Do mothers-in-law matter? Family dynamics and fertility decision-making in urban squatter settlements of Karachi, Pakistan

The perspectives of mothers-in-law about intra-household decision-making, family size and family planning are investigated, and their views compared with those of their sons and daughters-in-law. Women (717 daughters-in-law), their husbands (717 sons) and their 522 mothers-in-law were interviewed in eight squatter settlements in Karachi, Pakistan. Decisions about the schooling and health care of children, and the purchase of jewellery, are perceived to lie within the nuclear family domain (i.e. husband and wife). There was a difference in mothers-in-law's, daughters-in-law's and sons' desire to have more children. Twenty-eight per cent of mothers-in-law versus 58%, of daughters-in-law did not want more grandsons/sons and 36%, of mothers-in-law versus 66% of daughters-in-law did not want more granddaughters/daughters. The difference was markedly greater among the mother-in-law/daughter-in-law pairs than in the mother/son pairs. Overall, the mother-in-law's role seems to be somewhat overshadowed by that of her son (family male member), except for limiting family size. It is suggested that mothers-in-law should be included in Information-Education-Communication (IEC) campaigns about family planning.     

Setting Free the Son,Setting Free the Widow: Relational Transformation in Arrernte Life-Cycle Rituals (Central Australia)

ABSTRACT

In Australian Aboriginal society, personal identity is an evolving process whose successive mutations derive from a person’s capacity to enter into new relationships. Both initiation rites and funerary practices act to mediate such relational transformations. Drawing on Spencer and Gillen’s material on the Arrernte, this paper establishes a parallel between the procedures put into effect to render a son autonomous from his mother in the course of male initiation, and those undertaken to emancipate a widow from her deceased husband. Both ritual operations introduce a relational distancing within a totality. This totality is composed of two individuals whose antecedent close physical intimacy could thwart these persons’ ability to become an autonomous agent. The rituals make the person capable of entering a new intimate relationship: marriage in the case of a son and remarriage in the case of a widow. Both procedures entail the intervention of ritual objects closely connected to an individual’s personal identity: on the one hand, the churinga, a man is joined with at the end of his initiation and which allows him to exercise responsibilities in fertility rites, and on the other hand, the decaying, contaminating corpse a husband leaves behind upon his death.     

Constitutional extra chromosomal element in a family with Wilms' tumor

Summary We report the presence of an extra chromosomal element in a family with Wilms' tumor (WT). This family has three children, two of whom were affected. One son, the proband, had bilateral and one daughter had unilateral WT. The first child, the father, and the mother did not have WT. The son with bilateral WT had a ring chromosome (R) both in the lymphocytes as well as in the kidney tissue. The size of the ring varied considerably from cell to cell. The daughter with unilateral WT had an abnormal clone containing a small chromosomal ring (r) in phytohemagglutinin (PHA)-stimulated and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV)-transformed lymphocytes. The mother had a karyotype similar to that of the daughter with WT. We hypothesize that the proband's ring chromosome could be the amplified form of the r inherited from the mother. Chromosome 11 was cytogenetically normal in all the cells examined of the affected children and the unaffected mother. In situ hybridization with a centromere-specific DNA cocktail indicated dispersed centromeric DNA both in r and R.     

Evaluation of vitamin D receptor (VDR) gene polymorphisms (FokI, TaqI and ApaI) in a family with dentinogenesis imperfecta

Dentinogenesis imperfecta Type II (DGI-II) is a condition inherited as an autosomal dominant trait and characterized by abnormal dentine structure affecting both the primary and secondary dentitions. The genetic etiology of the disease still remains unclear, suggesting a genetically heterogeneous background. The aim of this study is to manifest briefly DGI-II and to investigate the association between BsmI, TaqI and FokI polymorphisms of vitamin D receptor (VDR) gene and dentinogenesis imperfecta type II in a Turkish family by PCR-RFLP methodology. The affected mother and her two affected daughters were bb for BsmI polymorphism, whereas her unaffected son and her husband were Bb for the same polymorphism. One of the affected children was tt, the rest of the family were Tt for TaqI polymorphism, and all of the enrolled subjects were FF for FokI polymorphism. As a conclusion, BsmI polymorphism bb seems to be associated with (DGI-II), but should be examined in larger numbers in order to be considered as a risk factor.     

Experimental study on sexual behavior between mother and son in Japanese monkeys (Macaca fuscata)

A mother, her adult son, four adult males and six adult females from a free-ranging group at Katsuyama were paired in a cage in the sexual seasons from 1976 to 1980. The paired subjects were classified into the following three types: mother and son, familiar pairs and unfamiliar pairs. The familiar pairs consisted of monkeys who had been in the Katsuyama group until about six months before the experiment. The unfamiliar pairs consisted of monkeys who had not met each other at all or who had not met each other for more than eight years before the experiment. Serial mounts which terminated with ejaculation occurred in nine of ten unfamiliar pairs, four of five familiar pairs, but there were none between the son and mother. The son and mother did not appear to be sexually aroused between themselves, although they were sexually active to other partners. However, on rare occasions, the son mounted singly on the mother, and on one occasion he ejaculated. Their interaction did not change essentially during the three years. The son rarely mounted serially on a female who had a close relationship with his mother.     

Responses to a stranger mother-son pair in the wild chimpanzee: A case report

A stranger mother-son pair of the chimpanzee was observed twice interacting with conspecifics of a neighbouring unit-group: first, when the mother and son accidentally encountered them within the core area of the former; second, when the mother and son temporarily immigrated for about one week. On both occasions, the mother and son were severely attacked by adult males of the neighbouring unit-group, and would have been killed had it not been for human intervention. The main target of the aggression was not the infant, but the mother. Some adult males intervened and prevented other males and females from attacking the mother-son pair. Moreover, most adult males displayed an ambivalent attitude since they showed aggression towards them on one occasion, but groomed, reassured and played on another. The reasons for the variable responses of adult males to a stranger female are discussed in terms of possible differences in their mating strategies.     

An observed birth in a free-living chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) in Gombe National Park,Tanzania

During 19 years of study of chimpanzees in the Gombe National Park only one birth has been observed; this is probably the first such observation for any chimpanzee in the natural habitat. The birth took place in a nest in a tall tree during the morning. Details were recorded by Tanzanian field staff from a neighbouring tree. Labour and parturition are described as well as the mother’s care of the infant immediately after birth. The mother consumed the placenta as she lay in another nest. Throughout the birth process the mother’s juvenile son remained close by and watched with apparent interest. Another mother and her offspring were present during the birth and an adult male approached the mother while she was feeding on the placenta. Their behaviour is described.     

子代身高性别对父母身高的回归分析

对抽样调查的身高数据进行计量分析,建立了子代对亲代身高的回归分析模型,揭示了子代身高与亲代身高的遗传率;研究结果表明,父母身高对下一代的遗传率强度不同,母亲要强于父亲;子女接受遗传的效应也不一样,女儿要强于儿子;建立了性别遗传模型,深入研究了亲代父母之间的身高差对子代性别的影响,亲代身高差越大,则生女孩的几率就越大,反之生男孩的几率就越大．     

甘肃汉族头面部特征亲子相关研究

本文对甘肃永登农村地区69个汉族家庭的父母和成年子女头面部特征进行了亲子相关研究。结果表明:头颅部指数似乎儿子受父亲母亲的影响较强,测量项目似乎女儿受父亲的影响较强;脸面部测量项目的亲子相关表现出一定程度的方向性,儿子或女儿垂直方向的尺寸(高度)似乎受父亲的影响较强,横向(宽度)似乎受母亲的影响较强,从指数上来看,母亲对子女脸面部的影响似乎比父亲强一些。     

Borna disease virus infection in two family clusters of patients with chronic fatigue syndrome.

A high rate of Borna disease virus (BDV) infection has been demonstrated in patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). Herein, we focused on BDV infection in two family clusters of patients with CFS: a father, mother, two sons and one daughter (family #1); and a father, mother, two daughters and one son (family #2). All members, except for the elder son in family #1 and the father and son in family #2, were diagnosed with CFS. The results supported that all the family members with CFS were infected with BDV, as evidenced by the presence of antibodies to viral p40, p24 and/or gp18 and BDV p24 RNA in peripheral blood mononuclear cells. The healthy members, except for the father of family #2 who was positive for antibody to p24, were all negative by both assays. Follow-up studies in family #1 continued to reveal BDV antibodies and BDV RNA, except in the mother, who lost the RNA upon slight recovery from the disease.     

Translocation d'une partie des bras longs d'un chromosome 5 sur les bras longs d'un chromosome du groupe D (Bq-, Dq+) chez un enfant et sa mère

Résumé L'étude du caryotype d'un enfant polymalformé a montré un remaniement (Bq-, Dq+). Cette translocation a été retrouvée chez la mère de la proposante. L'étude des phénotypes correspondant à cette anomalie chromosomique et son mode de transmission seront discutés dans cette note.

---

An autosomal translocation Bq-, Dq+ diagnosed in a girl and her mother is reported.The proband and her mother present similary phenotypical abnormalities: round face, low set ears, hypertelorism, upper lip circumflex formed.The girl shows in addition an important psychomotive retardation which may be explained by one of the following factors: a postnatal meningeal hemorrhage the low I. Q. of both parents the possibility of an aneusomy of recombination during meiosis in mother.

     

Engaging with Dementia: Moral Experiments in Art and Friendship

The box-office as well as critical success of the 2014 major motion picture Still Alice, starring Julianne Moore in the title role and based on the bestselling novel of the same name by the Harvard-trained neuroscientist Lisa Genova (Still Alice. Simon & Schuster, New York, 2009), marked an important moment in public cultural representations of people with dementia. Still Alice tells the story of Alice Howland, an eminent scientist whose increasing memory lapses are eventually diagnosed as early-onset Alzheimer’s, and chronicles the transformations in her family relationships as her husband and three children respond to her decline in different ways. Alice’s husband, her son, and her older daughter all respond by turning toward science, while her younger daughter Lydia seeks to engage her mother as she is now, and turns toward art and relationships. Taking Still Alice and the figure of Lydia as an entry point, I discuss arts-focused efforts to improve the lives of people with dementia, and draw upon ongoing interview-based research on the topic of dementia and friendship, to offer an account of some of the ways that people I have spoken with are actively experimenting with art and with relationships in the face of dementia. I argue that these efforts can be understood as “moral experiements,” in the sense articulated by Cheryl Mattingly (Moral Laboratories: Family Peril and the Struggle for a Good Life. University of California Press, Berkeley, 2014). Although Lydia is a fictional character, her response to Alice’s dementia points toward the kinds of moral experimentation that are in fact possible, and quietly being practiced, by ordinary people every day.     

Estimating paternity confidence

If paternity confidence is less than absolute, sociobiological reasoning leads one to expect a preference for female relatives, and for people related through a female rather than through a male. We obtained ratings of closeness to various relatives and estimated paternity confidence by examining the extent to which certain relatives were preferred to others. The overall estimate suggests that people behave as if seven-eights certain that the husband of their mother is their father.     

Maternal-fetal interaction in the ABO system: a comparative analysis of healthy mothers and couples with recurrent spontaneous abortion suggests a protective effect of B incompatibility.

We investigated the possible differential effects of A and B blood group materno-fetal incompatibility on human fertility through a comparative analysis of couples with recurrent spontaneous abortion (RSA) and healthy mothers. ABO phenotype was determined in 5180 healthy mothers and their newborn babies from the population of Sassari (Sardinia) and in 1359 healthy puerperae (women who have just given birth) from the population of Rome. Mother-newborn joint ABO distribution in healthy mothers was compared with wife-husband joint ABO distribution in RSA couples. Distortions from expected distribution were evaluated by symmetry analysis. In both RSA couples and healthy mothers significant deviation from expected symmetry patterns were observed. Deviations in RSA are in the opposite direction to those observed in healthy puerperae. The most important difference observed concerned the symmetric joint phenotypes mother (women) A/infant (husband) B (B incompatible) and mother (women) B/infant (husband) A (A incompatible). A low number of B incompatible in RSA couples and a high number of B incompatible in healthy mothers was observed. The phenomenon is much more evident in women aged 24-28 years, a period of maximum fecundity. It is possible that the presence of anti-B immunoglobulin in the mother might have a protective effect against fetal loss in some cases of mother-infant ABO incompatibility.     

Identical mitochondrial DNA deletion in a woman with ocular myopathy and in her son with pearson syndrome

Single deletions of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) are associated with three major clinical conditions: Kearns-Sayre syndrome, a multisystem disorder; Pearson syndrome (PS), a disorder of the hematopoietic system; and progressive external ophthalmoplegia (PEO), primarily affecting the ocular muscles. Typically, single mtDNA deletions are sporadic events, since the mothers, siblings, and offspring of affected individuals are unaffected. We studied a woman who presented with PEO, ptosis, and weakness of pharyngeal, facial, neck, and limb muscles. She had two unaffected children, but another of her children, an infant son, had sideroblastic anemia, was diagnosed with PS, and died at age 1 year. Morphological analysis of a muscle biopsy sample from the mother showed cytochrome c oxidase-negative ragged-red fibers-a typical pattern in patients with mtDNA deletions. Southern blot analysis using multiple restriction endonucleases and probed with multiple mtDNA fragments showed that both the mother and her infant son harbored an identical 5,355-bp single deletion in mtDNA, without flanking direct repeats. The deletion was the only abnormal species of mtDNA identified in both patients, and there was no evidence for duplications. We conclude that, although the vast majority of single large-scale deletions in mtDNA are sporadic, in rare cases, single deletions can be transmitted through the germline.     

Familial retinoblastoma (mother and son) with 13q14 deletion

Summary We present here the first familial cases (a mother and son) of dominantly inherited retinoblastoma with a 13q14 deletion [46,XY or XX,del(13)(q14.1q21.2)]. Their esterase D activities in red blood cells were as low as 50% of the normal control and the haplotype of esterase D was a type 1-0 in the mother and a type 2-0 in the son. They had peculiar facies characterized by a high forehead, low and broad nasal root, a short and bulbous nose, a long philtrum, and open mouth with a thin upper lip, and prominent earlobes. Chromosome and esterase D analysis should be performed in patients with retinoblastoma even if retinoblastoma seems to be transmitted through an autosomal dominant inheritance. This family indicates that one of the causes of dominantly inherited retinoblastoma is a chromosome deletion of part of the 13q14 band whether it is detectable by chromosome analysis or not.     

Son preference and intimate partner violence victimization in India: examining the role of actual and desired family composition

Son preference has been considered as a determinant of women's risk of intimate partner violence (IPV) experience in India, although quantitative evidence from large nationally representative studies testing this relationship is limited. This study examines the association between husband's son preference, sex composition of children and risk of physical and sexual IPV victimization among wives. Information was collected for 26,284 couples in the nationally representative 2005-2006 National Family Health Survey of India. The exposures were husband's son preference measured as husband's desire for one or more sons greater than the number of daughters and sex composition of the household: only sons, only daughters and mixed. Outcome included past year physical and/or sexual IPV. The results showed that husband's reported son preference (RR: 1.05; 95% CI: 0.98-1.13) and sex composition of children were not associated with risk for IPV victimization in the models adjusted for socio-demographic factors. The findings from this first population-based study of socio-cultural norms around son preference and married Indian women's risk for IPV victimization indicate that cultural preference for sons does not influence women's risk for IPV victimization.     

In Sync with the Family: Children and Partners Influence the Sleep‐Wake Circadian Rhythm and Social Habits of Women

Different factors have been proposed to influence morningness‐eveningness, biological rhythms, and sleep‐wake cycles, but few studies focused on the influence of social habits. Here, we focus on the influence of children and partners on the social habits of women at different stages of their lives and on synchronization within the family. One hundred and seventy‐nine women participated in the study and were allocated into four groups: women without children, pregnant women without children, pregnant women with children, and non‐pregnant mothers. Morningness was predicted by the presence of children, and earlier chronotype was predicted by the presence of children, pregnancy, and age. Average sleep duration was longest in pregnant women. The presence of children was responsible for a difference in rise times of approximately 1.5 h on the weekend. Subjective sleep‐onset latencies were shortest in women with children. The synchrony between partners (husband/wife) was 0.46 in women without children, 0.79 in pregnant women, 0.40 in women with children, and 0.56 between mother and child. Partners’ chronotypes were highly correlated, as were those of mother and child. This study suggests children have a strong influence on their mother's lifestyle and sleep‐wake rhythm, far beyond the first months of life, and that children are a more important social factor than the male partner.     

Counselling as death approaches: is the New Yorker really the best we can do?

An expert in palliative care has taken exception to a recent CMAJ article dealing with euthanasia. That column praised a magazine article in which a son explained why he and his family had helped their mother commit suicide in the face of a terminal illness. Dr. Balfour Mount says the article was misleading and offers no credible solutions to the issues surrounding palliative care.     

Mother-child HLA compatibility ratios in children of Amerinidian parents who share common haplotypes.

Among 166 children whose parents share the HLA-A, -B, and -C antigens of at least one haplotype, there is a superficial concordance between observed and expected proportions of children whose mothers would recognize no foreign antigen in them. However, this balance is composed of fewer (64%) homozygous offspring than expected and more (147%) than the expected number of genotypes identical to the mother's. A homozygous child would be expected to recognize his or her mother as foreign, unless the mother was also homozygous, but an HLA-identical child would not. Thus, the number of children who might be immunologically tolerant of their mothers was greater than expected. No one of the three loci included in designating haplotypes was individually responsible for the divergences in haplotype frequency.