• Korean Journal of Family Social Work
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• no.62
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• pp.71-102
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• 2018

The purpose of this study is to enrich our understanding of the family utilizing childcare by grandmothers and the elderly women by examining the experience of grandmothers who refused to support raising their grandchildren. The researcher focused on grandmothers who have been in charge of caring the family in the main and tried to explore the reasons for their decision not to take care of their grandchildren. For the purpose, Research participants were seven elderly women who have refused raising of their grand-children. Data were collected by in-depth interview and analyzed based on the phenomenological method. As results, it turned out that the elderly women refused caring of their grandchildren due to the burden of parenting and the rejection of an extended mother role, and the fear of family conflicts, but they felt sorry about their refusal of a request for caring support from their adult children. Second. these decisions caused various dynamics of the family members, and they were experiencing psychological difficulties. Third, elderly women perceived raising of grandchildren as a task of adult children or a problem for which the society should be accountable, and felt that the family and the society have shifted the responsibility to them. This research result confirms that a new generation of the elderly women have emerged who have different viewpoints on caregiving. It also presents a necessity to reflect the viewpoints of elderly who are mainly concerned when establishing a policy of caregiving. Based on this finding, this study also presents implications regarding support for family utilizing childcare by grandmothers and support for the elderly women.