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Under the Demand-Resources framework, more household dependents and higher levels of work–family conflict are demands on workers in high-income countries, yielding negative effects on worker wellbeing. The authors investigate how living in a household characterized by multiple types of dependency – where children and other adults are living with married, working respondents – shapes self-rated health. The authors further investigate whether work–family conflict mediates or moderates the relationship between this multi-faceted dependency and self-rated health, as expected. The authors exploit data from the 2014 General Social Survey and 2015 International Social Survey Program on over 2,000 individuals in Austria, France, Iceland, Switzerland, and the United States – the available countries with indicators appropriate to their research purpose. The authors employ logistic regression techniques to estimate individual self-rated health.

The authors find that living in a multi-faceted dependent household is actually associated with better self-rated health, while work–family conflict has a negative influence on self-rated health. There is also no evidence of strong mediating or moderating effects of work–family conflict on the positive association between living in a multi-faceted dependent household and health. These results suggest that individuals experience similar effects with regard to dependents and work–family conflict, regardless of their country of residence. Policy implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to report the findings of a scoping review on the health challenges of families experiencing homelessness. There is a bi-directional relationship between health and homelessness in that poor health can increase the risk of housing loss, and experiencing homelessness is bad for one’s health. The experience of homelessness differs between populations and this review focuses on families as one of the fastest growing segments of the homeless population. While research has been integrated on the causes of homelessness for families, this same integration has not been conducted looking at health challenges of families experiencing homelessness.

A scoping review methodology is utilized in the paper. As the goal of this work is to ultimately develop interventions for a Canadian context, primacy is given to Canadian sources, but other relevant literature is also included.

A clear distinction is seen in the literature between health challenges of children of homeless families and health challenges of parents. These themes are explored separately, and preliminary recommendations are made for potential points of intervention as personal, program and policy levels.

This review of current evidence is an important first step in building a foundation for interventions to improve health outcomes for those experiencing housing loss.

The chapter investigates: (1) Do married parents efficiently allocate time to children’s health care? (2) Are parents willing to sacrifice consumption for health improvements at an equal rate for all family members? (3) How does family structure affect health trade-offs parents make? (4) Are parental choices consistent with maximization of a single utility function?

A model is specified focusing on how parents allocate resources between consumption and goods that relieve acute illnesses for family members. Equivalent surplus functions measuring parental willingness to pay to relieve acute illnesses are estimated using data from a stated-preference survey.

Results provide limited support for the prediction that married parents allocate time to child health care according to comparative advantage. Valuations of avoided illness vary between family members and are inconsistent with the hypothesis that fathers’ and mothers’ choices reflect a common utility function.

Prior research on children’s health valuation has relied on a unitary framework that is rejected here. Valuation researchers have focused on allocation of resources between parents and children while ignoring allocation of resources among children, whereas results suggest significant heterogeneity in valuation of health of different types of children and of children in different types of households.

Results may provide a justification on efficiency grounds for policies to provide special protection for children’s health and suggest that benefit–cost analyses of policies affecting health should include separate estimates of the benefits of health improvements for children and adults.

In this chapter we examine how micro- and macro-level issues including access to child-only or family public health insurance shape low-income immigrant families’ health care experiences in two policy contexts in the Washington, DC metropolitan area.

This qualitative study includes 40 in-depth interviews with first-generation, low-income immigrant Latin American and African mothers in DC and Northern Virginia.

The majority of families living in Virginia had child-only health insurance, whereas most of the families living in Washington, DC, had family health insurance. Regardless of these insurance differences, all mothers had access to free health care for prenatal care. Pregnancy, for most, was their entry into the U.S. health care system. Families’ ongoing health care experiences differed in relation to insurance access, and culture, including parents’ previous experiences with health care in their countries of origin.

Future research should consider the experiences of other immigrant groups, mental health experiences of immigrants, and fathers’ experiences with health care.

Future initiatives to address health care should focus on providing family health care to low-income immigrant families across the country, improving access to mental health services for immigrant families, and creating more culturally and linguistically appropriate health care services.

This study points to the importance of family health care for immigrant families, as well as care that is culturally and linguistically competent.

This study illustrates the need for public family health insurance for low-income immigrant families, and the importance of culturally competent health care for immigrants.

This study investigates how compulsory citizenship behavior (CCB) restricts police employees from fulfilling their family responsibilities [i.e. work–family conflict (WFC)] and affects their psychological health. The authors also examined putting family first (PFF) as a conditional variable on the association between CCB and WFC.

This quantitative study collected data from 341 police employees on convenience basis. Further, the authors tackled the issue of common method bias (CMB) by collecting data in two waves.

The data were analyzed through structural equation modeling (SEM), and the result revealed that WFC mediates the association between CCB and police employees' psychological health. In addition, the authors noted that individuals high in PFF were less likely to experience WFC in the presence of CCB.

This study contributes to the scant literature on police employees' psychological health. Specifically, this study is the first to investigate the mediating role of WFC between CCB and psychological health with the boundary condition of PFF.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the budget of the Indian family planning programme from a human rights perspective. Family planning services play an important role in the realisation of the reproductive rights of women. In India, the family planning programme is one of the largest in the world with thousands of patients, mostly women, accessing services every year. Although the Indian legal system guarantees the right to health, Indian women from marginalised sections of society still battle inadequate services and the absence of health care that respects their right to reproductive autonomy and choice. Therefore, the question is: in the presence of a strong legal framework, what are the factors that contribute to this phenomenon?

The authors have gathered data from the project implementation plans at the state level comparing year-wise expenditure for family planning against overall expenditure for reproductive, maternal and child health expenditure. The data are then compared to the number of women using sterilisation to suggest a relationship between both. Finally, the article relies on desk research to review scholarship on the Indian family planning programme and applicable human rights obligations.

The paper finds that social-economic rights such as the right to health are applicable to government spending and budgeting. It also finds current spending in the NHM is insufficient to guarantee women’s reproductive rights as the vast majority of resources are spend on sterilisation, thus limiting women’s ability to choose the number and spacing of children.

The data used in this research bears one limitation: the propensity of the government to change the guidelines as to how States should present their budgets in the project implementation plans. The authors have adjusted the data so that it remains comparable. However, the adjustment was not possible for all expenditure data, which is why the current study is limited to the family planning programme alone.

The paper argues that to be human rights compliant, health budgets of the NHM need to be geared towards the specific needs of women in terms of family planning. Finally, the article briefly outlines the role played by human rights and human rights litigation in impacting government budgets.

India’s family planning programme has been examined from a performance and medical standpoint, focussing on medical indicators such as total fertility rate, unmet needs for family planning, amongst others. Academic scholarship has investigated through statistical analysis patterns of contraceptive use and contraceptive mix. What is absent, however, is an assessment of the programme from a right-based perspective by looking at the human rights obligations of India and their normative implications for the Indian family programme.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how the experiences of work–family conflict (WFC) and health- and sleep-related outcomes differ among traditionally employed and two forms of self-employment (SE): incorporated and unincorporated workers. Moreover, to explore whether the rationale in one’s decision to enter SE might influence these experiences, the authors additionally examined work-family (WF)- and non-WF-related reasons behind an individual’s decision to pursue incorporated vs unincorporated SE status.

Using anonymous Mechanical Turk survey data from a high-quality US adult worker sample (n=711; 62 percent male, age M=33.94) consisting of traditionally (78 percent) and self-employed individuals, the authors conducted an analysis of covariance to test hypotheses regarding the relationships between employment status, reasons for pursuing SE, WFC, sleep disturbance, sleep hours and physical health complaints.

Results showed WFC was positively related to sleep disturbances and physical health complaints and this relationship was exacerbated for self-employed workers, particularly those who were incorporated. Unincorporated self-employed individuals indicated more WF-balance-related reasons for pursuing SE compared to incorporated workers. Moreover, individuals who pursued SE for WF-balance reasons tended to report fewer negative reactions to WFC.

SE is associated with more negative sleep and health-related outcomes in response to WFC. This is particularly true for incorporated workers. Individuals should bear in mind these outcomes when considering whether to pursue SE. Moreover, governmental policies, and calls for change in such policies, should not only address financially related detriments (e.g. higher taxes, fewer benefits and protections) but also increasing support and providing resources (e.g. health insurance, family leave and entrepreneurial workplace initiatives) regarding the work/family and health-related impairments common for this growing, independent portion of the workforce.

This is the first study to examine WF-related rationales for pursuing SE and differing sleep and health outcomes in response to WFC as a function of SE status and type.

The purpose of this paper is to provide knowledge on barriers to preventive action on early childhood overweight in non-western migrant families. It investigates the underlying understandings of the parental role in relation to weight control present in health-care professionals and in families.

The study is based on qualitative interviews with parents who are engaged in interventions aimed at helping them and their children to adopt a healthier life style, and on interviews with health-care professionals.

This study shows that the participating parents, all low SES and living under different forms of insecurity, perceived their parental task for the present as creating well-being for their children, and they were, therefore, reluctant to enforce dietary changes. The health-care professionals, in contrast, considered the need for change through a perspective on future risks.

The results are based on a rather small sample and the link between insecurity, family dynamics and health practice needs further research.

The participating parents represented a group that is rarely included in scientific research and the study, therefore, contributes valuable knowledge on health behavior in ethnic minority families. The empirical analysis provides new insights for health professionals regarding the suitability of the universal model of parental feeding styles. It illuminates the implications of implicitly applying this model in health interventions which involve vulnerable categories of parents such as refugees to western societies.

The purpose of this paper is to explore ways in which children and young people are being positioned as change agents for families through school health promotion initiatives in New Zealand.

The paper maps and describes the kinds of policies and initiatives that directly or indirectly regard children as conduits of healthy eating and exercise messages/practices for families. Drawing on post-structural theoretical frameworks, it explores what these resources suggest in terms of how healthy families should live.

Families are positioned as central to school health promotion initiatives in New Zealand, especially in relation to obesity prevention policies and strategies. Children are further positioned as agents of change for families in many of the resources/policies/initiatives reviewed. They are represented as key transmitters and translators of school-based health knowledge and as capable of, and responsible for, helping their families eat well and exercise more.

While recognising children’s agency and capacity to translate health messages is a powerful and welcome message at one level, the author need to consider the implications of requiring children to convey health information, to judge their family practices and, at times, to be expected to change these. This may create anxiety, family division and expect too much of children.

The paper takes a novel post-structural perspective on a familiar health promotion issue. Given the proliferation of family-focussed health initiatives in New Zealand and elsewhere, this perspective may help us to explore, critique and understand more fully how children are expected to be engaged in these initiatives, and the potentially harmful implications of these expectations.

Most research on the work conditions and family responsibilities associated with work-family conflict and other measures of mental health uses the individual employee as the unit of analysis. We argue that work conditions are both individual psychosocial assessments and objective characteristics of the proximal work environment, necessitating multilevel analyses of both individual- and team-level work conditions on mental health.

This study uses multilevel data on 748 high-tech professionals in 120 teams to investigate relationships between team- and individual-level job conditions, work-family conflict, and four mental health outcomes (job satisfaction, emotional exhaustion, perceived stress, and psychological distress).

We find that work-to-family conflict is socially patterned across teams, as are job satisfaction and emotional exhaustion. Team-level job conditions predict team-level outcomes, while individuals’ perceptions of their job conditions are better predictors of individuals’ work-to-family conflict and mental health. Work-to-family conflict operates as a partial mediator between job demands and mental health outcomes.

Our findings suggest that organizational leaders concerned about presenteeism, sickness absences, and productivity would do well to focus on changing job conditions in ways that reduce job demands and work-to-family conflict in order to promote employees’ mental health.

We show that both work-to-family conflict and job conditions can be fruitfully framed as team characteristics, shared appraisals held in common by team members. This challenges the framing of work-to-family conflict as a “private trouble” and provides support for work-to-family conflict as a structural mismatch grounded in the social and temporal organization of work.