Year: 2010
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: F EW families fit the notion of a "sandwich generation,"where adults simultaneously provide care for young children and elderly parents.More commonly, middle-aged adults with elderly parents have children who are grown (Grundy & Henretta, 2006;Spitze & Logan, 1990).Prior studies of intergenerational support tend to examine only two generations at a time, either middle-aged adults' exchanges with elderly parents (e.g., Davey, Janke, & Savla, 2005;Laditka & Laditka, 2001;Suitor, Pillemer, & Sechrist, 2006) or their exchanges with young adult offspring (e.g., Aquilino, 2006;Eggebeen, 1992).Studies rarely compare the support middle-aged adults provide each generation and address the pivotal role that middle-aged adults may experience within families.By examining only two generations, researchers have precluded an understanding of intergenerational support in the context of multiple generations.Indeed, middle-aged adults may help members of both generations (Attias-Donfut & Wolff, 2000; Grundy & Henretta;Soldo, 1996), but we know little about how support provided to members of one generation is associated with support to members of the other generation.This study examined middle-aged adults' exchanges with each of their grown children and living parents.We assessed the flow of generational support to grown children versus parents.We were interested in why most families give greater support on average to a grown child than to an aging parent and asked whether affection and offspring's needs explain this flow of support.In cases where middle-aged people pro-vided more to their parents than to their children, we sought to understand whether parental needs explained this pattern. Generational flow of support in a life course perspectiveThe literature suggests that in Western countries, intergenerational support typically flows downstream.That is, support flows from parents down to the younger generation, rather than the reverse.According to a life course perspective, parents assist their children until very late in life, when declines in health reverse the normal flow and parents turn to their children for assistance (Fingerman & Birditt, 2009;Zarit & Eggebeen, 2002).Studies in the United States document financial gifts and loans (McGarry, 1999) and practical support (Suitor et al., 2006) parents provide to grown children.Similar findings are evident in Europe (Albertini, Kohli, & Vogel, 2007;Kohli, 2005).Nonetheless, these studies do not address three-generation families and the decisions middle-aged adults make when they have grown children and aging parents (for an exception, see Attias-Donfut & Wolff, 2000).Furthermore, two additional issues remain to be addressed.First, we do not know whether middle-aged adults provide support to each of their grown children or only to specific children who have particular needs or affectionate relationships with them.Prior studies have addressed total support Who Gets What and Why? Help Middle-Aged Adults Provide to Parents and Grown Children
Authors: K. L. Fingerman, L. M. Pitzer, W. Chan, K. Birditt, M. M. Franks, S. Zarit
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
Funder: National Institute on Aging
OpenAlex ID: W2128462216