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The purpose of this paper is to investigate eldercare issues in China through exploring what was discussed about eldercare in a Chinese online community for older adults (OCOA).

Netnography was used to explore eldercare-related online discussion in a Chinese OCOA – LaoYouBang. After a two-month-long online observation, 275 microblogs and 594 comments were collected and analysed qualitatively and quantitatively.

The main findings include as follows: the users involved in an online discussion about eldercare were consist of four categories, namely, elderly user, non-elderly user, advertiser and community administrator. Non-elderly user include the elderly’s caregivers and families, young and middle-aged people concerning about eldercare. From 2012 to 2017, eldercare issues gradually became refined and differentiated in China and elderly users’ contribution proportion and activeness increased yearly. According to the results of thematic analysis, users’ information needs for eldercare included opinion, news, practice, emotion, knowledge and others. In China, some changes have taken place in the public’s conceptions of eldercare, embodied in the changes in the public’s attention, attitudes and cognition. Changes in user structure and communication patterns in OCOA have also been noted. OCOA plays an important role in eldercare information dissemination and social support exchange and helps to meet the eldercare challenges.

This study explored an online community for older adults. This is the first netnography study in the information field on Chinese OCOA. This paper provides new perspectives to explore eldercare issues and OCOA in other regions and cultures and it also provides some suggestions to improve OCOA.

The purpose of this study is to examine the satisfaction formation process under conditions of varying involvement for new, nontraditional, credence‐based service offerings.

Hypotheses were tested using an on‐line simulation of a service encounter, beginning with perceptions of an advertisement and continuing through satisfaction with the completed service report. ElderCare, an assurance service provided by Certified Public Accountants to the children of an elderly parent, was the context of study.

The findings indicated expectations were not influential in the satisfaction formation process for these services, regardless of involvement. Under conditions of high involvement, performance evaluation was the dominant predictor of satisfaction. Low‐involvement subjects used disconfirmation to assess satisfaction.

Limitations of the research stem from the use of a convenience sample in a simulated service encounter. Future research should examine the influence of individual characteristics, particularly innovation, on the results. Additional research examining the determinants of model variables, from disconfirmation to involvement, across subjects in a variety of situations would also be valuable.

This research suggests a heightened need to guide the consumer experience where expectations are hard to develop and performance is hard to evaluate. Providers should carefully spell out key service dimensions, provide tangible information about performance outcomes for high‐involvement individuals, and focus on emotional appeals, provider qualities and sensory aspects of the service for low‐involvement individuals.

This paper helps researchers and practitioners better understand the applicability of expectancy disconfirmation theory and role of involvement in the context of new, nontraditional, credence‐based services.

The importance of alignment between users’ and providers’ expectations of accounting services has long been recognized as paramount in the auditing profession. The importance of expectations, and especially expectations gaps, is even more compelling for new assurance services, where the importance of marketing the service is pronounced. This paper develops the Assurance Gaps Model, which describes expectations gaps in general, defining these holistic differences between users’ and providers’ perceptions of assurance services as assurance gaps. The model suggests that assurance gaps really have a number of components – expectations, evaluations of performance and disconfirmation – all of which impact users’ satisfaction with the service. The magnitude of each of these components, as well as the emphasis placed on each one, is important in describing the nature of the gap. This model is consistent with previous research in auditing as well as a large body of research in marketing studying expectations and the satisfaction process (Oliver, 1997). To illustrate potential applications of the Assurance Gaps Model, hypotheses are developed and tested using an online simulation of the ElderCare assurance service proposed by the AICPA/CICA. Results indicate that users and providers demonstrate similar magnitude of each of the factors in the model, but differ in that users emphasize performance in forming satisfaction judgments while providers emphasize expectations. The study and results illustrate the usefulness of the model for performing detailed analysis of assurance gaps and for suggesting appropriate courses of action to manage the factors that contribute to them.

The aging world population provides a unique opportunity for women and entrepreneurs to shape their long-lived futures. Women control the purchasing power and healthcare decisions in most families and, over the next few decades, will control most of the world’s wealth. Entrepreneurs will continue to create new platforms, products, and services for the two billion people who will reach age 60 by 2050. Yet, the future is not without challenges. Most products and services are designed around the family and the expectation that family members will be involved, even remotely, with the care of aging relatives. Family caregiving strains careers, health, and savings; planning for longevity is no longer an option but a necessity. The chapter provides rich detail about current innovators in the healthcare and eldercare ecosystems and offers specific guidance for navigating the aging journey successfully. Importantly, it highlights the role of women as entrepreneurs and innovative leaders in the longevity economy.

Discrimination against workers because of their family responsibilities can violate federal law, yet scholars know little about the context surrounding perceived family responsibilities discrimination (FRD). This chapter investigates both the types of caregiving responsibilities that put workers at risk of FRD and the organizational contexts that give rise to perceived FRD.

We identify features of FRD which make detecting it particularly difficult and theorize the mechanisms by which caregiving responsibilities and organizational contexts lead to perceived FRD. We draw on data from the 2008 National Study of the Changing Workforce for our empirical analysis.

Caregivers who provide both child and eldercare are more likely to perceive FRD than caregivers who provide one type of care, as are people who experience high levels of family-to-work interference and who spend more daily time on childcare. Certain family-friendly and meritocratic organizational contexts are associated with lower perceived FRD.

We measure perceptions, not actual discrimination on the basis of family care responsibilities. Our research cannot pinpoint the factors which intensify or lessen actual discrimination, just perceptions of it.

By pinpointing the characteristics of organizations in which perceived FRD occurs, this chapter shows how organizations can create workplaces in which perceived FRD is less likely.

The undervaluing of care work, whether conducted informally or formally, has long been subject to debate. While much discussion, and indeed reform has centred on childcare, there is a growing need, particularly in countries with ageing populations, to examine how long-term care (LTC) work is valued. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the way in which employment policies (female labour market participation, retirement age, and precarious work) and social policies (care entitlements and benefits/leave for carers) affect both informal carers and formal care workers in a liberal welfare state with a rapidly ageing population.

Drawing the adult worker model the authors use the existing literature on ageing care and employment to examine the approach of a liberal welfare state to care work focusing on both supports for informal carers and job quality in the formal care sector.

The research suggests that employment policies advocating increased labour participation, delaying retirement and treating informal care as a form of welfare are at odds with LTC strategies which encourage informal care. Furthermore, the latter policy acts to devalue formal care roles in an economic sense and potentially discourages workers from entering the formal care sector.

To date research investigating the interplay between employment and LTC policies has focused on either informal or formal care workers. In combining both aspects, we view informal and formal care workers as complementary, interdependent agents in the care process. This underlines the need to develop social policy regarding care and employment which encompasses the needs of each group concurrently.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of the provision of employee services on employees' organizational commitment and their intentions to quit as well as their underlying reasons.

The paper shows that questionnaires were administered at two organizations in Singapore to evaluate employees' attitudes resulting from the provision of employee services. Mediator regression analyses and structural equation modeling were used to test the relationships between the provision of employee services with construed external image of the organization, valence for employee services, organizational identification, organizational commitment, and intentions to quit.

The paper found that positive employee attitudes arising from the provision of employee services were the result of a positive construed external image of the organization. It also shows that, when employees perceived that outsiders viewed their organization positively, their level of identification with their organization increased.

The paper did not find a significant relationship between employees' valence for employee services and organizational identification, implying that receiving tangible benefits was less important to employees than working for an organization that is viewed positively by outsiders.

The results in this paper suggest that employees' attachment to their organization is enhanced when they perceive that outsiders view their organization positively.

The results in the paper were explained in terms of social identity theory, which suggest that firms must continually invest in socially responsible activities and practices to create a positive corporate image. Employees' perceptions pertaining to how stakeholders view their organization affect their work attitudes.

Observes that historically, family and work were not separated in pre‐industrial societies in which life was a united whole, but that family and work are gradually becoming separated in industrial societies, as work becomes dependent, production becomes centralized, and the relationship of the individual with work impersonal. In Greece there is still some evidence of close relations between family and work due to the large number of very small family firms and the high proportion of the population working in small family farming lots. However, a large percentage of the population work in full‐time traditional jobs. Flexible working patterns such as part‐time, flexi‐time, annual working hours, parental leaves, job sharing, variable working time, telework, condensed working week, as well as contract, pay and task flexibility are not so extensively used in Greece and it is only since 1990 that they are gaining ground. Flexibility at work is a major tool in enhancing economic performance, fighting unemployment and promoting competitiveness. Apart from that, flexibility is needed because it can prove very useful in harmonizing family life with work obligations, provided it takes into consideration family needs, parental obligations and the right of employees to a better quality of life. Presents the current situation on work flexibility in Greece and examines these aspects of flexibility which can prove useful not only in enhancing economic performance but in providing better conditions for the reconciliation between family and work.

In many countries, both the number of older people in need of care and the number of employed caregivers of elderly relatives will increase over the next decades. The purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which perceived organizational, supervisor, and coworker support for eldercare reduce employed caregivers’ strain and weaken the relationship between eldercare demands and strain.

Survey data were collected from 100 employed caregivers from one organization.

Results showed that eldercare demands were positively related to strain, and perceived organizational eldercare support (POES) was negatively related to strain. In addition, high POES weakened the relationship between eldercare demands and strain.

The cross-sectional design and use of self-report scales constitute limitations of the study.

POES is a resource for employed caregivers, especially when their eldercare demands are high.

This research highlights the relative importance of different forms of perceived support for reducing employed caregivers’ strain and weakening the relationship between eldercare demands and strain.