Canadian Journal of Family and Youth (CJFY)
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Characteristics of Teen Families Accessing a Supportive Housing Program
No full textThere is a need for strength-based research that considers the complex realities of teen families. The purpose of the current study is to provide a springboard for this research by describing the characteristics of teen parents and their children involved in a supportive housing program. We used a community-based participatory research approach with a descriptive design. Teen parent participants completed self-report questionnaires about their relationship with their children, resilience, self-esteem, and parenting attitudes. In addition, the children of teen parents completed standardized assessments of their development. A total of 21 parents (18 mothers and 3 fathers) and 20 children participated. Results indicate that self-esteem and resilience are areas of difficulty for participants. In addition, most parents fell into the medium risk range with respect to the parenting attitudes measured. Of note, few parents fell into the high-risk range on most scales, suggesting that most participants have the foundation for successful parenting across the areas measured. Results also show that the majority of participants are demonstrating typical attachment, discipline practices, involvement, parenting confidence, and relational frustration. An area of particular strength for participants is their involvement with their children. It also appears overall that the children of teen parents are developing on a fairly typical trajectory that is reflective of the general population. This study reinforces the heterogeneity of teen families, with teen parents and their children showing different areas of strengths and challenges across the domains measured. Based on our findings, we discuss implications for research, policy, and practice.
 
Book Review of Blackmore, Mary Jayne. (2020). Balancing Bountiful: What I Learned about Feminism from my Polygamist Grandmothers. Halfmoon Bay: Caitlin Press.
No full textAn Exploration of Childhood Obesity, Ecological Contributing Factors, and the New Sociology of Indigenous Children in Canada
No full textDisruptions, Decisions and Discourses: Mothering in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic
No full textSince the COVID-19 pandemic hit North America in 2020 life has yet to return to “normal.” New realities included remote learning, physical distancing, lockdown measures, and mandatory masking. The pandemic has increased social isolation, stress and anxiety, employment loss, and financial instability. Even more, the domestic workload that mothers are usually responsible for in addition to their paid work, what Arlie Hochschild (2012) refers to as \u27the second shift,\u27 has been compounded and expanded, creating a \u27third\u27 and \u27fourth\u27 shift that involves homeschooling, increased carework, and \u27worrywork\u27 that burdens mothers during a crisis (O\u27Reilly & Green, 2021, p. 21). Mothers are the unrecognized \u27front-line workers\u27 of the pandemic – caring for sick family members, trying to balance working from home with childcare and homeschooling that has pushed mothers to their breaking points. This has left many mothers overworked, overstressed, overwhelmed, taking a substantial toll on their well-being. The purpose of this research is to examine the pressures, changes, and challenges around paid work, care, and family during the pandemic that mothers face– and the strategies they use to navigate these difficult situations. This study involves 11 qualitative interviews with Canadian mothers. The aim was to discover how women define and understand their own experiences of pandemic parenting, and how their experiences and choices were shaped by their constraining circumstances and contexts. This study examines the norms surrounding ‘who cares?’ and how disparities in carework underpin many of the gender inequalities women experience that blur the boundaries between their private and public lives
"Change is Coming": Imagined Futures, Optimism and Pessimism Among Youth Climate Protesters
No full textIn recent years, two unrelated developments have opened up new opportunities for examining how young people relate to climate change and participate in climate politics. First, there is a fast-growing literature in sociology and youth studies concerned with the roles of imagined futures in social action. Second, and more recent, is an explosion of youth-based climate activism, particularly the Fridays For Future movement. In this paper, I draw from in-depth interviews with participants in the Fridays For Future protests in London in Spring 2019, arguing that in this case of youth mobilization, protesters relied on shared, overarching narratives about the future of climate change, albeit ones that allow room for some divergence in opinion. In particular, I examine how regular involvement in the movement influenced participants’ imagined futures. Drawing from studies of similar issues by Kleres and Wettergren (2017) and Threadgold (2012), and from the phenomenological concept of “orientation” (Ahmed, 2005; Carabelli and Lyon, 2016), I argue that regular and repeated participation in climate activism engenders optimism among youth. This opens new ways of thinking about the relationship between political action and young people’s anticipations of climate change, with implications for scholarship of imagined futures, youth politics and climate politics.
 
Book Review of Greshner, Connie. (2020). Borderline Shine: A Memoir. Toronto: Dundurn Press.
No full textThe Age of Toxicity: The Influence of Gender Roles and Toxic Masculinity in Harmful Heterosexual Relationship Behaviours
No full textAlthough heterosexual relationships have been evolving since the dawn of humanity, there continues to be a considerable amount of inequality, toxicity, and dissatisfaction within heterosexual couplings. This paper explores the ways in which socially prescribed gender roles and toxic masculinity contribute to behaviours which lead to toxicity and unhappiness in heterosexual relationships. The behaviours that this paper will discuss include coercive control as well as physical and sexual violence, all of which are behaviours that according to current literature, are shockingly common in heterosexual relationships. Moreover, the present paper will investigate previous literature in order to explore these concepts in depth through theoretical concepts as well as previous qualitative and quantitative studies done on heterosexual relationship satisfaction. This particular research paper aims to identify and define the concepts of socially prescribed gender roles and toxic masculinity, before applying these concepts to the previously mentioned relationship behaviours in order to determine just how these social concepts contribute to or cause these behaviours in heterosexual couplings.  
Who Falls in Love First? The Role Gender Plays in Love Expression
No full textLove is a universal feeling. It is present in every language and every culture. There is variability that exists between cultures, but the essence of love is the same. It is influential, it is impactful, it is a feeling that is sought after and being in love is considered one of the greatest successes. The expression of love has the ability to vary greatly. The extent of how love is expressed and how often or how much love is expressed varies from culture to culture. But the question of whether or not it varies between genders is still a point of interest to researchers. The timeline of people falling in love is a topic of discussion and who in a relationship will say the three magical words first is something to examine. Asking the question of who falls and says “I love you” first, men or women, will help explore romantic relationships
Book Review of Blank, E. A. (2020). Easy Marriage Counselling: 52 Self-Guided Exercises to Deepen Your Relationship. California: Rockridge Press.
No full textThe Inevitability of Workplace Romance
No full textThe existence of workplace relationships poses many consequences for professional organizations. There are many factors such as motive, age, gender, and workplace culture that impact how these complex relationships are perceived by other employees of the organization. These perceptions can have a major influence on employee engagement, workplace productivity, and general cohesiveness of the organization that can be essential to its success. A proper response from management in terms of policy development is crucial in dealing with this form of intimate relationship. The existence of relationships in the workplace is inevitable as they have become very popular locations to discover a significant other.