Research
The Family Support Agency funds research on family issues related to its direct functions. The Minister for Community, Equality and Gaeltacht affairs may also request the Agency to undertake or commission research.
Prior to the establishment of the Agency in 2003, Family Research was funded by the then Department of Social & Family Affairs. Since the establishment of the Agency’s research programme in 2004, it has funded research through:
- the direct commissioning of research
- the provision of research grant aid
- sponsorship of a Masters/PhD sponsorship scheme
Commissioned Research
The Agency commissions research on issues of direct relevance to its own activities.
Two studies have been commissioned:
- An assessment of the contribution of the Family Support Agency’s Family Mediation Service
- The development of a family research strategy including a strategy for the Agency's research function. This project also involved the development of a database of all family relevant research in the last 10 years. Click to visit the Family Research Database.
Grant-Aided Research
The Agency advertises the availability of research grants under its annual Call for Research. Funding has been provided to these projects:
- Report on Attitudes to Family Formation in Ireland
This major new report was commissioned by the Family Support Agency and explores Irish people’s attitudes to family formation in the context of changes in gender role attitudes and behaviours and the changing nature of the family in Ireland.
The study entitled ‘Attitudes to Family Formation in Ireland’ was conducted by Trinity College Dublin and contains major new findings on marriage, cohabitation and child-bearing in Ireland.
The full report is available here in PDF format: Attitudes to Family Formation in Ireland - Report on Households and Family Structures in Ireland
A study entitled “Households and Family Structures in Ireland” has now been published. The study was conducted by the ESRI and with the aid of funding from the Family Support Agency.
The study demonstrate how changes in Irish society in recent decades have greatly transformed the landscape with regard to household formations, cohabitation and the family structures within which the country’s children now live.
The full report is available here in PDF format: Households and Family Structures in Ireland - One Family (principal investigator), a project titled Supporting Child Contact: The Need for Child Contact Centres in Ireland. Published in April 2010. For more information click on the reports title above
- ESRI (principal investigator), a project titled ‘Family Figures: Trends in family dynamics and family types in Ireland, 1986-2006’. Published in February 2010. For more information click the report's title above.
- Dr. Margret Fine-Davis, Trinity College Dublin (principal investigator), a project titled ‘Changing Gender Role Attitudes and Behaviour: Implications for Family Formation in Ireland’
- Dr Virpi Timonen, Trinity College Dublin (principal investigator), a project titled: ‘The Role of Grandparents in Divorced and Separated Families in Ireland’. Published in November 2009. For more information click the report's title above.
Masters/ PhD sponsorship scheme
Established in 2008, the Agency is sponsoring a PhD student based in Trinity College Dublin to pursue her Doctorate. The project title is ‘Immigration, Identity & Children’s Community Relations’.
