of grandmothers and mothers to provide and utilize child care by grandmothers in Korea. Grounded theory methods were used to collect and analyze interview data with 21 matched pairs of caregiving grandmothers and employed mothers. The grandmothers' motivations were concern for their adult children's well‐being and a feeling of responsibility to fulfill their parental responsibility for support. The mothers' motivations were the benefits they received as employed mothers and their trust of family care with prior expectations of the grandmothers' support. The core category integrating the findings was bilateral familism supporting traditional gender role ideology. The results suggest that changes from patrilineal to bilateral kinship interactions have been largely based on the influence of familism, which has created a cultural setting of expectations for downstream intergenerational support to maintain traditional gender roles despite increased maternal employment.     

Stress and Coping in Homeless Children

The possible moderating effects of social support and self-competence on the relationship between stressful life events and behavior problems were examined in 49 homeless children residing in shelters in New York City. The children's mothers were administered measures of their children's stressful life events, social support, and behavior problems; the children themselves were administered measures of their social support and perceived self-competence. There was support for the buffering hypothesis for social support, with the mothers' perceptions of their children's social support moderating a relationship between stressful life events and behavior problems. Social support also was related to self-competence and to behavior problems. The children's perceived self-competence did not function as a moderator. Implications for preventively oriented interventions with homeless children are discussed.     

Buffers of Racial Discrimination: Links With Depression Among Rural African American Mothers

The current study examines racial discrimination as a predictor of depression in a sample of 414 rural, low‐income African American mothers of young children. The potential moderating role of optimism and church‐based social support was also examined. Mothers completed questionnaires when their child was 24 months old. Hierarchical regression revealed that mothers' perception of racism was a significant predictor of depression even after controlling for a variety of distal demographic characteristics and environmental stressors. Significant interactions suggested the importance of psychological and social characteristics in understanding maternal depression. Specifically, high levels of optimism and church‐based social support buffered mothers from increased depressive symptomology attributable to perceived racism.     

Examining the trajectories of children providing care for adults in rural Kenya: Implications for service delivery

Research on caregiving children tends to be limited to children's caregiving experiences of parents with a specific disease or disability. This has led to a common perception that children's caregiving is a single, uniform and often long-term experience. Whilst this is most certainly the case for many children in economically more advanced countries, this may not hold true in rural Africa, where poverty and AIDS can have significant knock-on effects on entire families and communities. This paper seeks to develop a more complex understanding of children's caring experiences by asking children whom they have cared for over time and explore the different pathways that lead to their caregiving at different stages of their lives. The study reports on qualitative data collected from 48 caregiving children and 10 adults in the Bondo district of western Kenya in 2007. A multi-method approach was adapted, with historical profiles, Photovoice and draw-and-write essays complementing 34 individual interviews and 2 group discussions. A thematic network analysis revealed that children's caregiving was not confined to a single experience. Children were observed to provide care for a number of different family and community members for varying periods of time and intensities. Although their living arrangements and life circumstances often gave them little choice but to care, a social recognition of children's capacity to provide care for fragile adults, helped the children construct an identity, which both children and adults drew on to rationalise children's continued and multiple caring experiences. The study concludes that agencies and community members looking to support caregiving children need to consider their care trajectories — including whom they care for as well as the order, intensity, location and duration of their past and likely future caring responsibilities.     

Health Status,Living Arrangements,and Service Use at 100: Findings From the Oporto Centenarian Study

ABSTRACT

This paper describes the sociodemographic characteristics, health status, and service use of centenarians living in the community and centenarians residing in an elder care facility/nursing home and examines their main differences. Participants were 140 centenarians from the population-based Oporto Centenarian Study (M_age = 101.2; SD = 1.6). Main findings revealed that the majority of the centenarians lived at home with their family members (57.9%). Increased health care needs, living alone, and family caregiving constraints were the most common reasons for entering a nursing home. Community-dwelling centenarians were cared for mostly by their children and were less dependent and in better cognitive health than those who resided in a nursing home. Differences were found in the pattern of health service use according to the centenarians’ residence, ability to pay medical expenses, and dependency level. Findings highlight the need for an accurate assessment of caregiving support systems, particularly family intergenerational duties, and of the factors constraining the access and use of health and social services. Policy makers may be guided by the insights gained from this research and work toward improvement of support options and removal of barriers to service access.     

Doing It All? Mothers' College Enrollment,Time Use,and Affective Well‐being

The rising share of women in college with dependent children and growing emphasis on two‐generation policies for reducing socioeconomic inequality have galvanized research aimed at determining whether mothers' increased education can improve their and their children's well‐being. Yet as part of this effort, scholars have overlooked signs that mothers' college enrollment may not be unequivocally good for families. This research brief aims to bring greater attention to this side of the story. The authors analyze time diary (2003–2015) and well‐being data (2010, 2011, 2013) from the American Time Use Survey. The authors find that mothers in college experience a time squeeze that limits their time in caregiving, self‐care, and work, on one hand, and school‐related activities, on the other. This time squeeze may explain why mothers enrolled in college (compared with mothers who were not in school) also reported less happiness and more fatigue during activities with their children.     

A Therapist’s Mandate?: Integrating an Ethics of Care into Custody Law by Recognising and Responding to Post‐separation Parental Loss of Connection with Children

In 1999 Smart and Neale published their seminal book Family Fragments, arguing for the replacement of the ethics of justice that currently informs custody law and practice with an ethics of care. Recognising loss is one of four principles they identify as being key to care‐based processes for managing post‐separation parenting arrangements. Here they had in mind the non‐resident fathers in their study, who were often anxious, angry, and resentful about their diminished fatherhood. Yet gender‐neutral custody laws and the greater prominence given to shared care across the West means that increasing numbers of separated mothers are also experiencing diminished connections to their children, either by becoming non‐resident parents or through shared care arrangements. Research into post‐separation fathers’ and mothers’ experiences of loss and grief in relation to their children is sparse and largely consists of small‐scale qualitative studies focusing either on fathers or mothers. Nonetheless, these studies show that the grief talk of post‐separated parents is strikingly similar, except that mothers who become non‐resident parents commonly talk about a sense of stigma and shame, while fathers are more likely than mothers to resort to the language of anger and rights. Despite Smart and Neale's call roughly 20 years ago, custody law systems across the West continue to neglect parents’ need for recognition and support. This paper seeks to rectify this social neglect through describing a dual program of therapeutically informed interventions with separated mothers and fathers. This is designed to recognise and respond to parental loss and grief experiences, whilst simultaneously fostering personal self‐reflexivity and transformation. The latter is no easy task but is frequently an essential basis for workable co‐parenting post‐separation.