Negotiating independence : a qualitative study examining how mothers and teenage daughters understand and respond to risk

This thesis reports on a qualitative study examining mother and teenage daughter responses to risk and negotiated independence. Parenting has gone up the political agenda fuelled by changes in family structure and moral panics over teenage pregnancy, risk taking and anti-social behaviour. As a result, political focus on parental responsibilities has advanced dominant perceptions that parents are increasingly liable for their children's behaviour with particular emphasis on monitoring and supervision. This thesis builds on recent work challenging simplistic and deterministic accounts as flawed and unhelpful, in favour of calls for more in-depth qualitative work. This allows exploration of monitoring and supervision as part of the parenUchild relationship and embedded within broader family and social processes. Data were collected from forty-two interviews undertaken with seven mother/daughter dyads over two years. Data collected focused on aspects of risk taking including mother/daughter negotiations and were located within biographical and social contexts. Data were thematically analysed using a computer software package. Findings suggested maternal anxiety was primarily caused by fear of male violence and sexual threat. Mothers adopted practical strategies in an attempt to keep daughters safe. More significant were ongoing relationships in which negotiations about risk took place. Communication emphasised democracy, reciprocity, trust, commitment to intimacy . and mutual understanding. Maternal responses to risk taking were pragmatic focused on harm minimisation and providing support, irrespective of feelings of disapproval. Daughters were keen to minimise maternal anxiety and maintain good relationships even though they had different perceptions of risk concerns. Irrespective of social circumstances dyads experienced relationships as supportive and central to everyday survival. Service development and policy implications responsive to maternal needs within 'ordinary families' were explored, as an essential requirement for mothers responding to the increasingly complex task of negotiating risk within the context of extended transitions and fears about male threat.