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Caregiving Across the Generations

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Family Care and Social Capital: Transitions in Informal Care

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Abstract

This chapter focuses on carers who are themselves vulnerable in particular ways – young carers and older carers. There has been growing awareness of a group of young people who play a critical role in caring for parents, grandparents or siblings. Young carers face particular challenges as they carry responsibility for the care of another while negotiating the demands of adolescence, schooling and the transition into adulthood. Caregiving at this age presents a variety of developmental challenges. At the other end of the life course are grandparent carers. Here, too, there is a growing awareness of a group of people who face particular challenges from a caregiving role. Many fully substitute for the role of parents and become exclusive caregivers for, usually, their grandchildren. We focus on the experience of taking up this role and reflect on the consequences.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    A comment made to Beatrice Hale in 2012 by a group of young Australian caregivers emphasised that caregiving was part of family life and their role within the family.

  2. 2.

    http://www.youngcarersnsw.asn.au/StoryView.aspx?PageID=1370

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Social Sciences, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

    Patrick Barrett

  2. Dunedin, New Zealand

    Beatrice Hale (Independent Researcher)

  3. School of Occupational Therapy, Otago Polytechnic, Dunedin, New Zealand

    Mary Butler

Authors
  1. Patrick Barrett
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  2. Beatrice Hale
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  3. Mary Butler
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Barrett, P., Hale, B., Butler, M. (2014). Caregiving Across the Generations. In: Family Care and Social Capital: Transitions in Informal Care. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6872-7_8

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