Involvement In Family Life Research Articles

Caring for Our Youngest: Public Attitudes in the United States

Families make choices about employment and care for their children in a context that is shaped by public policies and colored by public opinion. Debates over whether the government should increase funding for child care or do more to help parents stay home with their children reflect tensions among strongly held ideas about family life, work, and the role of government. This article summarizes the results of public opinion polls that probe attitudes about parent and government roles and responsibilities with respect to children's care. The polling findings yield three main lessons: The American public believes that parents should be the primary influence in their children's lives and that it is best if mothers can be home to care for the very young. The public also values family self-sufficiency and understands that low-income families may need child care assistance to balance child rearing and employment responsibilities. However, skepticism about the appropriateness of government involvement in family life limits public support for proposals that the government act directly to provide or improve child care. From these lessons, the author draws several conclusions for policymakers: Policies focused on caregiving should respect the rights of parents to raise their children by ensuring that an array of options is available. Public programs should help families who are struggling economically to balance their obligations to work and family. Rather than directly providing child care services, government should fund community-based child care programs, and provide flexible assistance to help families secure the services they need and want.

Spousal Interdependence in Turnover Decisions: The Case of Israel's Medical Sector Employees

Gender-related labor behavior traditionally has been sensitive to and symptomatic of changes in the labor force and the social structure. Two developments in family life call into question the traditional gender model of work behavior, which posits the family versus job dichotomy: (a) the greater share of economic responsibilities assumed by female spouses, and (b) the greater male involvement in family life within married couple families. A multivariate model that encompasses demographics, work conditions, and family constraints was regressed on the actual turnover behavior of male and female spouses. The analysis reveals that male and female respondents differ in the importance they assign to employment conditions and work attitudes, but they do not differ in the importance they assign to the other spouse's employment and family responsibilities when a turnover decision is considered. These findings support the notion of spousal interdependence in turnover decisions. This interdependence nevertheless is asymmetrical, since the turnover antecedents are caused by the impact of different predictors for men and women.

The Inclusion of Fathers In Family Therapy: A Research Based Perspective

This paper summarizes the results of research on the role of fathers in families and family therapy with particular reference to preparation for fatherhood, father involvement in family life as a protective factor, fathers' deviant behaviour as a risk factor, fathers' communication and coping styles, fatherhood and different types of marriages, and the effects of the workplace on fathers' behaviour within the family. Available research suggests that, with respect to problem formation, the behaviour of fathers may serve as either a risk factor or as a protective factor. With respect to problem resolution, fathers may be a powerful therapeutic resource or seriously compromise effectiveness of family therapy. The implications of research for clinical practice are discussed.

Men and Women: Work and Family

Explored are the interaction of men and women with work and family, specifically dynamics that contribute to shared parenting, the power of men's marital and parental roles, differential stresses associated wzth commuting versus singleresidence dual-career couples, and intervention strategies to increase fathers' involvement in family life.

Reliability of the Foster Care Placement Decision: A Review

When a child welfare caseworker is deciding whether or not to remove a child from his or her biological parent or parents and to place the child in foster family care, the worker is making one of the most important decisions in both the parent's and the child's life. What is the foundation for this type of drastic intervention? This article reviews the scientific and clinical knowledge base developed to warrant professional intervention by the child welfare caseworker in this situation. Intervention does not appear to have a sufficient scientific or clinical basis in the social work literature to suggest that this is a professional judgment that the child welfare caseworker should be called upon to make. At a minimum, court involvement in the decision-makingprocess is required to provide sufficient justification for state involvement in family life until a firmer base for professional judgment can be demonstrated.

Family-Building Patterns of Professional Women: A Comparison of Lawyers, Physicians, and Postsecondary Teachers

Researchers analyzed 1980 data on 1120 postsecondary teachers 839 lawyers and 486 physicians to compare family building events of these 3 groups of 30-39 year old white professional women living in the US. 35-39 year old women were less likely to be currently married and were more likely to have no children than women in the general population ( 75% and 20-30% vs. 9%). More 35-39 year old physicians were currently married than lawyers (68.7% vs. 59.3%; p<.05). They also were less likely to be divorced than both lawyers and teachers (10.1% vs. 20.6% and 16.1% respectively; p<.05). Lawyers had the highest divorce and the lowest marriage rates. A higher percentage of physicians remarried than the other 2 groups (30-34 year olds=49.1% vs. 35.4% for lawyers and 44.6% for teachers; p<.05 for lawyers only; 34-39 year olds=51.4% vs. 46.5% and 49.7% respectively). 35-39 year old physicians were less likely to be childless (21.1% vs. 28.4% for lawyers and 31.4% for teachers; p<.05 for teachers only). They also had more children than the other professional groups (2.18 vs. 1.93 and 1.8 respectively; p<.05). Even though 35-39 year old physicians exhibited greater involvement in family life than the other 2 groups they worked considerably more hours/week than the other 2 groups (43.5 vs. 38.3 and 35.2 respectively; p<.05). Their husbands worked even more hours but the difference was not significant (47.9 vs. 46.3 and 45.2 respectively). A possible explanation for the differences may be wage differences. Women physicians made more money than the other groups. Lawyers and teachers were at greater risk of income loss following marriage and childbearing than physicians. Thus they were more likely to not marry remarry and have children. Other possible reasons which the researchers could not test were personality differences and structure of career paths. Further research is needed to explore these possibilities for the differences among the 3 professional groups of women.

Hispanic Househusbands

This is a qualitative field study of Hispanic househusbands in Southern California. It focuses upon 22 men who assume roles which emphasize household maintenance and emotional family support in direct contrast to the norms and traditions of the Latino subculture. Questionnaires and in-depth interviews revealed that most respondents viewed their role reversals as brought about by external economic circumstances and as temporary. Respondents reported greater involvement in family life and a greater understanding of their partners and children. The division of labor remained somewhat traditional although the availability of time influenced task responsibility. Positive self-concept and male gender identity were enhanced when family and friends were supportive and accepting of the role transcendence. Although machismo remained a powerful influence and the women's movement was frequently denied or mistrusted, increased information exchange resulted in crosssex empathy and identification which may ultimately weaken traditional sex role separation. The perceived short-term role reversal may have long-term effects on machismo, ascriptive sex role statuses and social order in the Hispanic community.

Rearranging Family and Career Priorities: Professional Women and Men of the Eighties

This study examines changes in the interrelationships of family career aspirations and occupational values over the 1970s decade for women and men graduating from college. Findings document the dramatic increase during the 1970s of university womens desires for high-status professional career and commitment to concomitant lifestyles and values. Aspiring professionals desiring career--accomodating lifestyles face the greatest potential for role conflict. The numbers of women who expect to place family 1st have declined. If family becomes a source of stress rather than support the dual-career family lifestyle may not be viable. Much of the hard-won ground upon which these undergraduates expectations rose is in danger of being lost unless changes are made in the social structure of the family and workplace to allow men intimate involvement in family life and women equitable opportunities for career advancement. Todays aspiring professionals will face difficult choices: lowering career aspirations or consciously rejecting parenthood.

Occupational commitments and paternal deprivation.

In the post-war era the husband-father role has been enlarged to encompass active participation in family life. However, occupational commitments may inhibit active involvement in family life, particularly in the middle classes where work has traditionally been defined as salient. This article reports on an investigation of the consequences of heavy work commitments for father role performance and child development. This investigation, using the case study method, focussed on hospital medicine and the early child-rearing stage of the family life cycle. It was found that fathers felt themselves to be shadowy figures in the background of their children's lives and that mothers experienced single-handed responsibility for child-rearing as burdensome. Children have little experience of a father's companionship, and discipline and work pressures may be transmitted to them. A few children exhibited behaviour difficulties. Suggestions for further study are made.