ECU Social Ageing (SAGE) Futures Lab

This postdoctoral research project aims to investigate the level of ease of access to and most importantly, the compatibility of government funded support services available to migrant family caregivers of older people. This project seeks to garner a better understanding of the gaps in existing policy infrastructure and public services that are geared toward supporting the informal caregivers that have traditionally served as cultural brokers for their ageing parents and are now assuming greater age-related care responsibilities.

This work builds upon Dr Cheng Yen Loo’s research in diversity studies and familial caregiving practices amongst non-English speaking migrant families. Given the increasing cohort of older people in Australia, this project is particularly timely as the challenges experienced by informal caregivers from migrant backgrounds have been largely under-represented in aged care policy and public service provision. There is also increased pressure and need for support for those serving as familial caregivers in migrant households, as they are often the cultural brokers navigating the aged care landscape on behalf of older family members, as well as the linchpin that connects the needs of their ageing parents with aged care services available in the wider community.

Hien Thi Nguyen’s postdoctoral research project explores the social support networks of older migrants in Australia. Many older people are affected by the international migration of their family members. While some older people stay in their home country, others migrate to join their migrant descendants, thus creating transnational grandparent migration.

The proliferation of communication and digital technologies and new media has enabled older people to participate in the transnational lives of their migrant family members, which leads to different types of support. However, little is known about the types of social support networks that are formed between older migrants and their social nodes. In addition, little is known about how social support networks can aid late life-course transitions of older migrants.

This postdoctoral research draws on two projects:

1. Growing older overseas: how older Vietnam-born people are experiencing ageing and aged care in Australia (Hien Thi Nguyen's PhD project); and
2. ‘Transnational and Translocal Mobility: Intergenerational Family Decision Making, Migration Experiences, and Settlement of Migrant Grandparents in Australia and China’ (a sub-project of the 'Transnational Decentering Migration Knowledge' (DEMIKNOW) project, of which Hien is the project manager).
   The postdoctoral research will explore the different social support networks used by older migrants and how these networks assist older migrants to adapt, integrate and establish a sense of belonging in the receiving society. In addition, the research will examine the roles of digital technologies and new media in forming and maintaining different types of social support networks in transnational contexts.

This project, led by Dr Catriona Stevens and funded by the Forrest Research Foundation, addresses some critical challenges faced by the Australian aged care sector and seeks to understand the experiences of migrants working in aged care and to develop policy responses to support recruitment, retention, and the delivery of quality care to older Australians. This focus on workforce issues requires forging new pathways of knowledge, in particular the pressing need for comprehensive understanding of the experiences and perspectives of the workers themselves, especially those from migrant backgrounds.

The significance of the cultural and linguistic diversity of aged care workers is currently underemphasised in policy formation. In response to limitations in research on workforce diversity issues, this project forges a new pathway. By using a qualitative grounded theory approach and considering the holistic experiences of workers, including factors outside of the workplace, this project aims to deliver an understanding of the personal perspectives of aged care staff from migrant backgrounds that is currently insufficiently developed in Australian scholarship and policy decision-making.

The Decentering Migration Knowledge (DemiKnow) Project is funded by the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. This project brings together four migration research centres, from Australia, Canada, China and India to create new knowledge about migration from the Global South and North about:

• The roles of families in migration in different contexts; and
• How best to navigate different structures, cultures, and interests in collaborative international research.

Working in interdependent teams, we will:

• Study how families shape migration decisions; facilitate and impede settlement and integration of migrants; and are impacted by migration related policies and processes.
• Create opportunities for emergent scholars and students to enhance their capacity for international work by conducting joint studies and exchanging visits.
• Jointly prepare a proposal for a large-scale migration research project informed by lessons learned from DemiKnow.

In Australia, the DemiKnow collaboration involves two research entities, the ECU SAGE Lab and ECU TRACS Migration Research Network. The ECU DemiKnow team comprises project manager Hien Nguyen, Loretta Baldassar, and Catriona Stevens.