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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Support networks of childless older people
— informal and formal support in Europe | | Author(s) | Christian Deindl, Martina Brandt |
| Journal title | Ageing and Society, vol 37, no 8, September 2017 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press, September 2017 |
| Pages | pp 1543-1567 |
| Source | https://doi.org/10.1017/S0144686X16000416 |
| Keywords | Childless ; Parents ; Friendship ; Informal care ; European Union ; Cross national surveys ; Europe. |
| Annotation | Western societies are ageing rapidly. Today, people not only live longer, they also have fewer children. These developments exert considerable pressure on welfare states. Children have usually been the mainstay of old age support, especially when there is no partner. We thus face new challenges: On which support networks can a growing number of childless older people rely? (How) can the lack of children be compensated in the informal social network? What role does the state play, and how is informal and formal support linked? In this article, comparative analyses by the authors of the support networks of childless older people are based on the first two waves of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), including 14,394 people aged 50+ from 12 European countries with (instrumental) activities of daily living (ADL or IADL) limitations. On average, 10 per cent of older Europeans today have no children. Sporadic informal support for these older people is often taken over by the extended family, friends and neighbours, and thus the lack of children is compensated within the social network. However, intense care tasks are more likely provided by professional providers, especially in the case of childless older people. In countries with low levels of social service provision, childless older people are therefore likely to experience a lack of (formal) support, especially when depending on vital care. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-170825201 A |
| Classmark | SU: SR: DS:SX: P6: WFC: 3K: 74 |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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