Andrej Srakar and Maša Filipovič Hrast, University of Ljubljana

The session builds on a theoretical premise that different early life experiences produce different family, health and economic outcomes in older age. One of the perspectives of observing and analysing the various aspects of lives of older persons is the life course perspective that interprets the level of activity in later life in view of the individual’s lifestyle and activities during earlier life (Elder, 1994; Settersten, 2003; Elder, Johnson and Crosnoe, 2004; Victor, 2013). Apart from differences in the lives of individuals, the social context – unique historical events and periods of social changes within which an individual ages strongly shape the course of ageing and older age (Danneferand and Settersten Jr., 2010; Settersten and Gannon, 2005). Differences in individual well-being accumulate over time, further intensifying in later life (Di Prete and Eirich, 2006).

This session focuses on life course approach to understanding care arrangements and the decisions taken by family members to provide care to older people. We invite papers that advance our understanding of the life course, with specific transitions in life, cumulative processes and how life courses within family intertwine and affect decision for care and specific care arrangements. The focus is on quantitative approaches, in particular using SHARE data and its retrospective panel perspective (Brugiavini et al., 2013; 2019), but we will also accept qualitative oriented papers. We welcome innovative approaches to different topics, novel methodological solutions (say, using stochastic processes to study year transitions in retrospective panels; or innovative causality perspectives) but also broad and comprehensive theoretical, historical and overview papers.