Abstract Good day-nursery education and its development require increased participation by the parents in the planning, implementation and evaluation of their children's day-care process. It is therefore the purpose of the current study to interpret and understand the conceptions of education held by the mothers of day-nursery children and their assessments of good day-nursery education. The theoretical frame of reference of this study is based on an existential-phenomenological approach to education and the holistic conception of man outlined by Rauhala (1983). The research data consists of individual and pair interviews with seven mothers selected in three day nurseries, and of their written evaluations of the summaries of these interviews. The data analysis made use of content analysis and an interpretational approach aiming at understanding meanings on the basis of wholes of thought. The Nud*ist analysis software was used as a technical tool. The study shows that the educational conceptions of the mothers of day-nursery children conform to the phenomenological approach to education. Their conception of the child focuses on individuality, the importance of the development of emotional life and self-esteem, as well as active subjectivity. The mothers have a mainly positive view on the possibilities of the day-nursery staff to support these areas of development. Their conceptions of the goals of education span between individual subjectivity and collectivity. The goals are crystallised in the individual who is a creative survivor capable of realising human dignity many-sidedly in relation to self and others. Day-nursery education is often a conscious choice by the parents to achieve these goals, although those interviewed also intervene in the social influences received by their children if necessary. The conceptions of the educational relationship and methods focus on a confidential and caring relationship in which open authority enables a genuine dialogue that creates something new between the child and adult. A democratic community of adults is also a source of modeling for the child. On this basis the personnel is authorised by the parents to act on behalf of the child. The conceptions of educational collaboration are based on the primary educational responsibility of the parents, and therein on the realisation of the parent's existential needs. Successful collaboration requires the parents to be well enough informed of day-nursery education and to have a positive emotional relationship with the day nursery and the child's educational situation. The parent also needs to have the opportunity to be fully involved in the child's educational process. The collaboration is mostly felt to support parenthood, but crisis situations may also cause value conflicts between the parents and staff. The results would suggest that knowledge and understanding of the parents' educational conceptions would promote the professionals' efforts to consider the differences between families and support educational companionship. In this way the parents' involvement would also be reinforced in terms of joint planning and evaluation in day-nursery education. The parents' ideas would thus also be conveyed to early childhood education planners and decision-makers to support them in their work. / Tiivistelmä Hyvän päiväkotikasvatuksen ja sen kehittämisen edellytys on vanhempien osallisuuden vahvistaminen lapsen päivähoitoprosessin suunnittelussa, toteuttamisessa ja arvioinnissa. Tästä syystä tämän tutkimuksen tehtävänä on tulkita ja ymmärtää päiväkotilasten äitien kasvatuskäsityksiä sekä heidän arviointiaan päiväkotikasvatuksesta. Tutkimuksen teoreettisen viitekehyksen perustana on eksistentiaalis-fenomenologinen lähtökohta kasvatuksessa ja Rauhalan (1983) määrittelemä holistinen ihmiskäsitys. Tutkimusaineisto koostuu kolmesta päiväkodista valittujen seitsemän äidin yksilö- ja parihaastatteluista sekä kirjallisista arvioinneista, joita he antoivat haastatteluidensa tiivistelmistä. Aineiston analyysissä on sovellettu sisällönanalyysiä ja tulkinnallista otetta, joka pyrkii ajatuskokonaisuuksien pohjalta merkitysten ymmärtämiseen. Teknisenä apuvälineenä on käytetty Nud*ist-analyysiohjelmaa. Tutkimuksen tuloksena päiväkotilasten äitien kasvatuskäsitykset myötäilevät eksistentiaalis-fenomenologista lähestymistapaa kasvatuksessa. Käsitys lapsesta painottaa yksilöllisyyttä, tunne-elämän ja itsetunnon kehityksen tärkeyttä sekä aktiivista subjektiutta. äideillä on pääosin positiivinen käsitys päiväkodin henkilöstön mahdollisuuksista tukea näitä kehityksen alueita. Käsitykset kasvatustavoitteista keskittyvät yksilöllisen subjektiuden ja yhteisöllisyyden jännevälille. Tavoitteet kiteytyvät yksilöön, joka on luova selviytyjä ja kykenee toteuttamaan monipuolista ihmisarvoa suhteessa itseensä ja muihin ihmisiin. Päiväkotikasvatus on usein vanhempien tietoinen valinta näiden tavoitteiden saavuttamiseksi, joskin haastatellut myös puuttuvat tarvittaessa lapsensa saamiin sosiaalisiin vaikutteisiin. Käsitykset kasvatussuhteesta ja -menetelmistä painottavat luottamuksellista ja välittävää kasvatussuhdetta, jossa avoin auktoriteetti mahdollistaa aidon ja uutta luovan dialogin lapsen ja aikuisen välillä. Demokraattinen aikuisyhteisö on myös lapsen mallioppimisen lähde. Tältä pohjalta henkilöstöllä on vanhempien valtuutus toimia lapsen valtuutettuna. Käsitykset kasvatusyhteistyöstä nojaavat vanhempien ensisijaiseen kasvatusvastuuseen ja siinä vanhemman eksistentiaalisten tarpeiden toteutumiseen. Onnistunut yhteistyö edellyttää vanhemman riittävää tietotasoa päiväkotikasvatuksesta sekä tunnetasolla myönteistä kokemusta vanhemman omasta suhteesta päiväkotiin samoin kuin lapsen kasvatustilanteesta. Osallistumisen tasolla vanhemman tulee saada vaikuttaa lapsensa kasvatusprosessiin. Pääsääntöisesti yhteistyö on koettu vanhemmuutta tukevana. Kriisitilanteet kuitenkin saattavat nostaa esiin myös arvoristiriitoja vanhempien ja henkilöstön välillä. Tulokset antavat viitteitä siitä, että vanhempien kasvatuskäsitysten tunteminen ja ymmärtäminen voisivat parantaa ammattilaisten työtä perheiden erilaisuuden huomioimisessa ja tukea kasvatuskumppanuutta. Tällöin myös vanhempien osallisuus vahvistuisi yhteisenä suunnitteluna ja arviointina päiväkotikasvatuksessa. Vanhempien käsitykset tulisivat näin artikuloiduiksi myös varhaiskasvatuksen suunnittelijoiden ja päättäjien työn tueksi.

D.Cur. (Psychiatric Nursing Science) / The overall goal of this research study was to explore and describe strategies in order to promote the mental health of married couples throughout the ante- and postnatal period. The majority of research on the transition to parenthood has found that as couples become parents, there is a dramatic decrease in positive marital interchanges, a dramatic increase in marital conflict and a precipitous decline in marital satisfaction (Belsky & Kelly, 1994; Belsky & Pensky, 1988: 133-156; Belsky, Spanier & Rovine, 1983: 567-577). The transition to parenthood is viewed as instigating a shift in the marriage whereby most couples are expected to experience a qualitative change in their relationship that is relatively abrupt (Pancer, Pratt, Hunsberger & Gallant, 2000: 253-280). Becoming a new parent poses challenges for nearly every married couple (Curran, Hazen, Jacobvitz & Feldman, 2005: 189). Becoming a parent is a major developmental transition of adulthood (Harwood, McLean & Durkin, 2007: 1). Individuals often have optimistic expectations about parenthood, yet this transition also presents a number of challenges (Harwood et al, 2007: 1). The questions that arose was what are the stories of married couples throughout the ante- and postnatal period of their first child, and what can be done by an advanced psychiatric nursing practitioner to promote the mental health of married couples based on their story. The researcher utilised a qualitative, explorative, descriptive and contextual study design as described in Babbie (2010: 92). This research study was carried out in four phases. During the first phase of this research study, the researcher explored and described the stories of married couples throughout the ante- and postnatal period of their first child according to the quest narrative method described by Frank (1997: 115). The results were discussed within relevant literature. iv In the second phase of this research study the researcher developed a conceptual framework on the basis of the empirical data. The conceptual framework was developed according to the concepts as proposed by Dickoff, James and Wiedenbach (1968: 435). The researcher described strategies, to promote the mental health of married couples throughout the ante- and postnatal period of their first child, in the third phase of this research study. These strategies were described according to a relationship phase, a working phase and a termination phase as part of the facilitation process. These three phases were discussed as part of a proposed facilitation process that forms part of the developed conceptual framework. In the fourth phase of this research study, the developed strategies were subjected to expert assessment according to the criteria stated by Chinn and Kramer (2011: 196-205). The findings of the research study are applicable to psychiatric nursing practice, research and psychiatric nursing education.

This thesis deals with the relation between marriage and parenthood in the Czech Republic. The main object is to explore changes in the family behavior of young generations and to analyze the related demographic processes of fertility and nuptality. Special attention is paid to marital, extramarital and premarital fertility. The thesis searches for the answer of the question if the marital surroundings are still unique for the child upbringing or if the economic and value changes of the society after 1989 broke the traditional family formation. Another important object is to perform a cluster analysis. Czech districts are divided into the clusters, which are made to describe the current situation. The last part demonstrates the results of the quantitative survey, which helps to find out the public attitudes about family life.

Within the Folds is a 70,000 word novel where prehistory and the near future meet together in a narrative examining the forces of evolution and duration. The work particularly focuses on the conceptual changes taking place in parenting models as biomedical science gives opportunities to reproductive paradigms which were previously impossible. Taking the premise that developments in human engineering are unstoppable, I explore the transgenic boundaries between 'natural evolution' and proactive human design, conceptually and thematically, as new models of gender roles within family life become inevitable.

This master thesis is focused on the present state of the family issues in the Czech Republic. Except the explanation of the basic terminology, it also indicates some of the areas with the family in the first place and its legal regulations and sociology investigation. It observes the actual trends in the behaviour of couples in the connection with the common life and starting family. The acquired demographic and sociological findings, valid generally for the Czech Republic, are analysed and compared with the statistical dates of the lower territory self-governing units. It also checks the rate of the regional differences above these regions (mainly at the level of districts), especially in the area of the marriage behaviour, parenthood and amount of the separating marriages. It confronts these data with the age structure of the founding family members. At the end of the graduation thesis is established whether the results of the sociological investigation and studies are consistent with the realized conclusions from the statistic data and if there exist the significant regional dissimilarities in the Czech Republic in statistic indicators which characterize the "family" behaviour of population.

The field of autism in epidemiology has received much attention in recent times especially as scientific information evolves on the causes and impact of autism spectrum disorder. Just as medical research is conducting to arrest the growing pace of autism with current research indicating one out of every 68 children in the United States diagnosed autistic, the field of the social science has equally produced some literature on the subject. Much of the social science and epidemiological information in the field has bothered on framing the concept (Murray, 2008), historical dimension and causation of the disease, and its associative influence on family (Grinker, 2007). However, not much has been done to assess the phenomenon from the point of view of conflict analysis and resolution (Sabatelli & Waldron, 1995) to fully understand their sense of conflict ambiguity and ambiguous loss of a child with autism (Cridland et al. 2014; O'Brien, 2007). This research therefore attempted to bridge that gap through reflexive analysis of transcripts from phenomenological interviewing of 19 participants comprised of 14 single parents and 5 married couples with autistic children. While the primary focus of the research was Single parents, married couples served comparative analytical purpose of data validation. Theories of phenomenology, Resilience, human needs, stereotypes & identity, relative deprivation, attribution, critical theory, ambiguous loss, etc. operationalize to frame the research language for hermeneutical transformative interpretation and social action about the phenomenon. Results from the study indicate conflict behavioral experience, a burden curve and resilient risk factors associated with caring for an autistic child leading to possible crisis borderline.

The purpose of the current study was, in general, to use the Experience Sampling Methodology (ESM) to more accurately assess the types of behaviors that mothers and fathers engage in with their sons and daughters and the amount of time they spend engaged in those behaviors when compared to each other.

Apart from the significant amount of research based in the perspective of social service workers, parents’ viewpoints of their experiences with children in long-term foster care is notably underrepresented within social science literature. To address this lack in coverage this paper discusses parents’ experiences of compulsory care (LVU) using content analysis drawing on selected comment sections from two internet-based discussion forums, Flashback and Familjeliv. Our main objective was to analyse parents’ descriptions of their relations with the social services and changes in the perceptions of the role of parenting after the emergency removal. Applying the theoretical framework of social trust we sought to achieve a deeper understanding for the parents’ situation. The social trust theory aims at analysing individuals’ trust for the state and state institutions, especially in relation to different social groups. The study shows that the high levels of trust between citizen and authorities, one of the Swedish society’s central trademarks, was not reflected in the material collected concerning parents’ experiences of the so-called social safety net. In line with previous research, parents’ narratives demonstrated a significant distrust for the social services and their descriptions indicated a sense of neglect. Parents’ comments also suggested a lack of understanding for the judgements made by social service workers and the resulting compulsory care.

The aim of this study was to examine how social workers in outpatient programs fordrug and alcohol abuse explain the process of working with parenthood and theparental ability amongst clients with children. The study was conducted throughqualitative interviews with five different social workers, who worked within anoutpatient programs. The analysis was done through two different perspectives; onewith focus on the clients engagement in different social systems and one regarding theclients relationships and interaction with others. The main findings of this study arethat the outpatient programs work with parenthood is initiated through the client'sown wishes to work on certain aspects of the parent-child relationship, and indialogue with social workers and other members of the outpatient program. It wasalso discovered that children were involved in the therapeutic work to some extent,but that working with parenthood also revolved around the client being able toexpress feelings of shame and guilt, and how to overcome these feelings with the helpof the social workers and fellow outpatients.

Syftet med denna studie var att lyfta fram pappors beskrivningar av att vara förälder utifrån deras förväntningar av vad en pappa respektive en man är. Detta för att få en överblick kring vilka förutsättningar och hinder män kan stå inför vid uttag av sin rätt till föräldraledighet. För att besvara frågeställningarna har ett kvalitativt metodologiskt angreppssätt använts i form av ostrukturerade intervjuer med öppna frågor. Urvalet i studien var sju fäder med minst ett barn under tre år. Intervjuerna genomfördes genom personligt möte med fem pappor och via telefon med de återstående papporna. De teman som diskuterades under intervjuerna var föräldraskap, arbete och försörjning, papparollen, mansrollen, föräldrastöd och förväntningar på sin partner och vice versa. Insamlad empiri analyserades utifrån en innehållsanalys där kodning och tematisering användes. I studien användes Raewyn Connells teori om olika maskuliniteter och George Herbert Meads teori om symboliska interaktionism som teoretiska utgångspunkter. Dessa teorier användes för att förstå mäns villkor i hur de kan utöva deras rätt till föräldraledighet. Detta genom att lyfta fram vilka barriärer män kan stå inför i förhållande till könsnormer, samt hur de hanterar dessa genom att belysa deras interaktion med andra människor. Resultatet visar att en destruktiv hegemonisk maskulinitet kan utgöra svårigheter för mäns föräldraskap, medan en uppmuntrande hegemonisk maskulinitet tillåter män att våga trotsa ideal om att de inte är hemma med sina barn. Med våra informanters berättelser kunde författarna skilja på en lojalitet gentemot informanternas arbetsplats som kan förklaras i Meads teori om den generaliserade andre. Interaktionen mellan kollegor och andra människor kan utgöra en tvingande arbetskultur som hindrar män att nyttja sina rättigheter. Studien framhäver att även om staten har upprättat reformer som främjar jämlikhet, till exempel de öronmärkta föräldradagarna, kan manlighetsideal förstås hindra staten från att nå sitt mål. / The purpose of this study was to highlight fathers’ descriptions of their expectations of what a father and a man are. The writers of this study aimed to get an overview of different conditions and barriers men can face when exercising their right to parental leave. To answer these questions was a qualitative method in terms of semi-structured interviews with open-ended questions used. The selection in the study was seven fathers with at least one child under three years. The interviews were conducted by a personal meeting with five of the fathers, while two interviews took place over the phone with the two remaining fathers. During the interview’s themes such as parenthood, employment and livelihood, the role of a father, the role of a man, parental support and expectations on their partner and vice versa were introduced. The empirical data is analyzed through a content analysis method, where coding and thematization were used. The study used Raewyn Connell’s theory of different masculinities and George Herbert Mead’s symbolic interaction as theoretical starting points. These theories were used to understand which barriers men face from gender norms and how they handle them being shown through interaction with other people. These conditions can avert men from exercising their right to parental leave. The result shows that a destructive hegemonic masculinity can pose difficulties for men’s parenthood, while an encouraging hegemonic masculinity allows men to dare to defy ideals about them not being home with their children. With our informant’s narrative we were able to distinguish a loyalty towards their workplace which could be emblematized in Mead’s notion about the generalized other. The interaction with colleagues and other people can constitute a coercive work culture that prevents men's protection of their rights. The study highlights that even though the state has established reforms that promote equality, for example the gender-segregated parental days, masculinity ideals can prevent the state from reaching its goal.