Family lens: Family Structure

Grandparents Supporting Families Affected by Mobile Labour (Families, Mobility, and Work)

Summary of a chapter on labour mobility and intergenerational relationships.

October 25, 2022

In Families, Mobility, and Work – a collection recently published by Memorial University Press that explores the intersection between family lives and work-related mobility – researchers Dr. Christina Murray, BA, RN, PhD; Dr. Doug Lionais, PhD; and Maddie Gallant, BScN, RN, share insights on intergenerational family experiences of labour migration in Atlantic Canada.

Their chapter, “‘Above Everything Else I Just Want to Be a Real Grandparent’: Examining the Experiences of Grandparents Supporting Families Impacted by Mobile Labour in Atlantic Canada,” highlights qualitative research findings on the challenges and opportunities experienced by grandparents who have stepped up to support their younger generations when one or both parents travel long distances and/or are separated from family for work.

This chapter is one of many rich contributions included in Families, Mobility, and Work – a compilation of articles and other knowledge products based on research from the On the Move Partnership. Published in September 2022 by Memorial University Press, this book is now available in print, as an eBook, and as a free open-access volume available in full on Memorial University website.

“All participating grandparents identified challenges related to three overarching themes: increased roles and responsibilities; a struggle between their idealized/anticipated vision of grandparenting and life after retirement and their lived reality; and challenges related to negotiating their relationships with other extended family members.” – Christina Murray, Doug Lionais, and Maddie Gallant

Access Families, Mobility, and Work

Chapter abstract

Until recently, research on interprovincial labour migration in Canada has paid limited attention to the experiences of the family members left behind. The Tale of Two Islands project was a multi-year narrative study that examined how long-distance commuting for work between Cape Breton Island and Prince Edward Island (PEI) and western Canada impacted intergenerational family members, including workers and their spouses and grandparents. As part of this study, conversational interviews were carried out with individual members of ten intergenerational families in PEI and Cape Breton including with thirteen grandparents. Three focus groups including one with grandmothers (N12) and another with grandfathers (N5) were carried out in PEI. This chapter explores the challenges and opportunities experienced by grandparents impacted by long-distance, interprovincial labour migration and their reflections on how this affects their daily lives. Key themes emerging from the interviews and focus groups involving grandparents included the multiple roles and responsibilities grandparents assume as they strive to support their adult children and grandchildren impacted by labour migration; the contrast between their ideal of grandparenting and their lived reality; and the familial and financial pressures they experience. Focus groups included multiple grandparents who have ended up caring for their grandchildren full-time due to parental mental health and addiction problems often linked to mobile work. Their challenges are highlighted, along with recommended steps to help address these challenges.

About the authors

Christina Murray, BA, RN, PhD, is an Associate Professor with the Faculty of Nursing at the University of Prince Edward Island. Her nursing practice has been grounded in public health and community development. Since 2015, Dr. Murray has been leading a program of interdisciplinary, collaborative narrative research focusing on labour migration and its impact on the health of individuals, families, and communities. She was the principal investigator on the Tale of Two Islands study and the Families, Work and Mobility community outreach project and is currently leading a project focused on grandparents raising their grandchildren on PEI. Dr.  Murray is also the recipient of the Vanier Institute’s 2018 Mirabelli-Glossop Award.

Doug Lionais, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the Shannon School of Business at Cape Breton University, where he teaches within the MBA in Community Economic Development (CED) program. He received his PhD in Economic Geography from Durham University (UK) after earning a BBA from Cape Breton University. Dr. Lionais’ research focuses on understanding processes of uneven development and the production of depleted communities, local and regional economic development, and forms of alternative economic practice that respond to depletion.

Maddie Gallant, BScN, RN, is a practising obstetrical registered nurse and a passionate advocate for evidenced-based practice and improving patient experiences and outcomes in all areas of health care. Maddie Gallant has played a role in the Tale of Two Islands research study as a research assistant for the duration of the study. She continues to delve into the data uncovered by the study in order to disseminate and translate important findings to other healthcare professionals in the hope of improving patient care for families experiencing labour migration.

Family Policy Update: Changes to the Divorce Act

February 17, 2021

On March 1, 2021, Canada’s new Divorce Act will come into force, introducing significant amendments to the Act since it was enacted in 1985, and since child support guidelines were amended in 1997. These changes modernize the language in the Divorce Act to encompass family adaptations outside of a deficit-based framework and include new guidelines that aim to centre the well-being of families and children.1

While the changes to the Divorce Act were initially scheduled for July 1, 2020, circumstances related to the COVID-19 pandemic deferred the amendments from coming into force until March 1, 2021.2

The four stated key objectives of the pending changes to the Divorce Act are:

  • To promote the best interests of the child;
  • To address the issue of family violence;
  • To help reduce child poverty; and,
  • To improve the efficiencies and accessibility of the family justice system.3

Terms “custody” and “access” to be replaced

Moving away from the terms of “custody” and “access,” with their proprietary connotations, parents and courts will now approach parenting orders that are focused on “decision-making responsibilities” and “parenting time” between parents. The change in terminology aims to reduce conflict between parents and more clearly convey the functions of parenting determinations under the Act. “Custody” has been replaced with the ability to make decisions regarding children’s care and well-being, and “access” has been replaced with the amount of time that children are to spend with each parent.

Non-court dispute resolution and parenting plans

The amendments state that parents should be encouraged to make their own parenting plans using non-court methods of dispute resolution, including mediation and negotiation, unless this is not appropriate, for example because of family violence concerns or mental health issues.  Parents are expected to make decisions based on the best interests of their children, and to recognize that conflict between them is harmful to their children.

Factors surrounding a child’s “best interests” to recognize each family situation is unique

During Committee hearings on proposed changes to the Act, the “presumption of equal parenting” was rejected on the basis that there is no default or one-size-fits-all approach to family situations, as children and family dynamics are diverse and unique. The new Divorce Act includes a provision that when “allocating parenting time, the court shall give effect to the principle that a child should have as much time with each spouse as is consistent with the best interests of the child.”

The new act specifically outlines what is to be considered in determining a child’s best interest, including:

a. The child’s needs, given the child’s age and stage of development, such as the child’s need for stability;

b. The nature and strength of the child’s relationship with each spouse, each of the child’s siblings and grandparents and any other person who plays an important role in the child’s life;

c. Each spouse’s willingness to support the development and maintenance of the child’s relationship with the other spouse;

d. The history of care of the child;

e. The child’s views and preferences, giving due weight to the child’s age and maturity, unless they cannot be ascertained;

f. The child’s cultural, linguistic, religious and spiritual upbringing and heritage, including Indigenous upbringing and heritage;

g. Any plans for the child’s care;

h. The ability and willingness of each person in respect of whom the order would apply to care for and meet the needs of the child;

i. The ability and willingness of each person in respect of whom the order would apply to communicate and cooperate, in particular with one another, on matters affecting the child;

    • Any family violence and its impact on, among other things,
    • the ability and willingness of any person who engaged in the family violence to care for and meet the needs of the child; and

j. the appropriateness of making an order that would require persons in respect of whom the order would apply to cooperate on issues affecting the child; and

k. Any civil or criminal proceeding, order, condition or measure that is relevant to the safety, security and well-being of the child.4

As part of ensuring the “best interests of the child,” the changes to the Divorce Act will allow a “non-parent” – including grandparents and other close family members – to apply for the right to spend a certain amount of time with the children of divorced parents. If this is granted, a legally binding “contact order” would be entered with the court.

Addressing impacts of family violence

The new Divorce Act addresses family violence and intimate partner violence (IPV), recognizing that, even if children are not directly or physically injured, they are harmed by their exposure to violence. The Act also identifies indicators of abusive behaviour, including coercive and controlling behaviour, or injury to pets or deliberate damage to property.

Mitigating risk of child poverty

Spouses and children are more vulnerable to living in poverty after a divorce or separation.5 The updated Divorce Act includes measures to:

  • Provide more tools to establish and enforce child support. In some cases, for example, tax information will be made accessible (keeping with Canada’s privacy laws) to those determining accurate child support amounts.
  • Lessen the need for costly court processes. By encouraging non-court dispute resolutions, families can avoid the expensive fees that going to court entails.

New framework to help decisions on relocation cases

Situations in which one parent wishes to relocate with a child following separation divorce have long been one of the most contentious issues in family law. The new Divorce Act aims to address this uncertainty by outlining what factors should and should not be considered. The framework’s new components are as follows:

  1. It requires a parent wishing to relocate with the children to provide 60 days’ notice in writing to the other parent of their desire/intention to relocate. The other parent then has 30 days to object to such relocation.
  2. It establishes which parent has the burden of proof in the event the matter moves to court.
    • If the children spend “substantially equal” time with both parents, then the parent who wishes to relocate must show why the relocation would be in the children’s best interests.
    • If the children spend the “vast majority” of their time with the parent who wishes to relocate, then the other parent would have to show why it is not in the children’s best interests to move.
  3. In determining whether the move is or is not in the children’s best interests, the courts are to consider the reasons for the relocation, but it is not to consider whether the moving parent would relocate with or without the children.

To learn more about changes to the Divorce Act, read the summary available on the Department of Justice website.

Notes

  1. Department of Justice Canada, “The Divorce Act Changes Explained.” Link: http://bit.ly/3nG5Up0.
  2. Department of Justice Canada, “Government Delays Divorce Act Amendments Coming into Force in Response to Requests from Justice Partners Due to COVID-19 pandemic.” Link: http://bit.ly/3ictOqI.
  3. L. Crisp, “Substantial Changes to the Divorce Act,” McKercher LLP. Link: http://bit.ly/3oFMOjW.
  4. Ibid.
  5. Department of Justice Canada, “Strengthening and Modernizing Canada’s Family Justice System.” Link: http://bit.ly/2OJfQPn.

 

Research Recap: Exploring Grand-family Experiences

Research recap by Gaby Novoa

February 9, 2021

STUDY: Ashley Martin, MD; Daniel Albrechtsons, MD; Noni MacDonald, MD, MSc, FRCPC; Nadia Aumeerally, MD, MSc, FRCPC; Tania Wong, MD, MSc, FRCPC, “Becoming Parents Again: Challenges Affecting Grandparent Primary Caregivers Raising Their Grandchildren,” Paediatrics & Child Health (May 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/30DE5ou.

Families are diverse, complex and evolve over time. These dynamics are exemplified in grand-families, in which grandparents are the primary caregivers for their grandchildren with little or no parental involvement. Counted in the Census as “skip-generation families” (also sometimes called “kinship families”), the term “grand-family” is being used by a growing number of support organizations for grandparents who raise grandchildren.

Grand-families have unique experiences, dynamics, strengths and realities, which researchers Ashley Martin, Daniel Albrechtsons, Noni MacDonald, Nadia Aumeerally and Tania Wong explore in a recent study, “Becoming Parents Again: Challenges Affecting Grandparent Primary Caregivers Raising Their Grandchildren.”1

Diverse pathways lead to formation of grand-families

Families adapt and transition to grand-families for many reasons, including mental illness and/or addictions; the absence, incarceration or death of a parent(s); or to provide support in the event of adolescent pregnancy. Similar to findings from other countries, research shows that grandparent primary caregivers in Canada are more likely to be female, out of the labour force and of lower socioeconomic status.

While grand-families are not a new phenomenon, data from the 2016 Census shows that they are home to a growing number of children in Canada (nearly 33,000 children under 15 lived in grand-families in 2016, up 32% since 2001).

“Becoming parents again” is a qualitative look at the lived experiences of grandparent carers based on semi-structured interviews with grandparent primary carers from 10 households in the Halifax Region. The authors note that the study participants were exclusively from urban environments and the majority were Caucasian. Therefore, grandparent caregivers from other ethnicities, cultures and contexts will be essential to further research on the topic, particularly First Nations families, who are overrepresented among grand-families.

Five major themes emerged in the interviews:

Changes in family dynamics: Grandparents consistently described significant role shifts within their family dynamics once they became primary caregivers and had taken on a parental role, while the biological parents adopted a stereotypical grandparent role of “spoiling their child during limited visits.”

The grandparents reported that these changes in family structures affected their relationships with their spouses, children and other grandchildren, expressing feelings of stress and guilt for not being able to meet everyone’s needs. Grandparents describe as “invaluable” the help they receive in cases where they have children, other than their grandchild’s parent, who can offer support and respite.

Psychosocial impact on grandchild and grandparent: Early adverse experiences for grandchildren often lead to the formation of grand-families. The grandparents interviewed said that the urgency in which children were placed under new care led to challenging behaviours for which the grandparents felt ill-prepared to manage.

The Department of Community Services (DCS) was involved in the cases of eight of the 10 grand-families interviewed, with reasons for intervention including the parents’ mental health and/or addiction issues or sudden death. These grandparents expressed complex feelings of sadness and anger toward their children for the resulting impacts on their grandchildren.

Challenges of parenting later in life: All grandparent caregivers discussed the difficulties of raising children as aging adults and the impacts that their chronic health conditions had on parenting. Many expressed feeling exhausted and felt it challenging to balance self-care while caring for grandchildren and spouses.

Many also spoke about the fear of dying before their grandchildren are old enough to be autonomous. The generational gaps between grandparent and child, rather than parent and child, was also noted, particularly in dealing with new and unknown technologies, such as setting boundaries around social media and screen time.

Resilience inspired by the love of family: Despite the challenges described, all interviewed grandparents said that caring for their grandchildren has profoundly impacted them in positive ways and that they had no regrets in assuming care. Their grandchildren’s well-being was cited as their top priority, and the unique relationships fostered out of the formation of their grand-family was described as one of the most fulfilling aspects of their lives. Ultimately, acting out of love inspired a sense of resilience among the study population.

Lack of resources: The majority of surveyed grandparent households (90%) expressed disappointment in the lack of community and financial supports and services available to them. Grandparents described it as emotionally and financially challenging to navigate the court system and DCS while establishing custody of their grandchildren. One expressed frustration over these interactions: “If you say you’re going to take this child and look after them and you’re the grandparents, it’s different than if I had stepped in as a foster parent. There’s no help for you.”

Since becoming a parent again was unplanned, many grandparents had to delay retirement plans and continue their participation in the paid labour force. Most families underlined financial difficulties, with minimal support from the child’s parent or the government, all while balancing work and caring for a young child.

Greater awareness of grand-families can facilitate evidence-based support

Intergenerational relationships are important for family well-being and can protect youth from risk, especially in the case of early adverse experiences, which are a common pathway leading to the formation of grand-families. While such family dynamics come with their challenges, studies nonetheless have reported that 90% of custodial grandparents would take responsibility for their grandchildren were they given the choice again. “Becoming parents again” highlights the challenges faced by grand-families in Maritime Canada that are indicative of similar experiences across Canada and the United States.

Greater awareness of grand-family experiences can facilitate the development of evidence-based supports and services, or the modifications of existing programs, to recognize and respond to the needs and realities of diverse family arrangements.

Gaby Novoa, Families in Canada Knowledge Hub, Vanier Institute of the Family

This research recap was reviewed by Tania Wong and Christina Murray. 

Note

  1. Ashley Martin et al., “Becoming Parents Again: Challenges Affecting Grandparent Primary Caregivers Raising Their Grandchildren,” Paediatrics & Child Health (May 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/30DE5ou.

Grand-Families Highlight Family Adaptability

September 11, 2020

National Grandparents Day is on Sunday, September 13, 2020, a time to recognize and celebrate the significant contributions that grandparents and great-grandparents make to family life and family well-being across Canada. In many families, they are highly involved in the lives of their younger generations, whether it’s through some degree of co-parenting responsibility with the parent(s) or in leading a grand-family with no parental involvement (referred to in the literature as a “skip-generation” family).

Families adapt and transition to grand-families for diverse reasons, including mental illness and/or addictions; the absence, incarceration or death of a parent(s); or to provide support in the event of adolescent pregnancy. Choice, culture and circumstance can also play a role.

While grand-families are not a new phenomenon, 2016 Census data show that they are home to a growing number of children in Canada (nearly 33,000 children under 15 lived in grand-families in 2016, up 32% since 2001). However, there is little data on their well-being and unique experiences.

The Vanier Institute of the Family recently engaged with grandparents and great-grandparents living in Prince Edward Island to increase our understanding of grand-families in PEI, their well-being and experiences caring for their grandchildren, program awareness and more in the Grand-families in PEI Survey.

While findings from this initiative will be released in Fall 2020, respondents to date report being satisfied with their lives, and most say they are aware of the PEI Grandparents and Care Providers program, which provides financial support to all grandparents caring for children in the province.

The survey is part of the Grand-Families in Canada Partnership between the Vanier Institute, the University of Prince Edward Island and Building GRAND-Families Inc. – an innovative, two-year collaboration that engages with a network of individual and groups to bring together those who serve families, researchers, community organizations and the general public to increase the understanding of family well-being in PEI and across Canada.

Diblings Asking “Who Am I?” – Searching for Answers, Finding More Questions

Sara MacNaull and Nora Spinks

August 13, 2020

“Who am I?” is an age-old question. A growing number of people around the world who are looking at this question, through a family lens, are discovering that they are part of a unique, emerging family relationship, as a “dibling.” The term dibling, which stems from “donor sibling” or “DNA sibling,” is someone with whom you share genetic material – from at least one or both parents – resulting from reproductive technologies or fertility treatments.

People’s curiosity about their origins has been ignited thanks to the mass digitization of historical documents and increased access to records, including birth records, immigration papers and marriage certificates. The growing availability and affordability of DNA testing has meant more people are spitting into a tube or swabbing a cheek and sending off their genetic material for analysis. Pop culture has provided a mirror of this trend in society through television shows such as Who Do You Think You Are?, Long Lost Family, Genealogy Roadshow, Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Ancestors in the Attic. Fictitious TV dramas profiling diblings – such as Sisters in Australia or its American remake, Almost Family – are also generating popular interest in the dibling phenomenon.

According to estimates published in MIT Technology Review1 in 2019, more than 26 million people have submitted their DNA to the four leading commercial ancestry and health databases (e.g. AncestryDNA and 23andMe). As a result, family lore is being rewritten, family mythology is being debunked, decade- or century-old questions are being answered, subsequent questions are being asked, and some previously unknown facts are being revealed. Truth is coming to light about ancestors who had once been hailed as heroes, only for DNA or genealogy to reveal that there was more to the story than what had been passed down from one generation to the next, such as a sister who’s actually a mother or a father who’s not a blood relative.

Debunking family lore

Family lore often glamourizes, exaggerates, or even covers up the truth – including socially unacceptable behaviour, crimes, or dishonour brought upon the family. Family lore reduces stigma, helps foster public acceptance or changes family members’ perceptions of a person or event. Consider the story shared at a recent Listening Tour event hosted by the Vanier Institute about a revered late uncle:

“The participant’s great-grandmother’s brother – a fearless countryman, who was well-respected – was a hard-working farmer and fiercely protective of his family. Family lore claims he was thrown from his horse on his way to help a neighbour during a terrible storm and died tragically on the side of the road, not to be found for days. Since his death he has been hailed as a hero, though now-accessible records reveal that your uncle was an alcoholic and had had several run-ins with the law. His death – though still tragic – was, in fact, the result of a late night at the local watering hole.”

And, just like that, the truth is revealed, family stories and identities altered, and the perceptions of others changed, all as a result of access to DNA testing and to public and genealogical records. Our ancestors could never have imagined what would exist one day – for all to see.

A new type of “family”

For M. (name withheld to protect privacy), submitting her DNA for testing was just for fun. Though she had recently learned, in her 30s, that the dad she had always known was not her biological father, she had no desire to find the latter. However, like many others, she took the test, shipped it off and waited. When the results arrived, there were no real surprises. Her ancestors came from the countries she expected and easily explained certain physical characteristics. However, within hours, she started receiving notifications that revealed “close DNA matches” from around the world. Within days, the number kept increasing, eventually exceeding 30 – that is, 30 biological half-siblings, previously unknown to her, now confirmed through DNA testing.

“It was quite overwhelming, to be honest,” M. stated in a recent interview with the Vanier Institute of the Family. “I never imagined I’d find anyone who was related to me, except for perhaps a distant cousin. I had no reason to think I had multiple diblings.”

M.’s family story may seem unique, yet she is not alone in her experience or discovery. Many others are finding new or lost relatives, sometimes asking their parents or extended family awkward questions, and considering tough decisions about whether to foster new relationships with their diblings.

Delaying motherhood in Canada

Families in Canada, like elsewhere, are diverse, complex and ever evolving. Families are formed through various means, such as birth, adoption, coupling, uncoupling or by choice. In Canada, the fertility rate, or average number of children per woman, has been steadily decreasing since 2009, reaching a low point in 2018, at 1.5 children, compared with 3.94 in 1959).2, 3

Women across the country are increasingly waiting longer to have children. In fact, the fertility rates of women in their early 20s and late 30s flipped over the past 20 years. In 2018, the fertility rate in Canada for women aged 20 to 24 stood at 33.8 live births per 1,000 women, down from 58 per 1,000 in 2000, while the fertility rate in Canada for women aged 35 to 39 was 57.1 live births per 1,000 women, nearly double the rate in 2000 (34 per 1,000).4, 5 Given that many women are delaying having children – either by choice or circumstance – the mean age of mothers at time of delivery was nearly 31 years of age in 2018 (30.7 years), a trend that has been on the rise since the mid-1960s.6, 7

Motherhood and reproductive technology

The choice to delay motherhood for women may be the result of focusing first on post-secondary education and career development – continuing a long-term trend observed over the past several decades.8 Sometimes circumstance – not choice – is the driving factor, such as for those who have not met a partner with whom they want to have a child. As a result, some women are choosing to embark on the journey solo, with recent figures showing that the proportion of babies born to single (never married) women in 2014–2018 (the most recent years in which data is available) hovers around 30%.9, 10 This road to motherhood may include the use of reproductive technologies or adoption, either domestically or internationally (within countries and jurisdictions that allow women to adopt without a partner).

Among couples, reproductive technologies and adoption are becoming more common routes to parenthood – particularly among LGBTQ couples. Since the 1980s,11 the proportion of couples who experience infertility has doubled, now 16% (or roughly 1 in 6 couples). These couples may choose insemination or invitro fertilization with the use of a sperm donor or egg donor, or both, which come with their own DNA and physical traits. For adoptees or adults who do not have information or a relationship with one or both biological parents, DNA testing provides an opportunity to reveal ethnicity, cultural background and affiliations, country of origin and close or distant relatives. As M. stated:

“At first, I was reluctant to engage with any of these DNA matches. Part of me questioned the accuracy of the testing and I had so many more questions than when I started. I was confused as to how I was connected to these people. Within a few days of getting my results, I had to turn off the notifications on my phone. I just couldn’t keep up with all of them. This process led to even more soul-searching. I really had to think about and decide whether I was interested in getting to know these people, whether I was willing to put in the time, learn about them, share things about myself and my life, and genuinely foster relationships. Eventually, I went for it. I began replying to messages, receiving pictures and learning about how each one of my diblings came to be. Each story was so unique. All of a sudden, these 30+ strangers and I were trying to piece together a giant, global puzzle.”

Connecting with your diblings

For M., deciding to connect with her new family members included creating a list of pros and cons. The pros included the excitement of discovering the biological traits that stood out, whether others had the same interests or aptitudes as she did, and getting the chance to meet people from around the world – all of whom had the same starting point. The cons included managing her own expectations about what and how the relationships would develop (would they be forced or organic?), dealing with how her family would react to this discovery, and taking into account the feelings of the sibling she had grown up with. It also meant considering what all this meant for her biological father’s family, since, thanks to the DNA testing, it revealed that he had been married, and fathered and raised children in the area where she was currently living. She ultimately decided that the pros outweighed the cons, and within a few short months, an in-person meeting of some of the local diblings took place:

“The night before the gathering, I didn’t sleep a wink. I was so nervous about what I would learn and wondered whether I had made a mistake. And yet, upon arrival at the venue, I was struck by how familiar some of the other faces were, as if I had seen them before or met them before in a different context. I also couldn’t help but notice that some of us had some very similar features, more so than I had expected. Though the first few minutes felt a bit like speed dating or an awkward job interview, the conversation began to flow quite easily afterwards. Since then, we have met several times and are planning a diblings retreat where all of us come together from around the world.”

Though M.’s DNA discovery has a happy ending so far, others who have unlocked the DNA mystery door have dealt with unfortunate or difficult experiences. In a world where access, privacy, Big Data and DNA are colliding at a rapid pace, it is too soon to tell what the next few years will reveal about people’s personal histories and ancestry. All we can do is try to prepare ourselves for the unknown, the questions, the answers and the family stories, and whether we should decide to embark on the journey to discover “Who am I?”

Sara MacNaull is Program Director at the Vanier Institute of the Family.

Nora Spinks is CEO of the Vanier Institute of the Family.

This article was originally published in Canadian Issues (Spring/Summer 2020), reprinted with permission from The Association for Canadian Studies. Link: https://bit.ly/2XWmWF9.

Notes

    1. Antonio Regalado, “More Than 26 Million People Have Taken an At-home Ancestry Test: The Genetic Genie Is Out of the Bottle. And It’s Not Going Back,” MIT Technology Review (February 11, 2019). Link: https://bit.ly/2DTARom.
    2. Claudine Provencher et al., “Fertility: Overview, 2012 to 2016,” Report on the Demographic Situation in Canada, Statistics Canada catalogue no. 91-209-X (June 5, 2018). Link: https://bit.ly/3iAsJYY.
    3. Statistics Canada, Crude birth rate, age-specific fertility rates and total fertility rate (live births) (Table: 13-10-0418-01) (page last updated May 22, 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/2XWsgbs.
    4. The Vanier Institute of the Family, “Mother’s Day 2019: New Moms Older, More Likely to Be Employed Than in the Past” (May 8, 2019).
    5. Statistics Canada, Crude birth rate, age-specific fertility rates and total fertility rate (live births).
    6. Statistics Canada, Mean age of mother at time of delivery (live births) (Table: 13-10-0417-01) (page last updated May 22, 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/3alUWjb.
    7. Claudine Provencher et al., “Fertility: Overview, 2012 to 2016.”
    8. The Vanier Institute of the Family, “Mother’s Day 2019: New Moms Older, More Likely to Be Employed Than in the Past.”
    9. Statistics Canada, Live births, by marital status of mother (Table: 13-10-0419-01) (page last updated May 22, 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/2E3Ztus.
    10. This figure may also include women who are living common-law and who are therefore partnered but not legally married.
    11. Public Health Agency of Canada, Fertility (page last updated May 28, 2019). Link: https://bit.ly/322khLB.

 

Published on August 13, 2020

Uncertainty and Postponement: Pandemic Impact on Fertility in Canada

Ana Fostik, PhD

June 30, 2020

Download this article (PDF) 

In the first weeks after the public health measures and economic lockdowns began in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the social life of millions of adults was suddenly halted and many started spending every day at home. This led some to wonder about whether, in about nine months, we would see a spike in births. Could there be a “Coronial” generation, a baby boom due to couples spending more time together?1

Although many couples have been spending more time together, they have also been experiencing a variety of challenges and difficult transitions never experienced by our current generations: the health care system was heavily impacted by the pandemic, children were suddenly out of daycare or school and in need of homeschooling, some adults needed to work from home while caring for young children in the household, and many others had difficulty with their family finances, as they found themselves unemployed, working fewer hours or making less income.

Indeed, millions of workers were left without employment or working fewer hours than normal as a result of the lockdowns, and the unemployment rate reached a historic high of 13.7% in May 2020, up from 5.6% only three months prior. About half of the self-employed saw a reduction in the number of hours worked, accompanied in most cases by a loss of income. As a result, more than 1 in 5 adults lived in a household reporting financial difficulty to meet basic obligations such as rent, mortgage and groceries that month.2

“In this context, I would be really surprised if family projects did not change,” says Benoît Laplante, a family demography professor at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique in Montreal. Indeed, evidence suggests it is very unlikely that fertility will increase nine months after the lockdowns started. On the contrary, past research shows that a reduction of the total fertility rate can be expected in the short term. Economic downturns and recessions, labour market uncertainty and, more broadly, general societal uncertainty and negative expectations about the future have all been associated with a postponement of childbearing plans, and thus with reductions in the number of births within a population.

Labour market uncertainty impacts childbearing plans

A recent meta-analysis on the impacts of unemployment and temporary employment on fertility in Europe showed that people who have experienced episodes of unemployment tend to delay planned births.3 As unemployment results in a loss of income and increased uncertainty about future job prospects, plans for starting or expanding the family are more likely to get halted until better financial times.

This was particularly true among heterosexual couples when the male partner became unemployed, and it had an impact not only on their decision to have their first child, but also among those with children who had planned on expanding the family. Data also showed that unemployment became increasingly more detrimental for childbearing between 1970 and 2015, as conditions in the labour market became more challenging and permanent jobs less common.

On the other hand, women in some countries leveraged their periods of unemployment as an opportunity to carry out their fertility plans and have their planned children in that moment, as time for childbearing and childrearing became more available and the opportunity costs diminished (in terms of the time spent in the labour market developing experience that allows advancing their professional careers). However, this was not true in the countries hardest hit by the 2008 Great Recession in Southern Europe (i.e. Italy and Spain), which were also those with the lowest fertility levels.

People with temporary jobs were also found to be less likely to have children during periods of economic uncertainty, particularly when having a second or third child, which the study suggests is the result of the increased financial impact of expanding the family. Men were more impacted by unemployment than by having a temporary job; especially in contexts where men are expected to be the main financial providers of the household, having a job, regardless of its characteristics, is better than having none in order to start or expand the family.

Great Recession associated with fertility decline in Europe

Economic crises can impact fertility intentions and actual childbearing, even when individuals are not personally affected by the loss of a job or income, as downturns translate to a reduction in GDP growth and an increase in unemployment. In times of uncertainty about the economic future and labour market stability, people might become risk averse and avoid any long-term commitments, of which having a child is the most irreversible one. Negative expectations about the future may lead many families to postpone childbearing plans until times of greater certainty.4

An interesting recent example of this can be found in Europe, where fertility rates had been increasing since the first years of the 2000s. During and after the Great Recession of 2008–2009, fertility rates stagnated and then decreased in most European regions, particularly those most affected by the recession.

A recent article on the impact of this recession on fertility in 28 European countries analyzed the effects of unemployment, long-term unemployment and GDP decline on fertility rates between 2000 and 2014. The study found that when unemployment increased, fertility rates decreased significantly. Moreover, the effect of unemployment was stronger during the period of the recession (between 2008 and 2014) than before its start, suggesting that the negative impact of unemployment on fertility behaviour may be magnified during times of recessions.5

Research suggests that “fundamental uncertainty” impacts childbearing plans

While the European economy recovered after the Great Recession, fertility did not bounce back in many European countries and, in fact, it continued to decline. This was especially true in some Nordic countries, where the effects of the Great Recession were mild and where fertility decline started later and continued past 2014, after the macro economic conditions had improved. This led some researchers to focus on the presence of “fundamental uncertainty” regarding the future and its impact on family aspirations. Their argument is that fundamental uncertainty regarding the future of the economy, but also of political systems at a global level, can have an impact on the narratives, perspectives and worldview of individuals, regardless of whether they have experienced a precarious job or unemployment themselves. As “narratives of uncertainty” become widespread, births are delayed, even if and when the economy recovers.6

A study of the effects of a financial crisis in Italy in 2011 to 2012 showed that, as individuals googled the technical term “spread” (an indicator used by economists to measure the lack of confidence in a financial system), births fell sharply nine months later. They estimated that births were reduced between 2.5% and 5% as a consequence of these “narratives of uncertainty.”7

Recent research shows the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting childbearing plans

A recent survey of adults aged 18 to 34 years old in several European countries (i.e. Italy, Spain, France, Germany and the U.K.) estimated the proportion of births that were planned for 2020 that are being delayed. Adults who had declared in early 2020 (i.e. before the coronavirus outbreak) that they were planning on conceiving or having a child by the end of the year were asked whether the pandemic had altered these plans in any way. The study found that individuals did indeed change their fertility plans in all studied countries, either by delaying or abandoning the plan for this year.

The impact varied across countries, but in Italy and Spain, nearly one-third of those who were planning a birth for 2020 abandoned the project for the year. Half or more of respondents in Germany, France, Spain and the U.K. declared that their plan to have a child still stood, but they were postponing it for later in the year.8

Planned births among mothers aged 40 and older may be significantly impacted

Experiences from past economic and sanitary crises (e.g. the 1918 flu pandemic) have shown that some of the births that are postponed in times up upheaval are caught up with later on.9 People sometimes wait until times are less uncertain before going forward with births that had previously been planned.

Laplante points out that the difference between delaying a birth and abandoning the project to have a child altogether may become especially blurry in the current circumstances. “What’s most likely is that people will delay or abandon (their reproductive plans) … and when you delay, after a while, you may end up abandoning … now, everyone is living in uncertainty, and when will we have a vaccine? In two years, maybe.” Laplante’s reasoning is that, if women in their 30s were planning to have two children, and then decide to wait until a vaccine becomes available to have their next birth, they might run out of time to have either their first or their second child before they reach a biological limit.

It is therefore possible that some of these birth plans might not be “recovered.” In many Western countries, women are increasingly waiting longer to have their first child, as many choose to develop their professional and educational paths beforehand. Even births at age 40 and older have increased in the past few decades, representing an increasing share of first births.10 In 2014, an estimated that 3.6% of all births in Canada were to mothers aged 40 years and over.11

For women aged 40 years and older, an important proportion of births is facilitated by assisted reproductive technology.12 Given that many of these procedures were interrupted for months on end in the midst of the pandemic, births at older ages might be more acutely impacted. In societies where a higher share of births are occurring among women in their 40s, some of the planned births that were already delayed might not ever happen: the biological clock might run out before both the labour market and health systems go back to previous standards.

Data from Quebec and Ontario show impact on fertility beyond economic recovery

The total fertility rate is a “snapshot” indicator, an estimate of how many children women would have on average, over their lifetime, if fertility conditions at the moment persisted during their entire reproductive life. That is why we can expect a reduction of fertility rates during a period of social and economic turbulence and/or uncertainty, followed by an uptake once the crisis is over: at least a portion of the births that were postponed are simply “caught up with” – so long as reproductive plans and ideals remain intact.

Laplante cautions that in Quebec and Ontario, fertility rates started falling in the 2008 Great Recession,13 and, as happened in European countries, continued falling once the economic downturn was over and unemployment rates were low. He is now investigating why the fertility decline did not reverse in these two Canadian provinces: are there more fundamental changes under way that are not just the product of temporary upheaval?

Only time will tell if the generations impacted by the COVID-19 crisis will have the same number of children they had been planning, but at a later time, or if their ideal number of children will change in these circumstances. If some adults decide to forego childbearing altogether as a response to the new challenges brought about by the pandemic and its associated economic crisis, younger generations might be more likely to not have children. It is currently too early to tell, but research on changes in fertility intentions before and after the pandemic will be of crucial importance to understand this aspect of family life.

Ana Fostik, PhD, Vanier Institute on secondment from Statistics Canada

 

Notes

  1. See, for example, “Is the COVID-19 Baby Boom a Myth? How Relationships Might Be Tested During the Pandemic,” CTV News (April 19, 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/3hCDUAy.
  2. Statistics Canada, “Labour Force Survey, May 2020,” The Daily (June 5, 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/31kDFo7.
  3. Giammarco Alderotti et al. Employment Uncertainty and Fertility: A Network Meta-Analysis of European Research Findings. Econometrics Working Papers Archive 2019_06. Universita’ degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Statistica, Informatica, Applicazioni “G. Parenti” (2019).
  4. Tomáš Sobotka, Vegard Skirbekk and Dimiter Philipov. “Economic Recession and Fertility in the Developed World,” Population and Development Review 37(2), 267-306 (2011).
  5. Francesca Luppi, Bruno Arpino and Alessandro Rosina. The Impact of COVID-19 on Fertility Plans in Italy, Germany, France, Spain and UK (2020).
  6. Daniele Vignoli et al. Economic Uncertainty and Fertility in Europe: Narratives of the Future. Econometrics Working Papers Archive 2020_01, Universita’ degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Statistica, Informatica, Applicazioni “G. Parenti” (2020). Link: https://bit.ly/3eIuVvS.
  7. Chiara L. Comolli and Daniele Vignoli. Spread-ing Uncertainty, Shrinking Birth Rates. Econometrics Working Papers Archive Universita’ degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Statistica, Informatica, Applicazioni “G. Parenti” (2019).
  8. Francesca Luppi, Bruno Arpino and Alessandro Rosina. The Impact of COVID-19 on Fertility Plans in Italy, Germany, France, Spain and UK (2020).
  9. Nina Boberg-Fazlić et al. Disease and Fertility: Evidence from the 1918 Influenza Pandemic in Sweden, Discussion Paper Series, IZA – Institute of Labor Economics (2017); Sebastian Klüsener and Mathias Lerch. Fertility and Economic Crisis: How Does Early Twentieth Century Compare to Early Twenty-first Century? Paper presented at the Population Association of America, Virtual (2020).
  10. Eva Beaujouan. “Latest‐Late Fertility? Decline and Resurgence of Late Parenthood Across the Low‐Fertility Countries,” Population and Development Review 0(0), 1-29 (2020). Link: https://bit.ly/2AjlOD6.
  11. Eva Beaujouan and Tomáš Sobotka. “Late Childbearing Continues to Increase in Developed Countries,” Population and Societies, no. 562 (January 2019).
  12. Eva Beaujouan. “Latest‐Late Fertility? Decline and Resurgence of Late Parenthood Across the Low‐Fertility Countries.”
  13. Melissa Moyser and Anne Milan. “Fertility Rates and Labour Force Participation Among Women in Quebec and Ontario,” Insights on Canadian Society, Statistics Canada catalogue no. 75-006-X. Link: https://bit.ly/2YyCXSE.

 

Who Is Your COVID‑19 Crisis “Extended and Chosen Family”?

Jennifer Kaddatz

May 1, 2020

My family moved to Ottawa from British Columbia for my job, nearly eight years ago now. It still feels like yesterday. Moving was a big, scary life change. There was considerable upset in the wake of the extraction of our three young boys as we left the kids’ grandparents and their aunt on the West Coast. The rest of our relatively small extended family is spread between three countries, with the majority residing in the South Pacific, so there were no grandchildren left in BC to be hugged.

My husband and I were pretty much left to fend for ourselves in Ontario after we relocated, but we have now settled, after eight wonderful years. During this time, we have developed strong relationships with our new neighbours and, while it’s no substitute for family, our relationships with our neighbours are a precious alternative.

Always know where to go in a zombie apocalypse

Within a year of moving to Ottawa, my family and I made some of the most amazing new friends – adults and kids we met through our involvement with Scouts Canada. These friends – our “chosen family” – are the ones my family now celebrates with every holiday or special event, including Christmas, New Year’s, Easter, St. Patrick’s Day, Victoria Day, Canada Day, Labour Day, Thanksgiving and birthdays in between.

These are the friends with whom we play, boil maple syrup, have new adventures (axe throwing and/or karaoke, anyone?) and vacation during the summer. We know each other’s biological extended families and our kids have grown together (like siblings or cousins), watching the youngest morph out of his baby fat and diapers and watching the eldest get his driver’s licence and embark upon a committed relationship with a girlfriend.

These three families are the friends that we always joked we would team up with in a zombie apocalypse. Turns out it was a COVID‑19 apocalypse, but at least we were ready! Need toilet paper or flour? Someone will bring it. Need a smile? Someone will make you laugh. Mid-pandemic, the boys are in contact with one another virtually 24/7 online, chatting through homework and gaming sessions alike.

  • 90% of adults in Canada agree that they currently have people to count on in case of an emergency.1
  • 44% of Canadians say that one of the main precautions they have taken as a result of the COVID‑19 situation is to make a plan for communicating with family, friends and neighbours.2

Get close to your neighbours, but no closer than 2 metres

But that’s not my only local community. I think I’ve pretty much got the most awesome neighbours on the planet. My ruralish neighbourhood has fairly quickly changed from a place where most of the “kids” were in their early 20s to a place where every second house and yard is now home to the noise and energy of approximately three children and youth, most of whom are under 12. We have skating in winter, an annual Easter egg hunt, campfires, bike rides, an informal “tick and wild animal” alert system, a vegetable-seed sharing club and a diverse group of incredibly hard-working, compassionate, giving and, let’s not forget, pretty darn tired mothers and fathers.

When I was undergoing cancer treatment earlier this year, it was these neighbours who took care of me, making sure my family had everything we needed, including some of the most delicious homemade meals ever shared. This morning, my breakfast was bread, freshly baked in gratitude by one of my neighbours who works in health care, because I’ve been sewing personal protective equipment for her during the pandemic.

  • Nearly three-quarters (74%) of the population feels very attached (35%) or somewhat attached (39%) to their neighbourhood.3
  • Four in five (80%) people in Canada say that their neighbours are strictly (29%) or somewhat strictly (51%) following the guidance of public health authorities to social distance from others.4

Stay in touch with family and friends using technology

Thanks to technology, my community doesn’t end at the Ontario border. I grew up in a farming and fishing village, where the high school mascot was a horse and blackberries were a dominant feature on the main road. This kind of childhood can make for long-lasting ties and my best friends from childhood are still with me now. During the COVID‑19 pandemic, we chat via text messaging and social media apps throughout the day every day, even though they are living way out west under the cherry blossoms, while I’m still feeling kind of shivery out here in eastern Canada.

These beautiful women make me laugh, give me hope and get me exercising. They are the ones I share with when I need a shoulder to lean on. We are all experiencing different aspects and effects of the pandemic – and in quite different ways – but we support one another through everything and anything.

  • 41% of people in Canada have been on social media more often since the start of the COVID‑19 pandemic.5
  • 88% of adults in Canada are very attached or attached to their friends, a share just lower than the 93% of adults who are very attached or somewhat attached to their family.6

But it’s not just for the fun and games

For me, staying in touch with my long-time besties, my Ottawa axe-throwing friends and my amazing-but-tired neighbours isn’t just about having a good time. This inner circle of people form my “extended extended family” and my relationships with them are critical for my positive mental health. During a time of crisis, like the COVID‑19 pandemic, they are my lifeline.

  • Half (50%) of Canadians report a worsening of their mental health during the COVID‑19 period, with 1 in 10 (10% overall) saying it has worsened a lot.7
  • Asked to describe how they have been primarily feeling in recent weeks, Canadians are most likely to say they are worried (44%), anxious (41%) and bored (30%), although fully one-third (34%) also say they are grateful.8

Where else can you go for support?

The Canadian government has acknowledged that COVID‑19 results in varying degrees of stress for many people who do not have ready access to the friend, community and neighbourhood networks for which I am grateful.

As a result, they have developed Wellness Together Canada, which provides an entire suite of tools offering different levels of support depending on need.9 It even offers an opportunity to chat with peer support workers and other professionals.

Visit Wellness Together Canada to connect with others during difficult times.

Jennifer Kaddatz, Vanier Institute on secondment from Statistics Canada

Notes

  1. A survey by the Vanier Institute of the Family, the Association for Canadian Studies and Leger, conducted March 10–13, March 27–29, April 3–5, April 10–12 and April 17–19, 2020, included approximately 1,500 individuals aged 18 and older, interviewed using computer-assisted web-interviewing technology in a web-based survey. All samples except for the March 10­–13 sample also included booster samples of approximately 500 immigrants. Using data from the 2016 Census, results were weighted according to gender, age, mother tongue, region, education level and presence of children in the household in order to ensure a representative sample of the population. No margin of error can be associated with a non-probability sample (web panel in this case). However, for comparative purposes, a probability sample of 1,512 respondents would have a margin of error of ±2.52%, 19 times out of 20.
  2. Statistics Canada, “How Are Canadians Coping with the COVID‑19 Situation?” Infographics (April 8, 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/2wVzkuL.
  3. April 17–19 survey by the Vanier Institute of the Family, the Association for Canadian Studies and Leger (see note 1).
  4. Nanos conducted an RDD dual frame (land- and cell-lines) hybrid telephone and online random survey of 1,013 Canadians, 18 years of age or older, March 14–17, 2020. The margin of error for this survey is ±3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
  5. April 10–12 survey by the Vanier Institute of the Family, the Association for Canadian Studies and Leger (see note 1).
  6. April 17–19 survey by the Vanier Institute of the Family, the Association for Canadian Studies and Leger (see note 1).
  7. Angus Reid Institute. Worry, Gratitude & Boredom: As COVID‑19 Affects Mental, Financial Health, Who Fares Better; Who Is Worse? (April 27, 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/3eWWzGd.
  8. Ibid.
  9. Health Canada. Government of Canada Connects Canadians with Mental Wellness Supports During COVID‑19 (April 15, 2020). Link: https://bit.ly/3bWq4FS.

Do Adults in Couples Have Better Mental Health During the COVID‑19 Pandemic?

Ana Fostik, PhD, and Jennifer Kaddatz

April 22, 2020

Download this article (PDF)

Nearly half of adults aged 18 years or older in Canada report feeling anxious/nervous (47%) or sad (45%) “very often” or “often” since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis, according to survey data from the Vanier Institute of the Family, the Association for Canadian Studies and Leger, which was collected from April 9 to 12, 20201 (fig. 1).

Four in 10 report feeling irritable (39%) and about one-third report experiencing sleep-related problems (35%) and mood swings (32%) “very often” or “often” since the start of the crisis (fig. 1).

But are adults currently in a couple – whether common-law or married – as likely as those who are single or separated, divorced or widowed to experience feelings of unsettledness?

Anxiety/nervousness and difficulty sleeping during the pandemic don’t appear to be linked to marital status

Feeling anxious or nervous very often/often is equally likely to be reported by adults who are part of a couple (48%) as by those who are single (47%) or separated, divorced or widowed (43%) (fig. 1).

Similarly, very often/often having difficulty sleeping is equally likely among those in a couple (35%) as among single adults (36%) or those who are separated, divorced or widowed (35%).

Whether single or in a couple, anxiety and sleeping problems are reported more by women than by men

Previous studies of mental health have found that women are more likely to experience anxiety disorders and depression compared with men.2 This appears to be the case in a pandemic environment as well.

Women are far more likely than men to report very often or often experiencing anxiety during the coronavirus pandemic: almost 6 in 10 women who were in a couple (58%) or were single (59%)3 report feeling anxious or nervous very often/often, compared with fewer than 4 in 10 men who were either in a couple (37%) or single (37%) (fig. 2).

As for challenges during the night, more than 4 in 10 women report difficulty sleeping very often/often since the beginning of the pandemic, whether or not they are in a couple (44%) or single (44%). This compares with fewer than 3 in 10 men, whether in a couple (26%) or single (29%).

Single people are more likely to experience irritability and mood swings

Irritability and mood swings are more common among individuals who are currently single (fig. 1). Almost half of single adults (48%) report feeling very often/often irritable since the start of the pandemic, compared with 37% of those in a couple and 30% of those who are separated, divorced or widowed. Single adults (39%) also report mood swings in higher shares than those in a couple (31%) and those who are separated, divorced or widowed (27%).

Again, women, regardless of their marital status, are more likely than men to experience irritability or mood swings. About 6 in 10 single women (59%) and 42% of those in a couple report feeling irritable very often/often since the start of the pandemic. Men report being irritable very often/often in lower proportions than women, whether single (38%) or in a couple (32%) (fig. 2.).

Single women (46%) are the most likely to report mood swings very often or often since the start of the COVID-19 crisis, followed by women in a couple (38%). Men are less likely than women to report frequent mood swings, but those who are single (31%) tend to report mood swings very often/often in higher shares compared with men in a couple (23%).

Separated, divorced or widowed women most likely to feel sad

Feeling sad very often/often during the coronavirus crisis is more commonly reported among separated, divorced or widowed (51%) and single (48%) adults, compared with those in couples (43%) (fig. 1).

Frequently feeling sad is also more common among women, whether single (59%) or in a couple (53%) than among men, whether single (37%) or in a couple (33%) (fig. 2).

Mental health impacts the well-being of families

Mental health trends, by marital status and gender but also by other factors, will be important to monitor in the short, medium and long term of the COVID-19 pandemic. An initial analysis has shown that income or job loss and immediate financial strain also affect mental health symptoms, such as anxiety and difficulty sleeping during the pandemic. Furthermore, mental and physical health are linked – people with a mood disorder are at much higher risk of developing a long-term medical condition than are those without.4

Problems with mental health can have a serious impact on an individual’s education, work, social life and interactions with their family.5 Among Canadians who had at least one family member with a mental health problem in 2012, over one-third (35%) thought that their lives had been affected by their family member’s mental health and approximately 71% of those who perceived that their lives were affected by a family member’s mental health problem reported they had provided care to their family member.6

As such, the well-being of families in Canada is dependent upon on the mental health of the individuals who make up those families. Evidence-based decision making will better drive targeted social supports both for individuals and for families as the coronavirus progresses, as well as after the present crisis is over.

Ana Fostik, PhD, Vanier Institute on secondment from Statistics Canada

Jennifer Kaddatz, Vanier Institute on secondment from Statistics Canada

Download this article (PDF)

Notes

  1. A survey by the Vanier Institute of the Family, the Association for Canadian Studies and Leger, conducted March 10–13, March 27–29, April 3–5 and April 9–12, 2020, included approximately 1,500 individuals aged 18 and older, interviewed using computer-assisted web-interviewing technology in a web-based survey. The March 27–­29, April 3–5 and April 9–12 samples also included booster samples of approximately 500 immigrants. Using data from the 2016 Census, results were weighted according to gender, age, mother tongue, region, education level and presence of children in the household in order to ensure a representative sample of the population. No margin of error can be associated with a non-probability sample (web panel in this case). However, for comparative purposes, a probability sample of 1,512 respondents would have a margin of error of ±2.52%, 19 times out of 20.
  2. Caryn Pearson, Teresa Janz and Jennifer Ali, “Mental and Substance Use Disorders in Canada,” Health at a Glance, Statistics Canada catalogue no. 82-624-X (September 2013). Link: https://bit.ly/3btTtHk.
  3. Comparisons by sex are not possible for separated, divorced or widowed adults in this case due to low response counts.
  4. Patten et al. (2005). “Long-Term Medical Conditions and Major Depression: Strength of Association for Specific Conditions in the General Population,” Canadian Journal of Psychiatry 50:195–202 (2005). As cited on Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), Mental Illness and Addiction: Facts and Statistics. Link: https://bit.ly/3eEjyWc.
  5. Mental Health Commission of Canada. Changing Directions, Changing Lives: The Mental Health Strategy for Canada (Calgary, Alberta, 2012). Link: https://bit.ly/2xEs4UI (PDF).
  6. Caryn Pearson, “The Impact of Mental Health Problems on Family Members,” Health at a Glance, Statistics Canada catalogue no. 82‑624‑X (October 7, 2015). Link: https://bit.ly/3bsRnaR.

 

Couples Find Support in One Another During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Ana Fostik, PhD, Jennifer Kaddatz and Nora Spinks

April 21, 2020

A family is a system of relationships with actions and reactions that occur over time. Family well-being hinges on the capacity of all members of a family to love, care and support one another in times of hardship as well as in times of ease. Like any and all systems, the strengths and tensions in those family relationships are magnified, amplified and intensified when put under stress.

While the COVID-19 pandemic marks one of the most potentially challenging times in Canada’s history, couples in this country seem to be faring relatively well to date. Data collected over four weeks during the pandemic[i] reveal that most people in committed relationships have strengths in those relationships and that they are leaning on each other and are having positive actions/reactions as they manage social distancing together.

Most couples in Canada are supporting each other, having meaningful conversations and arguing about the same amount as before home isolation.

Eight in 10 adults in couples say they have been supporting one another well

According to data collected April 9–12, 2020, 8 in 10 people aged 18 or older (80%) who are married or living common-law agree that they and their spouse are supporting one another more since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. These shares are about the same for those with children or youth at home (77%) as for those without children under 18 years of age in the household (82%).

Adults have been supporting one another more than before regardless of how the pandemic has affected their labour market situation: 82% of those whose job situation deteriorated (lost their job temporarily or permanently, or lost income or salary) and 81% of those whose job situation was not affected report more support from their partners.

Middle-aged people were less likely than older people to agree that they and their partner are supportive of one another, with 75% of 35- to 54-year-olds agreeing with the statement, compared with 84% of those aged 55 and older.

Interestingly, men agree in larger numbers than women (84% and 77%, respectively) that they have a supportive relationship with their partner.

More than 4 in 10 adults are having more meaningful conversations with their significant other

Clear communication is a key component of family well-being. More than 4 in 10 (43%) of adults in committed relationships in Canada report that they have been having more meaningful conversations since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to April 9–12 data. This is especially true among those whose labour market situation deteriorated since the start of the pandemic: 51% of them report having more meaningful conversations with their partners, compared with 36% of those whose job and/or income was not impacted by the pandemic. Just 10% of adults disagree that they are having more meaningful talks with their spouse.

Men are slightly more likely than women to agree that they have been having more meaningful conversations with their spouse or partner since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, at 45% versus 40%. Younger people, too, report this in higher numbers (52% of 18- to 34-year-olds) than older adults (40% of 35- to 54-year-olds and 41% of those 55 and older).

People who were married or common-law and had children or youth in the house were about as likely as those without kids to agree that they are having more meaningful conversations with their partner since the start of the crisis, at 44% and 42%, respectively.

Four in 10 adults feel closer to their spouse

Perhaps because they are supporting one another well and having meaningful conversations, nearly 4 in 10 adults in committed relationships (41%) agree that they feel closer to their spouse or partner since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. This share is even higher among Canadians who lost their job or who lost income or salary due to the pandemic: 48% of them report increased closeness in their relationship, compared with 34% among those whose job was not impacted by the pandemic.

The share of those feeling closer to their spouse is about the same for men (44%) as for women (38%) and is also relatively stable by age group and by whether or not children were living in the home. As of April 9–12, 43% of people in married or common-law relationships with kids under 18 years of age in the house agree they feel closer to their spouse since the start of the pandemic.

By region, the percentage agreeing that they now feel closer to their spouse is highest in Ontario and B.C., at 48% and 43%, respectively, and lowest in the Prairies, at 30%.

Ontario is the only province currently showing an increase in the share of adults feeling closer to their spouse now as compared with earlier in the pandemic, the proportion having risen from 39% in the March 10–13 survey to 48% in the April 9–12 survey.

Fewer than 2 in 10 adults in committed relationships have been arguing more

Only 18% of those who are married or living common-law reported that they have been arguing more with their spouse or partner since the start of the pandemic. In fact, approximately 54% disagree that they are arguing more and 28% neither agree nor disagree with that statement.

However, young adults in committed relationships – either with someone their own age or someone older – were more likely to report that they are arguing more with their partner than were those in older age groups. Nearly 3 in 10 (28%) of 18- to 34-year-olds say that they have been arguing more with their spouse or partner since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, compared with 19% of those aged 35- to 54-year-olds and only 12% of those aged 55 and older.

Canadians who experienced job or income loss due to the pandemic tend to argue more than before in greater proportions than those whose job remained unchanged: 26% and 16% report increased arguing.

Arguing with a partner is often linked to stress and other well-being indicators and, according to the data from April 9–12, about 6 in 10 younger women, aged 18–34, report “very often” or “often” feeling anxious or nervous (64%), irritable (64%) or sad (59%) and 45% report difficulty sleeping. These shares were significantly higher than for their male counterparts and were also higher than for women over the age of 55, among whom about 5 in 10 are “very often” or “often” experiencing anxiety or nervousness (46%) or sadness (50%), fewer than 3 in 10 (28%) are feeling irritable and 36% are having difficulty sleeping.

Ana Fostik, PhD, Vanier Institute on secondment from Statistics Canada

Jennifer Kaddatz, Vanier Institute on secondment from Statistics Canada

Nora Spinks is CEO of the Vanier Institute of the Family.

Note

  1. The survey, conducted March 10–13, March 27–29, April 3–5 and April 9–12, included approximately 1,500 individuals aged 18 and older, interviewed using computer-assisted web-interviewing technology in a web-based survey. The March 27–29, April 3–5 and April 9–12 samples also included booster samples of approximately 500 immigrants. Using data from the 2016 Census, results were weighted according to gender, age, mother tongue, region, education level and presence of children in the household in order to ensure a representative sample of the population. No margin of error can be associated with a non-probability sample (web panel in this case). However, for comparative purposes, a probability sample of 1,512 respondents would have a margin of error of ±2.52%, 19 times out of 20.

In Conversation: Lucy Gallo on Chosen Family Day and LGBTQI2S Youth

Nathan Battams

February 13, 2020

As many families across Canada come together for Family Day on Monday, preparations will be under way for another special observance – Chosen Family Day. On Saturday, February 22, Friends of Ruby – an organization focused on supporting the progressive well-being of LGBTQI2S youth through social services and housing – is launching Canada’s first annual Chosen Family Day to raise awareness of the experiences and challenges faced by these youth, to remind those who need support that help is available, and to celebrate the chosen families who provide them with love, care and support.

To learn more about Chosen Family Day and the importance of this unique family form to LGBTQI2S youth, Nathan Battams, Communications Manager at the Vanier Institute, joined Lucy Gallo, Director of Youth Services and Housing at Friends of Ruby, in conversation.

Tell me a little bit about Friends of Ruby, its history and what you do.

Research shows, and through our work we have seen, that LGBTQI2S youth experience barriers to employment and housing, and have significantly higher rates of family rejection, homelessness, poverty and suicidal thoughts than those who don’t identify with our community. There is a serious need for housing and social services focused on this community.

So, in 2014, with the support of a donor, Egale Canada opened Egale Youth Services, a little centre that served as a drop-in with multiple resources, as well as a little kitchenette where LGBTQI2S youth could have some snacks and food.

It was clear from the beginning that a) there was indeed a significant need for this kind of space, and b) the youth needed more than just housing. Individually and as a group, LGBTQI2S youth have diverse and unique experiences, and they benefit from having a place where they can build connections and relationships of love, care and support.

We’ve moved several times over the years to increasingly large spaces to accommodate this growing community. In 2019, we decided to design our new drop-in space based on our experience with the youth, in order to better support them. This is the space where we are currently located (i.e. 489 Queen Street East). At the same time, we were using our experience to build our emergency and transitional house (at the time called Egale Centre).

It had always been Egale’s plan to spin direct services off when it reached a certain maturity so, in November 2019, Egale Youth Services and Egale Centre merged to become Friends of Ruby, an independent organization that continues to focus on the progressive well-being of LGBTQI2S youth through social services and housing.

Since we started, our programming has expanded. We now offer barrier-free one-on-one counselling – both shorter-term crisis counselling as well as a built-in counselling structure where youth can see a counsellor for up to 20 sessions, and there aren’t huge wait lists (which is pretty amazing for counselling in general).

In addition to therapeutic groups, we also run psychologically beneficial social groups. For example, there’s an Art for Change group, which came from the youth about three years ago and it hasn’t stopped running, which facilitates expression through arts and crafts and community-building in a safe and inclusive environment. Soon, we’ll be launching a group called Skills for Safer Living, and it’s for folks who have experienced regular suicidal ideation.

We now have a weekly afternoon at the drop-in only for youth who are part of the Black, Indigenous and People of Colour (BIPOC) community. This is only for BIPOC youth and is staffed by people from the BIPOC community, which develops a whole other layer of safety and an opportunity for folks to talk about their intersecting identities. We run a discussion night that’s run by one of our staff and one of our partner agencies to unpack some of these intersections, which has been very well received.

Our drop-in centre has since extended due to significant demand, and because we recognize that there’s critical need for this space for some people such as trans youth, who may not feel safe to going into a shelter by virtue of their identity. Research shows that some shelters are not safe environments for trans people, who are commonly rejected based on their gender identity and aren’t given access to shelters that match the gender with which they identify, so we offer them a safe place to come in the morning, somewhere to rest and have a warm cup of coffee and something to eat, especially in the winter. The drop-in provides food security, with access to three meals a day, plus a snack in between lunch and dinner.

We also offer support with gender identity or transition, and help accessing housing, health care, and employment. Later this year, we’ll be opening a new programming centre with safe, transitional housing for up to 33 LGBTQI2S youth. The house has a purpose-based design with accessible single- and double-occupancy rooms, embedded mental health supports and case management, and a rooftop terrace for quiet reflection.

In all this growth, we’ve managed to support more than 900 youth, prevent 470 mental health crises and visits to hospital emergency rooms, and save an estimated $300,000 in health care costs, while providing approximately 2,500 one-to-one counselling and case management sessions and serving more than 4,500 meals per year.

Tell me about Chosen Family Day, and why the notion of chosen family is important at Friends of Ruby.

Chosen Family Day was actually inspired by what LGBTQI2S youth at Friends of Ruby were telling us when we asked them what this space means to them. Themes of relationships, connections, friendship, care and family – chosen family – clearly emerged.

We heard that it’s not like receiving services elsewhere, such as at the doctor, where you go have your appointment and leave. Here, there’s an added – and very important – layer of relationships that provides a sense of family that some youth aren’t used to having. It can be particularly important during such times as the holidays, when many people get together with their families, or in the dark months of winter, and now with Family Day. Many LGBTQI2S youth don’t have relationships with their biological families, some of which want nothing to do with them because of their identity, and it can serve as a painful reminder.

This sparked the idea to start Chosen Family Day, which will take place on the Saturday following Family Day every year, giving those who live in these incredibly diverse and unique communities a day to acknowledge and celebrate their chosen families. This idea of chosen family is so powerful — it brings energy and some light to what family itself means to other people.

How would you complete the phrase “Wouldn’t it be great if…”?

It would be amazing if organizations and spaces like ours, which focus on the LGBTQI2S community, didn’t need to exist. If they didn’t need to exist because we could be accepted and feel comfortable in any space.

I say this, of course, as a proud member of the chosen family at Friends of Ruby! I’m glad that we exist and that this space exists – there hasn’t been anything like this in the city before. When I was coming out, there was nothing like this, and to have this now for the youth is exciting.

But it would be great if we didn’t have to have these separations, build our own spaces because our trans youth actually can’t feel safe or comfortable in any other shelter or any other transitional housing. Wouldn’t it be great if all the other transitional houses and shelters that do exist were equally welcoming of youth for who they are, unique and precious like uncut ruby gems?

Chosen Family Day will be celebrated on Saturday, February 22, 2020.

Learn more about Friends of Ruby

 

Lucy Gallo is the Director of Youth Services and Housing at Friends of Ruby.

Nathan Battams is the Communications Manager at the Vanier Institute of the Family.

This interview has been edited for length and flow.

 

In Conversation: Rachel Margolis on Divorce Trends in Canada

Nathan Battams

Download In Conversation: Rachel Margolis on Divorce Trends in Canada

(February 10, 2020) Families in Canada have evolved considerably across generations, as have patterns of coupling (i.e. marriage, living common-law) and uncoupling (i.e. separation and divorce) that have an impact on families and family well-being. While a large and growing body of family research has documented how divorce can impact individuals and their families, our understanding of how this has changed over time has been significantly affected by a lack of publicly available vital statistics data in Canada over the past decade.

Rachel Margolis, PhD, Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Western Ontario and panellist at the Families in Canada Conference 2019, joined Vanier Institute Communications Manager Nathan Battams to discuss Canada’s evolving data landscape in her recent study published in Demographic Research exploring recent divorce trends and the use of administrative data to fill the data gap on divorce.

Tell me about your recent study on divorce in Canada, and what made you interested in this topic…

This study, which was funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), addresses an issue I’ve been thinking about for a long time. While doing my research and teaching demography over the years, I’ve often been frustrated by the fact that we haven’t had national measures on marriage and divorce in Canada since 2008, when vital statistics data stopped being analyzed and reported by Statistics Canada. My collaborators Youjin Choi, Feng Hou and Michael Haan all worked on this project with me to learn about recent changes in divorce.

The real motivation for this study was to strengthen our understanding of demographic changes in Canada.

This is important because marriage and divorce data provide important and unique measures for studying families and family life. It matters for understanding fertility trends, since formal unions are the context in which most babies are born. It matters for understanding family finances, since formal unions are vehicles for wealth accumulation, and they can tell us a lot about family resources and provisions, such as housing and caregiving. The real motivation for this study was to strengthen our understanding of demographic changes in Canada.

Historically, information on marriage and divorce in Canada has been collected and managed by a system called Vital Statistics. Vital statistics exist in most countries in some form as the means of collecting population data on things like marriage, divorce, births and deaths, although some countries have recently moved away from this mode of data collection and are exploring alternate strategies. In the United States, the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) discontinued divorce and marriage statistics in 1996, as it was argued that similar data could be collected more easily and inexpensively through surveys, which are now used to gather information about marriage and divorce rates.

And while we haven’t had data published by Statistics Canada on marriage and divorce trends since 2008, there hasn’t been any alternative data source in place, like there is in the U.S. The decision to stop publishing these data was made for a variety of reasons, including fiscal constraints, some problems with data compatibility across provinces and territories, and a reported underutilization of these data online. But with no alternative data source, there has since been a decade-long data gap on marriage and divorce in Canada.

The first data gap this study sought to address was whether other types of data can fill this gap. Though some researchers have already used administrative data to look at the effects of changes in marital status on other outcomes, we haven‘t really assessed the quality of these divorce measures.1

Second, there has been no national data on how the divorce rate in Canada has changed since vital statistics data collection ceased in 2008. Since then, research on divorce in Canada has relied on information about the current marital or conjugal status of individuals, which doesn’t provide divorce rates. The latter are important to track because they tell us a lot about how things are changing over time. Current marital status is not an effective indicator of divorce because many people who divorce later repartner and/or remarry. Our study used anonymized administrative data from tax records to estimate the divorce rate – the first to do so.

A third gap is that we don’t have information on the changing age patterns of divorce in Canada since 2008. We do know that there are significant shifts taking place in comparable countries, such as the United States, and in Europe. In the U.S., we know that divorce rates among those aged 50 and older – often referred to as “grey divorce” – doubled in the 1990s and 2000s. There are a lot of reasons for this, but many of the same trends happening among baby boomers in the U.S. are likely happening to boomers in Canada as well. But, with no data, we don’t really know whether there’s also been a “grey divorce revolution” in Canada.

What did you find in your study on divorce in Canada?

First of all, we found that the divorce rate in Canada can indeed be measured somewhat well with administrative data, when comparing it with vital statistics data before 2008. When we extrapolate after 2008 with this approach, we see a decline in the annual divorce rate between 2009 and 2016. The annual divorce rate was about 10 divorces per 1,000 married women in the early 2000s and this declined starting in 2006, reaching 6 divorces per 1,000 married women in 2016.

Second, we found a shifting age distribution among people getting divorced. In the early 1990s, most divorces in Canada were granted to people in their 20s and 30s. Fifty-one percent of all divorces were granted to women aged 20–39, 42% went to those 40–59 and only 7% to those 60 and above. Over the last 20 years, it has become more common for divorces to occur later. For example, in 2016, only 28% of divorces were granted to women 20–39, 57% were to women 40–59 and 15% to those 60 and above. Divorce, then, has become increasingly common at older ages.

Fewer people are getting married and those that do get married are more likely to be from groups with lower divorce rates.

Third, there have been changes in divorce rates for both younger and older Canadians. Divorce rates among adults in their 20s and 30s fell by about 30% in the last decade. Research from other countries helps explain this, as fewer people are getting married and those that do get married are more likely to be from groups with lower divorce rates (highly educated with lots of resources), and they are therefore less likely to get divorced while in this age group, and those who do are in potentially higher quality marriages than they were in the past.2 Even though age-specific divorce rates are highest for younger women, they’ve been declining over the period of our analysis.

Meanwhile, divorce rates for older people in Canada have increased slightly through the 1990s and 2000s, but nothing as significant as the “grey divorce revolution” in the U.S., and this now seems to have ceased. In the U.S., divorce rates for those aged 50 and older doubled between 1990 and 2010, from 4.87 to 10.05 divorces per 1,000 married persons.3 We found that the comparable increase in Canada between 1991 and 2008 was from 4.02 to 5.17 divorces per 1,000 married persons during this period (+25%). Since 2008, we find no further increase in divorce rates for older adults in Canada.

Divorce rates for older people in Canada have increased slightly through the 1990s and 2000s, but nothing as significant as the “grey divorce revolution” in the U.S.

The fourth thing we explored was comparing divorce trends in Canada with what’s been seen in the U.S. We found that trends in divorce in Canada are similar to trends in the U.S. Divorce rates were relatively flat in the 1990s and early 2000s and then declined more recently (see Figure 1). However, one important difference is that divorce rates are about half in Canada of what they are in the U.S. For example, for most of the 1990s and early 2000s, divorce rates in the U.S. sat at about 20 divorces per 1,000 married women, and the Canadian rate was about 10 divorces per 1,000 married women. More recently, divorce rates in the U.S. were 16.7 divorces per 1,000 married women in 2016, and the comparable number for Canada is 6.22.

Overall, we found that using tax data provided invaluable insights into recent trends in divorce in Canada and helps inform whether administrative data can be used to fill the data gap on divorce. However, we also found important caveats regarding data quality in recent years, as coverage rates of divorced people in the tax data has declined to some degree (i.e. divorces have been undercounted in tax data relative to vital statistics). This is potentially problematic, because it could lead us to increasingly underestimate divorce in the tax data over time, and it could become unclear how much of a decline in divorce in recent years is due to a decline in data quality.

Looking ahead, as a family researcher, how would you complete the phrase “Wouldn’t it be great if…”

To address data gaps, there’s been a growing focus in Canada and other countries to use administrative data rather than survey data to learn about the population. There are many reasons for this and it’s not necessarily a bad thing, but we have to be careful about different issues that arise with data quality – and that’s what we found when we used tax data to look at divorce trends.

In wanting to address this, I would say, “Wouldn’t it be great if we could add questions about marriage and divorce in the last year to a large annual survey in Canada with a known high response rate?” A survey with a large enough sample size, such as Statistics Canada’s Labour Force Survey or the long-form census, could serve as an efficient and reliable vehicle for collecting these important data.

We can also learn from our neighbours to the south, who added questions about recent changes in marital status to the American Community Survey in 2008. This could provide answers to how marriage and divorce are changing and how the percentage of marriages that will end in divorce is changing over time – invaluable insights for researchers, policy makers, service providers and others with an interest in families in Canada.

Rachel Margolis, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Western Ontario and a Vanier Institute of the Family contributor.

Nathan Battams is Communications Manager at the Vanier Institute of the Family.

Access the study in Demographic Research (open access):

Rachel Margolis, PhD, Youjin Choi, PhD, Feng Hou, PhD, and Michael Haan, PhD, “Capturing Trends in Canadian Divorce in an Era Without Vital Statistics,” Demographic Research 41, Article 52 (December 20, 2019). Link: https://bit.ly/39lHEBD.

More from Rachel Margolis:

  • Rachel Margolis, Grandparent Health and Family Well-Being, The Vanier Institute of the Family. Link: https://bit.ly/2Ugvm9s.
  • Rachel Margolis, Feng Hou, Michael Haan and Anders Holm, “Use of Parental Benefits by Family Income in Canada: Two Policy Changes,” Journal of Marriage and Family 81(2) (November 13, 2018). Link: https://bit.ly/2RTPSuN.
  • Rachel Margolis and Laura Wright, “Healthy Grandparenthood: How Long Is It, and How Has It Changed?,” Demography 54 (October 10, 2017). Link: https://bit.ly/36W9ClM.
  • Rachel Margolis, “The Changing Demography of Grandparenthood,” Journal of Marriage and Family 78(3) (March 14, 2016). Link: https://bit.ly/380Ow7c.
  • Rachel Margolis and Natalie Iciaszczyk, “The Changing Health of Canadian Grandparents,” Canadian Studies in Population 42(3-4): 63-76. Link: https://bit.ly/36TLNv1.

Notes

  1. This study did not focus on separations. Relative to the number of divorced people, the number who are legally separated but not divorced is small, and most separations end in divorce. In addition, separation rates are not a traditional demographic measure.
  2. Phillip N. Cohen, “The Coming Divorce Decline,” Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 5 (August 28, 2019). Link: https://bit.ly/2RK7J7j.
  3. Susan L. Brown and Lin I-Fen, “The Gray Divorce Revolution: Rising Divorce Among Middle-Aged and Older Adults, 1990–2010,” The Journals of Gerontology: Series B 67(6) (2012). Link: https://bit.ly/2UdlDAB.

“Virtual Parenting” After Separation and Divorce

Rachel Birnbaum, PhD, RSW, LLM

Download “Virtual Parenting” After Separation and Divorce (PDF)

The rapid increase in the use of communication technologies, such as text messages, instant messaging, email, social networking sites, Skype, FaceTime and webcams, has provided a variety of new ways for parents to maintain their relationships with their children and manage family responsibilities after separation and divorce. At the same time, the increased use of these methods has also created a new area of discussion and debate about the risks and benefits of this type of “virtual parenting.” Issues such as safety and vulnerability, the ability to use technology, and privacy and confidentiality for the child and each parent are only some of the considerations both for the family justice professionals who recommend virtual contact and for the courts that decide on these types of parent–child contact orders.

Families use technology to maintain ties after separation and divorce

Despite the increasing use of smartphones and online communication technologies, there are few studies about whether this “virtual” contact has an impact on children and their parents after separation and divorce, and what the nature of this impact could be.

Research to date has found that many parents report that using technology has a positive impact because it allows them to be able to stay connected to their children, though some negative aspects were discussed as well, such as sadness about being a “virtual parent,” and the challenges in navigating tensions in keeping the communications private from the other parent and not interfering in the daily activities of the other parent’s household.

One study found that children and youth preferred face-to-face contact and reported difficulties maintaining contact regardless of the type of virtual technology used (e.g. Skype, email, texting, FaceTime). This was due to factors such as issues with phone lines, a lack of immediacy with email contact and time differences as a result of the geographic distances.

The results of these studies highlight both the strengths and challenges parents and children experience in using technology to maintain their contact after separation and divorce. However, they don’t provide a complete picture, as they do not differentiate between parents who communicate well with each other and those who have more conflictual communication resulting from factors such as problem-solving difficulties, a lack of trust and instances where there may be family violence concerns after their separation and divorce.

Diverse perspectives provide fuller insights on “virtual parenting”

A 2018 study provided new insight by incorporating the perspective of legal and mental health professionals, who were surveyed on their views and experiences of using virtual technology after separation and divorce. They found mixed results, particularly with high-conflict families that could not cooperate and in situations where there was interference with the former partner’s parenting time during virtual parent–child contact.

As part of a broader research agenda examining children’s participation in separation and divorce matters, two follow-up studies funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) were performed exploring the use of virtual technology to maintain contact between parents and children after separation and divorce. The first study surveyed 166 family justice professionals (e.g. mental health professionals and lawyers) about their experiences with online technology in general and their views on virtual technology as a means of parent–child contact.

Two key questions provided unique insights into experiences with virtual technology after separation and divorce:

  • What do family justice professionals believe are the challenges and benefits regarding the use of technology as a means of parent–child contact?
  • What types of conflicts, if any, do adults and children report as a result of using any type of technology for parent–child contact?

The second study explored the same topics from the perspective of parents and children, aiming to shed light on how modern families maintain and manage relationships after separation and divorce.

Research to date has found that many parents report that using technology has a positive impact because it allows them to be able to stay connected to their children.

While the sample sizes were small in both studies, they are the only ones to date that explore the multiple perspectives (e.g. mental health professionals, lawyers, children and parents) using multiple research approaches (e.g. surveys and interviews) to learn more about the views and experiences of children and parents who use virtual communication to maintain contact after separation and divorce.

Children and parents see benefits and challenges associated with virtual contact

One of the recurring themes in the discussion with parents on the benefits was that it can reduce conflict between the parents. As one respondent said, “[I]t cuts down the number of conflicts that can be brought up, which tends to happen when you have swaps…” As with previous research, parents reported that technology has facilitated contact with their children:

“…once we started using this technology [FaceTime], it made all the difference in the world, because she can see me, I can see her, we talk […] if I am away at work, I can show her where I am and make her feel she’s there with me.”

Despite this benefit, parents also reported several sources of conflict, ranging from relatively minor (e.g. when the resident parent interrupts a child’s contact time with the non-resident parent) to more serious concerns about safety (e.g. non-resident parent having access into the resident parent’s home) and confidentiality (one parent said they were “not sure [they like their] child being online and an open communication as there is no real privacy and worry about pictures being taken and then sent somewhere”).

Interview questions about the experiences of children also provided valuable insight into the use of virtual technology as a means of parent–child contact after separation and divorce. Feelings of closeness to the non-resident parent were reported, along with reservations about virtual contact. “While it is really great to see my dad,” one child was reported to have said, “I want to feel him near me as well.” Another echoed this sentiment of longing for the non-resident parent: “One thing I don’t like about this [virtual contact] is I can’t actually see him in person… it’s sad, but good at the same time.”

Using technology to maintain parent–child contact can bring benefits, but also safety and privacy concerns.

Interference with access time and privacy also emerged as themes (“My mom is always asking me how it’s going and how long will I be online with my dad”), as well as availability of the non-resident parent (“I am supposed to call [FaceTime] on Monday and Wednesday; most of the time I can’t really make it, but it creates problems for my dad, who gets upset”).

Family justice professionals see risks and rewards in “virtual contact”

Family justice professionals were also asked to comment about the benefits and challenges of the use of communication technologies as a means of facilitating contact between separated and divorced parents and their children. Below is a snapshot of some of their comments on the risks and rewards:

“Technology can be a valuable tool for facilitating communication and connections when used properly, while at the same time presenting a heightened risk when used improperly and in an unsupervised manner, particularly for young or impressionable children who are caught up in their parents’ conflict deliberately or inadvertently.”

“I think it would be helpful in maintaining a parent–child relationship when one parent lives a significant distance away from where the child resides.”

“Challenge – privacy. Benefit – staying connected in real time.”

“It is a source of evidence about the parent’s ability to cooperate and whether they can reasonably make decisions about the child’s best interests. More rarely, it is also used to establish a prior inconsistent statement. The benefits are significant, since the lack of physical presence can assist clients to calm down in high-conflict cases. At the same time, some clients incorrectly try to use the medium to set up traps for the other parent or engage in what they see is a strategic manoeuvre in litigation.”

Parent and children reports to family justice professionals

To explore the issue of conflict in the parental relationship that may or may not facilitate virtual contact, all family justice professionals were asked to report how often, if ever, their adult and child clients report conflicts (e.g. privacy concerns, safety, confidentiality) during virtual contact such as Skype, FaceTime and WhatsApp.

The parents reported to family justice professionals that the majority of conflicts occur more often as a result of the other parent listening in on their conversation with the child (60%); the other parent alleging that the child is busy doing something else at the designated time (35%); the child not being available for the call at the designated time (41%); and the other parent saying that they do not know how to use or set up the technology (4%).

When asked to identify any other types of conflicts raised by parents, they said that conflicts also occur over the costs of the use of technology and who pays for it; concerns over rural areas where technology is unreliable or too expensive versus urban areas; one parent using the child to harass the non-custodial parent about child support issues; and some parents reporting that they do not want their child using technology because of safety and confidentiality concerns.

The results of this survey are similar to the 2018 study by Saini and Polak, who found that while there were benefits reported by the family justice professionals about using technology to maintain parent–child contact after separation and divorce, there were also challenges such as privacy concerns, safety issues and families experiencing high conflict who may require specific protocols to be put in place to mitigate these concerns.

When surveyed about their child clients, the majority of lawyers and mental health professionals reported that children said they “sometimes” experience conflict over the use of Skype, FaceTime and so on, with the most common conflict being that they’re busy and “do not want to talk at that time” (55%); the child(ren) not having a lot to say to the other parent and the other parent getting upset (45%); and the other parent listening to their conversation during parent–child contact (39%).

When asked to identify any other types of conflicts raised by their child clients, they reported that conflicts also occur over the non-resident parent asking the child questions about the resident parent; the parents arguing with one another during the call; the other parent not being available when the child calls; and the number of text messages and inappropriate content being sent to the child, including both verbal and emotional abuse by the non-resident parent.

Shining light on diverse experiences after separation and divorce

This is the first study incorporating multiple perspectives on virtual technology as a means of parent–child contact after separation and divorce from parents, children and family justice professionals. The findings highlight both risks and rewards depending on the different perspectives (i.e. mother, father, children, mental health professional, lawyer). They also highlight the need for more direction in their family law practices at a time when virtual contact is being increasingly recommended by family justice professionals and the court as a means of parent–child contact after separation.

A number of concerns were highlighted by parents reporting to their lawyers about virtual parent–child contact. These were related to the other parent listening in on the conversation as well as having to be responsible for making sure the child is available at the specified time. In the parent telephone interviews, the greatest concerns centred on safety and the resident parent feeling vulnerable during virtual parent–child contact as well as on privacy issues. That is, parents raised concerns regarding being blocked from access to the technology being used by the non-resident parent and the child, invasion of privacy and feelings of being monitored (e.g. the resident parent as well as the non-resident parent) and the unfettered virtual access to the resident parent’s home as a result of the use of technology. This latter theme raises particular concerns for high-conflict parents and especially for those families in which there may also be issues of domestic violence (e.g. stalking).

Nevertheless, there were also a number of benefits highlighted as a result of virtual contact in both the parental reports to their lawyers as well as in the parent interviews. The greatest benefit raised by each parent is that the child is that it facilitates an ongoing parental relationship and and that it can provide reduced hostilities between the parents, because they have no contact with one another other than organizing the call if the child requires adult assistance.

While it is important to hear diverse perspectives (e.g. children, parents, lawyers, family justice professionals) about this use of technology, more research is needed to determine what impact, if any, there is in relation to factors such as cultural nuances, barriers to using technology (e.g. rural versus urban areas) and the relative burdens and cost (i.e. emotional and financial) to parents providing the technology. It is equally important to examine the safety risks underlying the use of virtual communication tools, especially when high-conflict cases and family violence are of concern.

Our understanding can also benefit from unpacking some of the underlying assumptions about parenting via the virtual world. For example, what does “virtual parenting” mean to children and young people in particular?

Finally, the two studies raise important cautions and considerations for family justice professionals and the court when virtual technology is being recommended as a means of contact after separation. That is, at minimum, consideration should be given to factors such as the child’s age and the length of the contact time; the degree of parental assistance required to facilitate virtual parent–child contact; whether the child has any special needs and resulting degree of parental support required; the type and degree of conflict between the parents; the type and degree of domestic violence concerns (e.g. stalking); financial costs; the separation of aspirational from practical and feasible parenting plans; children’s views on virtual parent–child contact before court orders or agreements are made; and mechanisms to follow up on whether and how virtual contact is working for the children.

Rachel Birnbaum, PhD, RSW, LLM, is a Social Work Professor, cross-appointed between Childhood Studies (Interdisciplinary Programs) and Social Work at King’s University College, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario. She has written, presented and conducted research on many aspects of family justice issues, with a particular emphasis on children’s participation post separation. She thanks the children, parents and family justice professionals who participated in this research for their valuable time in sharing their views and experiences with virtual technology in parenting disputes after separation. Dr. Birnbaum gratefully acknowledges the Social Sciences and Research Humanities Council (SSHRC) in providing funding support to this important and timely area of research.

This article is a reprint of a three-part series featured in The Lawyer’s Daily.

 

Source information available on the PDF version of this resource.

Published on November 12, 2019

A Snapshot of Grandparents in Canada (May 2019 Update)

Canada’s grandparents are a diverse group. Many of them contribute greatly to family functioning and well-being in their roles as mentors, nurturers, caregivers, child care providers, historians, spiritual guides and “holders of the family narrative.”

As Canada’s population ages and life expectancy continues to rise, their presence in the lives of many families may also increase accordingly in the years to come. With the number of older Canadians in the workforce steadily increasing, they are playing a greater role in the paid labour market – a shift felt by families who rely on grandparents to help provide care to their grandchildren or other family members. All the while, the living arrangements of grandparents continue to evolve, with a growing number living with younger generations and contributing to family households.

Using newly released data from the 2017 General Social Survey, we’ve updated our popular resource A Snapshot of Grandparents in Canada, which provides a statistical portrait of grandparents, their family relationships and some of the social and economic trends at the heart of this evolution.

Highlights:

  • In 2017, 47% of Canadians aged 45 and older were grandparents, down from 57% in 1995.1
  • In 2017, the average age of grandparents was 68 (up from 65 in 1995), while the average age of first-time grandparents was 51 for women and 54 for men in 2017.2, 3
  • In 2017, nearly 8% of grandparents were aged 85 and older, up from 3% in 1995.4
  • In 2017, 5% of grandparents in Canada lived in the same household as their grandchildren, up slightly from 4% in 1995.5
  • In 2017, grandparents who were born outside Canada were more than twice as likely as Canadian-born grandparents to live with grandchildren (9% and 4%, respectively), the result of a complex interplay of choice, culture and circumstance.6

Download A Snapshot of Grandparents in Canada (May 2019) from the Vanier Institute of the Family.

Battams, N. (2019). A snapshot of grandparents in Canada. The Vanier Institute of the Family. https://doi.org/10.61959/disx1332e

Published on May 28, 2019

1 Statistics Canada, “Family Matters: Grandparents in Canada,” The Daily (February 7, 2019). Link: https://bit.ly/2BnyyFO.
2 Ibid.
3 No comparator provided because this is the first time the question has been asked in the General Social Survey.
4 Ibid.
5 Statistics Canada, “Family Matters: Grandparents in Canada.”
6 Ibid.

Mother’s Day 2019: New Moms Older, More Likely to Be Employed Than in the Past

May 12, 2019 is Mother’s Day, a time to recognize and celebrate the millions of women in Canada who are raising (and co-raising) future generations, often while managing multiple roles at home, in their workplaces and in their communities. The complex relationship between women, work and family across the country has evolved significantly across generations, as new moms are older and more likely to be employed than in the past – trends that are reflected in data recently released from Statistics Canada.

According to recent Vital Statistics data, women across the country are increasingly waiting longer to have children – in fact, the fertility rates of women in their early 20s and late 30s flipped over the past 20 years. Many are instead focusing first on pursuing post-secondary education and career development – continuing a long-term trend observed over the past several decades.

  • In 2017, the fertility rate in Canada for women aged 20 to 24 stood at 36 live births per 1,000 women, down from 58 per 1,000 in 2000.1
  • In 2017, the fertility rate in Canada for women aged 35 to 39 was 56 live births per 1,000 women, nearly double the rate in 2000 (34 per 1,000).2
  • In 2016, the average age of first-time mothers was 29.2 years, up from 27.1 years in 2000.3

Most of these new moms are (and remain) in the paid labour force at the time of birth or adoption of their newborn, often utilizing community supports to facilitate work and family responsibilities.

  • In 2016, the employment rate of mothers whose youngest child was aged 0 to 2 was 71%, up from 66% in 2001. As in previous years, this rate was higher in Quebec in 2016 (80%).4
  • In 2017, 79% of recent mothers across Canada had insurable employment, 90% of whom received maternity and/or parental benefits.5
    • As in previous years, recent moms in Quebec were more likely to have insurable employment (97%) and to have received benefits than their counterparts in the rest of Canada (91%).
  • In 2016–17, women accounted for 85% of all parental benefits claims made, down from 89% in 2002.6, 7

Since December 2017, new and expectant parents have been provided with more flexibility regarding the timing and duration of the benefit period.

  • New and expectant parents are now able to choose an extended parental benefits option, which allows them to receive their EI parental benefits over a period of up to 18 months at a benefit rate of 33% of average weekly earnings. Compared with the standard parental benefits option, this extends the duration of the benefit period but decreases the benefit rate, which stand at 12 months and 55% of average weekly earnings, respectively.8
  • Expectant mothers are also now able to access benefits up to 12 weeks before their due date – four weeks earlier than the previous eight-week limit (no additional weeks are available).9
  • In 2017, among recent mothers who had worked as an employee within the previous two years, more than 1 in 5 took or planned to take more than 12 months away from work (21%).10

 

Published on May 8, 2019

Notes

1 Statistics Canada, Crude Birth Rate, Age-specific Fertility Rates and Total Fertility Rate (Live Births) (Table 13-10-0418-01), page last updated May 2, 2019. Link: https://bit.ly/2PKZV2S.

2 Ibid.

3 Claudine Provencher et al., “Fertility: Overview, 2012 to 2016,” Report on the Demographic Situation in Canada, Statistics Canada catalogue no. 91-209-X (June 5, 2018). Link: https://bit.ly/2JUU872.

4 Martha Friendly et al., “Early Childhood Education and Care in Canada 2016,” Child Care Research and Research Unit (CRRU) (April 2018). Link: https://bit.ly/2TC1BwL.

5 Statistics Canada, “Employment Insurance Coverage Survey, 2017,” The Daily (November 15, 2018). Link: https://bit.ly/2VaYssA.

6 Employment and Social Development Canada, “New Five-Week Employment Insurance Parental Sharing Benefit One Month Away,” News Release (February 18, 2019). Link: https://bit.ly/2TUnXJN.

7 Canada Employment Insurance Commission, Employment Insurance 2002 Monitoring and Assessment Report (March 31, 2003). Link: https://bit.ly/2VRq99k.

8 Learn more in “Webinar Content: Changes to EI Special Benefits,” Transition (January 24, 2018). Link: https://bit.ly/302utBQ.

9 Ibid.

10 Statistics Canada, “Employment Insurance Coverage Survey, 2017.”

Facts and Stats: Divorce, Separation and Uncoupling in Canada

Just as families continuously evolve, so do the interpersonal relationships at the heart of family life. Every year, thousands of Canadians come together to form committed family relationships – some of whom decide to raise children together – and sometimes, a variety of reasons may compel them to end their relationship, which can result in diverse, unique and often difficult transitional experiences for the family.

Patterns of coupling or partnering and uncoupling or unpartnering have evolved throughout Canada’s history in response to social, economic, cultural and legal changes. While divorce rates were low for most of the 20th century due to restrictive social norms and legal processes, there has since been an increase in the share of families who have experienced separation, divorce and uncoupling – particularly following the liberalization of divorce through the 1968 Divorce Act and further amendments in 1986.

Whether it’s separation and divorce following a marriage, or the uncoupling of a common-law union, this change can be emotionally, socially, legally and/or financially challenging for family members. Current research shows, however, that the impact on adults and children – including the speed and degree of adjustment – varies widely and is shaped by post-divorce circumstances, access to community programs and services, as well as the availability of information, resources and support during the transition.

In May 2018, the federal government proposed amendments to the Divorce Act to mitigate the adversarial nature of family court proceedings following separation and divorce. These changes are meant to serve the “best interests of the children,” and include defining what these “best interests” are, updating adversarial language such as “custody” and “access” to terms that include “parenting orders” and “parenting time,” establishing clear guidelines for when one parent wants to relocate with a child, making it easier for people to collect support payments, strengthening the capacity of courts to address family violence and compelling lawyers to encourage clients to use family-dispute resolution services, such as mediation.

In this evolving social, cultural and legal context, our new fact sheet uses data from the General Social Survey1 to explore family experiences of divorce, separation and uncoupling in Canada.

Highlights include:

  • In 2017, an estimated 9% of Canadians aged 15 and older were divorced or separated (and not living common law), up from 8% in 1997.
  • In 2016, surveyed Canadian lawyers reported charging an average $1,770 in total fees for uncontested divorce cases and $15,300 for contested divorce cases.
  • In 2011, nearly 1 in 5 Canadians (19%) said that their parents are divorced or separated, nearly twice the share in 2001 (10%).
  • In 2011, two-thirds (66%) of divorced Canadians said they do not have remarriage intentions (23% said they were uncertain).

Download Facts and Stats: Divorce, Separation and Uncoupling in Canada (PDF)

Among top reasons for divorces in Canada we can find:

  • Infidelity: Extramarital affairs break trust and create an irreparable rift between partners.
  • Communication Breakdown: Lack of effective communication leads to misunderstandings and resentment, causing many marriages to fail.
  • Addictions and Gambling problem: Addiction to legal online casinos can lead to financial ruin and neglect of family responsibilities, causing significant marital issues and divorce.
  • Financial Problems: Disagreements over spending, debt, and financial priorities often strain marriages.

Notes

  1. The most recent data available on this topic is from 2011. This fact sheet will be updated when new data is released in Fall 2018.

Families in Canada Interactive Timeline

Today’s society and today’s families would have been difficult to imagine, let alone understand, a half-century ago. Data shows that families and family life in Canada have become increasingly diverse and complex across generations – a reality highlighted when one looks at broader trends over time.

But even as families evolve, their impact over the years has remained constant. This is due to the many functions and roles they perform for individuals and communities alike – families are, have been and will continue to be the cornerstone of our society, the engine of our economy and at the centre of our hearts.

Learn about the evolution of families in Canada over the past half-century with our Families in Canada Interactive Timeline – a online resource from the Vanier Institute that highlights trends on diverse topics such as motherhood and fatherhood, family relationships, living arrangements, children and seniors, work–life, health and well-being, family care and much more.

View the Families in Canada Interactive Timeline.*

 

Full topic list:

  • Motherhood
    o Maternal age
    o Fertility
    o Labour force participation
    o Education
    o Stay-at-home moms
  • Fatherhood
    o Family relationships
    o Employment
    o Care and unpaid work
    o Work–life
  • Demographics
    o Life expectancy
    o Seniors and elders
    o Children and youth
    o Immigrant families
  • Families and Households
    o Family structure
    o Family finances
    o Household size
    o Housing
  • Health and Well-Being
    o Babies and birth
    o Health
    o Life expectancy
    o Death and dying

View all source information for all statistics in Families in Canada Interactive Timeline.

 

* Note: The timeline is accessible only via desktop computer and does not work on smartphones.

Published February 8, 2018

A Snapshot of Family Diversity in Canada (February 2018)

Download A Snapshot of Family Diversity in Canada (February 2018).

For more than 50 years, the Vanier Institute of the Family has monitored, studied and discussed trends in families and family life in Canada. From the beginning, the evidence has consistently made one thing clear: there is no single story to tell, because families are as diverse as the people who comprise them.

This has always been the case, whether one examines family structures, family identities, family living arrangements, family lifestyles, family experiences or whether one looks at the individual traits of family members, such as their ethnocultural background, immigration status, sexual orientation or their diverse abilities.

Building on our recent infographic, Family Diversity in Canada (2016 Census Update), our new Statistical Snapshot publication provides an expanded and more detailed portrait of modern families in Canada, as well as some of the trends that have shaped our vibrant and evolving family landscape over the years. Based on current data and trend analysis, this overview shows that diversity is, was and will continue to be a key characteristic of family life for generations to come – a reality that contributes to Canada’s dynamic and evolving society.

Highlights include:

  • According to Statistics Canada, there were 9.8 million Census families living across Canada in 2016.
  • 66% of families in Canada include a married couple, 18% are living common-law and 16% are lone-parent families – diverse family structures that continuously evolve.
  • Among Canada’s provinces, people in Quebec stand out with regard to couple/relationship formation, with a greater share living common-law than the rest of Canada (40% vs. 16%, respectively) and fewer married couples (60% vs. 84%, respectively) in 2016.
  • In 2016, 1.7 million people in Canada reported having an Aboriginal identity: 58% First Nations, 35% Métis, 3.9% Inuk (Inuit), 1.4% other Aboriginal identity and 1.3% with more than one Aboriginal identity.
  • In 2016, 22% of people in Canada reported that they were born outside the country – up from 16% in 1961.
  • In 2016, more than 1 in 5 people in Canada (22%) reported belonging to a visible minority group, 3 in 10 of whom were born in Canada.
  • 73,000 same-sex couples were counted in the 2016 Census, 12% of whom are raising children.
  • In 2016, there were nearly 404,000 multi-generational households in Canada – the fastest-growing household type since 2001 (+38%).
  • In 2011, 22% of Inuk (Inuit) grandparents, 14% of First Nations grandparents and 5% of Métis grandparents lived with their grandchildren, compared with 3.9% of among non-Indigenous grandparents.
  • In 2014, 1 in 5 Canadians aged 25 to 64 reported living with at least one disability. Disability rates were higher for women (23%) than men (18%).
  • More than one-quarter (27%) of Canadians surveyed in 2014 said religion is “very important” in their lives.
  • One-quarter of Canadians reported “no religious affiliation” in the 2011 Census (most recent data available), up from 17% in 2001.

Download A Snapshot of Family Diversity in Canada (February 2018).

 

Infographic: Family Diversity in Canada (2016 Census Update)

Download the Family Diversity in Canada (2016 Census Update) infographic

 

The Vanier Institute of the Family has now been exploring families and family life in Canada for more than 50 years. Throughout this half-century of studying, discussing and engaging with families from coast to coast to coast, one thing has been clear from the outset: families in Canada are as diverse as the people who comprise them.

This has always been the case, whether one examines family structures, family identities, family living arrangements, family lifestyles, family experiences or whether one looks at the individual traits of family members such as their ethnocultural background, immigration status, sexual orientation or their diverse abilities.

These parents, children, grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings, cousins, friends and neighbours all make unique and valuable contributions to our lives, our workplaces and our communities. As former Governor General of Canada, His Excellency The Right Honourable David Johnston, said at the Families in Canada Conference 2015, “Families, no matter their background or their makeup, bring new and special patterns to our diverse Canadian tapestry.”

Using new data from the 2016 Census, the Vanier Institute has published an infographic on family diversity in Canada.

Highlights include:

  • 66% of families in Canada include a married couple, 18% are living common-law, and 16% are lone-parent families – diverse family structures that continuously evolve.
  • 518,000 stepfamilies live across the country, accounting for 12% of couples with children under age 25.
  • 404,000 households in Canada are multi-generational,1 and nearly 33,000 children live in skip-generation households.2
  • 1.7M people in Canada reported having an Aboriginal identity (58.4% First Nations, 35.1% Métis, 3.9% Inuit, 1.4% other Aboriginal identity, 1.3% more than one Aboriginal identity).
  • 360,000 couples in Canada are mixed unions,3 accounting for 4.6% of all married and common-law couples.
  • 73,000 same-sex couples were counted in the 2016 Census, 12% of whom are raising children.
  • 54,000 military families live in Canada, including 40,000 Regular Force military families and 14,000 Reserve force military families.

 

Download the Family Diversity in Canada (2016 Census Update) infographic.

This bilingual resource is a perpetual publication, and will be updated periodically as new data emerges (older versions are available upon request). Sign up for our monthly e-newsletter to find out about updates, as well as other news about publications, projects and initiatives from the Vanier Institute.

 

Notes

  1. Containing three or more generations.
  2. Living with grandparent(s) with no middle (i.e. parent) generation present.
  3. Statistics Canada defines a mixed union as “a couple in which one spouse or partner belongs to a visible minority group and the other does not, as well as a couple in which the two spouses or partners belong to different visible minority groups.” Link: http://bit.ly/2tZvrSr.

 

Infographic: Modern Couples in Canada

Just as families have evolved across generations, so too have the couple relationships that are a major part of Canada’s “family landscape.” This perpetual change is both a reflection of and a driving force behind some of the evolving social, economic, cultural and environmental forces that shape family life.

Dating, marriage, cohabitation, common-law relationships – the ways people choose to come together, or decide to move apart, are as diverse as the couples themselves. There are, however, some broad trends being witnessed across the country, with family structures diversifying, people forming couple relationships at later ages and family finances taking on a more egalitarian structure.

Using new data from the 2016 Census, the Vanier Institute of the Family has published an infographic on modern couples in Canada.

Highlights include:

  • In 2016, married couples accounted for 79% of all couples in Canada, down from 93% in 1981.
  • One-quarter of “never-married” Canadians say they don’t intend to get married.
  • In 2016, 21% of all couples in Canada were living common-law, up from 6% in 1981.
  • The share of twentysomething women (37%) and men (25%) living in couples has nearly halved since 1981 (falling from 59% and 45%, respectively).
  • In 2016, 12.4% of all couple families in Canada with children under 25 were stepfamilies, down slightly from 12.6% in 2011.
  • There are 73,000 same-sex couples in Canada, 12% of whom are raising children.
  • 1 in 5 surveyed Canadians reported in 2011 that their parents are separated or divorced, up from 10% in 2001.
  • The share of people living in mixed unions nearly doubled between 1991 and 2011, from 2.6% to 4.6%.1
  • 69% of couples with children were dual-earner couples in 2014, up from 36% in 1976.

Download the Modern Couples in Canada infographic from the Vanier Institute of the Family

 

Notes

  1. Statistics Canada defines a mixed union as “a couple in which one spouse or partner belongs to a visible minority group and the other does not, as well as a couple in which the two spouses or partners belong to different visible minority groups.”

A Snapshot of Population Aging and Intergenerational Relationships in Canada

Canada’s population is aging rapidly, with a higher share of seniors than ever before. While this can present some societal challenges, it also provides growing opportunities for intergenerational relationships, since younger people have a greater likelihood of having more seniors and elders in their lives. Population aging has an impact not only on family relationships, but also on the social, economic, cultural and environmental contexts in which families live.

Using new statistics from the 2016 Census, A Snapshot of Population Aging and Intergenerational Relationships in Canada explores the evolving demographic landscape across the country through a family lens. As the data shows, Canadians are getting older, and “seniorhood” is a growing life stage – a time when many of our parents, grandparents and great-grandparents are continuing to play important roles in our families, workplaces and communities.

Highlights include:

  • There are more seniors than ever before in Canada. More than 5.9 million people in Canada are aged 65 and older – up 20% since 2011 and now outnumbering children (5.8 million).
  • Nunavut is the youngest region in Canada. Children account for one-third (33%) of the population in Nunavut.
  • We’re more likely to become seniors than in the past. In 2012, nine in 10 Canadians were expected to reach age 65, up from six in 10 in 1925.
  • The number of multi-generational households is growing. In 2011, 1.3 million people in Canada lived in multi-generational homes, up 40% since 2001.
  • Working seniors are on the rise. The labour market participation rate of seniors more than doubled since 2000, from 6.0% to 14% in 2016.
  • Canada’s aging population affects family finances. An estimated $750 billion is expected to be transferred to Canadians aged 50 to 75 over the next decade.

 

This bilingual resource will be updated periodically as new data emerges. Sign up for our monthly e-newsletter to find out about updates, as well as other news about publications, projects and initiatives from the Vanier Institute.

Download A Snapshot of Population Aging and Intergenerational Relationships in Canada from the Vanier Institute of the Family.

 

Polyamory in Canada: Research on an Emerging Family Structure

John-Paul Boyd, M.A., LL.B.

Executive Director
Canadian Research Institute for Law and the Family (University of Calgary)

The Canadian Research Institute for Law and the Family began a study of perceptions of polyamory in Canada in June 2016. The project is only midway through its course, but the data collected so far have important implications for law and policy in the coming decades, as the meaning of family continues to evolve.

The term polyamory is a mash-up of the Greek word for much or many and the Latin word for love. As these roots suggest, people who are polyamorous are, or prefer to be, involved in more than one intimate relationship at a time. Some polyamorists are involved in stable, long-term, loving relationships involving two or more other people. Others are simultaneously engaged in a number of relationships of varying degrees of permanence and commitment. Still others are involved in a web of concurrent relationships ranging from short-term relationships that are purely sexual in nature to more enduring relationships characterized by deep emotional attachments.

 

Polyamory
The practice or condition of participating in more than one intimate relationship at a time. It is usually not related to religion and it is unrelated to marriage.

Polygamy
The practice or condition of having more than one spouse, typically a wife, at one time, usually for religious reasons.

 

Polyamory and polygamy

For many people, TLC’s Sister Wives and the religious community in Bountiful, British Columbia are what come to mind when polyamory is mentioned. However, there are a number of differences between polyamory and the polygamy practised by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, that being the common connection between Sister Wives and Bountiful. Polygamy in this sense refers to marriages – the “gamy” of polygamy comes from the Greek for marriage – between one man and many wives that are mandated by scripture and distinctly patriarchal.

In contrast, surveyed polyamorists involved in relationships with two or more other adults place a high value on the equality of their partners, regardless of gender or parental status. They tend to believe that their partners should have a say in changes to their relationships and should be able to leave those relationships how and when they wish.

Although Statistics Canada doesn’t track the number of Canadians who are polyamorous or engaged in polyamorous relationships, in just three weeks we received 547 valid responses to a survey on polyamory advertised primarily through social media.1 More than two-thirds of respondents (68%) said that they are currently involved in a polyamorous relationship, and, of those who weren’t, two-fifths (39.9%) said that they had been involved in such a relationship in the last five years. More than four-fifths of respondents said that in their view the number of people who identity as polyamorous is increasing (82.4%), as is the number of people openly involved in polyamorous relationships (80.9%).

If the number of people involved in polyamorous relationships is indeed growing, the potential economic and legal implications are significant, as almost all of Canada’s most important social institutions are predicated on the assumption that adult relationships come only in pairs.

If the number of people involved in polyamorous relationships is indeed growing, the potential economic and legal implications are significant, as almost all of Canada’s most important social institutions are predicated on the assumption that adult relationships come only in pairs. The Canada Pension Plan pays survivor’s benefits to only one spouse; the Old Age Security spousal allowance can only be paid to one partner. The forms we use to calculate our liability to the Canada Revenue Agency likewise assume that taxpayers have sequential but not concurrent relationships, an assumption shared by the provincial legislation on wills and estates and, for the most part, the provincial legislation on domestic relations.

Polyamorists in Canada are generally younger, and live in diverse relationships

Most of the respondents to our survey live in British Columbia (144), followed by Ontario (116), Alberta (71) and Quebec (37). Respondents tend to be younger than the general Canadian population, with 75% of respondents being between the ages of 25 and 44, compared to 26% of the general population, and only 16% of respondents being age 45 or older, compared to 44% of the general population.

Most of the respondents to our survey had completed high school (96.7%), and respondents’ highest levels of education attained were undergraduate degrees (26.3%), followed by post-graduate or professional degrees (19.2%) and college diplomas (16.3%). Respondents reported achieving significantly higher levels of educational attainment than the general population of Canada: 37% of respondents reported holding an undergraduate university degree, compared with 17% of the general population; and 19% of respondents reported holding a post-graduate or professional degree, compared with 8% of the general population.

The respondents to our survey also tended to have higher incomes than their peers in the general Canadian population. Fewer respondents (46.8%) had incomes under $40,000 per year than the general population (60%), and more respondents (31%) had incomes of $60,000 or more per year than the general population (23%). Although almost half of our respondents had annual incomes of less than $39,999, almost two-thirds of respondents were not the sole income-earner in their household (65.4%) and more than three-fifths of respondents’ households (62.3%) had total incomes between $80,000 and $149,999 per year.

Slightly less than one-third of respondents identified as male (30%) and almost three-fifths identified as female (59.7%); the rest identified as genderqueer (3.5%), gender fluid (3.2%), transgender (1.3%) or “other” (2.2%). A plurality of respondents described their sexuality as either heterosexual (39.1%) or bisexual (31%).

Most of the respondents to our survey described themselves as atheists (33.9%) or agnostic (28.2%). Of those subscribing to an organized faith, most said that they were Christian (non-denominational, 7.2%; Roman Catholic, 3.2%; Protestant, 1.3%). However, more than one-fifth of respondents (22.1%) described their faith as “other,” including Quakers, pagans and polytheists.

We also asked our respondents about their relationships and living arrangements. Almost two-thirds of the respondents answering this question said that their relationship involved three people (64.6%), 17.9% said that their relationship involved four people and 13.8% said that their relationship involved six or more people. Only one-fifth of respondents said that the members of their relationship lived in a single household (19.7%). Where the members of a family lived in more than one household, most lived in two households (44.3%) or three households (22.2%).

 

Where the members of a family live in a single household, three-fifths of respondents’ households involved at least one married couple (61.2%), and there was only one married couple in those households. Where the members of a family lived in more than one household, almost half involved at least one married couple (45.4%), and 85% of those households involved one married couple while the remainder involved two married couples (12.9%), three married couples (1.4%) and more than three married couples (0.7%).

Almost one-quarter of the survey respondents (23.2%) said that at least one child under the age of 19 lives full-time in their household under the care of at least one parent or guardian, and 8.7% said that at least one child lives part-time in their household under the care of at least one parent or guardian.

To summarize, the respondents to our survey tended to be younger, with higher levels of education and higher employment rates than the general Canadian population. Twice as many respondents identified as female than male, and roughly equal numbers of respondents described themselves as heterosexual and bisexual. Most respondents involved in polyamorous relationships at the time of the survey were involved in a relationship with two other people. However, a significant number of respondents were involved in relationships with more than three other people and the members of most respondents’ relationships live in two or more households.

Surveyed polyamorists highly value equality in relationships and family decision-making

The survey also explored attitudes toward polyamorous relationships and the people involved in them, and about their perceptions of the attitude of the general public toward polyamory.

On the whole, respondents strongly endorsed the equality of members of their relationships, regardless of gender and parental status. More than eight in 10 respondents (82.1%) strongly agreed and 12.5% agreed with the statement that everyone in a polyamorous relationship should be treated equally regardless of gender or gender identity. More than half (52.9%) strongly agreed and 21.5% agreed with the statement that everyone in a polyamorous relationship should be treated equally regardless of parental or guardianship status.

Likewise, a large majority of respondents agreed that all members of their relationships should have a say about changes in those relationships. About eight in 10 (80.5%) strongly agreed or agreed that everyone in a polyamorous relationship should have an equal say about changes in the nature of the relationship, and 70.3% strongly agreed or agreed that everyone in a polyamorous relationship should have an equal say about introducing new people into the relationship. More than nine in 10 respondents (92.9%) strongly agreed and 6.3% agreed with the statement that each person in a polyamorous relationship should have the right to leave the relationship if and when they choose.

Respondents’ conviction in the equality, autonomy and participation of the members of their relationships likely explains another important finding from our research: 89.2% of respondents strongly agreed and 9.2% agreed with the statement that everyone in a polyamorous relationship should have the responsibility to be honest and forthright with each other.

The views of the general public toward polyamory have doubtless been complicated by the popularity of television shows dealing with polygamy, such as Sister Wives, My Five Wives, another TLC offering, and Big Love, from HBO, and by the publicity attracted by the recent criminal prosecution of a number of community leaders from Bountiful under s. 293 of the Criminal Code. The views of respondents themselves have also been influenced by the Criminal Code, sections 291 and 293 of which respectively prohibit bigamy and polygamy.

Although most respondents said that public tolerance of polyamory is growing (72.6%), more than eight in 10 (80.6%) agreed that people see polyamorous relationships as a kind of kink or fetish. Furthermore, only 16.7% of respondents agreed that people see polyamorous relationships as a legitimate form of family.

Polyamorous families have a unique and complex relationship with the law

The responsibilities of people involved in long-term, committed polyamorous families tend to be complicated, especially when those responsibilities must intersect with people outside the family, government services and the law. The difficulties faced by polyamorous families, especially those with children, cover every aspect of life in Canada:

  • Who will schools recognize as parents and guardians, entitled to pick children up from school, give permission for outings or talk to teachers about academic performance?
  • Who can get information from and give instruction to doctors, dentists, counsellors and other health care providers?
  • Who can receive benefits from an employee’s health insurance? Who is entitled to coverage under provincial health care plans (e.g., OHIP in Ontario or MSP in British Columbia)?
  • Who is entitled to claim public benefits such as the Old Age Security spousal allowance or Canada Pension Plan survivor’s benefits?
  • What are the rights and entitlements of multiple adults under the provincial legislation on wills and estates, or the federal legislation on immigration?
  • How many adults may participate in the legal parentage of a child under the legislation on adoption and assisted reproduction?
  • What are the rights and entitlements of individuals leaving polyamorous families under the provincial legislation on domestic relations?

Many of the answers to these questions come down to how the applicable laws, policies and rules define terms such as parent, spouse and guardian, adult interdependent partner in Alberta, or common-law partner under most federal statutes.

The responsibilities of people involved in long-term, committed polyamorous families tend to be complicated, especially when those responsibilities must intersect with people outside the family, government services and the law.

Although schools and hospitals tend to look at the nature of the relationship between the individuals in question rather than a textbook definition of “parent,” agencies providing benefits tend to cleave more rigidly to narrowly defined terms. Some polyamorous families, for example, have been required to decide which of the adults in their family will be deemed to be an employee’s “spouse” for the purposes of health care and prescription coverage, resulting in the coverage of the employee and the family member selected as his or her spouse, but the denial of benefits to others.

The most urgent of these questions, however, likely relate to individuals’ entitlements and obligations under the provincial legislation on domestic relations. When committed polyamorous relationships come to an end, the same range of problems tend to arise as those faced by people ending monogamous relationships. Depending on the circumstances, the departure of one or more members of a polyamorous family may result in disagreements about: where children will live, how parenting decisions will be made and how much time the children will have with whom; whether child support must be paid, and if so who must pay it; whether a person is entitled to spousal support, and if so who is responsible for paying it; and how property and debt will be distributed, and whether an individual is entitled to an interest in property owned only by other family members.

When committed polyamorous relationships come to an end, the same range of problems tend to arise as those faced by people ending monogamous relationships.

On the whole, the legislation of the common law provinces tends toward the generous extension of rights and duties relating to children but takes a more parsimonious approach to spousal support and the division of property.

In keeping with the child-first approach of the Child Support Guidelines, the statutes of Canada’s common law provinces all impose a liability for child support on persons who are step-parents or stand in the place of a parent to a child, whether anyone else is subject to a pre-existing child support liability or not. As a result, all members of a polyamorous family are potentially liable to pay support for a member’s child, particularly where the child’s primary residence was the polyamorous household.

A dependent adult family member may be entitled to spousal support from another member of a polyamorous family if:

a) the person is a married spouse of the other member; or,

b) the person qualifies as an adult interdependent partner (Alberta), an unmarried spouse (British Columbia, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Saskatchewan), a partner (Newfoundland and Labrador) or a common-law partner (Manitoba, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia) of another member.2

A dependent adult family member may be entitled to spousal support from more than one family member where the legislation is not written so as to preclude the possibility of concurrent spousal relationships, as it is in Alberta, or the person qualifies as an unmarried spouse or partner of those members, as may be the case for families living in British Columbia.

In all of the common law provinces but Alberta and Manitoba, a child’s parents may share custody of the child, as well as the associated rights to receive information about the child and make decisions concerning the child, with:

a) other family members who fall within the statutory definition of guardian (British Columbia, Nova Scotia) or parent (New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Ontario, Prince Edward Island); and,

b) any other family members where the legislation does not require a biological relationship to apply for custody (British Columbia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Saskatchewan).

The legislation of British Columbia and Newfoundland and Labrador additionally allow more people than the biological parents of a child to have standing as the legal parents of that child when the child is conceived through assisted reproduction.

In all of the common law provinces except Manitoba, a child’s parents may share guardianship of the child, and the associated obligations as trustees of the child’s property, with one or more other family members.

With the exception of British Columbia, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, statutory rights to the possession and ownership of property are restricted to married spouses in the common law provinces, limiting the relief available to the unmarried members of a polyamorous family to:

a) the legislation generally applicable to co-owned real and personal property; and,

b) whichever principles of equity and the common law might apply in the circumstances of the relationship.

The statutory property rights available to the members of polyamorous families in British Columbia, Manitoba and Saskatchewan arise from the application of the legislation to unmarried spouses (British Columbia, Saskatchewan) and common-law partners (Manitoba), and the failure of the legislation to preclude the possibility of concurrent spousal relationships.

A look down the road

The traditional model of the Western nuclear family, consisting of married heterosexual parents and their legitimate offspring, which prevailed almost unaltered for more than 1,000 years, has been evolving at an ever-increasing pace since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, along with the legal concepts and structures that support it. The legal disabilities of married women, such as their inability to own property or conduct business in their own names, were the first to go, followed by the disabilities associated with bastardy, such as the inability to inherit or assume their father’s title.

The federal Divorce Act first allowed Canadians to end their marriages other than by dying in 1968, and the baby boomers, the oldest of whom turned 65 in 2011, are the first generation to have lived almost the whole of their adult lives under federal divorce legislation. Not only has the stigma associated with divorce largely evaporated, but the rate of remarriage and repartnering has continued to rise over the last two decades, as has the number of blended families, which seem to now be as commonplace as unblended families.

Sexual orientation became a prohibited ground of discrimination in the mid-1990s, following which same-sex marriage became legal in Ontario in 2002, and in eight other provinces and territories in rapid succession thereafter, until the introduction of the federal Civil Marriage Act in 2005 legalized same-sex marriage throughout the country. Legislation giving unmarried cohabiting couples property rights identical to those of married spouses became law in Saskatchewan in 2001, in Manitoba in 2004 and in British Columbia in 2011.

In Canada, family is now thoroughly unmoored from marriage, gender, sexual orientation, reproduction and childrearing; the presumption that romantic relationships, whether casual, cohabiting or conjugal, are limited to two persons at one time is likely to be the next focal point of change.

The scant data currently available on polyamorous relationships suggest that the number of people involved in such families is not insignificant and may be increasing: according to a 2009 article in Newsweek, Loving More, a magazine aimed at polyamorous individuals, has “15,000 regular readers,” and more than 500,000 Americans live in openly polyamorous relationships; in Polyamory in the Twenty-First Century, author Deborah Anapol estimates that one in 500 Americans are polyamorous; and the website of the Canadian Polyamory Advocacy Association, polyadvocacy.ca, identifies two other national organizations supporting or connecting people involved in polyamorous relationships and eight similar regional organizations based in the Maritimes, 36 in Quebec and Ontario, 23 in the prairie provinces and 22 in British Columbia.

We have successfully accommodated significant, transformational change to how we think of family in the past, and we will do so again.

If the prevalence of polyamory is indeed increasing, a significant number of our most important social customs and institutions will need to evolve. This will require a reconsideration of how we think of parenthood and how we distribute the liabilities parenthood entails. It will also have an impact on how we demarcate those committed adult relationships that attract legal entitlements and obligations and those that do not, as well as how these entitlements and obligations are distributed among more than two people.

Although the magnitude of potential change is significant, it is not pressingly imminent; we have time to acclimate and adapt to the rising number of polyamorous individuals and families. We have successfully accommodated significant, transformational change to how we think of family in the past, and we will do so again.

 

Notes

  1. Survey data have not been weighted.
  2. Note that the legal situation in Quebec is different than in the rest of the rest of Canada’s provinces since it is governed by civil law rather than the common law system used in the other provinces. As such, it is beyond the scope of this article.

John-Paul Boyd, M.A., LL.B., is the Executive Director of the Canadian Research Institute for Law and the Family, a multidisciplinary non-profit organization affiliated with the University of Calgary.

To learn more about John-Paul Boyd’s research into polyamorous relationships and family law, see “Polyamorous Families in Canada: Early Results of New Research from CRILF” from the Canadian Research Institute for Law and the Family.

Download this article in PDF format.

Published on April 11, 2017

Infographic: Family Diversity in Canada 2016

International Day of Families is approaching on May 15, a special day to recognize the importance of family to communities across the globe. Parents, children, grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings, cousins and the friends and neighbours we care for (and who care for us) all make unique and valuable contributions to our lives, our workplaces and our communities.

As we reflect on Canada’s 9.9 million families, one thing that’s clear is that there’s no such thing as a cookie-cutter family. Families are as diverse and unique as the people who comprise them, and they are all an essential part of Canada’s family landscape.

For this year’s International Day of Families, we’ve created an infographic providing a “snapshot” of modern families in Canada that highlights some of the many ways families are diverse:

  • 67% of families in Canada are married-couple families, 17% are living common-law, and 16% are lone-parent families – diverse family structures that continuously evolve
  • 464,000 stepfamilies live across the country, accounting for 13% of couples with children
  • 363,000 households contain three or more generations, and there are also approximately 53,000 “skip-generation” homes (children and grandparents with no middle generation present)
  • 1.4 million people in Canada report having an Aboriginal identity (61% First Nations, 32% Métis, 4.2% Inuit, 1.9% other Aboriginal identity, 0.8% more than one Aboriginal identity)
  • 360,000 couples in Canada are mixed unions,* accounting for 4.6% of all married and common-law couples
  • 65,000 same-sex couples were counted in the 2011 Census, 9.4% of whom are raising children
  • 68,000 people in Canada are in the CAF Regular Forces, half of whom have children under 18

As His Excellency The Right Honourable David Johnston, Governor General of Canada, expressed at the Families in Canada Conference 2015, “Families, no matter their background or their makeup, bring new and special patterns to our diverse Canadian tapestry.” Join us as we recognize and celebrate family diversity, from coast to coast to coast.

Download the Family Diversity in Canada 2016 infographic.

 

* Statistics Canada defines a mixed union as “a couple in which one spouse or partner belongs to a visible minority group and the other does not, as well as a couple in which the two spouses or partners belong to different visible minority groups.”

Language, Labels and “Lone Parents”

Victoria Bailey

Lone parent, single parent, one-parent family, independent parent, non-married parent, alone parent, autonomous parent: the words or terms used to identify, or self-identify, adults who parent independently are diverse and subjective, and they have evolved over the years. While our choice of labels may seem trivial, language is powerful and loaded – it shapes how we see the world and the people in it. These familial terms, and the respective ideas they aim to convey, are at best blurry. What can seem like a valid category to one person may be considered a stereotype by another, and these labels can carry stigma with them that has an impact on family well-being and identity – particularly for single mothers,1 who account for 8 in 10 single parents in Canada.

Many labels are used to categorize “lone parents”

Statistics Canada uses the term lone parent to identify “Mothers or fathers, with no married spouse or common-law partner present, living in a dwelling with one or more children.” They are not alone in this choice of terminology: the UK’s Office for National Statistics also utilizes the term lone parent/lone parent family, as does the UK government’s statistics website. The Australia Bureau of Statistics, meanwhile, uses the term one-parent family and Statistics New Zealand lists the term sole parent in its definitions of census family classifications but tends to defer to the same terminology as Australia in census information-related texts.

The United States Census Bureau uses a number of different terms in their definitions and reports; phrases including female householder, no husband present, single parent and lone parent are used to describe different family and/or household structures. In Engendering Motherhood, sociologist Martha McMahon frequently uses the term “unwed mother”; however, this text is now 20 years old and, once a commonly used term, “unwed mother” is now infrequently applied in either dialogue or in media content. To many people, the phrase may now seem dated, archaic and even tied to (and measured more by) religious doctrine.

In a sense, none of the terms commonly used to identify single mothers are satisfactory in their ability to capture family experiences, because they use deficit language. Lone mothers and sole mothers could suggest to some that these parents are “on their own,” without supports, while many of these parents may have rich networks of support that include family, friends, community organizations and even former partners. One-parent families suggests a similar isolation, whereas the child(ren) in these families may have two parents, even if the parents have ended their relationship. Whereas single parent/s, as with “unwed mother,” suggests a deviation from a married-parent norm, it is rare for a determining label of “married parent/s” to be used in conversation or in text unless focusing specifically on the topics of parenting and marriage.

Overall, the use of a variety of terms does seem like a more sensitive, considerate and inclusive approach that is more appreciative of complex family forms and provides options for identifying families. Whether intended or not, what the differing US Census Bureau terms and more modern, emerging phrases such as autonomous parent and independent parent do signify is that terminology related to being a single parent seems to be evolving and progressing in a way that attributes power to the parent’s choice of familial circumstance.

Terms have changed over time, as have family experiences and realities

The use of single-parent synonyms and their attributed meanings have developed over time, reflecting ever-changing family realities. According to Statistics Canada, the proportion of lone parents in our nation is not drastically different from what it was 100 years ago, and it was nearly as high in 1931 (11.9%) as it was in 1981 (12.7%). But what does differ, is the reason behind those numbers, that is, a modern-day choice of relationship status versus a latter-day result of circumstance, often related to mortality rates. As highlighted in the Statistics Canada report Enduring Diversity: Living Arrangements of Children in Canada over 100 Years of the Census:

… diverse family living arrangements were in many cases a result of the death of one or more family members. Death within the family – of siblings, of mothers during or following complications from childbirth, of fathers serving in war, for example – was a much more common experience for young children in the early 20th century than today. In 1921, about 1 in 11 (8.9%) children aged 15 and under had experienced the death of at least one parent, while 4.1% had experienced the death of both parents.

The researchers go on to point out, “In comparison, in 2011, less than 1% of children aged 0 to 14 lived in a lone-parent family in which the parent was widowed.”

Throughout Canada’s history, there have been diverse paths to parenting independently, such as through adoption, sperm/egg donation, surrogacy, in vitro fertilization (IVF) or through separation, divorce from, or death of, a partner – or there never having been a partner in terms of a relationship to begin with. To avoid reinforcing stereotypes, it is important in any discussion about single parents to acknowledge this diversity and avoid generalization or homogenization.

Family labels can have an impact on identities

The language and terms we use to identify family forms matter, as they can carry negative connotations and meaning. An example of this can be found in the 2011 Census definition of family, in which Statistics Canada included stepfamilies for the first time:

A couple family with children may be further classified as either an intact family in which all children are the biological and/or adopted children of both married spouses or of both common-law partners or a stepfamily with at least one biological or adopted child of only one married spouse or common-law partner and whose birth or adoption preceded the current relationship.

While counting stepfamilies is a positive step toward capturing diverse family forms, the decision to contrast this with the label “intact family” could suggest, to some, that families deviating from this status are not intact, that is, not whole or complete due to lack of a partner living under the same roof as a parent and their child.

Labels such as single mother or single parent may also not be terms some people feel comfortable with. For example, in an online article entitled “Single Mother Was Not a Title I Wanted to Own. A Year Later It Still Isn’t,” blogger Mavis King writes how both she, and other mothers, do not want to be labelled as “single mothers”:

The problem with being a “single mum”… is the negative connotations it can conjure. At their worst single mums are associated with welfare, dole-bludging, unkempt and unruly kids. The single mother is just keeping it together, just scraping by. She’s not a heroine, no she’s responsible for her plight. She should have known better, should have never married him, shouldn’t have had children. And what about the kids? She’s selfish, the kids won’t do well at school, they’re worse off than their friends.

However, some parents proudly take ownership of wording that communicates their self-sufficiency. On the Wealthy Single Mommy blog, for example, Emma Johnson writes, “I feel totally fine calling myself a single mom: I float my family financially and am the primary caretaker of my kids.”

Stigma related to “lone motherhood” can affect family well-being

Negative stereotypes about single mothers such as those described by King, that is, assumptions that single mothers are struggling and irresponsible, or that their children are worse off than others, are often fuelled and reinforced in the media. A recent post-graduate study I completed focused on the representation of single mothers in Canadian news media found that coverage typically followed three main trends: a negatively biased dichotomy of representation, homogenization of single mothers and application of the term “single mother” being connected to gender-related identification of familial status rather than relevance to article information.

These depictions bolster stereotypes that can have measurable consequences. For example, in a 2011 study into rental discrimination, single mothers were found to be more than 14% less likely to be granted a positive reply to rental inquiries than a (heterosexual) couple. Similarly, women who participated in a qualitative focus group for my dissertation research reported that the stigma of being labelled a single mother had acted as a barrier that prevented them from leaving negative situations, including statements such as, “I was more scared of being a single mom than of staying in an abusive relationship.”

Family labels gloss over diverse experiences

While many texts claim that being raised in a home by single parents may predispose children to negative outcomes, some research challenges the causal relationship between growing up in a single-parent family and detrimental outcomes. As researchers Don Kerr and Roderic Beaujot point out, “Studies that do not take into account the pre-existing difficulties of children and their families have a tendency to overstate the effect of growing up in a single-parent family.” There are many circumstances in which mothers have created healthier environments for themselves and their children precisely because they ended a negative relationship to become single mothers.

Often, it seems that resources, such as money, time and community supports (i.e. extended family, friends and other community members) have a more significant impact on child and parent experience and/or outcome than a parent’s relationship status. As Jon Bernardes states in Family Studies: An Introduction, “Whilst Queen Victoria was a single parent for many years, she is not thought of as a ‘problem parent.’”

However, what is perhaps most important to note is that children tend not to care about how the census categorizes their parents, nor do they tend to repeatedly quantify any kind of relationship status distinction when speaking about their parents. While they may initially share their familial status with friends – for example, “It’s just me and my dad” or “My dad doesn’t live with us” – there’s most likely an informal, colloquial tone to this statement. It’s highly unlikely that, once this personal information is shared, any future descriptions of an event or issue linked to their parent/s includes determining terminology such as “my single father” or “my lone parent mother.” They most likely simply say “my mom” or “my dad” or “my whomever” with a sense of confident, unconditional, personal belonging and attachment marking the initial, and perhaps most crucial, signifier in that type of statement: “my.”

 

1 This article frequently uses the terms “single mothers” and “single parents” for consistency, but as it discusses, there are many recognized and preferred terms in use.

Victoria Bailey is a freelance writer and a student of women’s studies. She lives and works in Calgary, Alberta.

 

 

The Place of the Family in Times of Social Transition, Part 2

Dr. Elise Boulding was a founding thinker behind the work of the Vanier Institute, a family sociologist and author whose work informed (and continues to inform) our understanding of families and family life. In 1981, she delivered a public lecture that was published by the Vanier Institute entitled The Place of the Family in Times of Transition: Imagining a Familial Future, which explores the role families play in the lives of individuals and society at large. While she delivered these words more than three decades ago, much of the content is timeless and still provides insight into how families serve as a cornerstone of our ever-evolving society.

The following is the second of two excerpts from this lecture. The full lecture can be downloaded by following the link at the bottom of the page.

Every family is a “micro-society”

We can think of each family or each familial grouping as a micro-society choosing a life path. We have discussed, at the Vanier conference over the last two days, lifestyle options. We have talked about the fact that most people really don’t have many choices in their lives. There are so many constraints, so many things one can’t do, so many opportunities that are not available because of age, sex, education, economic background, whatever. Each family, in effect, given the resources and opportunities available to it, makes choices about the kind of micro-society it wants to be. At its best, that is what the family is, a culture-choosing entity. The industrial family doesn’t do this on its own, however. There is no such thing as a familial group in isolation.

Think about an evening at home, when you draw down the blind, shut the door and settle in for a quiet family evening just by yourselves. Look at the activities that are being carried on; you are on the telephone engaged in “community networking”; you are planning a meeting, writing messages or notes about meetings; or you are reading up for some kind of personal project. At least, you are reading newspapers or watching TV to see what’s going on in the world, making shopping lists or deciding when family members need their next medical checkup, or maybe you are thinking about the next PTA meeting at school.

In short, a host of things go on inside the family setting that have to do with the community itself and with the quality of civic life. When you are out in the community, on the other hand, a lot of what you are doing is creating the quality of your family life. If you are at school expressing concern about the music or language program, or the way arithmetic is being taught, you are concerned about the quality of your child’s life. This is part of family life. It’s as a family person that you are concerned, and you are concerned not only for your own child but for other children.

Wherever we are in the community, we are constructing our family life out there. So much of the quality of our family life depends on whether we have a neighbourhood shopping centre, whether there is a mall in the downtown area, where the bus routes go, whether we have public transportation. All of these things impinge on family life. What we do in the community we also do for our family, and what we do for our family we also do for the community. The family is an interface between the public and the private.

Families provide nurturance to individuals and communities

Society requires human beings who are able to engage in nurturant acts for survival. They must be men and women. As long as nurturance is defined as women’s work, remains women’s role, society is to remain rigid and crisis-prone. Nurturance has to be a task that is jointly shared by men and women. The capacity to identify and act on the needs of others, to think about the neighbourhood, begins in early childhood. The training for nurturance, the learning, the skills, the listening, the evaluating of the response of the other comes in the family. The family isn’t the only place we learn it, but it is a very important place. Extending that process into more places in the community, creating environments where other families can have their stresses lessened so that they too can begin to engage in this kind of sharing-caring is absolutely essential if the work of professionals in social design is to have any use.

Whatever is done in terms of planning and resource redistribution at the county, state and national level has to relate to these capacities, however weak or however strong they are, that are developing inside individual families. To a depressing extent we don’t notice the kinds of help that people give each other, and therefore we don’t build on the human capacities that are already present. We put in professionally designed human services that don’t connect with the nurturance that already goes on.

One of the biggest stumbling blocks to an adequate acknowledgement of the role of the family in society is that helping behaviour and nurturance is considered women’s stuff. It’s thought of as looking after babies and seeing that husbands’ slippers and pipes are laid out. We have, in short, some very poor imagery about the work of nurturance. In fact, nurturance is intimately connected with the conditions under which human beings engage in any kind of learning. What nurturance does is allow a person to be open and vulnerable so that new information can be absorbed, new mental arrangements made of facts about the outside world. That is what happens in learning. If we don’t have places where we can be vulnerable and open, we can’t learn anything. The reason we learned so little in school is that we were scared to death of teachers and we were scared to death of tests. The family at its best is the setting for that kind of openness and learning, a social group in which we learn to accept the uses and values of vulnerability.

The family is a training ground for the future

The family is both a training ground and a metaphor for the kind of society we want. We can take the skills and the analytic capacities that are developed in the course of making judgments about what’s needed in a growing family and in a growing neighbourhood, and carry them from sphere to sphere and level to level as we move from the local to the planetary. I do not mean to oversimplify; conflicts arise, needs and wants differ everywhere. However, the mode of caring, the attitude of nurturance, the willingness to be vulnerable is always appropriate to the human condition at all times and places.

The full lecture can be downloaded here.

The Place of the Family in Times of Social Transition, Part 1

Dr. Elise Boulding was a founding thinker behind the work of the Vanier Institute, a family sociologist and author whose work informed (and continues to inform) our understanding of families and family life. In 1981, she delivered a public lecture that was published by the Vanier Institute entitled The Place of the Family in Times of Transition: Imagining a Familial Future, which explores the role families play in the lives of individuals and society at large. While she delivered these words more than three decades ago, much of the content is timeless and still provides insight into how families serve as a cornerstone of our ever-evolving society.

The following is the first of two excerpts, the second of which will be published on the Vanier Institute blog next week. The full lecture can be downloaded by following the link at the bottom of the page.

 

Families and society adapt and react to each other

Each era invents the familial forms it requires. The particular family form consisting of mother, father and children, which we tend to think of as “the family” in our age, is one of those forms. There have always been single-parent households, there have always been extended-family households and there have always been households composed of people who were not related to each other but grouped together because economic, political and social conditions made the grouping useful.

The family is the adaptive mechanism in society that helps us get over the rough spaces as we move from one era to another. It provides elasticity in the social order so we can stretch and contract, make shifts in size, grouping and organizational patterns. The family is a setting in which we can create the other, the different, the alternative. It is both the adaptor and the creator of the new. The family is an instrument for imagining futures.

When I talk about the family, I am talking about any type of group that provides a family-type setting. I include in that category single-person households, since many single persons in a sense maintain a familial network of relationships; that too is a type of family. Anything human beings construct or nurture over time is a family. Attention to this – attention to the craftwork of human relationship – is the new emphasis in our time. The family grouping has enormous advantages for doing this crafting of persons, particularly because the family becomes an instrument for analyzing the complexity of the planet.

If you stop and think about growing up in a multi-age family group where you have older people, middle-years people and children, what you have is the most complex type of human experience possible. It comes directly from one’s own most intimate environment. Each person in a family grouping is older each day than they were the day before. People change ages almost daily, particularly when they are children. As we grow older, we start shrinking; when we are younger, we grow up. Either shrinking or growing, whatever it is, we are changing size and shape: we get heavier, we get lighter, we need different clothes, we have different friends, our aspirations change, our understandings change, our processing of information about the environment changes. Each person in a family, whether we are talking about a three- or five-person family or more, is in themselves a host of complex wishes, aspirations and needs.

The fantastic thing within the family setting is that everybody negotiates those changes every blessed day. You cannot react to the others in your family as if they were yesterday’s person without causing trouble. You will get called down immediately if you are treating a sibling or a parent or a child on the basis of what they didn’t know yesterday, instead of on the basis of what they understand today. You cannot treat them on the basis of yesterday’s understandings. They know more about the world today and they resent being treated like children, like someone who doesn’t understand. We watch the transitions from a tricycle to a two-wheeler, from the two-wheeler to the family car. Those are the big transitions. Little transitions happen every day.

In family groupings, without ever stopping to think about it, we are negotiating extraordinary changes in every person around us and changing ourselves, adapting our behaviours to others. At this moment I am making analytic statements about the process. Normally, we don’t talk about it that way.

Families are teachers of complexity

One advantage of the family as a teacher of complexity is that it provides instantaneous feedback. In the larger social system, you can do all kinds of strange things in your workplace, in the schoolroom, in the community. You may never get feedback on the mistakes you have made or the good things you’ve done. In the family, feedback comes quickly. “That was crummy!” Or “Gee, that was neat!” You get it very fast. We only learn to the extent that we get feedback on our behaviour. In this microcosm of the family, we get continuous feedback as to how good our judgments are and where everybody else is at in the family.

It sounds as if I’m talking about some ideal family where everybody understands everybody else, but I’m not. The mistakes, the fights, the conflicts, the struggles over who gets the family car, what allowance I have this year as compared to last year and all the accompanying hostility is nevertheless part of a feedback system that helps us to grow up being able to assess a rapidly shifting complex environment. Most of us don’t realize what it is we are learning in the family, however. We can carry that complexity with us out into the larger world and consciously make judgments about other people’s shifting needs and aspirations. All the time, we are drawing on knowledge we gained in the family, but we aren’t taught to acknowledge our family-based knowledge. I think we should make that acknowledgement and begin to draw on that basic learning about complexity.

The family has an enormous advantage in its size. I am involved in several projects researching how we adapt to catastrophe, such as climate change and war-incurred disasters. Every time you try to design a larger scale system that is going to meet the individual needs of all the people in it, you miss, because the more people you are trying to plan for, the more individual differences you are simply glossing over. If you look at where adaptation is occurring, whether it is flood or famine or drought or recovery from war disaster, the groups that are making the adaptations are the familial types of groupings. They are the ones that can regroup; they can redistribute roles. A family group can reorganize its way of utilizing its environment more rapidly than any other size of group. It is the ultimate adaptive group.

In every country, family skills are crucial for societal survival. The family does more than adapt, however. It is itself an instrument of change. As society struggles with new conceptions of gender roles, it is in the family unit that actual behaviour is reshaped. While it is important to change our textbooks to present more diverse images of men and women, so that not all women have aprons in our school readers, nevertheless, the practice of the sharing of work and the sharing of parenting – the practices that change the person and reshape the person – happen in the family.

Families live in a “200-year present”

A special feature of the family, apart from its size and its value as a social laboratory that makes it an instrument of change, is that its cross-generational structure provides a way of grasping social time and social process. One of the things that is true about us particularly in this era in history is that we have a very truncated sense of social progress. There is a sense that every important happening has taken place in the last 10 years. If it happened before 10 years ago, it’s ancient history. But a decade or two decades is too narrow a slice of time to give us an understanding of the nature of the changes that are taking place in society. The intergenerational nature of relationships in the family enables us to get hold of larger chunks of time.

I offer for your consideration a concept that I find very useful, that of the 200-year present. This is a very real “present” in the family context. To explain the concept: today is March 19; one boundary of the 200-year present is March 19, 1881. That is the day of the birth of the people who are celebrating their 100th birthday today. The other side of that 200-year present is March 19, 2081, which will be the 100th birthday of the babies born today. Now, you may not have any centenarians in your family, and you may not have any babies born in your family today. Nevertheless, within your extended family and among those close to your family, someone will have been born somewhere close to 100 years ago, and some child you know will be alive 100 years from now.

By thinking about that span of time as encompassing the living present reality of people you know and care about, that span of time becomes accessible. It becomes our time in a very profound sense. This 200-year span belongs to us: it’s our life space. It’s the space in which we should be thinking, planning and making judgments, evaluating, hoping and dreaming. This opening up of what we normally think of as our future and our past and making it a part of our present experience, makes changes more comprehensible.

An enormous expansion of personhood becomes possible by drawing on the life experience within the family. Many people don’t experience their family as history-in-the-present in this way. We don’t share across generations in the family to the extent that we could. I am talking about an instrument that is available to us for this kind of sharing, and shortly I will talk about how we can make it work that way. It doesn’t necessarily work that way, but when it does, it becomes an enormous strengthening force in a period of very rapid change.

The full lecture can be downloaded here.

Timeline: 50 Years of Families in Canada

Today’s society and today’s families would have been difficult to imagine, let alone understand, a half-century ago.

Families and family life have become increasingly diverse and complex, but families have always been the cornerstone of our society, the engine of our economy and at the centre of our hearts.

Learn about how families and family experiences in Canada have changed over the past 50 years with our new timeline!

Download the 50 Years of Families in Canada timeline.

Lone Mothers and Their Families in Canada: Diverse, Resilient and Strong

Mother’s Day is just around the corner, a time when children of all ages recognize and honour mothers, grandmothers and, increasingly, great-grandmothers! As we focus our attention on moms, many people worry about the prevalence of lone mothers and express concern about the well-being of their families.

“For many people, the term ‘lone mother’ brings to mind an image of a poor, struggling victim of sorts. They’re often seen as a single, growing group in crisis, toiling to raise children all on their own,” says Vanier Institute of the Family CEO Nora Spinks. “But this stereotype overlooks the diverse family experiences of lone mothers. This diversity, and the complexity of family life, is often lost in the statistics.”

“Of Canada’s 9.4 million families, only 16% lived in lone-parent families in 2011, with eight in 10 being led by women,” says Spinks. Many people feel that lone-parent families have been growing consistently over time. The truth, however, is more complex.

This belief is in part the result of looking only at trends since the 1960s, when the “traditional” family model with two married parents was at its peak. However, family structures fluctuate over time. Looking back further, lone-parent families were relatively common; the share of children living with a lone parent was 12% in 1931, similar to the 1981 rate of 13%.

While these numbers are close, the stories behind them differ because families faced different realities in these times. Many lone-parent families in the first half of the 20th century were in fact the result of mothers who died giving birth. The rate of children living in lone-parent families resulting from family death was eight in 10 in 1931. By the end of the century, it was only one in 10.

After the baby boom, a growing share of lone mothers were the result of separation and divorce, particularly following divorce law reform in 1968. This was just one of many changes for women in Canada during this period: women also gained greater capacity for family planning after the birth control pill emerged, and a growing number were pursuing higher education and joining the paid labour force, resulting in rising incomes.

This growth continues today, as the economic well-being of women improves. The incomes of lone mothers grew by 51% between 1998 and 2008 (compared to 13% among men). The income gap among lone parent families has shrunk: lone-parent families headed by women had incomes worth 53% of those headed by men in 1998, but 70% by 2008.

The prevalence of lone mothers, and lone-parent families in general, has always fluctuated over time. The reasons change, but the reality of ongoing change is constant. Families adapt and react to change, regardless of their form or the number of parents within.

The “lone mother” label often leads to another misperception: that these moms are without support. “Lone” suggests that these mothers are raising a family without any outside support (as does “sole” in the alternate label of “sole support mother”).

Often, these moms are not raising their children alone. Sometimes support comes from ex-partners. In 2011, 35% of separated or divorced parents said that decisions about their child(ren)’s health, religion/spirituality or education were made jointly or alternately. That same year, 9% said that their child(ren) live equally between their homes.

Support can come from other family members as well. In 2011, 8% of grandparents lived with their grandchildren, and one-third of these technically lived in “lone” parent households. “That’s 600,000 grandmas and grandpas in the family home, many of whom provide care and support to both generations,” says Spinks.

Multigenerational living is on the rise. It’s relatively common among immigrant and Aboriginal families. Shared living makes it easier to share costs, pool savings and provide care. Three-quarters of grandparents in lone-parent homes report some responsibility for household costs.

Many lone mothers may be in committed relationships with a partner who contributes to their family life, but choose to live in “living apart together” (LAT) couples. According to Statistics Canada, 8% of women aged 20 and over (1.9 million) are in LAT couples. However, we do not know how many of these are lone mothers.

Just as families are diverse, so are the forms of support they can provide and receive. Not all networks of care or forms of support are easy to capture with statistics. Lone mothers can be supported by friends or family members who offer help in ways such as child care; financial loans; living space; transportation; used toys, books or other goods; meals or groceries; and emotional support.

“Any portrait or discussion of modern lone mothers requires an open mind. One needs to understand that family life is diverse and complex, and families of all kinds are adaptable, strong and resilient. Myths and stereotypes about particular family types only lead to misunderstandings,” says Spinks. “That idea has guided the Vanier Institute of the Family since its founding 50 years ago, and will continue to as we study Canada’s families in the years ahead.”