| Research Abstract |
This study was to examined the accessibility to the social services or resources for mothers during the early life of child-raring. Taiwa Town, Miyagi (population 24,000) was consistently focused in this, study, and data were obtained through questionnaires given to mothers who lived there. 1) During the first five years of child-raring life, negative feelings and behaviors of mother increased after the second year of rearing life, and the positive feelings decreased at the same time, though the positive level kept rather high. It suggests that mothers constantly need some support during these years. 2) Child-raring resources in the town were neither fully recognized nor made most use of. It is important to let mothers know what resources are there in town and how they are available. 3) For the purpose of examining how the individual program is used by Mothers, we focused on "Kosodate-Soudan which is available for anyone who has an infant. Mothers can consult staff anything they worry about or talk freely with each other. Results suggested that users were likely "to live not so long in town", "to have the first child who is younger", "to have less support", and "to feel her child more difficult" than un-users were. Concerning with the way they used, two factors identified "To get the informat ion or advice" and "To feel at home". Both were related to their feeling of being supported. Furthermore this kind of feeling made them communicative to their husband, grandparents or friends after participation. Although it was evaluated that "Kosodate-Soudan" has been generally well-functioned, some difficulties of access to the program need to be solved in the near future.
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