The application of a domains based analysis to family processes: implications for assessment and therapy

Social domains are classes of interpersonal processes each with distinct procedural rules underpinning mutual understanding, emotion regulation and action. We describe the features of three domains of family life – safety, attachment and discipline/expectation – and contrast them with exploratory processes in terms of the emotions expressed, the role of certainty versus uncertainty, and the degree of hierarchy in an interaction. We argue that everything that people say and do in family life carries information about the type of interaction they are engaged in – that is, the domain. However, sometimes what they say or how they behave does not make the domain clear, or participants in the social interactions are not in the same domain (there is a domain mismatch). This may result in misunderstandings, irresolvable arguments or distress. We describe how it is possible to identify domains and judge whether they are clear and unclear, and matched and mismatched, in observed family interactions and in accounts of family processes. This then provides a focus for treatment and helps to define criteria for evaluating outcomes.

The experiences and priorities of young people who care for their siblings in Tanzania and Uganda

This report presents key findings from a small-scale pilot research project that explored the experiences and priorities of young people caring for their siblings in sibling-headed households affected by AIDS in Tanzania and Uganda. Qualitative and participatory research was conducted with 33 young people living in sibling-headed households and 39 NGO staff and community members in rural and urban areas of Tanzania and Uganda. The report analyses the ways that young people manage transitions to caring for their younger siblings following their parents’ death and the impacts of caring on their family relations, education, emotional wellbeing and health, social lives and their transitions to adulthood. The study highlights gendered- and age-related differences in the nature and extent of young people’s care work and discusses young people’s needs and priorities for action, based on the views of young people, NGO staff and community members. Meeting the basic needs of young people living in sibling-headed households, listening to young people’s views, fostering peer support and relationships of trust with supportive adults, raising awareness and advocacy emerge as key priorities to safeguard the rights of children and young people living in sibling-headed households and challenge the stigma and marginalisation they sometimes face.

Working-class household consumption smoothing in interwar Britain

We examine the strategies interwar working-class British households used to “smooth” consumption over time and guard against negative contingencies such as illness, unemployment, and death. Newly discovered returns from the U.K. Ministry of Labour's 1937/38 Household Expenditure Survey are used to fully categorize expenditure smoothing via nineteen credit/savings vehicles. We find that households made extensive use of expenditure-smoothing devices. Families' reliance on expenditure-smoothing is shown to be inversely related to household income, while households also used these mechanisms more intensively during expenditure crisis phases of the family life cycle, especially the years immediately after new household formation.

The intrinsic value of agency: the case of Indonesia

This paper analyses the relationship between agency and Indonesian women’s well-being. The existing debate on empowerment mostly focuses on agency's instrumental value, how agency benefits development and household/women's welfare. We depart from this debate by considering the intrinsic value of agency for women using the Indonesia Family Life Survey. We measure agency based on the decisions women make within their households. We find the effects of agency are not unambiguously positive. Agency has intrinsic value, seen in its strong relationship to well-being in certain spheres, which is moderated by the 'burden of responsibility' that seems to be felt by decision-makers.

Caring responsibilities, change and transitions in young people's family lives in Zambia

Despite diversity in family dynamics within and between societies, globally, it is adults who are usually relied upon to care for family members who are sick, disabled or have other care needs. Young people in Zambia and other African countries affected by the HIV epidemic are under increasing pressure to obtain a good education and employment to support their families, whilst some also have to cope with the loss of parents and care for relatives with little external support. This article discusses the findings of qualitative research that explored the experiences of young people (aged 14-30) who had significant family caring responsibilities and those without such responsibilities in Zambia. Interviews and life-mapping methods were conducted with a total of 35 young people living in rural and urban areas, 12 parents and relatives and 12 professionals. We analyse young people's experiences and perceptions of socially expected transitions, such as completing education and earning an income to support themselves and their families, in addition to more unpredictable changes in young people's family lives. ‘Critical moments’ (Thomson et al, 2002), such as bereavement and loss of parents and other family members, disinheritance of assets and property grabbing, migration and mobility between different relatives homes, parental divorce and separation, often had significant impacts on young people’s ability to navigate their pathways to adulthood according to wider social norms and expectations. A more relational conceptualisation of youth transitions is needed that takes account of young people's caring responsibilities and changing family dynamics.

How students view the boundaries between their science and religious education concerning the origins of life and the universe

Internationally in secondary schools, lessons are typically taught by subject specialists, raising the question of how to accommodate teaching which bridges the sciences and humanities. This is the first study to look at how students make sense of the teaching they receive in two subjects (science and religious education) when one subject’s curriculum explicitly refers to cross-disciplinary study and the other does not. Interviews with 61 students in seven schools in England suggested that students perceive a permeable boundary between science and their learning in science lessons and also a permeable boundary between religion and their learning in RE lessons, yet perceive a firm boundary between science lessons and RE lessons. We concluded that it is unreasonable to expect students to transfer instruction about cross-disciplinary perspectives across such impermeable subject boundaries. Finally we consider the implications of these findings for the successful management of cross-disciplinary education.