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No life without family: Film representations of involuntary childlessness, silence and exclusion
Abstract
Forming a family and having children constitutes an adulthood rite of passage, one of the tacitly assumed requirements of a fulfilled life. What happens, then, when the “family dream” does not materialize? This article addresses the dark sides of the “family imperative” by focusing on representations of involuntary childlessness (i.e. childlessness not by choice) in film. It advances the argument that popular culture, far from being “mere entertainment” has an important role in wider processes of stigmatization, silencing and, as a result, exclusion of those who do not have a family. The analysis, which is informed by a broader study into the structure of silence surrounding childlessness, presents the findings of a comparative qualitative content analysis that examined the (troubling) representations of involuntary childless individuals in 50 films from Italy, Norway, the US. It discusses their far reaching cultural and political implications, making practical suggestions to counter their stigmatizing effects.
... According to Wells and Heinsch (2019), in pronatalist societies, childbearing is constructed as an inevitable fulfilment of the female identity, and being permanently childless could be considered a nonnormative adult identity (McQuillan, Greil, Shreffler, Wonch-Hill, Gentzler & Hathcoat., 2012). Childlessness may affect a woman's sense of identity (Archetti, 2019), and require emotional work from her to reaffirm her identity in mainstream groups (Exley & Letherby, 2001). Childlessness can impact a woman's self-esteem (Wischmann, Korge, Scherg, Strowitzki & Verres, 2012) and psychological well-being (Beyer, Dye, Bengel & Strauß, 2004), it has been associated with feelings of loss (Koert & Daniluk, 2017), disenfranchised grief (McBain & Reeves, 2019) and a lack of meaning in life (van der Geest & Nahar, 2013). ...
... Childlessness can impact a woman's self-esteem (Wischmann, Korge, Scherg, Strowitzki & Verres, 2012) and psychological well-being (Beyer, Dye, Bengel & Strauß, 2004), it has been associated with feelings of loss (Koert & Daniluk, 2017), disenfranchised grief (McBain & Reeves, 2019) and a lack of meaning in life (van der Geest & Nahar, 2013). Portrayals of childless women in wider society may lead to stigmatisation and feelings of exclusion (Archetti, 2019). ...
Childlessness may affect a woman’s well-being and sense of identity, and cause feelings of loss and grief. I found no research on coaching for childless women. Using heuristic inquiry, I explored the experience of coaching in six participants (co-researchers), including myself. Findings suggest that coaching helped women cope with negative self– and societal– narratives; accept and change their perspective on a life without children; picture alternative futures; build confidence; achieve goals and rediscover themselves. Some women felt vulnerable and coach understanding, support and care were important, as were trust and co-creation. The research highlights the potential utility of coaching amongst childless women.
... Narratives in the media are not only influential in defining public narratives about "appropriate" family and gender roles (Tincknell, 2005), but they are also the ground in which stigma and the shame associated to it are rooted, especially when these narratives involve stereotypes and negative representations. My analysis of 50 movies from Italy, Norway and the US (Archetti, 2019), in a nutshell, found that, regardless of country and time period (the analysis spanned 1949 to 2017), the childless tended to be portrayed negatively. In the plots I analyzed, the childless tend to die, either committing suicide or killed by others. ...
... 10. For a discussion of further portrayals of childless individuals in film-as career-focused, selfish, care-free, for example-see (Archetti, 2019). 11. ...
This article extends the conceptualization of silence in public relations beyond strategic communication. It develops a new theoretical framework to explain the mechanisms through which suffering and pain felt inside the body translate into silence, exclusion from public debate, and communication gaps in health communication. This happens through intermediate steps that involve, among others, the role of the media in the narrative construction of the body and the self. This framework advances an understanding of public relations oriented towards civil society and is based on the empirical case study of involuntary childlessness (i.e. not having children not by choice): even in the age of ubiquitous communication, despite affecting about 25% of the adult population of virtually all developed countries, this issue is shrouded in taboo and seldom heard of. The analysis makes the case for a more material, indeed embodied, approach to conceptualizing silence in public relations.
... Women who choose not to have children are often rendered invisible in advertising, negatively portrayed in media and film productions (Turnbull, Graham, and Taket 2016;Archetti 2019), and subjected to stigmatization and exclusion in pronatalist societies (Turnbull, Graham, and Taket 2016;Yeshua-Katz 2018;Harrington 2019). Given the opposition they face due to their decision, defending their reproductive autonomy remains challenging (Penney 2022). ...
... Other scholars have studied representations of involuntary childlessness in film, literature, social media, reality TV, and print media (e.g. see Archetti 2019;Björklund 2023;de Boer et al. 2022;Edge 2015;Graham and Rich 2014;Striff 2005). Cristina Archetti (2020) and Melanie Notkin (2014) have done ethnographic work on women who move on with their lives after failing to have children. ...
This chapter introduces the volume by theorising non-motherhood, outlining existing scholarship on the topic, and presenting the chapters in the volume. While feminist theory has paid close attention to motherhood and mothering, there has been less rigorous focus on non-motherhood, and research has typically focused on either involuntary or voluntary non-motherhood. This volume seeks to deconstruct the barriers between these two positions, instead allowing them to enter into dialogue with each other. It unites scholars from different disciplines and national contexts in the study of non-motherhood across a variety of materials and from diverse perspectives. The chapters draw attention to the fact that non-motherhood cannot be defined as a singular experience, and they carefully engage in the probing and widening of the term ‘non-motherhood’ itself. By including representations and experiences that are not usually discussed as part of the research field on non-motherhood, such as secondary infertility, miscarriage, and perinatal loss, the volume expands the definition of non-motherhood. Moreover, it interrogates social and cultural norms that continue to conflate motherhood with womanhood and creates a space where the silenced stories of non-mothers can be articulated and where non-mothers can claim an identity that is legitimate.
... Studies in the past have considered worklife balance as a proxy to work-family balance (Casper et al., 2018;Haar et al., 2014;Keeney et al., 2013;Peng et al., 2011;Sirgy & Lee, 2018), though the two terms are conceptually distinct (Antai et al., 2015;Baba Rahim et al., 2020). Currently, the heterogeneity and the ever-changing employment market with the advent of elderly employees, differently abled workforce, long-standing health problem or disability (LSHPD), child-less employees and the like (Archetti, 2019;EUROSTAT, 2014;Mård, 2020;Verniers, 2020;Wilkinson et al., 2017;World Bank, 2023) place importance on health, socialization and other aspects of human need, besides keeping family's role as central. These all go on to indicate WLB as a much broader theme, whereas the concept of investigation in the current study is WFB. ...
Organizations have come to realize the significance of workplace well-being (WWB) for their existence and progression. This article substantiates the association of work–family balance (WFB) with WWB, while job satisfaction (JS), work engagement (WE) and turnover intent (TI) were studied as mediators to this primal association. The data was obtained in two phases, wherein at the end of the second phase, the authors gathered responses from 346 full-time employees, using a structured research tool. The study adopted a mediated structural equation model to examine the theoretical construct and its hypothesised relationships. The findings supported the hypothesized positive association between WFB and WWB, and a direct relationship of these focal variables was more magnified and pronounced than when mediated. The study revealed a significant mediation effect of work attitudes that is, JS and WE on the outcome variable: WWB; though, counterintuitively, turnover intent remained passive. Our research emphasizes the need to foster work– family culture for creating workplace happiness. The study further accentuates the body of knowledge that the association between these two focal variables also aids in making an immersive and engaged employee.
... According to the theory of social representations, classifying and naming are strongly connected to processes of stereotyping. The phenomenon of childlessness is being named as a pervasion and deviation, and childless women as 'empty-bellies' (1), vain (1), egoists (1), incomplete (4), worthless (1), weird (1), different (3), spinsters (2), grumble (1) and cold (1). Of course, these are not neutral classifications; such namings are loaded with preferences, the process of stereotyping brings questions of inclusion and exclusion, discrimination and domination (Pickering 2001). ...
Based on social representations theory, the paper focuses on the communication of attitudes towards childless women in politics in one of the Internet news sites. One article case was selected, and a qualitative content analysis of comments (365) was conducted. The article and the content of comments were on childless women in politics. The predominant hegemonic social representation is most commonly reflected via an argument that childless women lack practical experience; therefore, they could not represent the interests of families with children. The chosen method allows expressing more radical and aggressive attitudes towards childless women roles. The polemic social representation opposes hegemonic attitudes through the arguments breaking the interlink between female procreation role and their role in the public sphere, also through the critique of double standards. Finally, emancipatory social representation undertakes the neutral position, emphasising the freedom of choice. Thematic anchoring is the most common communicative mechanism in all three types of social representations.
... So did Sara feel (32), who was in her second IVF cycle with her husband Isak (35), stressing how couples with children started to socialize with one another, excluding them (as childless) from these social activities. Such exclusion is also noted by Archetti (2019Archetti ( , 2020, who points to how stereotypical and conservative Norwegian popular culture remains in its representation of family life, in movies and magazines, playing an important role in broader processes of stigmatization and exclusion of the childless. ...
This article provides novel insights into how the values placed on patient-centred care in an in vitro fertilization (IVF) setting are shaped by discourses and practices on what counts as 'normal family life' in society at large. Based on an ethnographic study drawing on observations and interviews in a Norwegian IVF clinic, we show how patients place great value on interpersonal aspects of care and provision of information, factors well known in the literature on IVF and patient-centredness. To understand such values, we argue for the need to go beyond the clinical encounter and recognize how the experiences are influenced and shaped by the socio-cultural discourses on Norwegian family life, which shape the suffering of childlessness and its all-consuming effect on many infertility patients' lives making them not only value the outcome (a child), but also the treatment process itself. Amidst this social context and the expectations, hope and uncertainty surrounding IVF, the couples want their concerns addressed, to be informed and recognized as human beings, not just patients in an 'IVF factory'. In this sense, IVF users are modern patients, but more than that citizens in terms of considering the choice of IVF as taking part in Norwegian family life.
... Film-based portrayals of male infertility remain uncommon. In 2019, Archetti conducted a thematic analysis of 50 films that center on infertile couples produced between 1949 and 2017 [15]. The author identifies a preponderance of negative themes in portrayals of infertile couples, such as high levels of depression and suicidality, disordered living patterns, and high levels of irrationality. ...
Purpose of Review
Approximately half a million men each year facing infertility in the USA are not properly evaluated by a dedicated male infertility specialist. Prior research has examined barriers to male infertility care from epidemiologic, geographic, financial, socioeconomic, and health policy perspectives. This article aims to describe barriers to male infertility care that have traditionally received less consideration and to suggest innovative solutions for enhancing access to care.
Recent Findings
We explore how the portrayal of male infertility in television shows, movies, and news media shapes the public perception of male infertility. We then define how social networking websites influence awareness and engagement with the concept of male infertility. In addition, potential avenues for collaboration with other medical providers to increase the frequency of male infertility workups are discussed. Finally, we touch on how funding for basic science and clinical research shapes the spectrum of available treatment options and briefly review state-of-the-art research in male infertility.
Summary
Access to dedicated male infertility care represents an unmet public health need in the USA. Using an atypical lens, the authors’ goal is to provide a brief review of issues surrounding access to male infertility care and to highlight new avenues to enhance access.
... Most societies have expectations of their citizens involving transitions across the life course with attendant roles and meanings surrounding each specific phase (Becker, 1999;Goldberg, 2014). In most cultures, parenthood is a typical and expected part of the life cycle (Neugarten, 1969) and the majority of people intend to become parents (Archetti, 2019;Riskind & Patterson, 2010;Sylvest et al., 2018;Thompson & Lee, 2011). In the Netherlands, Keizer (2010) found that childless cohort was formed of three distinct sections: the childless of circumstance accounted for 80%; with rest equally divided by the chosen-childless (10%); and the infertile (10%). ...
The objective of this study was to test the hypothesis that childhood attachment predicts whether a person has children in later life. Although being a parent is considered a typical part of the human life cycle in most parts of the world, childlessness has increased substantially in recent decades in developed parts of the world. It is possible that insecure childhood attachment has contributed to this phenomenon, but this hypothesis has been relatively little explored. This study is a cross-sectional survey of 394 men and women aged over 50 years old, stratified by geographical UK region from a research panel, and analysed using hierarchical logistic regression. Validated measures of childhood attachment and other psychological and demographic factors were used. The main finding was that, independent of the impact of other variables (age, sex, education level, marital status, life stress, health-related quality of life, mental positivity, and avoidant attachment style), people who were childless were significantly more likely to have developed an anxious attachment to their primary caregiver in childhood. This study is the first to demonstrate the significance of anxious childhood attachment as a predictor of producing children in one's lifetime.
The aim of this chapter is to explore infertility and the journey out of non-motherhood via surrogacy in a century-old text, namely Miguel de Unamuno’s novella-play Dos madres ( Two Mothers , 1920). The plot of Dos madres employs the same core leitmotiv as the biblical passage it is inspired by, the story of Rachel and Jacob (Gn. 30: 1–6). There are three main characters: Raquel, don Juan and Berta. Raquel is a widow who could neither have a child with her husband nor with her younger lover, don Juan. Raquel is desperate to become a mother and makes a plan to achieve her goal. She encourages don Juan to marry a young woman, Berta—who is supposed to be fertile—and have a child with her but then give the child to Raquel, who will raise the baby as her own. This chapter examines, through a literary lens, the theme of non-motherhood, maternal desire and the potential for a solution via surrogacy. In addition to this, the chapter interrogates the possibility of imagining new and alternative family formations, thanks to surrogacy.
In Sweden in the twenty-first century, childlessness has emerged as a topic in literature across genres. These narratives take stories about non-motherhood, which are often invisible and abjected from mainstream society, and tell them in new and defiant ways. Moreover, this body of literature depicts a variety of ways of being a non-mother: through involuntary childlessness and infertility, through childlessness by choice and through childlessness by circumstance. This chapter explores a range of literary representations of women without children in twenty-first-century Swedish literature. This chapter discusses fiction, autofiction and personal essays that deal with childlessness and analyses how these representations reclaim the position of non-motherhood in various ways: by telling stories of failed fertility treatments, by embracing the abjected position of non-motherhood and claiming it as a liveable life, and by using laughter and failure to turn things around and propose alternative ways of living. The chapter brings together theories of abjection, laughter and failure to analyse stories that are usually expulsed from the public domain in order to uphold the fertility norm. It shows how abjection, laughter and failure are employed in these narratives to reclaim the position of non-motherhood, to criticise dominant discourses and to imagine different futures.
The vast bulk of the discourse surrounding reproduction is centered on women. Yet, the rate of childlessness in the United Kingdom (and much of the world) is higher among men. Recently, there has been an increased focus on fatherhood and fathering in academia, policy, practice, and the general media. However, data on men who do not become fathers has been excluded and their experiences minimized and dismissed. Infertility research has shown that failure to achieve the high social status of parenthood has the similar effects on mental and physical health as a diagnosis of life-threatening illness. In this chapter, I will draw on two qualitative research studies to show how not achieving the pronatalist ideal of parenthood impacts on men’s identity, sense of self, behaviors, health and well-being and social networks across the life course. The workplace is an arena where people who do not fit socio-cultural norms and expectations are overtly and/or covertly stigmatized and discriminated against through policy, working practices and everyday interaction between groups and individuals. I will argue that failing to acknowledge men’s experience of non-reproduction has a significant impact on both individuals and institutions alike.
En México es cada vez más visible la tendencia entre algunas mujeres a elegir trayectorias de vida que no incluyen la maternidad. A través de un análisis textual interpretativo de una muestra de caso crítico de dos películas mexicanas que tienen como personaje central a una mujer que no desea convertirse en madre, en este artículo se examina las representaciones y narrativas dominantes problematizándolas ante el creciente número de mujeres que expresan no desear asumir el papel de madres. Se encuentra que el rechazo a la maternidad se posiciona como una circunstancia que, con ayuda de un varón, pueden superar, lo cual desestima la agencia de las mujeres y perpetúa la romantización de la maternidad.
This chapter focuses on literary representations of childlessness, more particularly, Swedish novels from the twenty-first century, with female protagonists and where the struggle to have children takes center stage: Pernilla Glaser’s 40 minus (2010; 40 Below), Martina Haag’s Glada hälsningar från Missångerträsk: En vintersaga (2011; Happy Greetings from Missångerträsk: A Winter’s Tale), and Tove Folkesson’s Hennes ord: Värk I–III (2019; Her Words: Ache I–III). I analyze the literary representations of involuntary childlessness and the women at the center of the narratives, focusing in particular on how non-motherhood is positioned in relation to femininity and (hetero)normativity. I also situate these representations in their national context and analyze how they relate to Swedish-branded values like gender equality and progressive family politics. On the one hand, the representations of non-motherhood illustrate the centrality of motherhood to normative femininity, and all three novels reinforce heteronormative temporalities. On the other hand, the novels to some extent also resist these norms. Moreover, none of these novels ends with children or even a pregnancy, and thus the narratives break with the conventional infertility plot line and frame the struggle to become a mother as a story that can be told in its own right.
One in five women are childless at midlife, and for an estimated 90 percent of these women, childlessness is not actively chosen. In this article, we explore how solo-living and childless professional women navigate the ‘balanced mother ideal’ over their fertile years and what this means for organizations and organization studies. Drawing on biographical narrative interview data from solo-living professional women in the UK, we argue that identifications with the balanced mother ideal change over the life course as a result of futurity, ambivalence, and suppression of negative emotions—part of the logic of both postfeminism and neoliberal feminism—and the ‘disenfranchized grief’ of contingent childlessness. At the point of late fertility, the absence of alternative social narratives to the balanced mother ideal appears to create a crisis point for childless women, including in the workplace. We conclude our article with recommendations for how organizations can better cater to the needs of this significant, yet largely silenced, demographic group
The act of drawing is still an underestimated, powerful and simple means of expression for adults. It represents an odd, unconventional and hence exceptional channel to self-awareness. This article is a phenomenological study of the author’s path from sketching to an emerging visual narrative about a prolonged period of unsuccessful attempts at conceiving a child. The emotional states that arose and the transitions that occurred during this period are discussed through the prism of matrescence, a transitional period to motherhood. It starts with a conscious decision to have a child. Through the biology and by means of drawing and illustration, the author explores the inner workings of the mind, decodes visual metaphors and symbols, and explores emotional and menstrual cycles of conceiving and losing, searching for lost connections to the body and processes within. Motives of walking, going through and cycling recur in the sketches and drawings. The cycling also appears through the metaphor of tides on the seashore. The fjord – the sea as the origin of life in a biological sense – becomes a place for emotional transformation. In this article, emotional landscapes hold a special place as a helpful tool for working with emotions and developing the story. The initial sketches are examined along with the text of the diary. The phenomenon of disconnection is discussed in a social context to reveal how it is shown in the illustrations. Finally, the egg becomes a strong visual trigger and a link between biology and art, and a character in the narrative.
Levels of childlessness in Britain are higher than in many other European countries, with just under one in five British women currently reaching age 45 with no biological children of her own. This chapter provides new insights in two ways. First, by combining childbearing data from repeated rounds of the General Household Survey and the United Kingdom Household Panel Survey, the chapter examines how the educational gradient of childlessness has changed over birth cohorts. Second, the chapter investigates childlessness from a life course perspective among men and women born in 1970 who were followed up within the British Cohort Study. Focusing on cohort members who were childless at age 30, the relationship between fertility intentions expressed at age 30 and achieved childbearing by age 42 is examined. At age 42, the male and female respondents who remained childless were invited to give their reasons for remaining childless. Some reported that they did not have children “due to health reasons”, many more responded that they “did not ever want children”, while others said that they had “not met the right partner to have children with”. Only a few suggested that they “had been focused on their career”. We examine these responses in the context of the individuals’ partnership histories, and contribute to the debate on the question of whether the “perpetual postponement” of childbearing to later ages is acting to increase the proportion of the population who ultimately remain childless.
Earlier studies have documented persistent negative stereotypes of childless or childfree adults, though acceptance has increased in recent decades. Recent studies have also shown negative biases against parents, especially mothers, in work-related contexts. The current study used college students’ responses to hypothetical vignettes (N = 1,266) to compare perceptions of childless and childfree adults and parents using means comparisons with generalized linear modeling methods, controlling for student and vignette characteristics. Results showed that parents were perceived as warmer, but with less positive marital relationships, than those without children. Mothers were perceived as more stressed and childless men and women as more emotionally troubled, but there were few differences in work-related perceptions. Childless wives with no plans to have children were perceived as least warm, whereas husbands were perceived as least stressed. Results indicate some persistent negative stereotypes of childless adults along with negative perceptions of stress and marital strains related to parenthood.
This article employs participant definitional analysis, sensitized with feminist poststructuralism and critical ethnography, to understand three identity construction processes that members of childfree LiveJournal communities participate in: (a) naming childfreedom, (b) negotiating childfreedom, and (c) enacting childfreedom. I argue that childfree identities are contested and sometimes activist. Ultimately, I call for scholars to reconsider the definition of childfree to account for the complex and nuanced identities constructed by individuals who identify as such.
According to narrative psychology we are all storytellers and we live in a storied world. Narratives or stories permeate our everyday life such that we interpret the world and define ourselves through our stories
Infertility is a health issue that demonstrates how unequal access to health care is at a global level. In the poorer segments-- of the world, and in poor parts of wealthy societies, access is often minimal or non-existent. Public and lay attitudes to modern infertility treatment have been heavily debated alongside development of methods. I have looked at the changes in the public discourse in modern media, legislation, politics, and among professionals. The paper seeks to present and discuss some of these changes as they have evolved in one of the countries that have had one of the more strict laws regulating access to treatment, namely Norway. It is a country that nevertheless offers treatment in the public health system. The paper also tries to connect this discussion to the difficulties faced in every attempt to expand-- infertility services to the developing world.
In this article, I discuss how the politics of survival in the science fiction TV series “Battlestar Galactica” (BSG) correspond to contemporary biopolitics in late modern Western society. BSG takes place in a post-apocalyptic world where war between artificial, non-human bodies and organic, human bodies emphasizes the importance of sustained population growth and, ultimately, survival for the human race. The BSG survival narrative accentuates the challenges that advanced reproductive technologies pose to the female body and how this is interrelated to state regulation of reproduction and population control. As a political fiction, BSG facilitates a discussion of the dynamics of choice and duty in relation to post-human reproduction: the right to choose not to reproduce as well as the right to reproduce. In light of my analysis, I suggest that the BSG survival narrative concludes with a displacement of discourses of choice onto discourses of obligation due to biotechnological advancement. I posit that BSG's endorsement of post-human reproduction, coupled with a pro-natalist approach to population control, represents post-human reproduction as an evolutionary advancement the female body cannot refuse. As such, the BSG survival narrative reinscribes gender as a category of difference and the link between the female body and reproduction as key norms for late modern societies. “I'm not a commodity, I'm a Viper pilot” Starbuck, BSG 205: The Farm
Faced with declining fertility rates, media in Britain are reacting with anxiety about cultural annihilation. To look at how nationalism inflects concerns over biological and cultural reproduction, the authors analyze coverage of falling fertility and rising immigration in Great Britain in major newspapers in 2000-2. They find pronatalist appeals to be commonand especially directed at women but varying in how women’s duty to the nation is framed. Appeals characterized as begging, lecturing, threatening, and bribing express different relationships between individual interest and the national good and offer positive and negative views of women. The political leanings of specific newspapers affect how they connect biological reproduction to the cultural threat seen in immigration. Even positive views of women as making rational reproductive choices are tainted by alarmist views of immigration as a threat to national survival.
This article provides an overview of the psychological and social implications of infertility. After describing the evolution of current theoretical understanding in this area, it outlines typical emotional and gender-specific reactions as well as the impact of infertility on the concept of identity and loss. Key questions are presented that medical professionals can use in order to facilitate communication with patients and in order to gain a first understanding of the psychosocial impact infertility has for them. In concludes by highlighting the need to integrate psychosocial counselling into medical treatment, not only as counselling provides vital emotional support, but also because it can contribute towards reducing the drop-out rate in treatment.
In Italy family is characterized by strong ties and is based on mutual aid of all its members. In the last 20 years, the structure of families has been significantly influenced by demographic, economic and professional changes, determining a transition from a patriarchal to a nuclear family model, with a higher number of single-parent families, single-person households, childless couples, same-sex couples. However, this transition has been slower than that occurring in other countries, probably as an ongoing impact of prevalent Catholic ideology. Major demographic changes in Italian families include, 1) a decrease in the number of marriages, delays in getting married and an high number of civil ceremonies, 2) a reduced birth rate; Italy is becoming one of the European countries with lowest growth rate, and with an increasing number of births out of wedlock, 3) an increased marital instability, with a constantly growing number of legal separations. Like many countries, relatives in Italy are highly involved in the care of patients with physical and mental disorders. There are a number of psychosocial interventions used in Italy including the 'Milan Systemic Approach' and family psycho-educational interventions. However, there are difficulties in implementing these interventions which are highlighted in this paper. We recommend research strategies to identify the best options to involve families in the care of mentally ill patients and to adequately support them.
Objective: This study aims to explore the experience of childless men and the
desire for fatherhood. Background: There is little research exploring the desire
for fatherhood, with most studies concentrating on couples in infertility treatment. Of those, the majority focus on the women’s experience, a factor that may reflect the gender stereotype and cultural identification of childlessness to women.
Methods: A qualitative approach was adopted. A convenience sample of 10
biologically childless men were recruited through the snowball method and
interviewed individually. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and transcripts were then analysed using Grounded Theory.
Results: A core category, ‘Lifescape’s of childless men: enduring anticipation and expectation in an uncharted world’, divided into three meta themes: Emotive Forces, Extant Agency, and Life Course. The desire for parenthood appeared to peak in the 30s, gradually reduced, but did not cease. The participants also revealed a sense of ‘outsiderness’ in familial, social, and work relationships.
Conclusion: Involuntarily childless men reported similar experiences to those in, or who have had, infertility treatment. These included a sense of loss, depression, exclusion, isolation, and risk-taking behaviour. Over the life course the men also found ways to adapt and reappraise their beliefs concerning themselves emotionally, psychologically and socially. To help understand this process, gender-role therapy is presented as a possible approach for working with childless men.
This article describes how the intrapsychic, psychosocial, and social ramifications of infertility may be addressed when infertility patients present with distress at the psychotherapist's office. Self psychology provides a valuable framework for the therapist, given the profound and multiple narcissistic assaults on self-esteem, consolidation of identity, developmental aspirations, and other self attributes which infertility causes. The therapist's empathy becomes the primary tool of both understanding and alleviating suffering resulting from infertility. The current medical and interpersonal experiences of the infertile person must be part of the therapeutic process. A psychodynamic model of treatment is outlined which includes goals of reestablishing narcissistic equilibrium, diminishing internalized stigma, and ameliorating other adverse psychological consequences of infertility diagnosis and treatment.
In formulating a notion of filmic reality, this book offers a novel way of understanding our relationship with cinema. It argues that cinema need not be understood in terms of its capacities to refer to, reproduce or represent reality, but should be understood in terms of the kinds of realities it has the ability to create. The book investigates filmic reality by way of six key film theorists: André Bazin, Christian Metz, Stanley Cavell, Gilles Deleuze, Slavoj Žižek and Jacques Rancière. In doing so, it provides comprehensive introductions to each of these thinkers, while also debunking many myths and misconceptions about them. Along the way, a notion of filmic reality is formed that radically reconfigures our understanding of cinema.
Relatively little research on infertility focuses exclusively or significantly on men’s experiences, particularly in relation to emotional aspects. Evidence that does exist around male infertility suggests that it is a distressing experience for men, due to stigma, threats to masculinity and the perceived need to suppress emotions, and that men and women experience infertility differently. Using thematic analysis, this article examines the online emoting of men in relation to infertility via forum posts from a men-only infertility discussion board. It was noted that men ‘talked’ to each other about the emotional burdens of infertility, personal coping strategies and relationships with others. Three major themes were identified following in-depth analysis: ‘the emotional rollercoaster’, ‘the tyranny of infertility’ and ‘infertility paranoia’. This article then offers insights into how men experience infertility emotionally, negotiate the emotional challenges involved (especially pertaining to diagnosis, treatment outcomes and their intimate relationships) and how they share (and find value in doing so) with other men the lived experience of infertility.
These are the headlines of a now familiar story of infertility and its ‘treatment’ via new reproductive technologies. The typical description of the infertile is one that emphasises their ‘desperation’, ‘anguish’ and ‘suffering’ and refers to them as the ‘victims of childlessness’, ‘unwillingly childless’, ‘involuntarily childless’ or as the ‘sufferers of infertility’. Juxtaposed against these tales of ‘desperateness’ are the stories of the ‘happy couples’ who have won their battle against childlessness by producing a ‘miracle baby’ with the help of modern medical science. Together, these two sets of stories, of happiness and hopelessness, constitute the major frame of reference for discussions of infertility.
The present study investigated the way husbands and wives were perceived if they were described as having two children, as voluntarily having no children, or as involuntarily having no children. A social perception paradigm was employed in which a folder was developed containing information about a couple applying for a bank loan in order to purchase a new car. Three versions were constructed, differing only with respect to whether the couple was described as having two children, voluntarily childless, or involuntarily childless. After reading one version of the folder, participants were asked to respond to a series of scales measuring liking, perceived psychological disturbance, adjectives describing general psychological characteristics, and perceived likelihood of getting a divorce within the next ten years, for each of the spouses. Husbands were perceived as more psychologically healthy when they had children than when they had no children, regardless of the reason. Wives were liked less and viewed more negatively on general personality descriptors when they were described as voluntarily childless than when they were involuntarily childless.
There is an array of socially constructed life scripts which feature the motherhood role as a pinnacle for women; however, increasing numbers of women are remaining childless, violating these very basic informal morals of our society. In Australia, the political and social climate is predominantly pronatalist. Powerful discourses, produced through social, political, medical, and religious institutions, provide commentary on cultural discourses surrounding reproduction, femininity, and motherhood. The media play an important role in reinforcing and communicating these pervasive ideologies. This paper explores how childless women are represented in the Australian print media within the context of a pronatalist society. The representation of childless women was predominantly negative and characterised by reprimanding, pitying, and threatening undertones. Four main representations (sympathy worthy women; career women; the artefact of feminism; and reprimanded women) were identified but ultimately taken together they suggest that being a childless woman is an undesirable position in contemporary Australian society.
This essay explores Jean Benoît-Lévy and Marie Epstein's box-office success La Maternelle and their lesser-known Maternité in the context of interwar debates over women's roles in society. Reflecting natalist-familialist conceptions of motherhood and femininity, the films magnified three pervasive cultural icons in French social and political discourse: the monstrous, childless "modern woman," the exalted mother, and the "single woman" who fell somewhere in the middle. As both products and vehicles of these tropes, La Maternelle and Maternité not only illustrate how popular cinema disseminated and justified certain valueladen assumptions about female identity in the late 1920s and early 1930s; they also reveal the limitations of French feminism and socially-engaged, progressive art of the period.
Many of the formal conventions of American television entertainment are supports of a larger hegemonic structure. After proposing the concept of ideological hegemony as a useful approach to questions of ideology and control, I indicate interrelated ways in which television messages are integrated into the dominant system of discourse and the prevailing structures of labor, consumption, and politics, in particular through these formal features of prime-time network programs: (1) format and formula (including the rigidity of program length and the narrative curve of action); (2) genre; (3) setting and character type; (4) topical slant; and (5) the solution imposed on the fictional problem. Within certain definite limits—related both to the core of dominant values and to market tolerances—these formal structures are flexible; for example, some of Norman Lear's comedies have disrupted stereotypical conventions of static character and imposed solution. The hegemonic commercial cultural system routinely incorporates some aspects of alternative ideology and rejects the unassimilable. I trace this process to the self-contradictory nature of the dominant ideology.
This study systematically examines the role of informal social response in the emergence of involuntary childlessness or infertility as a stigmatizing attribute. Seventy‐one involuntarily childless women provide detailed instances of perceived informal social sanctions related to their infertility. Subjects perceive that normals consider infertility to be caused by psychological or sexual malfunctioning, or by the woman in the dyad. Infertility is also seen by some to act as a master status. Subjects categorize other infertile individuals in terms of stigma and consider male infertility to be more stigmatizing than female infertility. Social sanctions and social control are shown to be relevant to an understanding of the experience of involuntary childlessness.
Objective
To explore the psychosocial effects of infertility and the role that social support plays over time. The major hypothesis was that although infertile persons report less contentment, lower levels of marital and sexual satisfaction, and lower self-esteem over time, those with higher levels of social support will be less affected.
Design/Setting
Four questionnaires were completed in subjects’ own homes, one every 9 months.
Participants
Subjects, all of whom perceived themselves as infertile, were recruited through the national newsletter for an infertility support group. Ninety-four subjects entered the study, and 41% of the sample completed it.
Main outcome measures
Contentment, marital satisfaction, sexual satisfaction, self-esteem, sex-role identity, press (the measure of perceived internal and external pressures), and social support.
Results
Perceived support (F[3, 111] = 4.77, p < 0.004), as well as contentment and self-esteem, significantly increased over time (F[3, 111] = 12.03, p < 0.0001, and F[3, 111] = 5.378, p < 0.002, respectively). Social support was positively correlated with all dependent measures.
Conclusions
Contrary to what was hypothesized, infertile persons experienced increased social support and greater contentment over time. As hypothesized, there was a significant positive relationship between social support and all dependent measures. The positive impact of social support, counseling, and the adoption of strategies to deal with the stress of infertility lends credence to the crucial role nurses can play in helping infertile couples cope.
Obra teórica de una sociología de las asociaciones, el autor se cuestiona sobre lo que supone la palabra social que ha sido interpretada con diferentes presupuestos y se ha hecho del mismo vocablo un nombre impreciso e inadecuado, además se ha materializado el término como quien nombra algo concreto, de manera que lo social se convierte en un proceso de ensamblado y un tipo particular de material. Propone retomar el concepto original para hacer las debidas conexiones y descubrir el contenido estricto de las cuestiones que están conectadas bajo la sociedad.
Infertility is experienced by 5 million U.S. couples, some of whom perceive it a stigmatizing condition. Recent technological innovations have created a multitude of medical interventions for those infertile individuals who can financially afford them. For some infertile women, those interventions also transform infertility from a private pain to a public, prolonged crisis. Our research focuses on 25 U.S. women who sought medical treatment for infertility and describes their perception of the stigma associated with infertility. We apply a critical, feminist perspective to our analysis of the women's lived experiences within the social and medical contexts in which they occur.
Older lesbians are invisible both within and outside of the lesbian community. Using a postmodern and lesbian feminist approach, in this article we identify a paradox in our society which defines lesbians in terms of their sexuality while older women are generally viewed as asexual. We suggest that this paradox contributes to the invisibility of older lesbians. Our focus is on the interactive nature of the relationship between personal and public constructions of lesbianism in the lives of older women. Finally, we discuss the potential impact of invisibility on self-identity, and using a feminist gerontological framework suggest implications for the empowerment of older lesbians.
There is growing concern about the health of men in the developed West. Compared with women they have higher rates of morbidity and mortality and are less likely to seek out and employ medical services. Several authors have drawn on social constructionist models, such as the concept of hegemonic masculinity, to account for these gender differences in risk and behaviour. One might anticipate that certain conditions, such as male infertility, would be perceived as posing a particular threat to conventional views of masculinity. There is some support for this, although there is little research into the social construction of male infertility. In this study Discourse Analysis was employed to analyse newspaper accounts of a reported decline in sperm counts in order to study the way in which infertility and masculinity were represented and constructed in the media. The results indicate a construction of fertility as being in crisis and of male infertility as conflated with impotence. Men were positioned as vulnerable and threatened by forces outside their control. The accounts drew on a range of stereotypically masculine reference points, such as warfare and mechanical analogies. These results are consistent with concepts of hegemonic masculinity and suggest that men are offered a highly restricted set of options in terms of perceiving and representing their bodies and their health.
A nation's approach to the burgeoning ART industry reflects deep-rooted cultural imperatives. Choices regarding how ART should be regulated and funded, as well as how ART-related disputes should be mediated, reflect both specific attitudes toward family and parenthood, as well as broader notions about the role of the state in encouraging or impeding novel family forms. The United States and Israel are widely regarded as possessing two of the most ART-friendly environments in the world. Both countries stand at the epicenter of fertility-related research and practice and support the supply and demand sides of the ART market with avidity. Yet, the flourishing of ART in each country takes a different form, shaped by divergent legal and financial policies reflecting deeper cultural values. This article takes a comparative approach to assisted reproduction practices and regulation in Israel and the United States, focusing on the imprint of cultural priorities on each nation's legal framework and financial policies. Part I examines Israeli and American cultural features that influence emerging ART practices. Part II reviews the use and financing of artificial insemination and IVF in Israel and the United States, including the state's role in the delivery of these services. Part III turns to ART's aftermath - examining how disputes regarding the disposition of frozen embryos are handled in each country. The future of ART will be shaped by how the culture wars in each country are fought and won. And, while it seems clear that culture will powerfully mark the development of ART, it remains unclear whether the relationship between national values and ART might someday become more mutually transforming. If today, ART serves primarily as a map on which we can read a nation's cultural geography, perhaps in the future a nation's experience with ART will inspire change in traditional understandings of kinship, parenthood and the state's role in facilitating family.
Around 4% of all couples remain involuntarily childless. These people often experience insufficient social support, which further aggravates the distress symptoms such as physical health problems, anxiety, depression and complicated grief. This study investigates the association of coping style and the degree of satisfaction regarding social support from primary support groups with distress symptoms of involuntarily childless individuals.
Subjects in this cross-sectional study were people who wanted to have children with their partner but were unable to conceive and had acknowledged their involuntary childlessness. The sample consisted of 116 persons (response 88%) with an average age of 39 years (SD = 6.0), with 75% women. The sample group completed a questionnaire consisting of passive and active coping styles from the Utrecht Coping List (UCL), the discrepancy variant of the Social Support List (SSL-D), the short version of the Questionnaire on Experienced Health Complaints (VOEG-21), the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) and the Inventory of Complicated Grief-Revised (ICG-R), adapted for this study.
Women especially experienced more health complaints, more anxiety and depression symptoms and more complicated grief than the general population. Regression analysis shows that when controlled for sex and the duration of involuntary childlessness, the concepts passive coping style and dissatisfaction with social support were positively associated with health complaints, depression, anxiety and complicated grief. The concept active coping style was negatively associated with depression, anxiety and complicated grief. Explained variance of the different distress symptoms varied from 30 to 65%. A moderating association of perceived social support is only found between a passive coping style and health complaints.
Psychosocial interventions should be continued after the childlessness has become definite. By teaching couples how to cope actively with their childlessness and how to ask for support, the negative consequences of their childlessness may be decreased.
INTRODUCTION
The purpose of the present study was to review existing population surveys on the prevalence of infertility and proportion of couples seeking medical help for fertility problems.
METHODS
Population surveys, reporting the prevalence of infertility and proportion of couples seeking help in more and less developed countries, were reviewed.
RESULTS
Estimates on the prevalence of infertility came from 25 population surveys sampling 172 413 women. The 12-month prevalence rate ranged from 3.5% to 16.7% in more developed nations and from 6.9% to 9.3% in less-developed nations, with an estimated overall median prevalence of 9%. In 17 studies sampling 6410 women, the proportion of couples seeking medial care was, on average, 56.1% (range 42–76.3%) in more developed countries and 51.2% (range 27–74.1%) in less developed countries. The proportion of people actually receiving care was substantially less, 22.4%. Based on these estimates and on the current world population, 72.4 million women are currently infertile; of these, 40.5 million are currently seeking infertility medical care.
CONCLUSIONS
The current evidence indicates a 9% prevalence of infertility (of 12 months) with 56% of couples seeking medical care. These estimates are lower than those typically cited and are remarkably similar between more and less developed countries.
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Europe needs many more babies to avert a population disaster
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She delivered keynote speeches at two events organized by Barnlängtan, the Swedish Association for the Involuntary Childless (Archetti 2016, 2017a) and at a graduate conference (Archetti 2017b) on "Gender and Representation
The author, for instance, contributed to (Archetti 2018d) and organized the event "Untold stories: When the family
dream goes unrealized" (Litteraturhuset, Oslo, 8 February 2018). She delivered keynote speeches at two events
organized by Barnlängtan, the Swedish Association for the Involuntary Childless (Archetti 2016, 2017a) and at a
graduate conference (Archetti 2017b) on "Gender and Representation" (University of Oslo, 3 November 2017). She
served as spokesperson for Norway in the online event "World Childless Week 2018" (10-16 September) (Archetti
2018a, b, c).
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The test's criteria began as a set of humorous observations in comic Dykes to Watch Out For, in a strip entitled
The test's criteria began as a set of humorous observations in comic Dykes to Watch Out For, in a strip entitled
"The Rule" (Bechdel 1985).