Predictors of basic needs and supervisory neglect: Evidence from the Illinois Families Study

Approximately 80% of the over 3 million reports of child maltreatment each year are due to concerns of child neglect (United States Department of Health and Human Services [USDHHS], 2015). The literature is growing, but relatively little is known about the predictors of the subtypes of neglect. The current study uses data from the Illinois Families Study to run fixed effects logistic regression models to estimate the predictors of two distinct forms of neglect: basic needs (failure to provide adequate food, clothing, or shelter) and supervisory (failure to provide adequate supervision). Within individual mothers, welfare receipt was associated with increased odds for basic needs neglect. Having worsening health conditions, gaining more child care concerns, and moving from a safe neighborhood to an unsafe neighborhood were positively associated with supervisory neglect. Our findings suggested that policies and practices that enhance economic stability over a longer period would likely decrease basic needs neglect, while policies and practices that aim to support families in terms of providing flexible childcare options for working mothers, improving socioeconomic status, and promoting health and wellness would be more beneficial for reduction of supervisory neglect.     

The relationship between mothers' social networks and severe domestic violence: a test of the social isolation hypothesis

To understand the relationship between characteristics of mothers' social networks and domestic violence, battered mothers who were severely assaulted were compared to battered mothers who were not severely assaulted and mothers who were not assaulted. The results showed that all three groups of mothers had several family members in their social networks with whom they had frequent contact during the past month. No differences were found between the groups on the number of family members who gave emotional support. However, the mothers who were severely assaulted had fewer friends, fewer contacts with their friends, fewer long-term friendships, and fewer friends who really listened to them than did the nonbattered mothers and the battered mothers who were not severely assaulted. Batterers may be more successful in disrupting friendship ties than family ties.     

Volunteer Support for Mothers with New Babies: Perceptions of Need and Support Received

Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with 55 mothers of infants. Some had received Home‐Start during their infant’s first year, others were offered the support but declined and the remainder were not offered Home‐Start. Most of their support had come from informal sources, such as family and friends with less from professionals. Mothers who received Home‐Start described beneficial aspects, in particular, the extent of practical support provided, preferable to calling on close relatives or friends. Difficulties related to volunteer characteristics and administrative problems. Overall volunteer support can be important to complement informal and formal support, but needs careful management.     

Divorced Mothers

Employed divorced mothers (381) were surveyed on sources of support available to them in managing family responsibilities, with emphasis on managing conflicts between employment and child care responsibilities. A particular focus was the noncustodial parent's contribution. Although the divorced mothers perceived they had sources of help available, notably the child's father, friends, and relatives in the community, they did not perceive that these sources offered much help in managing family responsibilities. The mothers tended to manage the employment-child care conflicts themselves. It is not clear if this was the preferred option or if the other sources, due to similar employment commitments, could not provide help.     

Mothers in the workforce

This evaluation of maternity leave was completed by the Australian Institute of Family Studies. The use of maternity leave was investigated in 3 separate surveys. In 1, all women throughout Australia who had borne a child during 1 week in May 1984 (2000 women) were surveyed 18 months after the birth. The 2nd and 3rd surveys examined the experience of maternity leave in 1252 private sector businesses of varying sizes and a smaller number of public sector organizations. The study found that 46% of women are in the workforce during pregnancy. However, looking only at women in employment before the 1st birth, 3/4 of them are in the workforce. 44% of women took maternity leave, 33% were eligible but did not take leave, and the remaining 24% were ineligible for maternity leave either because they were casual workers or because they had not been in continuous employment with their employer for the required minimum period of 12 months. Of all maternity leave taken, 78% is taken by public sector employees and only 21% by women employed in the private sector. 1/2 of the women eligible for maternity leave in the private sector who did not take up the option had no information about maternity leave provisions. The main determinants of taking maternity leave, apart from having information about it, are working in the public sector, having a strong attachment to the workforce, having values which see work and child rearing as complementary, being a member of a trade union, having a high education and high status occupation, and being employed in a large establishment. Other survey findings follow. 1) 55% of women who were in employment before their 1st child returned to the workforce within 18 months of the birth. 2) 45% of women returned to work used informal child care provided by family or friends (usually unpaid). 32% used formal care only. 23% used a combination of formal and informal child care. 3) Women are spending an average of between 20% and 25% of their income on child care. 4) Financial reasons are the main reasons given by women for their return to the workforce. 5) Cost and availability of child care is an important issue in determining women's workforce participation after the birth of a child. 6) 60% of women do not return to the workforce after childbirth; 90% of these women intend to do so in the future. 7) For the majority of women who give birth, motherhood emerges as their most important role in life. Almost 1/2 the women agree that a woman should give up her job if it inconveniences her husband and children. 8) 2/3 of working women can establish just as warm and secure a relationship as non-working mothers, compared with 4 out of 10 non-working mothers.     

MATERNAL GRANDMOTHERS AS CHILD CARE PROVIDERS FOR RURAL,LOW-INCOME MOTHERS

This qualitative study investigated the experiences of forty-two rural, low-income mothers who utilized their own mothers for routine child care. A life course perspective was used to explore mothers’ perceptions of their child care arrangement and the influence of the adult daughter–older mother relational context. Results focus on the benefits and weaknesses of child care provided by grandmothers and the influence of the relationship between participants and their mothers on this care arrangement. The analysis has implications for research, support programming, and public policy.     

Met needs and unmet needs, and satisfaction among Social HMO members

This article reports on a survey of 800 members of four Social HMO demonstration sites, who were receiving home-based, community-based, and short-term institutional services under the demonstration's expanded community care benefits. The survey asked whether members needed help in 11 areas, whether they received help in each area from an informal caregiver, whether they wanted more help from the Social HMO, and whether help provided by both was adequate. Satisfaction with the program and with service coordination was also assessed. The adequacy of informal care differed by problem area, as did the help desired from the Social HMO and its responsiveness. Members were less satisfied when they had weaker informal care, were African American, and when they received inadequate help from the plan with ADLs, transportation, medical access, and managing money. Members were more satisfied when they were professionals, home owners, knew their service coordinator's name (or how to contact her), and received help with their problems. The findings point to the importance of clarifying divisions of labor with informal caregivers, as well as possible expansions in responsibilities for service coordinators and benefits beyond traditional boundaries.     

Home care for the elderly: the role of relatives,friends and neighbors

We use data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe to examine the hours of home care received by the elderly. The existing empirical literature has mostly examined informal home care from children and formal home care. We identify two additional informal home care providers, namely, relatives (other than children) and friends (including neighbors) who provide about 30 % of the hours of informal home care. Our main new empirical finding is that single elderly persons who can rely less on children—and in particular daughters—for their home care receive not only more formal care but also more care from friends and neighbors. These findings suggest that policymakers need to take into account not only home care provision from children but also home care provision from friends and neighbors to obtain accurate projections concerning the increasing costs of formal care programs due to an aging population.     

Child protection pathways for newborn infants: A multi-disciplinary retrospective chart review of an Irish maternity hospital’s records

In Ireland, little is known about mothers and infants where child welfare and protection concerns arise during the perinatal period. This study explores, for the first time, perinatal child protection. A retrospective audit was carried out of a large maternity hospital's medical social work, neonatal and psychiatric files for a five-year period from 2016 to 2020. The study identified 99 children, born to 86 mothers, who were either subject to a child protection conference; placed for adoption; discharged to someone other than the mother; or discharged home under supervision. The study found that two-thirds of the children were discharged to their mother's care. When compared to national data, the health indicators for this cohort of mothers and children painted a grim picture. The maternal profiles identified high prevalence of mental health and addiction difficulties and domestic violence. The study found evidence of supports provided to the mothers to enable them to care for their infants while they remained in the hospital and during an initial discharge from hospital. However, a significant number of the mothers were not caring for their children when viewed across a longer time frame. Dedicated multi-disciplinary clinics and improved data systems were identified as of importance.     

Living Arrangements and Informal Support for the Elderly

ABSTRACT

A network of informal care and support provided by family, friends and neighbors often forms the basis for elderly care. Changes in the structure of Chinese family alter this supportive function, and changes in traditional values affect the nature of the network and support provided. This is especially so in modernized Hong Kong where the traditional role of the family and especially children's duty of care for their aged parents (“filial piety”) may be weakening. This proposition was investigated by a qualitative study involving in-depth interviews with 50 older persons in a modern new town (Tuen Mun) in Hong Kong. Living arrangements, geographical proximity and the quality of relationships between potential caregivers and the elderly affected needs for and provision of informal support. Traditional Confucian filial piety is undergoing modification, perhaps erosion, implying ongoing changes in inter-generational relations in this modernized Asian society.     

Older Parents Providing Child Care for Adult Children: Does It Pay Off?

This study examined whether past grandparental child care is related to present support from adult children. On the basis of social exchange theory, the authors expected that grandparental child care creates a debt that is repaid in the form of receiving support later in life. Using data from the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (N = 349 parents, N = 812 adult children), the authors found that grandparents who frequently provided child care for sons in the past more often received instrumental and emotional support from these sons approximately 13 years later than grandparents who less frequently provided child care. Investments in daughters did not pay off. Instrumental support other than child‐care provision did not predict receiving support from either sons or daughters, but emotional support did. These results support the notion of long‐term reciprocity in parent–child relationships, but its importance depends on the child's gender and the type of earlier investment.     

Parents' searches for child care and the design of information services

This article reports selected findings from a study of the process by which urban parents search for child care. Analyses of interview data indicate that (a) parents used informal sources of information to a considerably greater extent than formal sources, (b) the general pattern was to begin the search with relatives and close friends and gradually move out to more peripheral ties, (c) there does not appear to be an effective informal system of neighbors or community persons who matched parents with child care providers, and (d) there was no single or several sources that were outstanding in effectiveness for a large proportion of parents. The article sets forth implications of these data for the design of child care information and referral services in urban settings.     

On shifting ground: First-time parents’ ideal world of paid work and family time

We examined first-time fathers’ and mothers’ perspectives about their ideal world of support in the context of dominant social ideology, ethno-cultural ideals, and the pragmatics of their everyday family, workplace, and socioeconomic circumstances during their first 18 months as parents. Twelve Canadian-born and six Chinese immigrant couples participated in individual in-depth interviews. We conducted a three-part analysis: fathers’ perspectives, mothers’ perspectives, and couples’ perspectives. Fathers focused on fulfilling dual fathering ideals of ‘time with family’ and ‘providing for family’; mothers emphasized fulfilling a mothering ideal of ‘caring for children'. Examining couples’ perspectives revealed a more nuanced understanding of their shared focus on ‘caring for family'. Parents in this study found the current social ideal of the ‘new’ father, who is both financial provider and nurturing co-parent, appealing, yet difficult to achieve. Couples wanted informal (i.e. family and social network) support, along with formal (i.e. workplace and childcare) support to enable them to provide family care and financial stability for their family. Findings contribute to understanding family and paid work experiences and decision-making among couples as new parents. We offer insights into the complexity of intersections among social ideals, personal expectations, family care, and paid work for fathers and mothers.     

Flemish Foster Mothers’ Perceptions of Support Needs Regarding Difficult Behaviors of Their Foster Child and Their Own Parental Approach

Family foster care is a valuable, but vulnerable type of out-of-home placement. Adequate support of foster parents is an important factor for placement success. This requires an accurate assessment of the support needs of foster parents. This paper focuses on the support needs of foster mothers concerning difficult behavior of the child and their own parenting behavior. Data were gathered from 282 foster mothers. 46 % of the foster mothers needed support on at least one behavior of the child, 40 % on at least one parenting behavior. Foster mothers, who felt less competent to deal with the child, expressed a higher support need on both areas. A high support need concerning difficult behaviors was further predicted by the foster mother’s age, the type of foster care, and the number of biological children. A high support need concerning parenting was further predicted by the quality of support by the foster care worker and the number of foster children. Careful monitoring of all types of foster care situations with special attention to problem behaviors and how to handle them could make this type of out-of-home-placement more effective.     

Resilience in parenting among young mothers: Family and ecological risks and opportunities

The present study used a person-centered approach to examine resilience in parenting among a sample of young mothers (under age 21 at childbirth). Resilient functioning as a parent was defined as the lack of perpetration of child maltreatment (substantiated reports of child abuse and neglect) in the context of risk. Risk factors were assessed at multiple levels, including family (e.g., negative childhood histories in family of origin) and ecological (e.g., neighborhood poverty, mother's financial stress) levels. Analyses revealed a group of mothers who demonstrated resilience in parenting despite a context of substantial risks from their childhood histories (e.g., negative family relationships) and current ecologies (e.g., economic and neighborhood conditions). Mothers in the resilient group were less likely to a) live with their families of origin, and b) to rely on their own mothers as sources of emotional or caregiving support. Data also indicated that young mothers' resilient functioning as parents was associated with higher rates of depressive symptoms among these mothers, perhaps suggesting a “cost” or limit to resilient parenting functioning in young mothers. Results are discussed in a resilience framework.     

Stability in the Social Support Networks of Homeless Families in Shelter: Findings From a Study of Families in a Faith-Based Shelter Program

The following article outlines a longitudinal study tracking changes of the social support networks of 28 homeless families in shelter. Weekly changes in support networks of homeless mothers were tracked including 482 dyadic ties between mothers and supportive persons. Findings suggested that informal social support and persons who provided emotional support were significantly more stable forms of support in the mothers' lives throughout their shelter stay. Time was found to be a significant predictor of financial well-being and housing stability at shelter exit, but characteristics of the supportive ties were not. Implications for family social work and research practice are presented.     

Feeling Rushed: Gendered Time Quality,Work Hours,Nonstandard Work Schedules,and Spousal Crossover

The authors investigated gender differences in couple parents' subjective time pressure, using detailed Australian time use data (n=756 couples with minor children). They examined how family demand, employment hours, and nonstandard work schedules of both partners relate to each spouse's non‐employment time quality (“pure” leisure, “contaminated” leisure, multitasking housework, and child care) and subjective feelings of being rushed or pressed for time. Mothers averaged more contaminated leisure and less pure leisure and did much more unpaid work multitasking than fathers. These results suggest that these differences in time quality do partially account for mothers feeling more rushed than fathers. Weekend work was associated with mothers having less pure leisure, but not contaminated leisure. The opposite was found for fathers. Spousal work characteristics also related to time use and feeling rushed in gendered ways, with male long work hours positively associated with higher time pressure for mothers as well as the fathers who worked them.     

The influence of partners on parental stress of neglectful mothers

This study aims to test the existence of a specific pattern of maternal perception of partners' participation: that is mothers in neglectful families perceive their partners as (1) less satisfying as a marital partner, (2) more violent, (3) less supporting, and (4) having a less positive relationship with the target child than mothers in low-educated, low socioeconomic but non-maltreating families. The study also aims to estimate the link between this pattern of maternal perception of partners' participation and the level of parental stress of the mothers. The total sample is composed of 48 two-parent families with a target child aged 0–6 years old. Half of the families received treatment by the child protection services for child neglect and the other half were non-maltreating families paired with the neglectful families on sociodemographic variables. The data partially support the first hypothesis: compared to men in non-maltreating families, men in neglectful families are perceived by the mothers as being less adequate marital partners, less supportive and more violent.     

“I'm Not Supporting His Kids”: Nonresident Fathers' Contributions Given Mothers' New Fertility

The authors examined whether nonresident fathers provide informal support to their children and whether support stops if their ex‐partner goes on to have a child with a new man. A logistic regression analysis of longitudinal survey and administrative data for 434 women who received welfare in Wisconsin showed that fathers are less likely to provide informal support when their ex‐partner has a child with a new partner. Alternative models that control for unobserved characteristics suggest somewhat different results, providing stronger evidence of declines in support that can be shared across family members than in support that can be directed to a particular child.