Caught in the middle in mid-life: provision of care across multiple generations

Abstract

With a large baby-boomer generation entering mid-later life in the United Kingdom, and families spanning across multiple generations, understanding how individuals support multiple generations is of increasing research and policy significance. Data from the British 1958 National Child Development Study, collected when respondents were aged 55, are used to examine how mid-life women and men allocate their time to support elderly parents/parents-in-law and their own adult children in terms of providing grandchild care, and whether there is a trade-off in caring for different generations. Binary logistic and multinomial regression models distinguish between individuals supporting multiple generations, only one generation or none. One-third of mid-life individuals are ‘sandwiched’ between multiple generations, by having at least one parent/parent-in-law and one grandchild alive. Among them, half are simultaneously supporting both generations. Caring for grandchildren increases the probability of also supporting one's parents/parents-in-law, and vice versa. More intense support for one generation is associated with a higher likelihood of supporting the other generation. Good health is associated with caring for multiple generations for men and women, while working part-time or not at all is associated with such care provision for women only. Facilitating mid-life men and women in responding to family support demands whilst maintaining paid employment will be critical in fostering future intergenerational support.

The Role of Fertility in the Demography of Grandparenthood: Evidence from Italy

“…Even in low fertility countries like Italy, a non-negligible percentage of women (about 15%) born in 1970 still completed their fertility histories with three or more children (ISTAT 2017). These mothers are likely to become grandmothers at an age characterised by the prospect of juggling multiple roles, combining paid work with family-caring obligations (Evandrou and Glaser 2004;Vlachantoni et al 2019). Supporting these women who might have to provide care for both their parents and their grandchildren while being in paid employment still remains a critical challenge.…”

Helping older parents in Europe: the importance of grandparenthood, gender and care regime

“…All these factors may make it difficult for women to provide help to more than one generation. To our knowledge, only Vlachantoni et al (2019) have analysed help to multiple generations separately for men and women, finding no gender differences in their British sample. The importance of gender may, however, vary across welfare states, depending on care policiesthe second key dimension of our study.…”

“…The studies we are building on here, have not addressed this issue. Vlachantoni et al (2019) only included Britain, Grundy and Henretta (2006) employed data from two so-called liberal welfare states (the United States and the United Kingdom), and Železná (2018), using data from Europe, only controlled for country when assessing the provision of grandchild care. Thus, the question remains: is it easier to provide help to more than one generation in de-familialised welfare states, where family help is less extensive and demanding because of the availability of care services, than it is in welfare states where care is regarded a family responsibility?…”

“…However, the few existing studies addressing provision of help to more than one generation do not give any indication of a zero-sum phenomenon in the family: helping one generation does not seem to reduce the likelihood of helping another (Grundy and Henretta 2006;Fingerman et al 2011;Vlachantoni et al 2019;Železná 2018). Actually, Grundy and Henretta (2006), as well as Vlachantoni et al (2019) and Železná (2018), have concluded that providing help and care to parents increases the probability of helping younger generations, not the contrary. The explanation suggested is in line with the family solidarity model (Bengtson and Roberts 1991).…”

Informal care provision across multiple generations in China

“…The concept of the sandwich generation was initially introduced by Miller in the 1980s to describe middle-aged care-givers ‘sandwiched’ between their parents and children (Miller, 1981). Since then, the use of the term has expanded as improvements in longevity have increased the number of surviving generations within families and care-giving roles have broadened (Rubin and White-Means, 2009; Friedman et al , 2015; Vlachantoni et al ., 2019). Today the term sandwich generation can be used to describe those in their fifties and sixties who are sandwiched between ageing parents, adult children and grandchildren, or alternatively those in their thirties or forties with young children, ageing parents as well as their grandparents (Abramson, 2015).…”