there is no data to tell us whether these effects continue into adolescence over per cent of all three generations reported harmonious relations between generations research in kwazulunatal found that grandmothers perceive themselves as important in building families educating younger generations and providing generational continuity cattell a survey of rural women in the same province with an average age of years suggested that most of them felt empowered when they took responsibility for important family decisions including the education of grandchildren moller these women were proud to be homemakers and of adopting the traditional male role as providers of the family if their men were unemployed poverty was identified as the core driver behind most of these changes examples including families seeking to benefit financially from their daughters marrying before they lose their virginity a second driver was the gradual loss of traditions such as the initiation rites for boys where manhood is proved by fending for themselves in the bush and instruction to girls on sexual matters by their madrinha godmothers and the absence of replacements