The Transition to Parenthood

1
The Transition to Parenthood
2
Sexual Relations in Marriage

• Sociological questions concerning sexuality in
  relationships.
• Cohabiting couples sexual relationship vs.
  marriage
• The Selection factor- happy cohabitation leads to
  marriage
• Vitality in a relationship

3
The decision to have a child

• Having a child as a marker event
• The myth of motherhood
• Having children as the ultimate experience for a
  woman
• Childless by choice
• Marriage as satisfying

4
Myths cont

• Having a child of each sex for well roundedness
• Temporary partners
• Childfree by choice
• The importance of having a large family
• The drop in birth rate

5
Childfree by choice

• Replacement levels in Canada
• Encouraging immigration
• Why remain childfree?
• Damage to the relationship
• Sacrificing the career for women
• Keeping options open for all sorts of experiences

6
Childfree cont

• Interests in the world rather than in rearing
  children
• Workplace scheduling
• Ways to ensure childlessness in a relationship
• Oral contraceptives
• Other contraceptives

7
Abortion

• Induced abortion as a contraceptive
• The history of abortion from 1969 to 1988
• Abortion rates
• Legal abortion and psychological distress?
• Children who were unintended

8
Childlessness by Infertility

• Medical advances for those who are infertile
• Reproductive technologies
• Issues surrounding reproductive technologies
• No social planning and legal protection
• Children as commodities

9
Methods of contraception

• Donar Insemination
• Donated to physician or bank
• Designer sperm
• The Ethical Question
• Biological background
• The childs rights
• Location

10
Methods cont

• Legislation surrounding donar insemination
  European countries
• Other Questions
• Multiple donations?
• Suing the donor?

11
In-Vitro Fertilization

• The first test-tube baby
• Other degrees of IVF
• Older women and the use of IVF
• The risks of IVF
• The legal issues surround all methods of
  reproductive technologies

12
The Social Construction of Adoption

• Family equated with biology
• Adoption as a solution to unwanted pregnancies
• Fertility equates with self-esteem
• Biology is not destiny
• The psychological need to search

13
Adoption cont

• Genetic connectedness
• Culturally created
• Transracial adoption in Canada US census data.
• The adoption of Native children

14
Social Construction of Parenthood

• Gendered social constructions of parenthood
• Motherhood
• Socially constructed not just biological
• Defined along with childhood
• The development of intellectual abilities
• The demands on women
• The children of Zaire

15
Motherhood cont

• The best interest of the child
• The role of caregivers scripted around child
  safety and feedings
• Mothers essential to childs well-being?
• Motherhood according to Western criteria
• Multiple parenting

16
Multiple Parenting cont

• Child as a project to be perfected
• Motherhood competing with childhood
• Employment within the gendered division of labour
• Children demanding more

17
Social Construction of Fatherhood

• Ethnic and educational status of the family
• The increase of womens participation in the
  labour force- the effect on fatherhood
• The dual practice for fatherhood
• Intact families
• Absent fathers

18
Fatherhood cont

• The male peer group
• The double standard for fathering
• Tradition vs. divorce
• The role of fathers being less scripted
• The differences between motherhood and fatherhood
• Fathering as a contextually sensitive process.

19
Fatherhood cont

• Job flexibility and hours
• Time and quality of involvement

20
Life Pre-Birth in Marriage

• Differentiation from relationship to relationship
• The differing structural arrangements
• 1. Planned pregnancy
• 2. Unplanned pregnancy
• 3. Disagreement with pregnancy
• 4. Expecting from Fertility methods
• 5. Expecting adopted child

21
The transition to parenthood

• Stress and disenchantment in the marriage
• Level of adaptation
• The variables associated with the transition to
  parenthood

22
New Mothers

• Expecting husbands to participate more
• The traditional social construction of motherhood
  and fatherhood over time
• Level of disagreement in parenting
• The employment trajectory
• Financial resources and employment as a factor

23
Transition of parenthood cont

• Cohabitational unit?
• Single mothers
• Babies loving unconditionally and new found
  attention
• Teen mothers and their transition
• Educated and professional women
• The older single mother

24
Same-Sex couples

• The adjustment for homosexual couples- little
  research
• Gay vs. lesbian couples
• Two structural ambiguities
• The biological child
• Two persons in the same role