Childcare In Europe Research Articles

The prevalence of grandparental childcare in Europe: a research update

We investigate (a) how the proportion of European grandparents providing childcare changed over a period of 15 years, (b) how these proportions differ by gender and education, and (c) how countries not covered in earlier analyses fit into previously identified regional patterns of grandparental childcare in Europe. Using data from Waves 1, 2, and 8 of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), our descriptive analysis provides estimates of the prevalence and intensity of grandparental childcare in 26 European countries as well as of the changes therein over time and across socio-demographically defined groups. Overall, the prevalence and intensity of grandparental childcare in Europe has remained fairly stable over time, with minor increases. Proportions of grandparents providing any childcare strongly vary, however, across countries (from 24 to 60%). Grandmothers are generally more likely to provide childcare than grandfathers, while differences based on educational levels are less clear-cut. Central and southeastern Europe, representing the bulk of the ‘new’ countries in the analysis, exhibit patterns of grandparental childcare closely resembling those observed in Mediterranean countries. Our analysis revealed an overall stability over time rather than change in grandparents’ provision of childcare in Europe, with substantial variations across welfare state regimes and within countries when accounting for grandparents’ gender and educational levels. Including countries that had previously been excluded from other studies challenges the ‘narrative’ that has emerged around a negative macrolevel association between the provision of extensive and intensive grandparental childcare.

Opinion-policy correspondence in public provision and financing of childcare in Europe

Citizens’ preferences regarding who should provide and finance childcare and whether these preferences are linked to the current policies in place have been understudied. Two sets of multilevel analyses are conducted to determine whether the current governmental involvement in childcare provision and financing is supported by the citizens in European countries and the results are discussed in relation to political representation and issue salience. In countries where public provision and financing are more prominent, the demand for public childcare is higher. Citizens support public childcare more in countries where the government is more involved in childcare provision and financing.

Perceived accessibility of childcare in Europe: a cross-country multilevel study

Perceptions of users regarding the accessibility of childcare services have been under-researched. The present study addresses this gap by looking into the effect of systemic level characteristics of the ECEC system on the perceived accessibility of childcare at the individual level. Perceived accessibility is composed of perceived affordability, availability, quality and physical accessibility of these services. The socio-ecological model at the micro-level and the model of institutional setting of ECEC (provision, regulation and financing) at the macro-level are combined in multilevel analyses. Our finding is that childcare is perceived to be more accessible in countries that (1) do not allow private commercial profit-making ECEC services for 3–6-year-old children, (2) adopt a unitary ECEC system where services for 0–3-year-olds and 3–6-year-olds are harmonised and (3) provide generous public support per 0–5-year-old child in the ECEC system. The latter has an even stronger effect on families with an income below average.

Access to Childcare in Europe: Parents' Logistical Challenges in Cross‐national Perspective

AbstractA burgeoning comparative literature has identified the centrality of childcare policy and provision in promoting parental, and specifically maternal, participation in paid employment across countries. This literature has focused on the importance of macro‐level institutional arrangements, with a special emphasis on variation in availability of, and access to, formal early childhood education and care services. However, there has been limited comparative exploration of what this means in practice at the micro‐level: the everyday challenges parents face when attempting to navigate the childcare system and the labour market simultaneously. Taking inspiration from human geography literature on the concept of ‘space–time fixity’, we present cross‐national findings on the logistical challenges of arranging childcare. Evidence is drawn from interviews with parent‐ and childcare‐related organizations in six European countries: Germany, Hungary, Italy, Slovenia, Sweden and the UK. Our research provides a richer understanding of childcare availability than would a sole focus on formal childcare services, by elucidating the difficulties parents face in organizing access to these services, which can be a challenge to some extent even in contexts where childcare services are comprehensive and affordable.

What Drives National Differences in Intensive Grandparental Childcare in Europe?

Objectives. Grandparents play an important role in looking after grandchildren, although intensive grandparental childcare varies considerably across Europe. Few studies have explicitly investigated the extent to which such cross-national variations are associated with national level differences in individual demographic and socio-economic distributions along with contextual-structural and cultural factors (e.g., variations in female labor force participation, childcare provision, and cultural attitudes). Methods. We used multilevel models to examine associations between intensive grandparental childcare and contextual-structural and cultural factors, after controlling for grandparent, parent, and child characteristics using nationally representative data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe. Results. Even controlling for cross-national differences in demographic and socio-economic distributions, contextual-structural factors play an important role in explaining grandparental childcare variations in Europe. In particular, higher levels of intensive grandparental childcare are found in countries with low labor force participation among younger and older women, and low formal childcare provision, where mothers in paid work largely rely on grandparental support on an almost daily basis. Discussion. Encouraging older women to remain in paid work is likely to have an impact on grandchild care which in turn may affect mothers’ employment, particularly in Southern European countries where there is little formal childcare.

The impact of caring for grandchildren on the health of grandparents in Europe: A lifecourse approach

Grandparents are becoming an increasingly important source of childcare. However, caring for grandchildren may have negative health consequences particularly for grandparents with intensive commitments such as those with primary care responsibilities. To date most studies on this issue are based on cross-sectional data and do not take earlier life circumstances into account. Thus, it is not known whether (or to what extent) the relationship between grandparental childcare and health is due to cumulative advantage or disadvantage throughout the lifecourse or to the impact of grandchild care per se.Employing data from waves 1–3 of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe we investigated the longitudinal relationship between grandparental childcare (i.e. intensive and non-intensive) and health once cumulative histories of advantage or disadvantage are taken into account. We used latent class analysis to categorise respondents according to childhood socio-economic and health conditions drawing on life history information. Experiences in adulthood (e.g. periods of ill health) were also captured. We created a latent continuous physical health variable based on self- and observer-measured indicators. OLS regression was used to explore the association between physical health at wave 2 and grandparental childcare at baseline, controlling for conditions in childhood and adulthood, and for health and socio-economic characteristics.We found a positive longitudinal association between grandchild care and health even after earlier life health and socio-economic conditions were taken into account. However, this significant association was found only for grandmothers, and not grandfathers. Our results suggesting the health benefits of grandchild care are important given the widespread provision of grandparental childcare in Europe. However, further research on underlying mechanisms and causal pathways between grandchild care and grandparent health, as well as on gender differences in the pattern of association, is needed.

What Drives National Differences in Intensive Grandparental Childcare in Europe?

Objectives.Grandparents play an important role in looking after grandchildren, although intensive grandparental childcare varies considerably across Europe. Few studies have explicitly investigated the extent to which such cross-national variations are associated with national level differences in individual demographic and socio-economic distributions along with contextual-structural and cultural factors (e.g., variations in female labor force participation, childcare provision, and cultural attitudes).Methods.We used multilevel models to examine associations between intensive grandparental childcare and contextual-structural and cultural factors, after controlling for grandparent, parent, and child characteristics using nationally representative data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe.Results.Even controlling for cross-national differences in demographic and socio-economic distributions, contextual-structural factors play an important role in explaining grandparental childcare variations in Europe. In particular, higher levels of intensive grandparental childcare are found in countries with low labor force participation among younger and older women, and low formal childcare provision, where mothers in paid work largely rely on grandparental support on an almost daily basis.Discussion.Encouraging older women to remain in paid work is likely to have an impact on grandchild care which in turn may affect mothers’ employment, particularly in Southern European countries where there is little formal childcare.

The business of childcare in Europe

This article is based on work undertaken for the European Commission (EC) as part of a wider project on what is termed ‘social services of general interest’. The EC is currently engaged in considering what kind of legislative and quality assurance mechanisms might be promoted for those social services, which have been opened up to competition. The EC work reported here mapped the extent to which early education and childcare (ECEC) is provided by private organizations in the member states of the European Union, and what regulatory frameworks exist for such services. This article foregrounds the situation in the UK, and England in particular. England is exceptional in Europe in the degree to which it has conceptualized and promoted childcare as a business or for-profit enterprise; and it has developed a regulatory framework with a narrow scope which excludes or limits such issues as financial regulation, access, pay and conditions of work for staff, and accountability measures.

Grandparental Child Care in Europe: Evidence for Preferential Investment in More Certain Kin

Theories of kin selection and parental investment predict stronger investment in children and grandchildren by women and maternal kin. Due to paternity uncertainty, parental and grandparental investments along paternal lineages are based on less certain genetic relatedness with the children and grandchildren. Additionally, the hypothesis of preferential investment (Laham, Gonsalkorale, and von Hippel, 2005) predicts investment to vary according to available investment options. Two previous studies have tested this hypothesis with small samples and conflicting results. Using the second wave of the large and multinational Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), collected in 2006-07, we study the preferential investment hypothesis in contemporary Europe based on self-reported grandparental provision of child care. We predict that 1) maternal grandmothers provide most care for their grandchildren, followed by maternal grandfathers, paternal grandmothers and last by paternal grandfathers; 2) maternal grandfathers and paternal grandmothers provide equal amounts of care when the latter do not have grandchildren via a daughter; 3) women who have grandchildren via both a daughter and a son will look after the children of the daughter more; and 4) men who have grandchildren via both a daughter and a son will look after the children of the daughter more. Results support all four hypotheses and provide evidence for the continuing effects of paternity uncertainty in contemporary kin behavior.

Work–family policies, participation, and practices: fathers and childcare in Europe

This paper asks about social policies for fathers’ participation in childcare in Europe, and fathers’ work–family reconciliation practices and ideals, with special reference to the UK. In some European countries, especially Sweden, reform has given fathers non-transferable rights to parental leave. Might such innovations enhance UK men's contribution to childcare? In the UK, gender inequalities in policy are stark: parental leave systems assume – through maternity leaves – mothers’ responsibility for care, while seeing fathers’ care as a question of individual choice. Our qualitative research asked how fathers managed reconciliation between work and family, and how alternative social policy strategies would fit with their practices and ideals. The paper concludes that social policies supporting men's care – particularly parental leave dedicated to fathers – are needed to enhance gender equality and work–family reconciliation for men and for women.

Teaching and Learning Guide for: A Window on the ‘New’ Sociology of Childhood

Teaching and Learning Guide for: A Window on the ‘New’ Sociology of Childhood

Paradoxes of New Labour Social Policy: Toward Universal Child Care in Europe's "Most Liberal" Welfare Regime?

This article interrogates recent developments in early childhood education and care policy in Britain, taking care to include the experiences in Wales and Scotland alongside those in England. It focuses on the apparently paradoxical aspiration to “universal childcare” in the state usually identified as the most liberal (residualist) in Europe. It finds evidence of greater policy innovation in Wales than in Scotland, despite the weaker formal powers and flimsier child care policy legacy in the former. England displays a second paradox: policy expansion (from a very low base) against an apparently unfavorable background despite a lack of strategic policy coherence. On the basis of this record, the article goes on to a reappraisal of welfare regime theory. It argues that we should expect a degree of incoherence and inconsistency in social policies. As a result, regimes are better understood as abstract concepts than as precise descriptions of particular welfare states, which are better understood as welfare settlements.

Caring for Our Young: Child Care in Europe and the United States

Parents in the United States struggle to find and afford even mediocre private child care. Most European countries provide quality publicly-funded programs. Should child care emphasize education or play? Parents or peers? Organized care or parental involvement?

?Please draw me a sheep?: My journey with child care

The author provides a comparative perspective on professional child care in Europe and North America, following on an experiential exploration of the development of child care in Europe from its Antiquity and Middle Ages to Modern Times. These two analyses provide a basis for suggesting philosophical, cultural, ecological, clinical, interdisciplinary, political, and cooperative concerns for child care in the Third Millenium.

Commentary: More about Child Care in Europe

Commentary: More about Child Care in Europe