Biotechnologies and Reproductive Agency. An Ethnography of Solo Motherhood in Spain and in the United Kingdom, de Ana Bravo-Moreno

Bravo-Moreno, Ana. <b>Biotechnologies and Reproductive Agency: An Ethnography of Solo Motherhood in Spain and the United Kingdom</b>

Home Treatment as an Alternative to Hospital Admission for Mothers in a Mental Health Crisis: A Qualitative Study

This article highlights some concerns with the regulatory structure envisioned by Canada's new Assisted Human Reproduction Act, principally by comparing Canada's proposed Assisted Human Reproduction Agency (AHRA) with the United Kingdom's Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA). The article elaborates on the past and present regulation of ARTs in both Canada and the United Kingdom, using the current regulation of preimplantation genetic diagnosis by the HFEA as an example. The author notes that there is considerable cause for concern over the ability of the AHRA to effectively regulate ARTs, and cautions that Canada's proposed regulatory structure may serve only to reignite the debate around the moral status of the embryo that featured so prominently in the debate over the legislation itself.

Using data collected by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development's Program for International Student Assessment in 2003, this study examines the gap in the educational aspirations of children from single-parent families and two-parent families in the United Kingdom (UK) and Hong Kong. Consistent with previous research on the relationship between cultural orientation and academic motivation, our analysis shows that children in the UK have statistically significant lower levels of educational aspiration than those in Hong Kong. Moreover, children from single-parent families in the UK and Hong Kong are found to have statistically significant lower levels of educational aspiration than those from two-parent families. Further analyses indicate that family capital and school experience are important factors for understanding the negative effects of single parenthood. Finally, we observe that single parenthood has a less negative effect on educational aspiration in the UK than it does in Hong Kong, which can be explained by differences in government family policy and family capital between the two regions. Based on the outcomes from the current analysis, we put forward several policy and service recommendations for improving children's educational aspiration and enhancing family well-being.

This study uses time diary data from the 2003 American Time Use Survey and the United Kingdom Time Use Survey 2000 to examine the time that single, cohabiting, and married parents devote to caring for their children. Time spent in market work, in child care as a primary activity, and in child care as a passive activity are jointly modeled using a correlated, censored regression model. Separate estimates are provided by gender, by country, and by weekend/weekday day. We find no evidence that these time allocation decisions differ for cohabiting and married parents, but there is evidence that single persons allocate time differently - as might be expected, given different household time constraints. In the U.S. single fathers spend significantly more time in primary child care on weekdays and substantially less time in passive child care on weekends than their married or cohabiting counterparts, while in the UK single fathers spend significantly more time in passive child care on weekdays. Single fathers in each country report less time at work on weekdays than their married or cohabiting counterparts. In the U.S., single mothers work more than married or cohabiting mothers on weekdays, while single mothers in the United Kingdom work less than married or cohabiting mothers on all days.

The cost-of-living crisis in the United Kingdom has profoundly affected the mental wellbeing of single parents, compounding economic and psychosocial challenges. This study, through semi-structured online interviews with four female single parents, used thematic analysis to explore how financial burdens, mood fluctuations, sacrifices for children’s needs, and intensified social isolation impacted their mental health. The application of Social Identity Theory demonstrates the exacerbating effects of societal stigmas. The results highlight the need for targeted policies and interventions to alleviate these strains and recommend further research into the intersectionality of gender, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status among single parents.

Morland et al suggest that the absence of a neighborhood supermarket is associated with poor adherence to healthy eating patterns compared with those in neighborhoods with one or more supermarkets.1 The article also suggests that this relationship is particularly pronounced in Black neighborhoods. In the United Kingdom, areas where there is little or no food retail provision have been described as “food deserts,” and there is a tradition of research in this field.2–4 Food deserts may affect population health in a number of ways, most importantly, by establishing barriers to healthy eating through restricting individual and household access to the food price and availability benefits of the modern retail economy. These barriers may have particular impacts upon low-income households, single parents with children, the elderly, and those with mobility problems.5 Food deserts research in the United Kingdom has culminated in several area-based policy initiatives that have sought to improve physical retail access in low-income communities. However, debate over the interpretation and extent of the evidence base for the existence of food deserts began after a recent study suggested that research findings (including those cited by Morland et al.1) may have been misinterpreted by food activists and policymakers.6 In the United States, the evidence base for the existence of food deserts is also ambiguous, as work has produced conflicting results about whether a grocery store “gap” exists between rich and poor urban neighborhoods.7–9 One problem with studies such as that described by Morland et al. is that they fail to establish a causal relationship between the presence or absence of a supermarket and an improvement in healthy eating patterns. However, two separate but similar projects being undertaken in the United Kingdom (in Glasgow and Leeds) are seeking to remedy this by treating the building of a new food supermarket, in a neighborhood previously described as having poor food retail access, as a “natural experiment.” Initial results from the Leeds study suggest that building a supermarket in a retail-poor area may have direct and indirect beneficial effects on health through a significant increase in fruit and vegetable consumption, tripling the use of walking as a method of transport, and reducing the stress of complex coping mechanisms to access food stores.10 Whether this demonstration of a causal relationship could be replicated in the United States remains to be seen. It would, however, be an important step forward for research in this field.

Healthcare services for pregnant and postpartum ('perinatal') women were reconfigured significantly at the advent and for the duration of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, and despite the United Kingdom announcing 'Freedom Day' on 19 July 2021 (whereafter all legal lockdown-related restrictions were lifted), restrictions to maternity (antenatal, intrapartum, and postnatal) services remained. This study presents data from eight perinatal women about their experiences of psychosocial wellbeing and maternity care in the post-'Freedom Day' epoch. Semi-structured interviews were conducted virtually, with data recorded, transcribed, and analysed by hand. Grounded theory analysis was employed with the final theory assessing the reproductive injustice of the pandemic 'Freedom Day'. Analysing iteratively and inductively led to four emergent themes: 'A Failing System, Failing Women'; 'Harm Caused by a State of Difference'; 'The Privileges (Not Rights) of Reproductive Autonomy, Agency, and Advocacy'; and 'Worried Women and Marginalised Mothers'. Together, these themes form the theory of 'Freedom for some, but not for Mum'. Women experienced a lack of high-quality reliable information about the pandemic, vaccination against the virus, and the changes to, and decision-making surrounding, their perinatal care. Women recognised healthcare professionals and maternity services were stretched and that maternity services were failing but often reported hostility from staff and abandonment at times when they were unsure about how to navigate their care. The most singular injustice was the disparity between women having to accept continuing restrictions to their freedom whilst receiving maternity care and the (reckless) freedom being enacted by the general public.

We use time-diary data from the 2003 and 2004 American Time Use Surveys and the 2000 United Kingdom Time Use Study to estimate the effect of family structure on the time mothers and fathers spend on primary and passive child care and on market work, using a system of correlated Tobit equations. Our results indicate that estimates are sensitive to the inclusion of a common household factor that controls for selection into family type. Estimates from the selection-controlled models indicate that single parents in both countries spend more time in child care than married or cohabiting parents, perhaps in part to compensate for the missing parent, but that there is no difference in the time allocation of married and cohabiting parents. There are substantial cross-country differences, however, as single parents in the U.S. work more than other parents and single parents in the U.K. work less.

We use time-diary data from the 2003 and 2004 American Time Use Surveys and the 2000 United Kingdom Time Use Study to estimate the effect of family structure on the time mothers and fathers spend on primary and passive child care and on market work, using a system of correlated Tobit equations and family structure equations. Estimates from these models indicate that single parents in both countries spend more time in child care than married or cohabiting parents. There are differences, however, in market work with single parents in the U.S. working more than other parents and single parents in the U.K. working less.

Single parents are increasingly a target group for “activation” through new obligations to seek paid work or engage in education or training. Researchers commonly characterize new activation policies in terms of epochal shifts or unidirectional movements away from understanding single parents as “carers” or “mothers”. This characterization downplays the degree to which the postwar welfare state viewed single parents as potential workers and the degree to which contemporary reforms view them as carers. Based on historical research and drawing on Foucault’s concept of problematization and research on neoliberal governmentalities, pre-emptive politics and anticipatory modes of power, this article seeks to extend existing characterizations of activation policies for single parents.

Introduced in the United Kingdom in 2012, Universal Credit (UC) is a welfare benefit that replaces six working-age ‘legacy’ benefits for out-of-work and low-income people. Designed with the aim of simplifying benefits and incentivising paid work, UC represents a deepening of conditionality in the British welfare state. Considering these developments, this paper quantitatively investigates the effect of UC on recipients’ life satisfaction. Data from the United Kingdom Household Longitudinal Study is analysed, primarily using a fixed-effects regression approach. Results reveal a significantly negative effect of UC recipience on life satisfaction. Robustness checks and alternative model specifications, including difference-in-differences and inverse probability weighting, confirm this finding. Additionally, mediation models give credence to the idea that UC also negatively affects life satisfaction indirectly by increasing psychological distress. Heterogeneity tests indicate that UC has a less negative effect on single parents’ life satisfaction compared to non-parents. Meanwhile, UC has a significantly more negative effect on the life satisfaction of people not in paid work (for reasons other than unemployment) than those in paid work. Discussion focuses on the potential effect of welfare conditionality specifically, and implications for future research and policy are explored.

Moral, efficiency, and rights-based arguments have sparked widespread acknowledgment in both academic and policy circles that children deserve a special focus in poverty measurement. Children can be considered to have a “differential experience” of poverty in childhood, setting their situation apart from adults as well as from other children depending on their life stage. The European Union (EU) is among those bodies that have recognized the need for child-focused indicators in monitoring poverty and social exclusion and is currently in the process of developing, testing, and comparing single indicators of child well-being across member states. In this article, we seek to add to this debate by providing a micro-analysis of the breadth of child poverty in the EU by analyzing the overlap of deprivations across monetary and multidimensional indicators of poverty. Thereby, we aim to gain insight into the breadth of child poverty and degree of overlap between measures of monetary and multidimensional poverty in the EU. Particular attention will be paid to the investigation of cross-country and cross-domain differences. Using the 2007 wave of the EU-SILC data, we compare the EU monetary “at-risk-of-poverty” indicator to a range of child deprivation indicators at the domain level in four EU member states (Germany, France, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom). Overall, the article's findings provide a strong call for the need to take a multidimensional approach toward the measurement of child poverty in the EU context. Size and group differences between children faced with income poverty and/or deprivation in other domains are considerable and underline the need to take a broader perspective to identify those who are vulnerable. Overlap analysis of income and domain poverty suggests considerable mismatch across the board, regardless of the particular country under consideration. This suggests a considerable breadth of child poverty in the EU, meaning that deprivation in monetary and non-monetary terms does not seem to be concentrated on a few particular groups but rather spread out across the population, with large numbers of children likely to face deprivation in a few domains. Although dependent on the domain and country under consideration, single parenthood, living in a rented dwelling, low work intensity, and income poverty are found to be significantly and considerably the risk to poverty.

Internalizing and externalizing behavior problems are associated with a variety of negative child outcomes, but these conclusions have been drawn from research that usually compares children in families with two biological, married parents to all other family types. We compare behavior problems across two-parent, single-mother, and single-father families, which allows us to explore competing gender theories as possible explanations for why child behavior outcomes may be different across these three categories. Results from analyses of the UK Millennium Cohort Study suggest that while children in both single-mother and single-father families initially look like they experience more behavior problems than those in two-parent families, controlling for physical and, especially, social resources explains potential differences. Similarly, when single mothers and single fathers occupy similar family environments in terms of physical and social resources, their children report similar behavior. In contrast to findings from the US, children of single mothers who occupy similar family environments as children in two-parent families in terms of resources perform slightly better in terms of externalizing behavior problems than their two-parent counterparts. We conclude that constructivist theories more accurately explain gendered parenting behavior and its consequences for child behavior problems. Environmental factors such as income, parental closeness, and participation in extracurricular activities have a significant effect on child behavior problems.

ABSTRACTThis special issue on Grandparents highlights the increasing role that they are taking in raising the next generation, not only in the United Kingdom, but across the world. Why are grandparents playing a major role in rearing the next generation? Firstly, older people are living longer and are healthier so they are more available. Also rising divorce rates, increases in single parenthood, more working mothers and the globalisation of work has fuelled family change. The expanding body of interdisciplinary research in cross-generational relations has raised key questions such as: how has human evolution shaped grandparental behaviour? How is grandparenting different from parenting? How do lineage, gender or marital status influence grandparenting? How does grandparental involvement affect the well-being of children and is this different when they are caring for them full-time? How is contemporary grandparenthood shaped by cultural patterns and what are the social policy implications? This introduction outlines some key topics which are further developed by the 11 papers in this special issue. Contributors come from many disciplines and countries and employ a vast range of research methods. The overall conclusion is that societies need to re-evaluate the role of grandparents, pay attention to the support they need, and systematically integrate kin and grandparental care into family policies. As caretakers of many of their grandchildren, who will be our future citizens, grandparents are guardians of all our tomorrows.