The relationships of grandparents and grandchildren: A study on child care practices

The transformations that are occurring worldwide in the areas of health, population, technology, economy are also reflected in the family institution and dominate roles and family relations. Changes in the demographic area are one of the most influential transformations in family structure. While fertility rates are gradually decreasing worldwide; the average life expectancy is increasing. This situation, an indication of the aging population, affects the relationship between grandparents and grandchildren as well as the relationship between other members of the family, and changes the role of grandparents towards their grandchildren. The most influential factor causing relationship between grandparents and grandchildren to take new forms and making these relations open to new tasks is the new family arrangements. The increasing prevalence of middle-generations divorce is a Contemporary problem that is effective in converting the primary role of grandparents into grandchild care in the family. Grandparents play an important role in grandchild care support when parents fail to effectively parent their children or meet the developmental needs of their children. One of the dynamics, perhaps the most powerful one, behind the shaping of grand parenting as a role involving responsibility for child care is midrail female employment. Grandparents provide different intensities of care depending on which of these dynamics giving rise to the need for care plays an active role in their care for their grandchildren. Accessibility of affordable and reliable public child care support service also influences the grandparental involvement levels and the nature of care they provide. In this study, trends leading to changes in duties and responsibilities in family, family structures, family relationships were discussedand effects of these tendencies on the grandparenting role and responsibilities were analysed through the use of qualitative research techniques on grandmothers who have provided care to their grandchildren in Antalya city. Through in-depth interviews with grandmothers, the conditions leading to grandchild care were tried to be understood and grandparenting patterns arising due to their degree of involvement in child care were examined. How full-time, regular or assistive care affect their lives was tried to be understood. The study also revealed the ways how relationships of grandparents with their grandchildren differ from relations with their own children as factors affecting grandparenting experience. When the interviews were analysed, it was observed that the grandmothers were often placed in the family as mother savers and child care assistants, taking responsibility for care of their grandchildren,due to the fact that middle generation women have started to work in paid employment outside their house. It was seen that the daily practices of the grandmothers regularly taking responsibility for the care of their grandchildren are affected both positively and negatively. Moreover, despite all the negativity involved, grandparents have associated grandparental roles with emotional satisfaction in general. This situation, indicative of the fact that grandmothers are motivated to avoid high cost behaviors and maximize rewards in their relationship with middle generations and grandchildren, can be explained by the exchange theory in the grandchildren maintenance care activity.