ABSTRACT
This chapter presents and discusses one aspect of an ongoing research project on elderly persons utilizing home help services in Japan and Sweden. It examines the quality of the home help services from the user's point of view, as well as from the perspective of family members. The categories that the researchers in Japan have found and formulated from the interviews are based on the assumption that the users of home help services are the primary caregivers, thus the family caregiver. The chapter argues that comparative socio-cultural research designs, as it can both help researchers become aware of their culturally coloured 'glasses', and provide tools with which to work with the empirical material. In Sweden, independence is nearly seen as a necessary quality for a close relationship between grown children and parents. The chapter suggests that the term familism can come in handy, especially when we look at social structures and legislation.
