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Ageing is the basic human experience which begin on the day of our birth and reaches its peak in older age. By accepting ageing on the personal, family and social level as a period of life which carries certain changes in psychical, health and social functioning as well as spiritual maturation we send a message about ageing process as a natural, integral and necessary part of human life. At the same time inevitable changes in older age should not be basis for development of stereotypes, prejudices and discrimination but the challenge for finding and testimony for meaningful life. In mutual (intergenerational) searching for the answer on the question about the role of elderly people in today`s world lays the ground for successful, active and healthy ageing, ageing which is not the meaning of itself but which allows (through open communication and coexistence with others) shaping of one new reality which from generation to generation send message about indestructibility and sense of human life. The goal of these qualitative research was to examine the role of elderly persons in the family from the perspective of the elderly, their children and grandchildren. In the research participated 74 participants in elderly age (65-98), 82 participants in middle age (26-62) and 86 young persons (age 18-25). The data was obtained by half structured interview in rural and urban parts of Croatia. The method of analyse was thematic analysis. The results of the research show that all three generations see the role of the elderly people in the family as providing emotional, advisory and material help/support ; providing support in bringing up grandchildren ; care of the spiritual aspects of life in family and care about the required members of family. Also the important theme represent the role of elderly persons in running a household. Although the main themes are common and matching in all mentioned groups of participants some specifics in individual age categories are found which will be presented and discussed. In the conclusion it will be highlighted that regardless the differences in the three generations, the role of the elderly persons in the family (seen by the elderly, their children and grandchildren) is very clear and speaks in favour of family and intergeneration connection and support within contemporary family in Croatia.

The presentation discusses main results of case- based surveillance study of child abuse and neglect conducted within the BECAN project.

The main purpose of this paper is to determine impact of different roles in woman’s life as competing roles to motherhood. The focus is put on impact of economic status, educational goals and professional aspirations as partially interfering activities to motherhood. According to goals of analysis the female subsample of EVS data is analyzed taking into account variety of countries covered by EVS. Dependent variable in analysis is the attitude towards having children as goal of life. As independent variables few blocks of predictors are used. The role of educational activities are depicted by educational achievement, educational aspirations (through level of parents’ education). Professional role is measured through employment, importance of work, and professional aspirations. The other descriptors of social influence were found in religious beliefs, attitudes toward marriage, abortion and sex, and gender roles. And in the end biological descriptors such as age is used to describe fertility period of life and age of the birth of first child are used. On the macro level the description of societal environment is given through country level descriptors partly derived from statistical description of countries like economic performance, natural growth indicators or indicators of country’s promotion of fertility (such as provision of facilities of children) or aggregated from male subsample in EVS survey data like average attitude of men in country about gender roles or position of women in society. Special advantage of EVS data is recognized in diversity of countries regarding religious background, impact of religion on everyday life and fertility rates. The main goal of analysis is directed to distinguish macro or micro level policy conclusions about birth promotion

In Croatia, the epidemiological research on child abuse and neglect was conducted throughout the whole country: 40 primary and 29 secondary schools were selected, using a multi-stage stratified cluster sample. In each school 2 class divisions per targeted grade were randomly selected. In order to reach the expected sample size (2% of the population for each targeted age groups) 5, 006 children were approached and 3, 688 (73.67%) participated in the study. The highest participation was for the 16 years old (84.12%), while for the 11 and 13 years old the participation was 69.24% due to the fact that for the children younger than 14 written parental consent was needed according to the Croatian Code of Ethics for the Research with Children. By Croatian law, all cases of detected violence against children, including witnessing violence between parents, must be reported to Centres for social care (CSC). The date for reported cases of child abuse and neglect were collected from 37 CSC that geographically correspond to areas covered by the epidemiological research. In all these CSC there were only 311 reported cases of direct child abuse and neglect (67.52% cases were in depth analyzed), and 573 cases of children witnessing violence between parents (48% were analyzed) for the targeted age groups. The preliminary results from both studies will be discussed with the focus on specific challenges that must be addressed in their generalization.

Metoda fokus grupa može predstavljati korisnu istraživačku strategiju prikupljanja spoznaja o društvenim fenomenima koji impliciraju upotrebu multimetodskog i multiparadigmatskog pristupa. Korisnost metode fokus grupa ogleda se u mogućnostima njene primjene u različitim fazama istraživanja, pri čemu svrha metode ovisi o ciljevima pojedine faze. U skladu s tim, fokus grupa se može koristiti u eksplorativne svrhe ili za konstruiranje novog odnosno provjeru valjanosti već postojećeg mjernog instrumenta u pilot istraživanjima. Cilj ovog izlaganja je ukazati na mogućnosti primjene metode fokus grupa u pilot istraživanjima koje su temeljene na iskustvu i rezultatima dobivenim u BECAN projektu. Ciljevi provedbe fokus grupa u pripremnoj fazi glavnog dijela istraživanja u BECAN projektu su bili: 1) generiranje novih sadržaja o pojedinim aspektima fenomena zlostavljanja i zanemarivanja djece u obitelji ; 2) provjera sadržajne valjanosti, strukture, jasnoće pitanja i prikladnosti ponuđenih raspona odgovora, te 3) ispitivanje doživljaja odgovaranja na pitanja emocionalno zasićenog sadržaja. Ukupno je provedeno sedam fokus grupa s djecom u dobi od 11, 13 i 16 godina, te tri fokus grupe s roditeljima. Provedba fokus grupa je uključivala grupnu diskusiju i ispunjavanje upitnika. Zaključci dobiveni na temelju provedenih fokus grupa ukazali su na moguće prednosti primjene metode fokus grupa u pilot istraživanju koje su se očitovale kroz: uočavanje dodatnih konstrukata koji opisuju proučavani fenomen, povećanje sadržajne valjanosti instrumenta, prilagodbu pitanja postojećem kulturološkom kontekstu i dobi sudionika te stjecanju uvida u iskustvo odgovaranja na pitanja emocionalno zasićenog sadržaja. Unatoč navedenim prednostima, primjena fokus grupa u BECAN projektu ukazala je i na moguća ograničenja metode koja se očituju kroz različite izazove etičke i metodološke naravi kao što su: višestrukost uloga djece kao sudionika istraživanja uzevši u obzir njihov emocionalni i kognitivni razvoj te iznošenje osobnih iskustava doživljenog nasilja.