Older adults with no kids take on bulk of caregiving, study shows

Older adults who do not have children provided significant caregiving support for their elderly parents, compared with their siblings who have children, a local study has found.

- Thian Wen Li

Regardless of gender and birth order, this group of adults aged 50 and above contributed more in caregiving for their parents.

These findings were from a study by researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) and Singapore Management University that involved 475 Singaporeans aged 50 and above with at least one living parent. Of the group, 298 had children and 177 did not have children.

The study looked at four areas of support for ageing parents, such as financial support and instrumental support, which refers to the frequency of performing activities that require time, such as household chores and caregiving.

It also studied the frequency of physical meetings and non-physical contact between child and parent in the past year, and the geographical proximity between child and parent.

Adults without children were found to give significantly higher levels of support across all areas of support, compared with their siblings with children, according to the research paper published in January 2024 in an academic journal, Journal Of Marriage And Family.