Lecture 12/5/2001
Transitions of Adulthood
Delayed Adulthood – today many young adults are having a tough time with the transition to adulthood. More and more people are choosing to remain single, delaying marriage, or if married, deciding not to have children. Buying a home is beyond the means of most young adults and periodic downswings in the economy can make getting a good job exceedingly difficult.
A new pattern of entry into adulthood has developed among young people which includes interrupted, delayed, or postponed college attendance, erratic job patterns with no assurance of an income high enough for self-sufficiency; and postponement of marriage and/ or childbearing. Many young people who do attend college live at home and commute daily. According to one study, 25% of full-time, first – year college students live a t home while they attend school.
Consequently, recent cohorts of young adults have been slower to leave the nest and more likely to return home after they have tried to leave than older cohorts were.
The percentage of young adults who live with their parents has increased steadily since the mid-1970s, an increase that has been more dramatic for men than women. 15% of Americans men between the ages of 25 and 34 live with their parents, up from 10% in 1970. 8% of women in this age bracket live with their parents, up form 7 percent in 1970.
The prevailing cultural image is that adults who live with their parents are either slackers who lack the drive to become independent or immature "Peter Pans" who don’t want to grow up. Lack of economic opportunity is the major reason why today’s young adults are more likely to remain at home. Between 1976 and 1996, the average per capita income (measured in 1996 dollars) of people, between ages of 25 and 34 dropped from 23,123 to $20,305.
Another factor associated with the delay in leaving home is the rise in the age at which young people first marry. Between 1970 and 1995, the median age at first marriage rose from 23.2 to 26.9 for men and from20.8 to 24.5 for women. The marriage delay affords young adults more time to live with their parents(But also it increases the number of young adults who live alone or who cohabitate).
Creates potential problems for everyone. Most adults would rather not have to live with their parents. Since we still tend to take independent living as the most important indicator of being adult in this culture, adults who live with their parents – even if they’re working and saving money for a family, going to school to enhance their future earning capabilities- feel that others see them as not-quite adults.
Parents too may feel anxiety over their adult children still living at home. Periodically conflict can erupt over the organization of household labor and the allocation of family resources.
The Empty Nest
We have a pervasive belief in American culture that middle-aged parents – particularly stay-at-home mothers – suffer severe emotional crises when all their children grow up and leave home. However, for most parents, the departure of grown children from home actually provides them with freedom, relief from responsibilities, and time for themselves.
Still parents don’t want to be completely isolated from their adult children. Parents tend to experience greater improvement in life satisfaction when children maintain frequent contact after they move out. In other words, continuation of the parental role – albeit at a distance appears to be important to well being in middle age.
Grandparenthood
We usually think of grandparents as elderly and retired. But most people become grandparents while in mid-life, when they are married, when they are fully employed, and with increasing frequency, when their own parents are still alive.
Different cultures and different racial and ethnic groups within this culture vary I the degree to which grandparents are incorporated into the daily lives of families.
Today – the birthrate today is lower and people are getting married and starting families later. Hence, parents are more likely to be finished raising their own children before any grandchildren are born. So now when a person becomes a grandparent, fewer family roles are likely to be competing for his or her time and energy. Grandparenting has become a separate identify and a separate stage of family life. With advances in travel and communications, grandparents today have an easier time seeing and talking to their grandchildren, even if they don’t live close by. In addition, 40-hour workweeks and an increase in available leisure time mean that grandparents today have more time to spend with grandchildren than they did a century ago. Contemporary grandparents also have more money to spend on grandchildren than ever before.
Other social changes, however has made contemporary granparenthood more difficult. One such change is the high rate of divorce. Some states have laws protecting visitation rights of grandparents, but others have ruled that grandparents have no such legal rights.
Types of Grandparents – Cherlin and Furstenberg
Companionate grandparents (55% of sample)
Remote grandparents (30%)
Involved grandparents (16%) assume parentlike roles and responsibilities.
Ethnic Variation in grandparenting – In African-American families, grandmothers frequently play critical, involved roles in child rearing and parent support. Over 12% of African-American children live with their grandparents and close to 40% of this group have neither of their parents living with them in the household.
Harriet Presser – “Some Economic Complexities of Child Care Provided by Grandmothers.”
Grandmothers represent 22% - 29% of childcare that is provided to their grandchildren.
There may be a more complicated negotiation of work and family roles between grandmothers who provide child care and employed mothers who rely on such care.
1/3 of grandmothers who care for children are otherwise employed, although some of this employment may consist of caregiving for other children.
Among employed grandmothers who provide childcare, over one-third work completely different hours than the child’s mother and more than one-fifth have only a few overlapping work hours. The comparison of the child care hours of employed grandmothers with their work hours suggests that there is considerable juggling of time demands on the part of grandmothers – not just mothers – to enable their participation in child care.
Some dimensions of the relative burden to the grandmother and the ability of the mother to pay seem to be relevant determinants of cash payment.
Research has shown that child care by relatives (including grandmothers and fathers) is especially constraining on the number of hours mothers work; part-time employed mothers who rely on relatives for child care are more likely to report that they would work more hours if satisfactory and affordable child care were available, compared to part-time employed mothers who rely on nonrelatives.
The "Graying" of America – Them median age for Americans today is 34.6 and is expected to be over 38 by the middle of the next century.
72.6 males and 78.9 for females (life expectancy)
Why should we be concerned about this "graying" of the American population? The answer is that a society with an aging population will inevitably experience increased demands for pensions, health care, and other social services catering to the needs of the elderly. 1% of people between the ages of 65 and 74 require nursing home care. Figure jumps to 22% for those over 85 and almost 50% for those over 95. Moreover, aging populations change the assumptions we make about our economy, such as the size and composition of the labor force, productivity, and patterns of saving, spending, and consuming.
The effects of "Graying" on Families
Prolonged Marriage – Today, the average couple could live 30 years or more after the last child has left home.
Prolonged Parent-child Relationships- increased longevity also extends the amount of time parents spend with their children. In the near future a significant number of parents and children could spend 60 or more years together, of which only 18 or so would be in the traditional parent-child relationship.
Generational obligations – in contemporary American society, relationships between adult children and their parents are characterized by two seemingly contradictory sets of norms: obligation and independence.
In countries with well-established pension and Social Security programs, many elderly adults are now providing increasing support – instrument and emotional- to adult children who have run afoul of economic recession, broken marriages, and lack of affordable housing.
Care for Elderly Parents –
Both men and women claim a high acceptance of responsibility for aged parents, but women are more likely to be called upon to act on whose responsibilities. Men tend to perform managerial and maintenance tasks and provide financial support for their parents; women predominantly perform the daily hands-on caregiving.
B>Changing Marital Status – The marital status of older men is very different from that of older women throughout the world. Although widowhood rates rise with age for both sexes, a large majority of men aged 65 and over are married. Even at ages 75 and over, married men usually outnumber widowers. … The most obvious factor is simply that women live longer on average than do men. Also, the nearly universal tendency for women to marry men older than themselves compounds the likelihood of their outliving their spouses.
The increase in joint survival has meant that higher proportions of husband-wife families at age 65 and continue intact for some time. In one sense, then, concerns about growing proportions of elderly widows might be less onerous than previously thought.
Although many factors are related to the changing likelihood of elderly persons’ living alone or with their spouse only, rising income appears to be the primary vehicle that affords older individuals the opportunity to maintain households apart from younger family members. The desire for intimacy at a distance is frequently cited in Western gerontological literature.
Although the adverse effects of caring for elderly parents on women’s well-being are well documented, the experience apparently isn’t always so bad.
“Family Care of the Frail Elderly: A New Look at ‘Women in the Middle.’” Sandra Boyd and Judith Treas
“Women in the Middle” – also referred to as the “Sandwich Generation.” - women who are responsible for both the care of their own children (the younger generation) and the care of their parents (the older generation and 2) who combine parental care and paid employment.
According to their work, only a small percentage of women simultaneously care for dependent parents and children. When middle-aged women still have dependent children, their aging parents typically have not reached an age when they are likely to be impaired and in need of assistance. Middle-aged women who do have frail elderly parents tend not to be responsible for children living at home.
However, other factors may increase the number of women caught in the middle: postponed childbearing; responsibilities for grandchildren, crowded nests, increasing sickness of the “young-old.”
However, the definition of “sandwich” women – also has an alternative definition: women caught in the middle between caregiving and paid employment.
31% of all unpaid caregivers also hold paying jobs. (Old statistics – 1986 – so it is probably higher). Women who have competing demands from paid work and caregiving adapt in a number of ways, including leaving the labor force, making changes at work, and making changes at home..
Leaving the labor force – 12 – 28% of caregiving daughters leave the work force to provide care. These women often lose salary and benefits, retirement pensions, social networks, and work satisfaction. Moreover caregiving responsibilities also may compel some women to remain unemployed.
Changes at work – 20% cut back their hours, 29% rearrange their work schedules, and 19% take time off without pay.
Changes at Home – give up free time and leisure activities while maintaining rigid schedules.
Role strain from competing demands – The primary predictor of stress is the quality of the relationship between the caregiver and care recipient. There is definitely issues of conflicted feelings and fatigue. However, there is some evidence that the ability to handle diverse roles can promote self-esteem. Multiple roles provide women with added sources of satisfaction. Some caregivers feel it is a way to give back.
Reduced Kin Availability – Living with other people reduces the likelihood of using formal medical care and increases the use of informal care, at least I the U.S. context. Because most physical, emotional, and economic care to older individuals is provided by family members, the demography of population aging is increasingly concerned with understanding and model kin availability (the number of family members that will potentially be available to elderly individuals if and when various forms of care are needed)
The consensus to date foresees a declining biological kinship support network for elderly persons in developed and some developing countries. … We know, however, that decreased coresidence has not necessarily led to less familial interaction; patterns of reciprocal support continue to characterize older people and their children.
Culture and the Elderly
While the elderly tend to be a devalued segment of the American population, they are more likely than any other age group to benefit from social policies. Many federal programs are designed to assist the elderly in areas such as retirement, health care, housing, transportation, and other social services. The elderly have been the principal beneficiaries of the federal government’s involvement in ensuring health care for high-risk populations (Medicare and Medicaid) and guaranteeing minimum income. (Social Security). The proportion of elderly people who fall below the poverty line has decreased over the past 2 decades, even although the proportion of poor young people has increased.
Aging -
Cultural definitions of and attitudes toward old age can shape the experience of becoming elderly. In some cultures, the elderly are highly respected; in others they are either ignored or treated with contempt.
Elder Abuse
Physical abuse
Psychological abuse
Drug abuse
Financial abuse
Violation of rights
Estimates range from 3 to 10% (700,000 to 1.5 million) are abused nationally.
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