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The abstracts provided here are taken from Family,
the
Institute's Australian Family &
Society
Abstracts
This article examines value differences between groups. The focus is
on differences
in a set of traditional family values - attitudes to working mothers,
careers
for women, gender roles, marriage, cohabitation, ex nuptial births,
single parents,
childlessness, divorce, sex outside of marriage and homosexuality. The
findings
in this article come from the 1989 - 90 and the 1993 National Social
Science
Survey and the 1995 Australian Family Values Survey. Together these
three surveys
provide a current picture of views held by adult Australians on a wide
range
of family values. The majority of people held many traditional family
values.
A large majority of respondents stressed that caring for young children
should
take priority over work for mothers, and the majority supported the
traditional
breadwinner role for men and family role for women.
Full text (396K)
Dempsey, K. Women's
perceptions
of fairness and the persistence of an unequal division of
housework.
In the continuing endeavour to find convincing explanations for the
persistence
of an unequal division of domestic work, researchers have been
addressing the
following question: Do women who are doing most of the work believe they
are
being treated unjustly? The author determined that the majority of
employed
wives who are carrying by far the greater load of unpaid work declare
that they
were being treated fairly by their partners. The predictions of
feminists that
their consciousness raising activities, coupled with the entry of most
wives
into the paid workforce, would result in wives recognising that they
were being
exploited by their husbands have not been fulfilled. The author stresses
that
employed women often pay a high price physically and psychologically for
the
persistence of an inequitable division of housework. They have higher
rates
of depressive illness than employed husbands and many employed women are
perpetually
tired, often with feelings of ambivalence and resentment.
Full text (469K)
Funder, K. Changes in
child
support.
This article looks at changes to the Child Support Scheme. Aspects of
the child
support debate have centred on what was considered to be the unfair
demands
for financial support from non resident parents. There are four main
changes
to the scheme which are as follows: all non resident parents have to
contribute
a minimum weekly rate; some loopholes created by manipulating taxable
income
in order to minimise support payments have been closed; the liability of
non
resident parents for the financial support of children has been reduced
in cases
where there are second family responsibilities and where the resident
parent
earns more than $29,598; and parents are encouraged, and even required,
to move
off the scheme where collection appears reliable.
Full text (281K)
Kilmartin, C.
Children, divorce
and one-parent families.
This article outlines the latest trends relating to children, divorce
and single
parent families. The 1996 divorce figures showed the highest level in
the age
specific divorce rate for more than a decade, with one of the
consequences being
an increase in the existence of one parent families. Although the major
growth
of children living in one parent families is likely to derive from the
growth
in divorce, other factors such as the breakdown of de facto
relationships are
also contributing to this trend.
Full
text (396K)
Kilmartin, C.
Teenage ex-nuptial
births.
There have been some concerns that Australian teenage exnuptial
births are
rising and this article looks at the latest trends in this area.
Although the
rate has been increasing, it has not been growing as fast as the rate of
increase
of exnuptial births to older women. Therefore, explains the author,
relative
to the changing nature of births in Australian society, the teenage
exnuptial
birth rate has been making a decreasing contribution.
Full
text (440K)
McGurk, H; Kolar, V.
Exploring
parenthood and parenting: an introduction to
'Parenting-21'.
A major new study by the Australian Institute of Family Studies,
Parenting-21,
investigates how ordinary parents in ordinary Australian families are
going
about the task of bringing up children who are going to live the major
part
of their lives in the 21st century. This article sets the context of
Parenting-21.
The development of the project was influenced by consideration of
outcomes from
previous investigations of parents' ideas on parenting and child
rearing. It
involves studying the relationships between parental beliefs, ideas and
understanding
about the nature of children and childhood, and their child rearing
practices,
and focuses on the rearing of children from infancy to middle childhood.
The
study is part of an international network of projects known as the
International
Parents, Schools and Child Research Consortium.
Full text (458K)
Millward, C. Divorce
and
family relations in later life.
Parental divorce or separation can modify family networks, thus
affecting the
levels of intergenerational support available to people as they grow
older.
Overseas research has found that being divorced or separated decreases
levels
of contact and exchange between older parents and adult children, and
leads
to poorer parent - child relationships. In this article the author
examines
the effect of parental divorce and separation on the nature of
intergenerational
relations between older Australian parents and their adult children. At
issue
is whether or not public policies based upon assumptions of private
support
from adult children to older parents are ill founded where the parents
have
experienced divorce.
Full
text (629K)
Weston, R. Turning to
father:
the role of fathers relative to mothers and friends as confidants for
adolescents.
There is a growing public awareness that fathers, like mothers,
provide advice,
friendship and emotional support for their children. In this article the
author
discusses the extent to which teenagers confide in their fathers,
mothers and
friends, and whether confiding in fathers is independently linked with
the well
being of teenagers. The analysis is based on the 1991-92 Australian
Institute
of Family Studies Australian Living Standards Study, and focuses on the
responses
of 2016 young people who lived with both natural parents. Findings show
that
the approachability of both fathers and mothers may contribute to the
well being
of adolescents, while at the same time high well being in young people
may predispose
them to approach their parents for advice or emotional support. The link
between
the tendency to confide in fathers and adolescents' well being is
consistent
with arguments advanced by proponents of the men's movement that fathers
can
play an important role in their children's lives, not only as providers
of financial
and material support but also as confidants, nurturers and role models,
and
as providers of emotional and practical support for mothers.
Full text (505K)
Winter, I. Australian
family
research and policy news.
This column is designed to keep readers informed of contemporary
developments
that matter to families. It is compiled from reports provided by a panel
of
the following corresponding consultants with expertise in the many
dimensions
of family research and policy making: Pat Noller; Cynthia a'Beckett;
Sotirios
Sarantakos; Steven Zubrick; Judy Cashmore; Hal Kendig; Alison Garton;
Jon Altman;
and Lee Wightman. The column provides a snapshot of family research and
policy
issues from a range of research perspectives and geographic locations
around
Australia.
Full
text (699K)
Wolcott, I. The
influence
of family relationships on later life.
As the population ages, increasing attention is being focused on the
family
circumstances and relationships of people in later life. This article
reports
on the meaning and role of family relationships in the lives of men and
women
aged between 50 and 70 years. It is based on data from the Later Life
Families
Study conducted by the Australian Institute of Family Studies between
August-December
1996. The author found that for the majority of men and women in this
age group,
family across the generations was important and contact with family was
frequent.
Although only one third of men and women said specifically that their
own parents
or their children would influence later life decisions and activities,
the majority
of all respondents reported participating in a substantial amount of
reciprocal
support and valued family contact.
Full
Text (536K)
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