Families in Focus: New Perspectives on Mothers, Fathers, and Children

Despite the rhetoric of recent years lamenting the loss of the traditional family, families have never fit nicely into any single model. Family may refer to people linked by marriage or kinship or to people claiming descent from common ancestors. People may form and extend families by adopting or fostering children, defining nonrelatives as family, or establishing consensual partnerships. Families are as adaptable as they are diverse, reconfiguring themselves over their life cycles and evolving to accommodate the myriad pressures of the external world. This book focuses on families with dependent children specifically—on the roles of mothers, fathers, and children, and how these roles are evolving. We do not discount the value of understanding more about how the elderly are cared for, the role of extended kin in the support of children, the intricacies of sibling relationships, and the creative power of friendship to provide some of the comforts of family. Our primary emphasis, however, is on how fathers and mothers meet their parental responsibilities and, in turn, what children have a right to expect from their parents

Urban challenges to food and nutrition security

This review of recent literature explores the urban face of food and nutrition security in a more comprehensive, integrated way than most previous efforts. The review is organized around a conceptual framework that identifies food insecurity, inadequate caring behaviors, and poor health as the primary causes of malnutrition. It discusses current knowledge in eight areas that require the special attention of policymakers, development practitioners, and program administrators who wish to improve urban food and nutrition security: the sources and cost of food; incomes and employment; urban agriculture; urban diets; child caregiving practices; childhood mortality, morbidity, and malnutrition; health and environment; and social assistance programs, or safety nets. The review also reports on the magnitude of rural-urban and intra-urban health differences in mortality, morbidity, and malnutrition. In conclusion, the review indicates which policy issues and knowledge gaps remain for future research to address.Urban health. ,Urban poor Services for. ,Food security. ,Malnutrition. ,Child care. ,

La Familia en la Mira: Nuevas Perspectivas Sobre Madres, Padres e Hijos

A pesar de la retórica de los últimos años que lamenta la pérdida de la familia tradicional, las familias jamás se han podido encajonar en modelo único. Familia puede referirse a la gente que se ha vinculado entre sí por matrimonio o parentesco, o a los que pretenden descender de antecesores comunes. Las personas pueden formar y extender familias, ya sea mediante la adoptación o crianza de niños, o definiendo como familiares a gente no emparentada o mediante el establecimiento de sociedades consensuales. Las familias son tan adaptables como diversas, pues se reconfiguran a sí mismas en el transcurso de sus ciclos de vitales y se desarrollan para adecuarse a las innumerables presiones del mundo exterior. Este libro se enfoca específicamente en las familias con hijos dependientes—en los roles de madres, padres e hijos, y en la evolución de dichos roles. No menospreciamos el valor de una comprensión más profunda acerca de cómo cuidar a los ancianos, del papel de la familia extensa en la manutención de los niños, de los embrollos de las relaciones entre hermanos, ni del poder creativo de la amistad que proporciona algunas de las satisfacciones propias de la familia. No obstante, nuestro énfasis principal está en la manera en que padres y madres asumen sus responsabilidades ante sus hijos y, a su vez, qué es lo que los niños tienen derecho a esperar de sus padres. -- Despite the rhetoric of recent years lamenting the loss of the traditional family, families have never fit nicely into any single model. Family may refer to people linked by marriage or kinship or to people claiming descent from common ancestors. People may form and extend families by adopting or fostering children, defining nonrelatives as family, or establishing consensual partnerships. Families are as adaptable as they are diverse, reconfiguring themselves over their life cycles and evolving to accommodate the myriad pressures of the external world. This book focuses on families with dependent children specifically—on the roles of mothers, fathers, and children, and how these roles are evolving. We do not discount the value of understanding more about how the elderly are cared for, the role of extended kin in the support of children, the intricacies of sibling relationships, and the creative power of friendship to provide some of the comforts of family. Our primary emphasis, however, is on how fathers and mothers meet their parental responsibilities and, in turn, what children have a right to expect from their parents

The role of care in nutrition programmes: current research and a research agenda

The importance of cultural and behavioural factors in children's nutrition, particularly with regard to feeding, has been recognized only recently. The combination of evidence regarding the importance of caregiving behaviour for good nutrition, and improved strategies for measuring behaviour have led to a renewed interest in care. The UNICEF conceptual framework suggests that care, in addition to food security and health care services, are critical for children's survival, growth and development. The present paper focuses on the care practice of complementary feeding, specifically behavioural factors such as parental interaction patterns, feeding style and adaptation of feeding to the child's motor abilities (self-feeding or feeding by others). Three kinds of feeding styles (Birch & Fisher, 1995) are identified: controlling; laissez-faire; responsive. Probable effects of each feeding style on nutrient intake are described. A number of studies of feeding behaviour have suggested that the laissez-faire style is most frequently observed among families and communities with a higher prevalence of malnourished children. Nutrition interventions that have been able to show significant effects on outcomes, such as the Hearth Model in Vietnam (Sternin et al. 1997), have usually incorporated behavioural components in their intervention. At this time, there have been no tests of the efficacy of behavioural interventions to improve feeding practices. Research is needed to understand behavioural factors in complementary feeding, and to identify and test intervention strategies designed to improve nutrient intake of young children. Finally, the paper concludes with a discussion of how nutrition programmes might change if care were incorporated