By women for women: Caring for the frail elderly

The care of the frail elderly should be a subject of especial and growing importance to the women's movement. Two-thirds of the 75+ age group in England and Wales are women, who, when subject to the disabilities of advancing age, are usually assisted or cared for by other women. Current government policies emphasize care at home and assume the availability of unpaid female labour. Care in residential institutions depends largely upon the low paid labour of women. How can the dilemmas posed by different policy options be resolved? Can modes of care be devised which do not rely on exploiting women's labour and which offer choice to elderly women?     

There was never really any choice: The experience of mothers of disabled children in the United Kingdom

This article focuses on two main themes. First, it examines the impact that caring for severly disabled children has on the lives of their mothers: the exacting work they undertake, the restrictions they encounter and the choices they have to make. Second, it suggests that those very services which it is assumed will be helpful and relief-giving, are not only fragmented and thin on the ground, but are also often experienced as a mixed blessing, adding to the work load and inducing further stress in a number of ways. Some of the parents whose opinions have contributed to this article, are those who took part in a small-scale research project on the relationships between parents of disabled children and professionals. Others include those who participated, often in the role of teachers, in a series of open studies courses for service providers and consumers at Warwick University between 1980 and 1985.     

Family life education for young adolescents: A quasi-experiment

The impact of a family life education program for inner-city, minority elementary-school students was investigated. Two randomly assigned groups of seventh and eighth graders (balanced for gender) completed a self-administered survey, both before and after program implementation. In comparison to the control group, program participants displayed (a) improved knowledge about contraception, reproductive physiology, and adolescent pregnancy outcomes; (b) increased awareness of the existence of specific birth control methods; (c) among seventh graders, more conservative attitudes toward circumstances under which sexual intercourse was viewed as personally acceptable, and among eighth graders, a shift toward more liberal attitudes; and (d) a greater tendency to acknowledge mutual responsibility for contraception. The impact of this intervention and school-based sex education programs in general is discussed within the broader context of the young adolescent's social environment.This research was supported by grants from the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services and the Pittway Charitable Trust, and administered by the Ounce of Prevention Fund.Received Ph.D. from Loyola University Chicago.Received Ph.D. from the University of Michigan.Received Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo.