Living in the shadows of dementia care

Dr Julie Watson is the author of our latest research briefing Face-to-Face: Relating to people with dementia until the end of life in care homes. Julie, a registered nurse, is a Research Fellow in the University of Edinburgh’s School of Health in Social Sciences. Next week some of her work features in the exhibition Living with Dementia: Fostering Hope, Challenging Fear, part of the ESRC Festival of Social Science.

An inspiring plenary talk by Professor Annette Leibing at the recent ‘Life with Dementia’ conference at Linkoping University, Sweden, described people who are living well with dementia, able to remain active and connected within their communities, as the ‘heroes’ of dementia. However, Professor Leibing cautioned that we must not forget those who are perhaps not seen as living heroic lives, who remain in the shadows.

People with advanced dementia who live in care homes, and those who care for them, remain in the shadows of dementia care. The daughter of a woman with advanced dementia living in a care home recently described to me her sense of her mother living in a ‘twilight zone’, and the sadness associated with this for her as she struggles to connect with her mum. This is an increasingly common experience for families as the population ages and the number of people with dementia rises dramatically. The experience of families who say ‘this is not my dad’ (Sikes & Hall 2016) while at the same time expecting paid carers to ‘maintain the person within’ (Davies et al 2016) points to the tensions and complexity of relationships in this area of care.

So how do we foster hope and challenge fear among people living with advanced dementia in care homes and those who look after them? 

One way might be to re-imagine our relationships – moving away from a focus on language and conversation to other ways we can connect person to person. The recently published briefing paper Face-to-Face: Relating to people with dementia until the end of life in care homes presents findings from a study into how care staff in a care home and people with advance dementia relate to each other, from which we can all learn. 

The Primary Palliative Care Research Group at Edinburgh University have just published a commentary on their vision to establish a Care Home Centre for Excellence, a care home where people would choose to come and live, not as a last resort, where they would receive excellent care and where students can learn and research can help us understand how best to live well with dementia until the very end of life (Hockley et al 2016).

Much has been achieved within dementia care over the last 20 years which is to be celebrated. Now is the time to build on that, shining the light into those areas which are still in the shadows.

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8-10th November 2016: Living with Dementia: Fostering Hope, Challenging Fear

Edinburgh Centre for Research on the Experience of Dementia (ECRED), as part of the ESRC Festival of Social Science in November are presenting an exhibition of photographs and short films produced with and by people with dementia. This exhibition, ‘Living with Dementia: Fostering Hope, Challenging Fear’ shows many people living well with dementia, challenging the stereotype of them as tragic victims of a disease which takes away the person, and the stigma associated with a diagnosis of dementia, which so often marginalises the lives of those living with dementia.

Some of Dr Julie Watson’s work features in Exhibit 5 of the exhibition ‘Beyond words – the language of body and soul’. 

References

• Davies, N, Rait, G. Maio, L. & Illife, S. (2016) Family caregivers’ conceptualisations of quality end-of-life care for people with dementia: A qualitative study. Palliative Medicine DO1:10.1177/0269216316673552
• Hockley J, Harrison J, Watson J, Randall M & Murray (2016) Fixing the Broken Image of care homes, could a ‘care home innovation centre’ be the answer? Age and Ageing. DOI: 10.1093/ageing/afw154 
• Sikes, P. & Hall, M. (2016) “It was then that I thought ‘whaat? This is not my Dad”: The implications of the ‘still the same person’ narrative for children and young people who have a parent with dementia. Dementia DOI: 10.1177/1471301216637204

Addressing inequalities across the generations

Ahead of her keynote presentation today at our 5th International Conference: Unequal Families and Relationships, Julia Brannen addresses how, in the context of a widening gap in the fortunes of different family generations in Britain today, it is important to examine how parents and their adult children manage inequalities and negotiate relationships.

Sociologists, amongst others, increasingly reflect on the way inequalities remain despite policies and programmes to tackle them. Looking at relationships across the generations in families is a useful way to understand the perpetuation of inequality. In our research we are particularly interested in how changes over time in institutions and cultural practices have influenced different generations’ lives, identities and experiences.

We have pioneered the use of a particular style of biographical narrative approach alongside a research design that involves understanding the perspectives of multiple members of the same families. This approach provides a rigorous framework to understand change and continuity in the transmission of ideas and practices across generations over the long term. It also shows how the different resources held and accessed by families (e.g. time, knowledge, contacts and networks, as well as money) enable and support the construction of different identities. New generations may reject such resources or they may act upon them in new ways within the historical context in which their lives unfold.

Even though relationships between parents and adult children in Western societies can expect to last 20 or even 30 years and longer, they have been subject to little research. By focusing on a family whose life has been marked by migration, our research examines how different generations manage change and inequality. In particular, the research describes the relations between a migrant grandfather and his UK-born adult son.

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Julia Brannen is Professor of the Sociology of the Family at the Thomas Coram Research Unit, Institute of Education, University College London. You can read a brief introduction to her conference presentation Inequality and intergenerational family relationships: methodological and theoretical issues here.

You can follow live tweets from the conference using the hashtag #CRFR2016 on Twitter.

Fathers and Sons: Generations, Families and Migration authored by Julia Brannen is available from Palgrave Macmillan

An unanticipated journey within the landscape of care

Ahead of her seminar on 18 November, Jo Alexjuk reflects on her own journey in undertaking research into anticipatory grief, loss and bereavement of carers of people with dementia:

It was a pleasure to be asked by colleagues within the School of Health in Social Science to present at the CRFR Emotions Seminar Series this semester. They were particularly interested in my doctoral research which relates to: The journey from dementia diagnosis to final bereavement: an exploration of anticipatory grief, loss and bereavement experienced by carers of people with dementia. I felt this topic was extremely pertinent to the content requirements of the series, however, their request made me stop and think about my own ‘journey’ in undertaking this research and reflect on aspects that, for me at least, were totally unanticipated.

Research undertaken within the field of social sciences often reports on the ‘facts and stats’, the emotional experiences of the study participants: particularly with regard to research undertaken within the field of dementia care. Yet, as researchers employing research methods - whether utilising quantitative, mixed methods or as in my case a qualitative hermeneutic phenomenological approach - are we in actual fact ‘method researchers’? By this I mean are we akin to method actors? Are we the Meryl Streep or Robert de Nero of the research world who, especially with regard to phenomenology, impartially bring and immerse ourselves into the life-world, the lived-experience of others? And once the research is completed, do we withdraw with the ‘results or findings’, without acquiring any emotional residue from that experience?

My research journey began in 2008 and although I was pragmatic in my view towards my research role, for example in choosing my topic, how long the process may take and what I may encounter, I was nonetheless full of optimism. However, seven years on having experienced six close family bereavements (three of which were dementia-related) and a serious road accident involving my mother, I felt that I have been repeatedly thrown into a dual ‘role’ of family-caregiver and family-caregiver researcher.

On reflection this duality of roles has not been problematic insofar as my experience has offered a ‘truer’, more empathic approach to my research, which I felt that I already possessed, but perhaps hadn’t always previously maintained. The elucidation of a deeper understanding of the ‘lived experience’, the perceived and understood reality of the experiential ‘journeys’ of caregivers has resonated with me deeply.

During the research process I was always cognisant in adhering to professional boundaries with regard to my research aims and methodological application, but equally mindful of carer-participants’ expressions that caregiving is about more than the cognitive losses experienced by the person with dementia. There are also the physical and emotional experiences acquired by caregivers during and beyond their caring role.

Looking back over my research journey I have not only acquired an in-depth experiential perspective of caregivers of people with dementia, but I have also attained a personal understanding of the landscape of dementia care. My unanticipated journey will end with the submission of my PhD dissertation in April 2016, although I do anticipate future research journeys within this landscape of care.


Jo Alexjuk is a Lecturer in Dementia and Programme Director of the MSc in Dementia: International Experience Policy and Practice within the School of Health in Social Science, University of Edinburgh, as well as a member of the Edinburgh - Centre for Research on the Experience of Dementia: E-CRED. She is particularly interested in grief, loss and end-of-life care experiences of people living with dementia, whether they are family carers or people with dementia themselves. For further information contact Jo at ealexjuk@ed.ac.uk.

Jo Alexjuk’s seminar An unanticipated journey within the landscape of care will be held at CRFR on 18th November (12-2pm). To book a place email crfr.events@ed.ac.uk or call 0131 651 1832

Care leavers’ narratives of their past and future selves

Ahead of their CRFR seminar on 13 October and National Care Leavers Week 2015 (22-31 October), Lisa Whittaker (University of Glasgow) and Emma Davidson (University of Edinburgh) reflect on their research project Young People and their Future Selves.

This project arose after a chance meeting at the Journal of Youth Studies conference in Glasgow 2013. Lisa was working for a Scottish youth charity (who we will call the Green Project) and Emma had recently finished her PhD. Lisa had always felt that the video diaries filmed by young people at the end of the Green Project’s residential programme were a potentially fascinating resource. In these videos young people reflect on, and talk to, their ‘future self’. We were fortunate to be awarded funding from The University of Edinburgh’s Challenge Investment Fund for a pilot study to analyse a sample of video diaries combined with interviews with young people who had recorded them. We hoped this would give us an insight into the social worlds of vulnerable young people that research often overlooks.

Over the past 18 months we have interviewed 20 young people, some had not grown up in care but most of our sample had. Young people had different motivations for participating. Many wanted to give ‘something back’ following a positive experience at the Green Project but several were still experiencing challenges in their lives and saw the interview as an opportunity to re-engage with support. The interviews themselves were powerful and often very emotional. While we did hear positive stories about care, unfortunately many more were negative.

Our findings highlight the importance of relationships for young people in care, specifically the role of care, love and consistent unconditional support within professional/corporate relationships. Many of the relationships young people experienced were shaped by bureaucratic boundaries and regulations. There were many examples of positive, supportive professional relationships ending abruptly and without warning, and young people’s own ‘natural’ transitions into adulthood often did not match those impressed upon them by the care system. Young care leavers articulated goals and aspirations in their video diaries and interviews, but all too often structural processes denied them the opportunities to realise their aspirations and were left in precarious situations.

Our findings add further evidence to the research and debate about young people’s experiences of care. In particular we see parallels with IRISS’s exciting project Relationships Matter, the work of CELCIS and Who Cares? Scotland. We have shared our findings at several national and international conferences and will shortly submit several papers to leading journals. However, we would like to look beyond measuring success on the completion of academic outcomes. By working collaboratively with practitioners we can share information, clarify our understandings and inform their practice. Following the CRFR seminar, we have more knowledge exchange activities planned (including a podcast for IRISS:FM) which we hope will help build a network between the University, practitioners, policy-makers and young people.

Please note: our CRFR seminar is now fully booked. If you are interested in finding out more we would really like to hear from you. Please contact Emma Davidson e.c.davidson@ed.ac.uk and Lisa Whittaker lisa.whittaker@glasgow.ac.uk and follow us on twitter via @lisawhittaker02 @emz_davidson

Supporting Dads in the context of gender inequality

Sarah Morton, CRFR Co-Director, and Gil Viry, CRFR Associate Researcher and Chancellor's Fellow in Sociology at University of Edinburgh

There is a lot of recent interest in supporting dads. However, this focus on just one gender of parents poses some interesting questions and challenges in the context of ongoing gender inequality.

Dads often feel that general parenting services, like parent and toddlers, or parenting classes are not aimed at them and may feel excluded from these services. But young mums, older mums, women from ethnic minorities, same-sex mothers or women with disabilities might also feel that services are not ‘for them’. This is not only about gender.

Dads are getting more involved in family responsibilities than in the past – that’s a great step forward, but it’s not yet a revolution (see Giddeon Burrows blog). In most households (though not all), women continue to do the vast majority of childcare and housework. In particular, women fit their employment around the perceived needs of their husband and children more often than do men. This is one main reason why women account for 75% of part-time workers in Scotland.[i]

Because of this, it is likely that early years services, like parent and toddler groups will have more women than men using them. Services focus on those who need them, and the vast majority of those caring for young children on a day to day basis are women. Of course services should, where appropriate, make particular efforts to include all kinds of parents.

Whilst men are getting more involved with kids at home, they tend to focus on the fun things, and less on the hard work of caring, feeding, cleaning, doing the washing and ensuring children eat healthily and get enough sleep[ii].

Men face discrimination at work when asking for parental leave because we perpetuate the ‘father as breadwinner’ model. We need to tackle this, but not in isolation. Women still struggle to get their basic rights at work when pregnant, including not getting sacked, and face a barrage of assumptions and obstacles in their role as parents. Employed women are overrepresented among clerical workers, personal service workers (including care) and sales staff. This perpetuates gender stereotypes that caring and serving others (also within the home) are female tasks. All these issues are interrelated so that that they need to be addressed together.

Good parenting matters, but also good co-parenting – that is how parents coordinate and cooperate in their parenting roles – that benefits children’s wellbeing. Mutual support and good communication between both parents is likely to create a supportive environment within the whole family. High-quality co-parenting is also fundamental in the event of a separation or divorce. Fathers who were significantly committed to their co-parenting role before the separation are more likely to stay actively engaged in their children’s lives after the separation. In this situation, mothers are also more likely to trust and promote fathers having frequent contact with their children.

In most families, it is desirable that fathers are involved with their families and children, but it is also important to acknowledge that a number of fathers are destructive, abusive and violent forces in family life. In these situations, fathers often do more harm than good for children’s wellbeing.

What does the evidence say?

Evidence shows children need at least one loving and attentive parent. Having two parents helps to share this difficult and time-consuming task, but there is no clear evidence that the gender of either of these matters to children's outcomes[iii].

However the broader evidence on parenting is unclear about gender. Most research on parents focuses on mothers by default rather than intention as mothers as the main carers are usually more available to researchers to provide details of family life[iv] When research does look at fathers there is often no comparable data on mothers, so it is hard to identify a 'father' effect.

For separated families we know that good relationships both between parents and between fathers and children (in particular high support, responsive fathering and non-coercive control) are fundamental to children's wellbeing[v]. Some children regret not being in touch with absent fathers, other children feel coerced into continuing contact with fathers who are causing them distress (see Morrison, 2009).

In any case, tackling gender inequality within the home and at the workplace requires actions and changes from both genders.

Initiatives for just one gender of parent

What are we trying to achieve in developing and funding work aimed specifically at dads or mums? Do we want to get men more involved with their children? Or are we interested in getting men to play a full role in family life and share half of the homecare tasks enabling women to achieve greater equality in public life? Or is the aim that any parent should feel supported and enabled in their role regardless of gender?

If we are offering services to solely dads or mums, we need to be careful that they do not reinforce gender stereotypes and perpetuate gender inequalities. The following questions may act as a guide:

• Why are we offering services to a specific gender, rather than parents? Are there specific barriers we seek to overcome? For example, antenatal services must focus on women, or support for absent parents should be thinking mainly about dads.
• What is the aim of the gender specific service? Is it addressing inequalities issues or perpetuating them? For example, do services for mums emphasise attachment, whilst those for dads emphasise having fun with their kids? To tackle inequalities do services for men need to emphasise their role within the home, whilst those for women help them find employment?
• Are services for dads ensuring that they are not aiding coercive and violent fathers to continue to control their partners post separation, or enabling contact that children do not want?
• Are all parenting services building on the evidence that strong relationships between parents is a key factor in children's outcomes, rather than focusing separately on mums or dads relationships with their children?
• When we deliver gender-specific services for parents, do we avoid gender stereotyping? Are gender specific groups and organisations careful about the language they use to talk about men and women to avoid reaffirming gender-based assumptions (like men are not skilful at childcare, or women are naturally more caring?)
• Are we careful when talking about gender-specific parenting not to offend and upset children who have different family structures due to bereavement, separation, adoption, assisted conception or lone parenthood or same sex parenting?

If we want to move to a world where mothers and fathers are enabled to do the best for their children and families, gender-specific services need address inequalities. In imagining a Scotland that is the best place in the world to grow up, shouldn't any parent get the support they need to fulfil their role to the best of their ability regardless of gender, age, ethnicity or social background?

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[i] http://www.closethegap.org.uk/content/gap-statistics/
[ii] Growing Up in Scotland 2008 Chapter 7 'Parenting Styles and Parenting Responsibilities' in: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/212225/0056476.pdf
[iii] Bromley (2009) Growing up in Scotland: the impact of children’s early activities on cognitive development. Edinburgh Scottish Government
[iv] http://aboutfamilies.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/aboutfamilies_gaps-in-research-all-topics.pdf
[v] Mooney, A Oliver C and Smith M (2009) Impact of Family Breakdown on Children’s Well-being. London DCSF

CRFR's International Conference

Book now for the CRFR International Conference: Researching families and relationships: innovations in methods, theory and policy relevance

10-12 June, John MacIntyre Conference Centre, Edinburgh #crfr2013

International speakers from 25 countries including Norway, Finland, the US, Malaysia, Portugal, France, and Israel:

• Exploring key topics such as domestic abuse, early years, climate change, kinship care
• Unrivalled international networking opportunity for researchers interested in families and relationships
• Innovative research methods and approaches including visual methods, digital and social media
• Addressing ethical issues and covering sensitive topics

http://crfrinternationalconference.wordpress.com/ 
1 day, 2 day and 3 day rates available, including drinks reception and conference dinner

International keynote speakers will talk about child poverty, migration and globalisation; connectedness and kinship; and international development:

• Professor Jo Boyden from Young Lives;
• Professor Jennifer Mason, Manchester University
• Professor Rhacel Parreñas, University of South Carolina
• Glowen Kyei Mensah Participatory Development Associates, Ghana
• And CRFR’s Professor Lynn Jamieson

CRFR’s 3-day gathering of international academics working in the area of families and relationships is held every three years – don’t wait till 2016, book your place today!

Day one: Glowen Kyei Mensah on ‘Listening to the voices of children’ and choose from 41 papers on:
• Changing families and relationships
• Networks and mobility
• Elective relationships
• Time and generations
• The longitudinal lens
• Addressing issues of inequality m
• Resettling families
• The development of visual methods
• Post separation families and emotions
• Families and climate change
• Researching sensitive topics
• Addressing policy challenges
Then network and relax at the drinks reception

Day two: Rhacel Parrenas on Gendered intimacies in transnational life and choose from 43 papers on:
• Transnational families
• Kinship care
• Relexivity and Ethnography
• Researching majority/minority worlds
• The impact of the digital age
• Researching multiple family perspectives
• Mothers and inequalities
• Challenges in the early years
• Addressing issues of inequality
• Participative approaches
• Families food and eating
• Perspectives on families and domestic abuse’

Jo Boyden on what international comparative longitudinal research contribute to researching, understanding and changing childhood poverty in developing countries?

Then network and relax at the conference dinner

Day Three: choose from 19 papers on Families relationships and global issues
• Resettling families
• Networks and personal communities
• Learning from evaluation
• Families, relationships and global issues
• Mixed method approaches

Jennifer Mason talks about Sensations, atmospheres and resemblances: ‘tuning in’ differently to families and relationships.

A panel discussion is joined by Graham Allen, Keele University
Then book a masterclass with Jennifer Mason on ‘Facet Methodology’ principles and practice

Follow us on twitter @crfrtweet #crfr2013 Book online today http://crfrinternationalconference.wordpress.com

Families, Relationships and Societies, issue 2

Eagerly awaited by many of us at CRFR, issue 2 of Families, Relationships and Societies has just been published. Many of the articles draw on the rich accounts of qualitative research, and themes of relationships and parenting dominate.

Access to the journal is free for 2012 by emailing tpp-frs-trial@bristol.ac.uk.

Taking the relationships theme, Julie Carter explores theories of commitment from a female perspective in her interviews with young women aged 19-30 years. Lester Coleman and colleagues outline an academic and voluntary sector collaboration seeking to enhance relationship support for 'mixed' couples and families. And lastly, Ciara O'Dwyer and colleagues are interested in how grandparents cope with relationship breakdown among their adult children.

Parenting is another strong theme. Rhiannon Evans and Sally Holland make an important contribution by positioning their research on child protection within the context of 'troublesome' families - policy areas which are typically dealt with seperately. The authors suggest that many protective activities are carried out by communities labelled as 'troublesome'. Issues of child safety are similarly picked up in research by Anna Conolly and Jenny Parkes. Their work has gathered the experienes of young people's living in areas affected by high youth crime in relation to their parents' strategies to keep them safe.

Jeni Harden and colleagues present a very different aspect of parenting, exploring how parents negotiate paid work and care responsibilities. The authors emphasise the inevitable flexibility that emerges in boundaries between work and home, for example in relation to how time is managed and negotiated.

Sandra Cunning and colleagues shift the focus to evaluation, presenting a case-study of a Canadian mental health agency where evidence-based practices were implemented as part of a significant organsiational change process.

While Artur Steinerowski and Mike Woolvin present findings from an action research project in rural Scotland to reflect on the challenges and opportunities to support older people to establish social enterprises.

The Open Space article this month is from our own Sarah Morton and close collaborators David Phipps and Sandra Nutley to ask how research can be used to influence family services and policies. The article begins by outlining the growth in academic understanding of reserach use and offers some emerging lessons about reserach use can be improved. It continues by relating experiences of CRFR's work over the last 10 years and also experiences from the Knowledge Mobilization (KMb) Unit at York University in Toronto, Canada.

 

Editorial is by Brid Featherstone & Tess Ridge.

Visit the contents page by clicking here to access all the articles.

Is Scotland the best place to bring up children?

Parenting Across Scotland has published a new collection of essays about parenting in Scotland. Entitled 'Scotland: the best place in the world to bring up children', the publication puts forward proposals from leading researchers about how to make Scotland a world-leader in parenting. Two CRFR staff members contributed essays about their projects:

Parenting young children

Growing up in Scotland (GUS) is tracing the lives of thousands of children across Scotland from birth to the teenage years and beyond. This information can tell how  parents are parenting, what influences parenting and how parenting styles impact on children. Findings include:

• Home learning environment: Most parents of children under five are providing a good 'home learning environment: at age 22 months, 79% of children were read to every day, 58% sang songs  while 28% had the opportunity to paint or draw every day. However, children from less advantaged households were doing these activities less frequently. Children taking part in more activities scored higher on cognitive ability tests, even after other socio-demographic factors were taken into account.
• Discipline techniques: While one third of parents in Scotland had used smacking by the time their child was aged four, only 13% of parents agreed that it was a useful technique.
• Parenting support: A quarter of parents with a child under one said that they found it difficult to know who to ask for help or advice about being a parent. Young mums were more likely to say they did not like classes or groups.
• Parenting and children's health: A lack of parenting skills were associated with poorer health and health behaviours amongst children. In particular, high levels of parent-child conflict were associated with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties.

By Lesley Kelly, CRFR and Paul Bradshaw, ScotCen Social Research: Growing up in Scotland. 

Parenting teenagers: relationships and behaviour

Calls to helplines indicate that parents of teenagers often struggle and feel isolated, particularly with behaviour and relationship issues. The About Families project has highlighted a number of themes emerging from research about the key issues for parents of teenagers:

• Conflict: Conflict between parents and teens is not necessarily a bad thing and can play a useful role in teenagers' development. It is how often, with whom, and why conflict happens that is most important, along with how parents manage their own behaviour. Conflict with friends, which usually involves some attempt to limit the damage and preserve a friendship, can help teenagers to learn how to manage conflict and develop emtional responses.
• Communication and relationships: Teenagers who are communicated with and involved in family decisions are more competent in making decisions about their lives and less likely to engage in problem behaviour.
• Moving to independence: It is natural for parents to feel some anxiety as teenagers become more independent. However, problems can arise if this anxiety makes them act in a way which is instrusive or inhibits a teenager's exploration of new environments and relationships. Parents may manager better when they see becoming independent as a healthy part of adolescent development.
• Parent satisfaction: How happy parents feel about their parenting is linked to how they view the development of their teenagers.
• Parenting together: Parents agreeing about their approach to parenting is more important than who does what, or how much each is involved. Both parents of disabled teenagers are likely to be involved in all areas of their teenagers life.
• How much do parents about their teenagers?: There are differences between mothers and fathers in how they find out about their children's lives. Howevere, how much they know could be the result of what teenagers choose to tell them rather than what they try to find out. Ensuring a teenager feels comfortable about sharing information cold be more effective in deterring them from problem behaviour than trying to control their activities.
  Although some parents of disabled teenagers think that more detailed communication is necessary, generally the issues are thought to be the same, regardless of disability.

By Karen Mountney: About Families

New journal on families and relationships launched

 

CRFR is pleased to support the launch of a new social science journal, Families, Relationships and Societies. The journal explores family life, relationships and generational issues from a social science perspective and with a strong policy and practice focus. The aim to present high-calibre work and stimulate debate has been well achieved in the first issue:

• Editorial: Tess Ridge and Brid Featherstone
• An ethic of care and sibling care in older age: Marian Barnes
• Doing family, contesting gender and expanding affinity: Family practices of married women in Hong Kong: Anita Chan
• Family structure, family stability and outcomes of five-year-old children: Terry-Ann Craigie et al.
• Farewell to family? Notes on an argument for retaining the concept: Ros Edwards
• The effectiveness of interventions aimed at improving access to the health and mental health services for looked after children and young people: A systematic review: Roy Jones et al.
• Reflections on governing the family: The close relationship between child protection and social work in advanced Western societies – the example of England: Nigel Parton
• Care relations and public policy: Social justice claims and social investment frames: Fiona Williams
• Open Space: A review of social trends and family and relationships policies in England and Wales: Martina Klett-Davies

 Marian Barnes offers insight into the under-researched area of sibling care, and together with Anita Chan's article on married women in Hong Kong, demonstrates the value of qualitative approaches in exploring family practices. The journal has taken on an international perspective and the quantitative study by Craigie, Brooks-Gunn and Waldfogel from the United States is an important contribution to a contested area in families research. Edwards and Gillies have offered a similarly stimulating argument, and the editorial team are hopeful that many readers respond to the ideas put forward in these two articles in forthcoming issues. The systematic review by Roy Jones and colleagues, and the article by Nigel Parton are required reading for those interested in child welfare and protection, and again the editors would welcome alternative views of policy and practice in this area. Finally Fiona Williams' article builds on her groundbreaking work on care ethics.

Open Space is a unique feature of the journal providing space for more critical reviews of research, policy, practice initiatives and recent publications and providing an opportunity, over time, for authors to test out new viewpoints, stimulate debates and bring one another up-to-date on local and global contexts. Martina Klett-Davies kicks this off with a policy review in the area of relationships support.

The journal is available in print and online, and all institutions have free online access to the journal in 2012. Go to http://www.policypress.co.uk/journals_frs_trial.asp? for more information.

CRFR would like to congratulate everyone on the editorial board for this important contribution.