Foucault's genealogy is applied to the analysis of welfare-to-work policy and media representations of female-headed families. Discourses of personal responsibility in the history of welfare services and current media representations are analyzed and connected to ideologies of economic citizenship and freedom for female-headed families. A present truth of female-headed families is constructed: female-headed, living in poverty, utilizing welfare services, destructive to the social order and majority African-American. The history of female-headed families and welfare is a development of a knowledge system about single-parent families. This knowledge system is produced by cultural institutions that impose particular meanings on female-headed families as a strategy for controlling poor populations and expunging undeserving poor from social services. Disciplinary mechanisms, both moral and economic, have been transformed to primarily economic mechanisms of self-sufficiency and individual responsibility. Economic mechanisms of control articulated with freedom, citizenship and financial stability have allowed for the emergence of a normative single-parent family. The normative single-parent family is white, female-headed, middle-class and self-sufficient. Analysis of the articulation of welfare-to-work policies post 1996 reform and representations of female-headed families in television and film between 1992 and 2002 is produced in this work. The consequences of welfare-to-work and representations of normative female-headed family are articulated and produce a low-wage labor pool that benefits industry and reproduces the marginalization of single-parent families on welfare.

Sealed adoption records support the notion that adoptive families are the same as biological families and that adoptive parenting should mirror biological parenting. Whether adoptive parents subscribe to these beliefs is not really known, since they have had few opportunities to tell about this way of being a family. The research involved a narrative analysis of the stories told conjointly by six couples in the formation stage and six couples in the launching stage of the adoptive family life cycle; this reflexive research demonstrates the collaborative nature of social constructionism. The research subject (the storyteller) and the research interviewer (the listener) create meaning together through the questions and responses, the interviewers interpretation of the narrative and then the checkback which allows the storyteller to indicate disagreement or enlarged understanding. Adoptive couples with young children were found to believe that their family is not very different from biological families while the couples with children leaving home were assessing their parenting and the strength of their family ties. Overall, the couples seem to be constrained by their cultural understanding of parenthood.

Diana Baumrind's identification in the 1960s of authoritative, authoritarian, and permissive parenting styles, as well as her demonstration of correlations between optimal developmental outcomes and the authoritative style, continue to have profound influences on how child socialization is thought about and researched. But, times have changed. Cultural psychology's assumption of intentional individuals and intentional cultures co-constructing each other allows for the possibility that historically mediated sociocultural differences between the 1960s and 1990s may have influenced childrearing practices and outcomes. For this study, instruments used by Baumrind were adapted to investigate cultural ideals and families today. Middle-class, urban, Northeastern families in which parents (n = 10) of preschool children appeared to meet criteria for the authoritative style were studied in depth. Although the ratios of nurturance and demandingness appear to be comparable in the two time periods among authoritative parents, 1990s parents show substantially more conformist and authoritarian attitudes than did their predecessors. Whereas attitudes of 1960s authoritative parents support children in speaking their minds, 1990s authoritative parents support children in minding their speech. This change is interpreted as a function of historical changes in parents' creative intuitions that optimal developmental outcomes are now less related to the 1960s discourse of agency, and more related to the 1990s agency of discourse. As a consequence, what may appear to be a matter of authoritarianism on the parts of parents is interpreted here as greater vigilance regarding the significance of speech acts for succeeding in the 21st century.

Over the course of the last two decades, homelessness has become one of America's major social problems. On any given night, hundreds of thousands of people can be found living in temporary shelters, abandoned buildings and on the streets of our nation. Many are single mothers with dependent children. A considerable amount of research in recent years has focused on the topic of family homelessness. Most studies have been conducted with families who were homeless at the time of the investigation. They have focused primarily upon the characteristics of homeless mothers and children and the conditions of shelter facilities. The goal of this research was to examine the experience of family homelessness from a somewhat broader perspective by interviewing formerly homeless mothers about their lives before and after leaving the shelter system. A qualitative approach was used in an effort to also convey a sense of individual women's lives. In-depth interviews were conducted with twenty-four formerly homeless single mothers in New York City. Transcripts of these interviews were subsequently analyzed using an interpretive approach. Major themes that emerged from the women's life stories are elucidated. These themes include childhood neglect and abuse, poverty, troubled interpersonal relationships, and the experience of homelessness. The women's descriptions of their lives since leaving the shelter system, including issues of housing, education, employment and mental health, are also examined. A majority of participants talked about their experience in the shelter system in positive terms. This finding is examined in the context of the women's life experiences and also the support services provided by the New York City shelter system.

This work investigates the historical development of mechanized agriculture within the framework of family farming in Friesland province, the Netherlands. The research follows changing domestic composition in three historic municipalities which have been incorporated into the present day municipality of Franekeradeel. Changes within households are compared to changes in the sources of farm labor and the number of people and farms commercially involved in agriculture. The overall impact of these changes is then weighed with respect to the demographic, as well as the spatial make-up of the rural locality. The objective of the research is to study cultural continuity under conditions of rapidly changing technology. The main inquiry focuses on how rural families have modified productive and consumptive technologies over the last one hundred years to fit local and domestic social conditions. The primary focus is to study how an expansion of agricultural productivity has been effected within the households organizing farming. The secondary focus has been to study the effect expanding productivity has on farming households and local rural society. The analytical framework outlines changing dimensions of property rights by focusing on changes in the social form of labor, which is itself a dynamic property relationship. Other dimensions of historic property relations explored include domestic dynamics, technical change, land tenure patterns, patterns of productive ownership and devolution. Results of the demographic research indicate that since the advent of industrial processing, particularly dairying and crop harvesting, lack of employment and changing expectations for women have led to a higher outmigration of women than men, engendering changes in domestic composition. A diminished number of female headed households and a diminished retention of unmarried adult female, versus male children within the domestic unit are two primary markers. Conclusions arising from the analysis of the social construction of property rights indicate an ongoing diminution of private alienable rights, in favor of increased public/state allocation of property right's content. The construction of rights around the ownership of dairy production values following the establishment of the 1983 European Community quota system provides an example of this.

This study assesses the family and social conditions that shape adults' interaction with siblings, emotional closeness among siblings, the nature and amount of their help exchange, and the compatibility of adult views on their shared sibling relationship. Analyses are based on three data sets: the 1986 version of the General Social Survey; an original study of caregiving, which included a follow-up telephone interview; and a mail questionnaire sent to adult siblings. Original respondents in the caregiving study who had at least one sibling (N = 198) were recontacted to determine the amount of help, level of closeness and frequency of interaction with all siblings in their family (N = 607). We received 248 return questionnaires out of 462 mailed from these "target siblings." In the GSS, we found that contrary to popular opinion, affectionate components of sibling ties do not inevitably eclipse practical ones. We also found that race significantly shaped the extent to which adults felt close and gave help to adult siblings. In our regional data, we learned that adults varied widely in their emotional closeness to siblings within their family; women exhibited greater range in closeness than did men. Adults' perceived compatibility of life views was a significant determinant of closeness with individual siblings. Adult siblings are also far more "practically present" in each other's lives than previously thought. While adults provide more help to parents than they do to siblings, they give relatively equal amounts of help to siblings as they do friends. Research findings also expanded our understanding of the role of parents, early in childhood and later in adult life, both ill and well. Adults who recalled a more cohesive early family life, and a parental emphasis on sibling unity, were closer to adult siblings than those who did not recall such emphases. Sibling favoritism bore no relationship to adult sibling closeness. Siblings with ill parents visited and telephoned each other less often, and felt less close, than sibling dyads with parents in good health. Finally, we observed that there is a striking amount of disagreement among sibling pairs on nearly every relationship dimension we measured.

In an effort to increase our understanding of the experiences of multicultural caregivers, this study investigated factors that might be associated with depression among Black, Anglo, and Latino Alzheimer's Disease (AD) caregivers and analyzed how primary and mediating factors affect each group. Thirty Black, thirty-two Anglo, and thirty Latino participants were asked to report on their experiences as caregivers of Alzheimer's Disease patients. Income levels, size of households, size of social networks, elders' level of impairment, and use of formal services were characterized as primary factors. Participants' attitudes towards caregiving, their levels of competence and confidence in their caregiving roles, and their appraisal of the elders' problems were characterized as mediating factors. MANOVAs and ANOVAs were calculated to compare caregivers' experiences in terms of primary stressors and mediating factors. Results showed that Black and Anglo caregivers rated their primary factors similarly and, for most conditions, more positively than Latino caregivers. In terms of mediating factors: (1) Black and Anglo caregivers reported a more positive appraisal of their caregiving situation than Latinos; (2) Blacks reported significantly higher levels of competence and confidence in their role as caregivers than Latinos; and (3) Blacks and Latinos reported stronger adherence to norms of filial obligation than Anglos. Appraisal was found to be a significant predicting factor of depression among Black and Anglo caregivers and secondary stressors such as factors that were not directly associated with the caregiving situation (i.e. problems related to the caregivers' living situation) were found to be significant in predicting depression among Latino caregivers. In conclusion, when examining the experiences of multicultural groups of caregivers, one cannot make assumptions based on common beliefs and myths that have been attributed to particular ethnic groups. Furthermore, when examining the experiences of caregivers of AD patients, factors that might not be directly related to the caregiving relationship but that may affect the caregivers' health and subjective well-being, should also be taken into account.

This longitudinal study examined the experience of caregiving among a nationally-representative sample of 10,537 middle-aged adults participating in Wave 1 and Wave 2 of the Health and Retirement Study. Individuals were classified as parent caregivers, child caregivers, and multiple (parent and child) caregivers. The low incidence of multiple caregiving found among these middle-aged adults questions the validity of the phenomenon described as the "sandwich generation." Females comprised the majority of the parent, child, and multiple caregiving groups. Contrary to expectations, Black and Latina caregivers were not more likely than whites to hold parent and multiple caregiving roles. A high frequency of caregiving role losses and a low frequency of caregiving role assumptions occurred between Wave 1 and Wave 2. Most notable was the finding that 41% of multiple caregivers and 70% of parent caregivers in Wave 1 became noncaregivers in Wave 2. In addition, only.4% and 6.5% of women assumed multiple care and parent care, respectively. These findings suggest that the experience of caregiving during the middle-generation years is of short duration and likely to decrease over time. No support was found for the "caregiving pile up effect" (Doress-Worters, 1994) among those holding multiple caregiving roles. Rather, female caregivers experienced a decrease in well-being regardless of their caregiving role transitions, while caregivers who gained or maintained caregiving reported better physical health than those who lost caregiving. In addition, caregivers' well-being did not differ from that of noncaregivers, with the exception of ADLs (better for caregivers). Ethnicity was found to play an important and complex role in predicting transitions in caregiving and well-being. As hypothesized, being a Black or Latina caregiver who lost parent care predicted worse well-being. With regards to the maintenance or assumption of child care, however, being a minority woman accounted for worse well-being. The negative consequences of child caregiving for Latinas is especially intriguing given their greater likelihood to maintain child care. There was some support for the notion that minorities' traditional family values in support of caregiving predict better well-being for women maintaining child care or for multiple caregivers.

This study explores the meaning of informal caregiving for individuals living with HIV disease. As the number of individuals living with HIV disease continues to increase, there is a need for research on both the structure of caregiving networks and the meaning these networks have for individuals living with chronic illness. This study is continuous with prior research on social support and the illness experience, but departs from past work by addressing both the objective features of social support relationships and the way that they are subjectively interpreted by people living with HIV disease. Fifty-four (n = 54) individuals living with HIV disease participated in in-depth, qualitative interviews (31 women, 23 men). Participants were recruited from local AIDS service organizations and healthcare facilities in Western New England. Interview data were analyzed using cluster analysis and content analysis techniques. Respondents' informal caregiving networks are summarized using five categories developed using cluster analysis. Content analysis of interview transcriptions illustrate the diverse way respondents interpreted the care they received from network members and the way in which their illness experience was shaped by the different contexts in which they received care. The way in which caregiving networks and respondents interpretations of them varied by gender, race and ethnicity, sexual identity and other self-identifications is discussed. This research furthers the literature on social support and chronic illness. As an exploratory project, the aim of the research was to describe how individuals living with HIV disease make sense of the care they do and do not receive from family members, friends and other informal caregivers. This study contributes to the literature on social support and HIV disease by focusing on low-income individuals, living in small towns and cities and two urban areas that have not been the focus of a great deal of HIV/AIDS research. The results of this study can be used to better understand and strengthen existing relationships within social support networks. This research also has direct implications for both formal and informal caregivers and programs and activities to support them.

The purpose of the study was to explore parents' socialization goals and to describe the patterns of caregiver-child social interaction for the sample of 6 Chinese American toddlers, whose parents immigrated to this country recently. The theoretical framework for the study was Vygotsky's sociocultural approach which assumes that children's thinking derives from human social relations and is embedded in the sociocultural context. The study used a qualitative method of data collection and analysis. Data collection included a demographic questionnaire, two focused interviews and videotaped observations of caregiver-child interactions in everyday activities and joint play. The analysis focused on how caregivers guided and facilitated children's learning and adaptation to life in a North American setting. Parental goals were identified and five themes immerged from the interview data: a focus on learning; an emphasis on developing a loving relationship with the child; an emphasis on bringing up a moral child; an emphasis on guided independence and on adopting the values of the host culture while maintaining the values of their own cultural heritage. Links between the patterns of parent-child interaction and the parental goals were explored. The parents' conscious, creative synthesis of cultural values and practice were discussed. Implication for teachers and clinicians were suggested.