Families At Risk
Nicola Madge (ed) (1983)
London: Heinemann
Some families have far more than their share of difficulties, and often their children suffer as a result. Families At Risk is about these people.
There are three main purposes of the book: to describe the lives of families who are less well off and less successful than households in general, to find out why the life chances of families are so different, and to develop some means of predicting those most likely to be in difficulty.
The first step is to look at the needs of children and the signs that these are not being met. Next follow eight chapters of empirical findings, drawn from the recent DHSS/SSRC programme of research into transmitted deprivation. One of the central questions examined by these is whether features of children’s upbringing affect their functioning in later years and, in particular, their performance as parents. For instance, are there any adverse effects of growing up in multiple-problem households, ‘in care’, with single mothers, or in homes characterized by severe stress? Do women’s attitudes to their children’s health differ from those of their own mothers? With what consequences?
The final chapter draws together the results of these studies and tackles the problem of identifying families at risk.
A clear and authoritative work by experienced social scientists and practitioners, Families At Risk will be useful for those working professionally with disadvantaged families and for students, academics and administrators who wish to keep abreast of recent research and thinking.