Family Decision Making Processes

            
             This article focuses on establishing an understanding of how families develop decision-making processes utilized during care giving.
             BIBLIOGRAPHIC NOTATION:.
             The Influence of Autonomy and Paternalism on Communicative Behaviors in Mother-Daughter Relationships Prior to Dependency, by, Pecchioni, Loretta L., Nussbaum, Jon F., Health Communication, 10410236, 2000, Vol. 12, Issue 4.
             HYPOTHESIS:.
             Decision-making in the care giving situation becomes rather important for the care receiver if his/her sense of autonomy is battered because of the potential for negative consequences due to the loss of control over one's own life.
             SAMPLE: (kind and size).
             This research journal included women who were all white within the ages of 54 and 87. The daughters used in this study were ages 26 through 58. The main criterion for participation was that the mothers not be dependent on the daughters for more than ten hours of assistance each week.
             METHODS USED: (for data collection).
             Pecchioni organized appointments in the mother's home, daughter's home, or in a public place. Each participant was given a consent form to be signed, and fill out the respect for autonomy and paternalism scales. Each participant was then asked to fill out a set of demographic questions pertaining to themselves. After the information was gathered the individuals were interviewed and filmed. The data was collected in three stages including: preliminary analyses, coding of transcripts, and the analytical procedures. .
             FINDINDS and/or CONCLUSIONS:.
             This article established many reasons why an individual "s attitudes influence their communicative behaviors. These behaviors tend to influence the caregivers sense of autonomy. The care recipient's sense of autonomy affects the his/her own health and can play a role in the physical and psychological levels. This study also found that the decision making process revealed that mothers and their adult daughters did not appear to use a rational decision making process .