As recent advances in medicine contribute to people living longer and living with chronic illness in the home, the role of the family caregiver has become more common. Furthermore, due to varying family structures and living situations it is not always the parent or adult child who takes on the caregiver role. The traditional role of the adult caregiver increasingly falls on the shoulders of children, adolescents, and emerging adults. Also, in cases where parents are unable to take care of their children, grandparents take on the role of adult caregiver for their grandchildren. A caregiving role at any point in life may affect a person's development and add stressors, but also may create rewards that influence the caregiver's identity and well-being.
How Caregiving Affects Development: Psychological Implications for Child, Adolescent, and Adult Caregivers examines these effects using a lifespan development framework. Each chapter presents theory and empirical research on caregiving from a different phase in the lifespan including childhood, adolescence, emerging adulthood, and young, middle, and older adulthood. Within the context of the caregiver's life the chapter authors examine how the role of caregiver affects their development.
Topics include the effects of early caregiving on well-being, school performance, filial responsibility, felt obligation, coping with stresses of multiple roles in middle adulthood, and intergenerational reciprocity. Challenges and rewards specific to each stage in life are examined, and some chapters also provide a comparison with the experiences of noncaregiving peers.
This book offers a new and exciting look at often overlooked family caregivers and introduces a set of challenging questions that will guide future research in the field.
