 Des enfants pour la vieillesse: Forme de la Fratrie et soutien aux parents âgés dans le sud-ouest rural françaisSerge Clément Social Science & Medicine, 1993, vol. 37, issue 2, 139-151 Abstract: Résumé La prise en charge familiale des personnes âgées dépendantes est conditionnée en particulier par la disponibilité des enfants. Une des variables importantes entrant en compte est la forme de la fratrie engendrée par les parents. Une recherche en milieu rural du Sud-Quest de la France, mariant des résultats d'une enquête quantitative (N=405 et ceux d'une analyse de 74 monographies familiales a permis d'établir les caractéristiques des conditions de prise en charge des parents âgés selon 3 formes principales de la fratrie: celles á enfant unique, celles de plusieurs enfants de même sexe, celles qui sont mixtes. La stratégie de l'enfant unique, le regret du sexe manquant, le renforcement des rôles sexuels ont des conséquences sur la disponibilité en enfant lorsqu'on avance dans l'âge. Mais la sexualisation préférentielle de l'aide semble être vécue de plus en plus difficilement par les filles.Résumé The support of the dependent elderly is conditioned by the availability of the family, particular of children, even when assistance services help the elderly stay at home. But it is difficult to tell if the elderly will have descendants capable of providing for them. A survey carried out in the rural South-Western area of France shows the importance of taking into account sibling configuration when seeking support for the old and disabled. The analysis presented here result from the joint utilization of an epidemiological study based on a questionnaire (N = 405) and a sociological survey on family history: 74 elderly people from the initial sample as well as several of their relatives and friends were interviewed at length on the conditions of support at home. Three main sibling configuration have been established: the only child, several children of the same gender, several children of different genders. They were related to three types of distances between parents and children: co-habitation, vicinity, remoteness. If one finds as many children co-habitating with at least one parent in one-child families as in the whole sample (33%), it means that family support mostly depends on the transfer of property for farmers and tradesmen: in this area, the heir must provide for his ageing parents. But there are marked differences according to the gender of the children: a boy is only likely to stay with his parents if he inherits their professional activity. On a qualitative level, the question dealt with in this article is the following: how can one plan for one's old age according to the rigidity of the number, the order and the gender of the children? Keywords: vieillesse; famille; societe; rurale; fratrie; genre (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:socmed:v:37:y:1993:i:2:p:139-151 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from Access Statistics for this article Social Science & Medicine is currently edited by Ichiro (I.) Kawachi and S.V. (S.V.) Subramanian More articles in Social Science & Medicine from Elsevier |
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