• International Journal of Human Ecology
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.17-30
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• 2016

This study was conducted to make a policy proposal for Korean grandparent-grandchildren families, analyzing what adversities adolescent grandchildren suffer when living in a grandparent-grandchild family, the types of Korean families and how family resilience appears as family power. In order to conduct this study, 20 consenting adolescents were selected for an interview from grandparent-grandchildren families recommended by the U City Healthy Family Support Center. This study suggests the following conclusions. First, we discussed divorce, death, financial bankruptcy related stress, economic difficulties in the present family, accidents involving family members of a grandparent-grandchild family, grandparents' serious disease, death, family conflicts and family comparisons with friends. Second, in the domain of family resilience, desire to maintain the family appeared as a Korean value. In addition, efforts to bond as an emotional family and grandchildren's attitudes of gratitude to grandparents are also expressed. However, family conversation appears weak due to the generation gap between adolescents and grandparents or complications from family stress. Third, the resilience in the family organization appeared weak since there are relatively insufficient socio-economic resources to support the family. This study makes several suggestions for family policies and shows the necessity to develop policies that reflect the needs of grandchildren and grandparents.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.42 no.12 s.202
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• pp.15-29
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• 2004

Since the 1990s there have been increasing concerns about coresident grandparents and their children in the U.S. This study focused on the coresident grandparents and grandchildren, categorized into 6 household structures, and examined whether household structure with sociodemographic variables affected economic well-being. The data from the University of Michigan Health and Retirement Study (HRS) were used, and frequencies, $x^2$ tests, ANOVA, and logistic regression analysis were conducted by SPSS Windows. The results of the study showed that there was a significant difference in the yearly household income among the 6 household structures. In addition, household structure affected the economic well-being. Especially, grandchildren in grandmother only, some parents present families, and in grandmother only, no parent families were more likely to be poor than those in both grandparents.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.293-303
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• 2009

This study reported phenomenological analysis of the interviews with 26 adult grandchildren who had(or have) a cohabitation with grandparents. The research question was what adult grandchildren experienced in living with grandparents. Results indicated that "the aged" was described as generous and wise person, so they had positive attitude toward the elderly. Participants perceived level of benefits of the coresidence with grandparents were higher than the costs in instrumental, material, and emotional supports. The relationship between grandparents and parents was generally intimate. It makes adult grandchildren advocate parents living together in the future. But adult grandchildren plan to get along independently when they grow old.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.23 no.3 s.75
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• pp.103-114
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• 2005

The number of grandparents who have responsibility for raising their grandchildren is growing. The present study examines the extent of this phenomenon and some of the issues these grandparents face in surrogate parenting. The sample consists of 69 grandparents(63 grandmothers and 6 grandfathers) of grandchildren who have lived with them at least 6 months without their parents. The grandparents raising grandchildren reported that caregiving bought negative changes in relations with their own children, economic situation and health condition. They concerned most about the issue of good mannered behavior of grandchildren and making good friends and needed social supports in terms of house cleaning and cooking and transportation for after school activities. Caregiver burden was related to the number of family members, the degrees of life changes, economic hardship due to caregiving, grandchildren's school performance and the relations with granparents' own children.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.61 no.1
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• pp.109-134
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• 2009

Due to the change of socio-cultural conditions, family dissolving is increasing. As an alternative, grandparents who parent their grandchildren are also increasing rapidly and many show deep concern at this phenomenon. The grandparents-grandchildren families were approached through policy-makers' and professionals' perspective, not through insiders' view. The purpose of this ethnographic study were to explore the experiences and meaning-makings of grandmothers who are raising grandchildren. 22 narrative interviews with 10 grandmothers were conducted. The results of data analysis are as follows. The cultural theme in rasing experiences of grandmothers is 'Constituting a family beyond the multiple boundaries'. This theme include four cultural meanings: 'Recunstuction of everyday life beyound boundaries', 'Boundary of relative poverty more rigid than boundary of absolute poverty', 'Compromising constantly with normal culture having both inclusion and exclusion' boundaries', 'Having aspiration toward crossing the boundaries'. The policiy-makers and practitioners for the grandparents-grandchildren families should recognize the experiences and meaning-making of these families and should perform culturally perceptible and family-centered policies and practices.

• Survey Research
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.89-112
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• 2012

This study aims to explore emotional closeness between grandparents and grandchildren in Korean families with a focus on the lineage. The effects of the geographical proximity and the normative aspect as well as intergenerational financial, instrumental, and emotional supports were taken into consideration to accounting for the grandparent-grandchildren affective solidarity. Research questions are addressed using the data of "Survey on Generational Solidarity and Differences in Cultural Experience and Perception in Korea", and a series of multinomial regression model were conducted. Findings indicate that the salient factor to boost grandchildren's affective solidarity with paternal grandparents is financial transfers between grandparents and parents. By contrast, all types of intergenerational supports affected grandchildren's emotional closeness toward maternal grandparents. Geographical proximity was associated with the affective solidarity between grandchildren and maternal grandparents. The effects of normative solidarity were not shown at both lineages.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.24 no.4 s.82
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• pp.25-36
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• 2006

The purpose of this study is to investigate the parenting stress, efficacy, and behaviors of Korean and Yanbian Korean-Chinese grandfamilies in which grandparents have sole responsibility for raising their grandchildren. Our sample consists of 74 grandparents and their grandchildren (43 Korean and 31 Yanbian Korean-Chinese). The data were analyzed through crosstabs analysis, 1-test, Pearson's correlation, and stepwise regression analysis. The results of this study indicate that there are some differences based on the gender of grandparents, educational level, the reason for taking care of the grandchildren, and the grandparents' relationship with grandchildren between two ethnic groups. The results also show that parenting stress is higher for Korean grandparents' and parenting efficacy is lower than Yanbian Korean-Chinese. Also, Yanbian Korean-Chinese grandparents are higher in warmth and acceptance and lower in rejected and controlled parenting behaviors than Korean grandparents. There are strong relationships between parenting stress and parenting efficacy and between parenting behaviors and parenting stress and parenting efficacy for Korean grandparents, but not for Yanbian Korean-Chinese.

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.303-314
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• 1996

The purpose of this study is to investigate the satisfaction with sharing a bedroom among grandparent(s) and grandchildren, and the differences in the housing norms and satisfactions among the three generations of the extended families in Cheong-Ju city. Each three generations of the 50 extended families was interviewed with the questionnaire designed for each generation. The respondent family had at lest one child aged from 10 to 14 years old. The results showed that 40.0% of the elderly parents and 76.0% of the grandchildren shared a bedroom with someone beside a spouse, while about 90.0% of married couples had their own bedrooms. However, sharing a bedroom did not reduce the housing satisfaction of the grandparent(s) and the grandchild. The living arrangement of coresidence was mostly preferred by the grandparents, followed by the parents. The younger generations reported the more alternatives in living arrangement for the elderly. The number of bedrooms was the most important factor to be considered with coresidence of three generations but the most inadequate characteristics of the current housing to coreside. There were some differences in elderly housing norms and coresidence housing satisfactions among the three generations. The grandparents were most satisfied with coresidence living arragement, followed by the grandchildren and the daughters-in-law.

• Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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• v.35 no.3
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• pp.274-286
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• 2010

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of the rearing, health and nutrition services through intervention in GP-GC (grandparents-grandchildren) families. Methods: A structured questionnaire was administered in January 2008 and January 2009 to 55(70) grandparents of GP-GC families who received intervention services also GP-GC families that did not receive services. The study area was the city of Chunnam Province, South Korea. The intervention services were provided by electronic voucher one day per week. The questionnaire assessed the general characteristics of the grandparents, childcare stress and burden, health status (ADL, IADL, depression, subjective health status and fall index) and mini nutritional assessment(MNA). The data were analyzed using SPSS software and an F-test, Chi-squared test and t-test. Results: The stress of grandparents resulting from childcare was high, but depression in grandparents perceived by grandchildren was significantly lower in served GP-GC families than in non-served GP-GC families. Differences in scores of affection (t=2.12, df=116, p<.05), automatics (t=2.92, df=116, p<.01), realistic(t=2.24, df=116, p<.05), and level of depression(t=2.90, df=116, p<.01) were significant. Incidences of acute disease, IADL cognitive fuction and depression of grandparents were slightly higher. Intervention services for GP-GC families had an impact on the childcare attitude and health status of grandparents. The intervention services of nutrition for grandparents were not promoted, but the scoring for subjective nutrition status were statistically higher for the served group (t=18.230, p<.0001). Conclusions: This study found that intervention programs of childcare services and health and nutrition management are effective for grandparents of GP-GC families. Intervention services for GP-GC family should establish the political issue.

• 한국노년학
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.587-609
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• 2021

The purpose of this study was to investigate parenting experiences among grandmothers raising their grandchildren from grandmothers' perspective, and a variety of their physical health, psychological and social challenges they were facing in everyday life. In addition, this study explored new issues, changes, and difficulties grandparents and their grandchildren were going through during the COVID-19 pandemic. Seven grandmothers raising their grandchildren without their cohabiting parents participated in an in-depth interview, and the qualitative date were obtained using semi-structured questionnaires. Analyses identified 5 main categories: 1) my emotion, worries, and coping with parenting grandchildren, 2) difficulties and obstacles facing in real life of the parenting, 3) conflicts and coping with growing grandchildren who showed new characters, 4) relationships and emotions among grandparents, parents, and grandchildren, and 5) needs and desires toward social services and support. Sixteen themes and 60 sub-themes were also derived. The majority of grandmothers expressed diverse difficulties in their dail y lives including ambivalent emotions regarding grandchild-rearing(rewards and burden), economic hardships, physical health limitations, and a lack of communications with their grandchildren. Further, findings indicated profound generation conflicts which had been even deepened during school close period in COVID-19 pandemic and had been associated with increased hours of using internet and playing computer games. The top priority of the social service needs among interviewed grandmothers was learning support for their grandchildren. Emotional support and social support to cover their lack of family interactions, and financial support were the next of their desired social services. Implications to improve social services for grandparent-headed families are discussed.