Research Themes and Methods
Care Dyads in Singapore
Location(s): Singapore | Methods: Semi-structured interviews, Go-Along interviews, GPS tracking & Ethnographic observations
Description: Given Singapore’s rapidly ageing population, foreign domestic workers have become an essential care labour force for many Singaporean families with older adults who have advanced care needs. This research component examines the development of and transition in care relations within the ‘elderly person and domestic worker dyad’, as well as the politics of care encompassing both familial and non-familial actors located in Singapore and overseas.
Grandparenting Migrants’ Adaptation to Life Abroad
Location(s): Singapore, Australia | Methods: Semi-structured interviews, Go-Along interviews, GPS tracking & Ethnographic observations
Description: Grandparenting migrants from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) have become a noticeable presence in some of Singapore’s public housing estates and in Australia’s suburbs. Such grandparents move abroad as permanent residents or temporary migrants to assist their adult children with childcare. The fieldwork for this component examined the grandparenting migrants’ adaptation abroad, how they maintain their social ties back in China, and their future plans.
Care Chains of Foreign Domestic Workers
Location(s): Myanmar, Singapore | Methods: Semi-structured interviews & Ethnographic observations
Description: When foreign domestic workers are in Singapore to care for the elderly, who cares for their ageing loved ones back home? This probing question guided the research carried out in Myanmar. The fieldwork studied the impacts of migration on ageing family members left behind by foreign domestic workers, contextualising the analysis in accompanying research on the care migration industry in Myanmar (i.e. brokerage and training).
Globally Mobile Singaporean Migrants’ Ageing Trajectories
Location(s): China | Methods: Semi-structured interviews & Ethnographic observations
Description: Across nearly four decades of deepening regional ties between Singapore and China, multiple cohorts of Singaporeans have gone to work and live in the latter, with some choosing to transition towards later life while living abroad. This component investigated older Singaporeans’ experiences of ageing abroad and attitudes to it, as well as their intentions to return to Singapore to spend their latter years.