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In ageing societies, it is not uncommon to enter grandparenthood while one's own parents are still living. Thus, a pertinent question is whether it matters for provision of help to parents if adult children have grandchildren they look after. Earlier studies addressing help to more generations conclude that providing help to one generation increases the likelihood of helping another, and not the contrary. Here, we investigate whether gender and welfare state context make a difference for this finding by using data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe and the Norwegian Life course, Ageing and Generation study. The 14 countries included represent four different care regimes. Overall, we find that adult children who have grandchildren they look after on a weekly basis are more inclined to provide weekly help and care to parents compared to those without such frequent grandchild care responsibilities. However, the results suggest that gender and care regime matter. Helping more generations seems easier in some contexts than in others, and the contrasts across regimes are considerably greater for women than for men. When there are few alternatives to family care, many (women in particular) may have to prioritise which generation to help. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the strength and character of responsibility norms between older parents and adult children in a European context. Data from the ‘Generations and Gender Survey’ are analysed to compare seven countries from the North West to the South East of Europe: Norway, Germany, France, Romania, Bulgaria, Russia and Georgia. Norm strength is measured as the level of support for filial and parental responsibility norms. Character differences are indicated by how conditional the norms are, and how they are balanced between the younger and older generations. The general findings are in line with the family culture hypothesis – family norms are stronger towards the East and South of the continent, with Norway and Georgia as the extreme cases. National differences are considerable for filial norms, but moderate for parental norms. Parental responsibility is relatively stronger in the North West, filial responsibility in the South East. Family norms have a more open character in the West, where the limits to responsibility are widely recognised. Women are less supportive of family obligations than men. It is suggested that where the welfare state is more developed, it has moderated the demanding character of family obligations and allowed a more independent relationship between the generations to form. The level of support for filial obligation is for these reasons a poor indicator for family cohesion in more developed welfare states. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Discusses filial norms, personal preferences for care and policy opinions about the proper role of the family and the welfare state in elder care, by drawing from a comparative study of urban populations in Norway, England, Germany, Spain and Israel. National differences in preferences and policy opinions; Relation of filial solidarity with welfare state arrangements; Correlation of normative familism with expressed familism in individuals' preferences and in policy opinions.

With working life being in the middle of both a demographic and a digital transition, a key question is whether digitalization may counteract the policy goal of delaying work exit. Here, we use survey data from the Norwegian Senior Policy Barometer to investigate the association between how digital tools are experienced and the preference for timing of work exit. We find that, even after controlling for various potential confounders, experiencing digital difficulties at the workplace is correlated with preferring to leave work early. A relevant follow-up question is then which factors increase the likelihood among older workers of experiencing such difficulties. The analyses show that workplace conditions are more important than individual characteristics, suggesting that efforts taken to reduce experiences of digital difficulties at the workplace could be effective in preventing early exits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]