News Archive

NEWS FROM THE DIRECTOR

We’re nearly at the end of our seminar series and I think you’ll agree we have had some fascinating topics and excellent speakers. It’s good to see many “regulars” attending and enjoying the opportunity to learn from the different perspectives on the topics, and participating in the discussions afterwards.  The final seminar – “Caring for an ageing population” – will be of interest to many who may be looking after aged parents or grandparents, or planning for their own old age. Professor Neville Bruce
Director, Centre for Integrated Human Studies

NEXT SEMINAR: CARING FOR AN AGEING POPULATION, OCTOBER 7

“The great secret that all old people share is that you really haven't changed in seventy or eighty years.  Your body changes, but you don't change at all.  And that, of course, causes great confusion.”  Doris Lessing

A fast growing demographic is people in their nineties, but these people are the least likely to be happy with their quality of life. What values do Australians hold about caring for our elders? What can we look forward to, as an ageing community, and as individuals?

Professor of Geriatric Medicine Leon Flicker dispels some myths about ageing; physiotherapist Faye Bastow shares professional and personal insights into aged care; and actor and writer Jenny Davis speaks about tapping a rich vein of wisdom and story through Agelink Theatre.

Chaired by Professor Matthew Tonts .

The seminar is in Seminar room 1.81 at the School of Anatomy and Human Biology, UWA, at the usual time of 5:30 – 7 pm.

NOTES FROM THE LAST SEMINAR, FAMILY

Steve Johnson , chairing the seminar, said that Integrated Human Studies bridged science and the humanities, and that people understood the term “family” in different ways.  While there is a scientific understanding derived from biology, family is also a cultural notion which is interpreted in the practice of family law.

Asst Professor Debra Judge began her career as an evolutionary biologist with a study of ospreys, which reproduce in monogamous pairs. Later she studied human families; here she showed a slide of the fenced cemetery plot of a family that defined its boundaries even after death. The concept of families – individuals sharing home range, labor and related genetically or through mutual relatedness to descendants – exists in many animals other than humans.

Families may be matrilineal (males disperse from natal group), patrilineal (females disperse), demonstrate indeterminant dispersal (either or both disperse), or cooperative (adult pair and mature offspring). In evolutionary terms, the family displays constant tension between conflicting drives.  Conflict as well as cooperation is an inherent part of family life. “To mate (again) or to parent – that is the question” expresses the dilemma about allocation of reproductive effort.

Characteristics of the family – “Offspring continue to interact regularly into adulthood with their parents … delayed dispersal; prolonged co-residence with one or both parents beyond sexual maturity” (Emlen) – were evident in many animals such as the naked mole rat and the marmoset as well as humans.

Mating and marriage systems (Debra made it clear that these are not the same thing) in humans are strongly influenced by the availability and distribution of resources, with human stature suggesting a polygynous (having a number of female mates) history, in common with most mammals. Other systems were monogamy, both serial and perennial, and polyandry, with the last being the least common.  Hunter gatherers were most likely to be serially monogamous, while settlement and the raising of animals and growing food enabled polygyny. Monogamy is associated with more even distribution of resources.

Debra was interested in how resources were transferred in wills, to test whether this reflected biological imperatives, and researched records in the US.  She found that people favour close kin, but men and women behave differently.  Men left their estate to their wife and would favour a current wife over the children of a previous wife), while women were more likely to favour all their children over their husband.

Julie Jackson , Solicitor in Charge, Family Court Services, said that it is important for the different disciplines to work together to achieve the best outcomes for children, and this is the focus she brings to family dispute resolution. She felt that family had never been so broadly interpreted in our culture as it is now, with issues of remarriage, reproductive technology, surrogacy, and same sex partners making the traditional nuclear family less and less the norm.

An increasing number of children are in out-of-home care – over the last decade the number has more than doubled – and Indigenous children are nine times more likely to be living away from immediate family. The 2003 Australian census found that more than twenty thousand grandparents were looking after more than thirty thousand children under the age of 18. These numbers reflect high rates of divorce and family breakdown.

The government tries to respond to these social developments, but legislation, policy and budgets often lagged behind people’s experience and needs. The legal profession most often interacts with families in situations where children are in need of protection or support, but there was a difficulty in that child protection matters are dealt with in the Children’s Court, while family disputes are dealt with in the Family Court. Challenging cases that have not been dealt with by mediation may involve abuse, mental health and drug issues, and cross over the two courts, which have different language and procedures.

Grandparents or extended family carers sometimes find that having children taken into state care may be easier because they have formal procedures to back them up in care issues.

The government currently is aiming to streamline decision-making, especially regarding children under the age of two, to give certainty to foster carers and continuity for children.  “The best interests of children” can not be easily or broadly described as it is specific to children’s life experiences.  It is useful for lawyers to have some knowledge of child development and attachment theories, and to understand how social scientists and psychologists apply disciplinary perspectives to decision-making.

Changes in attitudes over the years are reflected in changes in terminology: “guardianship” and “access” have evolved into “residency” and “contact” and more recently into “live with” and “spend time with”. Her experience was that few parents were “evil”; most love their children but need support to provide good care, and it is important to enable this as it is true that exposure to ongoing high conflict between parents has the greatest ill-effects on children.

Penny Keeley said she had felt a shift in her own experience of practising law at the same time as shifts had occurred in society and the law.  With one third of first marriages and two thirds of subsequent marriages ending in separation – and probably similar rates for de facto marriages – many people will experience family breakdown.

There are a number of areas of concern: safety, children’s welfare, and financial issues. How people deal with these issues often depends on how they have been able to respond to the breakdown itself, which itself depends on whether it has been a mutual decision, they were the initiating spouse, or if they didn’t see it coming. People may be angry, unhappy or in denial and in no state to deal with practicalities.

Property and children are sorted out long before the legal process of divorce happens. There are two federal Acts (Family Law and Child Support) relating to family matters and a state Act relating to de facto relationships.

The law as written is the “one size fits all” default description of a reasonable outcome, but it is much better for people to make their own decisions about their individual situation. Penny has come to believe the legal system is far from the best way for family disputes to be resolved, with decisions made by strangers in a highly artificial situation and based on limited information provided by third parties in an adversarial position.  Mediation, alternative dispute resolution or collaborative law are better ways to go, with needs being the basis for decision making.  It is hard for lawyers to move away from the model based on people’s “rights” and “entitlements” but it is much easier for separating parents to agree when children’s needs were identified as the first priority, and to proceed from there.

The family endures beyond the marriage breakdown and parents have to maintain communication.  The modern family is changing and we need to recognise and support the many forms it takes.

Questions and comments included:

• How prevalent is the alternative dispute resolution process now?
• The mediation process allows the extended family to be involved.
• The Latin root for family connotes a much larger group – the household.
• Mediators in family dispute resolution are trained – they may be lawyers or social scientists.
• Immigrant families can be truly nuclear because of their separation from the extended family.
• Family mobility means breakdown can be especially traumatic because one spouse may decide to return to their country or state of origin.
• Step-parenting after a spouse’s death may be better accepted than after a marriage breakdown.
• Is marriage breakdown influenced by the form of the marriage vows – are they unrealistic?
• Does our biology influence our response to issues of population control?

ABOUT THE CENTRE FOR INTEGRATED HUMAN STUDIES

You can find out more about the Centre and about IHS at our web site www.ihs.uwa.edu.au . If you are interested in enrolling in postgraduate courses in IHS, please contact the Director, Prof Neville Bruce on 6488 3292 or email [email protected] .

TELL US WHAT YOU THINK

Please feel free to give us your comments, thoughts or suggestions for future seminar topics by emailing Karen on [email protected] .