| The grandparental child care model is a common family caregiving activity for the rural middle-aged and elderly.It is an important path to help the development of families,economy,and society,and to practice the active aging strategy.Data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study show that,about half of rural grandparents cared for their grandchildren in the past year of 2018,and they also cost about seven hours per day in average,which is higher than urban grandparental child caregivers.The grandparental child care affects the well-being of rural caregivers in a significant way.This study takes the well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers as the research object,and adopts the analytical framework of society ecosystems theory and welfare pluralism theory to comprehensively analyze the wellbeing of rural grandparental child caregivers,as well as the influence of multiple socialecological and welfare factors on the well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers and their interaction experiences.It also discusses policy pathways to enhance the well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers based on grandparental child caregivers’ policies of western countries.This study uses a mixed research method based on quantitative research method and complemented by qualitative research method.The part of the quantitative method uses data from the 2018 China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study,with a total valid sample size of 3,103 rural grandparental child caregivers,to describe the status of urban and rural grandparental child care,the characteristics and well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers,and to analyze the influencing factors of caregivers’ well-being using regression models.Qualitative research methods are used to conduct semi-structured in-depth interviews with 26 rural grandparental child caregivers and 10 staff members of,including the village committee and urban residents’ committee,civil affairs departments and health departments of the government,child care service institutions,and the private enterprises,using a purpose sampling method,and thematic analysis using NVivo software to explore the well-being experiences and enhancement dilemmas of rural grandparental child caregivers,in order to validate,explain,and extend the quantitative analysis results.The main research findings of this paper are as follows.First,the well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers is complex and unpromising.Most caregivers are satisfied with their lives,but 14%are dissatisfied,which is higher than urban grandparental child caregivers and non-caregivers.The rural grandparental child caregivers’ health is poor,with about 80%of caregivers rating their health as moderate or below.The rural caregivers are younger on average but have relatively poorer self-rated health than the urban caregivers and non-caregivers.The rural grandparental child caregivers are relatively more depressed,with higher depression scores than urban grandparental child caregivers and non-caregivers.The daily lives of the rural grandparental child caregivers are mostly tied to child care and household chores.Although caregiving activities mobilize the physical functionsand enhance a sense of self-worth,a significant number of caregivers are overworked,suffer from anxiety,depression,and irritability,have a low sense of personal freedom.Their employment and economic well-being are negatively affected,and they also face well-being dilemmas.Second,multiple socio-ecological factors and welfare factors play different levels of roles in enhancing the well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers.(1)The personal factors of caregivers in the micro-system are important resources for constructing their own well-being.The personal economic status,and participation status of social communication and recreational activities have significant protective effects on well-being.Having the chronic illness significantly reduces the level of the rural grandparental child caregivers’ well-being.Personal economic status and chronic illness status play greater roles in well-being than the participation status of social communication and recreational activities.(2)The grandparental child care in the meso-system has differential effects on the rural grandparental child caregivers’ well-being.The left-behind grandparental child care type,the type of migrant grandparental child care following children,and the high intensity of grandparental child care were significantly associated with caregivers’ well-being dilemmas,while traditional grandparental child care type,and low to moderate intensity of grandparental child care had an improving effect on the rural grandparental child caregivers’ well-being.(3)The multiple welfare factors of the meso-and macro-system are severely imbalanced in their responsibility for the rural grandparental child caregivers’ well-being,showing the characteristics of residual,family-oriented and low decommodification.Among them,①mutual family support takes the most important responsibility for the rural grandparental child caregivers’ wellbeing.The emotional and financial support from their children significantly improves caregivers’ life satisfaction and alleviates depression.The instrumental support from family and relatives plays an important role in caregivers’ life satisfaction,self-rated health,and depression relief.However,the trend of weakening and fragmentation of family functions exposes the mutual family support to the risk of uncertainty.②The role of state welfare arrangements in improving the well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers is limited.Only two variables,the resident pension,and other subsidies of the government,can improve rural caregivers’ well-being.The variable of resident health insurance does not have a significant effect on rural caregivers’ well-being.Most of the state welfare arrangements are not directly targeted at the rural grandparental child caregivers.The payment standards of state welfare arrangements are low,and the welfare programs are implicit,indirect,and absent.③ Market-based welfare arrangements,specifically referring to occupational welfare,have a partially supportive effect on rural grandparental child caregivers’ well-being.The benefits from the employing units and employer-provided insurance have a partially enhancing effect on rural grandparental child caregivers’ well-being,but paid leave does not have a significant effect.The rural grandparental child caregivers with parttime jobs receive a few benefits in kind and have the flexible work schedules to help alleviate the conflicts between work and family.But rural grandparental child caregivers are mostly employed informally,and their employers are generally absent in implementing state mandatory occupational welfare and voluntary occupational welfare,making it difficult for rural caregivers to receive adequate occupational welfare support.④Welfare arrangements of the social forces have weak or even opposite effects on rural grandparental child caregivers’ well-being.Only the variable of community services status can alleviate rural caregivers’ depression,while the other variables,such as relying on social forces or not to help in difficulties and social economic support status have negative effects on rural caregivers’ well-being,because caregivers’ recognition of the welfare of the social forces is low and the strength of social departments is weak.This over-reliance on residual strategy based on the support of individual and family,the problem of imbalance in multiple welfare provision,the long-term cumulative disadvantage of rural grandparental child caregivers,and the lack of alternative and complementary service support for grandparental child caregiving activities are important causes of rural caregivers’ well-being dilemmas.Third,combining the above research findings with policies of grandparental child caregivers of the western countries,the following policy pathways are proposed:adhering to the basic values of people-centeredness and civil social rights;establishing a government-led multi-provision system that focuses on enhancing family functions and promoting the welfare development of market-based and the social forces;comprehensively considering the socialecological and welfare factors and precisely identifying policy target groups;expanding the forms of welfare support and improving the welfare support levels.The main innovations of this study are as follows:(1)Taking the well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers as an independent research object and research starting point,which to a certain extent expands the research on individual well-being and related welfare arrangements in the discipline of social security.This paper also complements the existing wellbeing studies that mostly use quantitative methods but less qualitative or mixed methods in terms of knowledge exploration.(2)Using a theoretical analysis framework jointly constructed by the concept of well-being,society ecosystems theory and welfare pluralism theory,and combining micro-,meso-and macro-system factors,to analyze and interpret the well-being situation and logic of rural grandparental child caregivers in China,which compensate the problem that previous studies are mostly based on individual and family analysis perspectives,and the micro-and meso-analysis perspectives,and less using macro-analysis perspectives.(3)Based on the analysis framework of social welfare policies,we analyze the policy programs of western countries and propose the policy pathways to enhance the well-being of rural grandparental child caregivers,which enriches the research on grandparental child caregiver policy analysis and design in a certain extent. |
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