Caregiving across the Lifespan: National Prevalence and Predictors

National Survey of Families and Households 1987-88 (N = 13,017) data were used to generate population estimates of in- and out-of-household caregiving for persons of all ages. More than 1 in 7 U.S. adults reported caring for relatives or friends during the previous year, including more than 1 in 5 women aged 35-64. About one third of this care was provided to nonelderly persons. Multivariate analyses revealed that gender, age, marital status, education, ethnicity, education, and employment status helped predict the likelihood of caregiving. Demographic change and feminist scholarship have helped focus more attention on informal caregiving than ever before. Until recently, the work that family members and friends did to help ill or disabled members of society remained relatively invisible due to a lack of scientific attention, conceptualization, and measurement (Daniels, 1987). However, demographic changes have now increased the relative risk of becoming a caregiver at some time--or even multiple times--during a lifetime, and caregiving is emerging as an issue of increased public interest and prominence (Brody, 1990). There are several trends that have worked together to increase the likelihood of becoming a caregiver, which is a role that often contributes to increased strain in families. The U.S. is an aging society where a growing proportion of the total population is aged 65 and older (Watkins, Mencken, Seccombe, 1992). The increased rate of paid employment among women, even those who have preschool-aged children, has also provoked added concern about the caregiving load of families with younger disabled, as well as able, dependents (Seccombe, 1992). Feminist scholarship, in particular, has endeavored to bring the invisible private workload of caregiving for both young and old to increased public attention. Feminists have also sought to foster the social reconstruction of caregiving work into activities that include men as well as women and that enlists not only private interest but also public interest (Daniels, 1987; Hooyman, 1990, 1992; Pascall, 1986; Seccombe, 1992). Undoubtedly, the last few decades of research emphasizing informal caregiving for the frail elderly has helped pave the way for research that now more comprehensively considers caregiving for frail and disabled persons of all ages (Kahana, Biegel, & Wykle, 1994). Understanding the changing historical prevalence and predictors of caregiving across the lifespan is critical for family practitioners and policy makers who make decisions about need levels and the provision of family benefits and services. A population-level perspective on caregiving prevalence is important for targeting demographic groups that are likely to need complementary formal service help to enhance and support their provision of informal family support (Litwak, 1985). Researchers who undertake smallscale intensive studies of caregiving and care receiving are able to administer the detailed measures that are necessary for understanding the processes and outcomes of caregiving, but they often have difficulty recruiting large representative samples. …