Applied Ruddick's (1989) theory of attentive love to interview data from 29 adult daughters caring for aging mothers. Found support for the theory that adult daughters preserve their aging mothers' lives, foster their growth, and try to help their mothers remain acceptable to society. Findings have implications for family and gerontological…

Identified influence strategies used by elderly care-receiving mothers and their caregiving daughters, including positive strategies, overt and covert negative strategies, and option seeking. Findings from 64 mother-daughter pairs revealed that mother's health, level of dependency, and residence were not related to most strategy use. Negative…

Interviewed 174 care-receiving mothers and their caregiving daughters concerning contributions of care receivers. Majority of respondents perceived that daughters received aid from mothers in return for help given. Mothers who reported giving advice and money had better health whereas mothers who reported giving information were more dependent…

Compared pairs (n=174) of elderly mothers' and their caregiving daughters' perceptions of aid given to the mothers with actual caregiving activities. Results indicated nearly half of the mothers and daughters were accurate in their perceptions of aid given to the mothers; when mothers' perception of aid was inaccurate, mothers overestimated rather…

Using data gathered from Chinese, Japanese, and Korean Americans and their elderly parents (N=628), this research finds that such financial and structural factors as an adult child's income and his/her parent's need for assistance significantly influenced the frequency of an adult child's support for his/her parents. (Author/MKA)

Results from 174 elderly dependent mothers and their caregiving daughters revealed that most believed daughters were caregiving primarily for discretionary rather than obligatory reasons. Women who felt their daughters' motives were not highly discretionary reported lower intimacy in their relationships and said they had received care for more…

Used data from 144 elderly parent-adult child pairs to examine family caregiving. Final multiple regression model accounted for 63.2 percent of variability in filial role enactment. One main effect, parental marital status, and two interaction effects, child's gender with parental health and adult child's affection toward parent with geographical…

Examined bereavement among 38 daughters who were caregivers to their elderly mothers. Comparing bereavement feelings at two months to feelings at 6 months following mother's death, daughters reported decreases in grief resolution behavior and feelings of emotional shock, anger, and helplessness. Comparison to elderly widows indicated similarities…

Asked 30 families who cared for family member with Alzheimer's disease to provide narratives of daily care over 18 months. Found that different family members experienced their relationship with Alzheimer's disease patient to be continuous, continuous but transformed, or radically discontinuous with their relationship prior to the disease.…

Elderly adults (N=55) described situations provoking anger in relationships. Parental anger revolved around adult children's failure to adhere to family rules, accept parental control, and live up to role expectations. Filial anger was related to parental failure to provide assistance and accept child's autonomy. Anger between peers was related to…

Examined relationships between adults with mental retardation and their nonhandicapped siblings and the effect of these relationships on the well-being of aging mothers in 411 families. Results indicated mothers whose children provided support to the adult with retardation had better well-being than mothers with no other children or no involved…

Interviewed 11 caregivers for early-stage Alzheimer's patients to investigate changes in relationships concurrently with onset and progress of disease. Over 18 months, intimacy declined in both spouse and parent-child relationships. Caregivers were saddened at loss of reciprocal aspects of relationship and had difficulty coping with uncertain…

Examined extent to which adult sons were incorporated into support network of older rural fathers (N=56). Results revealed that sons played relatively minor role in support network of older fathers as seen through helping and moderately active role through association. Association could be explained through proximity. (Author/NB)

Examined quality of relationships between rural (N=111) and urban (N=112) older parents and their children. For rural parents, proximity to child was most important contributor to high quality relationship, followed by internal locus of control and low filial expectations. Internal locus of control was most important factor of high quality…

Aging mothers who lived with an adult child experiencing mental retardation (n=308) or mental illness (n=73) were studied to determine the antecedents and consequences of the end of coresidence. Consequences of this transition with respect to maternal burden and depressive symptoms were similar for most participants. (Author/MKA)