Conference Subtopics

The 2024 Conference has now taken place. Information on the next ICCFR conference will be posted here in due course.

Conference Workshops 2024

Our conference offers a diverse selection of workshops designed to deepen your understanding of intergenerational relationships and family dynamics.

Delegates will have the opportunity to attend one workshop from each of the three sessions, ensuring a personalised and enriching experience tailored to your interests. When registering, simply select the workshop from each session that resonates most with you, allowing you to engage with the topics that matter most to your work or research. This format ensures that you gain the maximum benefit from the conference by focusing on the areas that will have the greatest impact on your professional and personal growth.

The Workshop topics are listed below.

Workshop 1 – Friday 15th

Intergenerational Happiness: Developing Relationships through Educational Games

Presenters: Joanna & Julian Sant Fournier

Intergenerational communication plays a crucial role in fostering understanding, collaboration, and the development of children’s social and emotional competencies. This workshop delves into the dynamics of communication between different age groups within a family context highlighting the challenges, opportunities, and strategies for effective interaction and conflict resolution. The experiential workshop explores how a tool kit (theoretically derived preventive educational games) developed over the past 10 years by the ‘Happy Life’ Foundation creates opportunities for intergenerational dialogue. The tool kit maps Erikson’s Stages of Development and focuses on relationships, values, conflict resolution, and emotional well-being. The tool kit includes:

  • Families with infants – ‘First Years”
  • Families with young children
  • “Friendship Cards”
  • Families with adolescents and elderly – “On Our Journey”

For more info visit www.happylife.org.mt It explores how playing together as a family can contribute in the development of social and communicative skills. Drawing from research findings (4 research papers) and practical examples, attendees will gain valuable knowledge on the importance of conflict within the family and how such tools contribute to living a happy life.

Who are the family? Children’s views on family composition (the case of Estonia)

Presenters: Dagmar Kutsar, Kadri Soo

Family structures are changing and very often children stay in the middle of these changes. By the age of twelve, many children have witnessed separation of parents, creation of new family units of fathers’ and mothers’; many children are put in a situation to commute between two family nuclei or losing contact with the distant parent. Who are my family, the child might ask.

Attitudes of children concerning diverse family composition has rarely been in the researchers’ agenda even when policymakers are struggling with new measures to support children in their families of diverse and changing configurations. The aim of the workshop is to highlight children’s views about different types of family composition and discuss the related issues and specific problems. The study combines quantitative and qualitative approaches. It draws data from a small-scale survey with 12-13 years old children (225 respondents in 2023) and compares with data from 2010. The study searches answer to the research questions, which combinations of people do children think are a family; what are children’s personal attitudes towards forming a family in the future; and what are the changes in children’s views compared to a similar study in 2010?

Grandparents are the voices of the past and the door to the future for our children-but where does this leave them legally?

Presenter: Sacha Lee

There are an estimated 14 million grandparents in the UK and in the past two generations, the number of children being cared for by their grandparents has increased substantially from 33% to 82%. Almost two-thirds of all grandparents regularly look after their grandchildren. Many children recall their grandparents’ involvement in their lives fondly and have close relationships with them.

However, in the event of family breakdown, what legal rights do grandparents have?

This presentation will address the (perhaps surprising) lack of legal rights for grandparents in respect of their grandchildren in our jurisdiction. This will be contrasted with the right of the child to their identity and how important it is for their identity to have intergenerational familial relationships.

This presentation will then consider procedurally in practice how applications by grandparents are dealt with in the jurisdiction of England and Wales, with detailed and specific reference to our domestic legislation (including the Children Act 1989) and how the voice of the child is heard (including by Children’s Guardians, Independent Social Workers or Cafcass and therapists).

This will be contrasted with how grandparents are often engaged in public law care proceedings for children, with exploration of roles such as Special Guardianship.

This presentation will also consider the options, case law and procedure for grandparents in the event of child abduction/wrongful retention in England and Wales, including the potential for them apply to the court to seek the return of the child, if they have inchoate rights of custody.

Workshop 2 – Friday 15th

Grandparenthood: Understanding Constraints and Nurturing Intergenerational Relationships in Families

Presenters: Ruby Chau, Su Wan Gan and Jo-pei Tan

Western and Asian families increasingly recognise the significance of intergenerational relationships and the positive impact of grandparenting in rapidly ageing societies (Tan et al, 2024; Attar-Schwartz et al 2009). However, the challenges faced by grandparents transitioning into grandparenthood receive less attention. This workshop will address these challenges and explore how to nurture better intergenerational relationships for stronger family cohesion.

The workshop will consist of three parts. Part one introduces the life-mix model. Emphasising the respect for the life-mix preferences of the older generation, it examines the challenges older people face in transitioning to caregiving roles as grandparents (Chau & Yu, 2022). Drawing from current evidence, Part Two provides insights into issues related to grandparenthood, and explores the dynamics, adaptations and impact of cross-generation relationships in various household arrangements in the UK and globally. Finally, through two to three case studies and interactive discussions, participants will explore the challenges related to transitioning roles and responsibilities among grandparents and, how intergenerational dynamics affect grandparents, parents, and grandchildren in fostering strong family cohesion.

By attending the workshop, participants will have developed a research-informed understanding of relevant approaches for addressing grandparenthood challenges and cross-generation dynamics within various cultural contexts, family structures, and living arrangements.

The intergenerational impact of autism on families and their family members: A socio-cultural and systemic exploration. 

Presenters: Frida Mangion, Anne-Marie Callus, Elaine Schembri Lia

Despite the rising incidence of individuals with autism and the recognition of its impact on family dynamics (Chiarotti &Venerosi, 2020), there isn’t much research that explores the systemic interplay of how family systems can work together over time to thrive following diagnosis. Minimal literature mentions the impact of the sociocultural context. It is recognised that unique family dynamics come into play within these families. Caruana (2020) has reported that there is a yet-present shared feeling of social exclusion for families of children with autism locally.

For families to adjust to autism, their members need to sensibly acknowledge the impact it is having on each of them, renegotiate their roles, as well as elaborate on their connections with each other and the outside world. Resilience is seen in families where the members can collaboratively reflect on their experiences and empathically adjust to each other’s needs. The provision of support services and an accepting environment enhance this (Mangion, 2023). 

Fostering wellbeing and adaptation in families: Transforming disempowering intergenerational rituals and practices

Presenters: Srilatha Juvva, Neena Barnes

We learn how to deal with situations through the way our families teach or condition us. Families teach or condition the way we learn to deal with various situations. Most of the interactions reinforce patterns that are passed down across generations. The workshop aims to uncover interactions and practices within families (knowing and without awareness) that foster adaptation to situations. While some maybe healthy and helpful, some may not aid adaptation and adjustment to situations within and outside the family. The objectives of the workshop include:

a) to develop a framework to examine the reinforcement of coping patterns and adaption within families
b) to understand and explore disempowering practices, rituals and ideologies that are typically invisible within our families and culture and make them visible
c) to develop strategies for everyday routine challenges on how to change unhealthy narratives of reinforcement and adaptation to healthy ways

Using the Conscious Full Spectrum Response Model, a radical model, developed by Monica Sharma, the workshop will take us through cutting edge neuroscience of the triple helix for transformation. It will take into account strategies of responding to the problems and realising the full potential of families to interrupt disempowering practices within and outside in order to foster wellbeing, peace and harmony

Workshop 3 – Saturday 16th

Intergenerational Moral Formation in the Context of the Family: Challenges and Opportunities

Presenter: Carlo Calleja

Abstract TBC

Towards a pedagogy of the grandparent

Presenter: Philippe Noens

For quite some time, parental advice came to parents through (in)formal channels. But nowadays, especially in the western world, we can detect an emerging ‘market’ of scientifically based parenting advice (cf. scientification of parenting). Obviously, science can inform people, but due to the growing dominance of a scientific voice in childrearing, we risk downplaying another corpus of truth-finding: the life experience of the elderly, specifically the grandparents.

Edmund Burke described the wisdom embodied in life experience in a positive sense as ‘prejudices’: not an irrational sentiment, but a ‘pre’-judgment, based on experience, which someone ‘presents’ to another person. In a finalized research project (2023-2024), we explored ‘the grandparent’ as a pedagogical figure, i.e. as a member of the ‘old generation’ (Hannah Arendt) who (un)conscious passes-on values, beliefs, life views and so forth. An intergenerational ‘passing-on’ that, at least potentially, transcends family ties.

Through in-depth interviews with twenty grandparents, we gained a better understanding (a) of the meaning of grandparenthood and especially (b) of the intergenerational doings (cf. practices, artefacts) and sayings (cf. wisdoms, advices) the members of the old generation wish to pass on. At a time of increasing age segregation and age discrimination, the workshop explores further the ‘forgotten’ pedagogical capital of the elderly.

Latest Conference Information

  • Bursary & Scholarship Applications (deadline 3rd September)

    ICCFR is committed to making our 2024 Conference a success by encouraging attendance. If you have a protégé (ex: colleague, grad student, mentee, intern) who might benefit from financial assistance to attend the Conference, or if you are a grad student or intern yourself please get in touch via the Contact page. All applications must…