Childless Older People and Support: Positioning Experiences and Expectations

Abstract

Childless people are seen as 'at risk‘ of inadequate support as they grow older, given the reliance on family support for ageing populations. Yet this assumption has not been explored with childless older people. What are the experiences and expectations that they have of support, given and received? I interviewed 38 childless older people aged 63 to 93 (average age 80), of diverse partner status, sexual orientation, socioeconomic and health status. My work is framed by Rom Harré‘s positioning theory, which explores how people position themselves and others within social interactions and "storylines". Distinct from the more static idea of roles, positioning is active and dynamic. It provides a meaningful framework to understand changing and contradictory arguments, stances and ways of talking about particular groups or experiences. I also draw on William Randall‘s narrative gerontology, which privileges older people‘s narratives, and on Judith Butler‘s call to "trouble" taken-for-granted categories, such as "childless" or "older". Detailed analysis of the participants‘ positions and storylines show childlessness is a dynamic journey through life, not a simply defined "state". Participants resist or reposition normative storylines of pronatalism and ageism. Involvement with "other people‘s children" highlight connections that are possible outside of nuclear-family norms. Older men, whose childlessness has been little explored, have richly diverse positions in relation to non-parenthood and ageing. I investigate a counternarrative that childlessness can be a good preparation for growing older, rather than necessarily a "risk" factor. Categories of support (such as "emotional" or "social") and types of supporters (such as "friends" or "family") are often used in survey research and policy as if their meanings are fixed and transparent, and as if older people are net receivers of support. In contrast, my participants employ "support" as a complex concept, within which they include "self-support", help from strangers, and lifetime networks at a size that "fits". Many give a lot of support, including through voluntary work and charitable bequests. Participants often locate their narratives of support, childlessness and ageing within storylines of capability and independence, rather than loneliness and lack. Their experiences show the importance of understanding how support is positioned across the lifespan, and how it is enacted across delicately negotiated exchanges, often within reciprocal relationships. These insights are applicable to policy and practice, and potentially to the non-childless majority. Better understanding of the perspectives of older people on childlessness, support and growing older is provided by my research which has wide-ranging relevance as childlessness and ageing populations increase worldwide.