Breastfeeding is a practice that involves teaching and learning across generations. Women experiencing breastfeeding need models that come from their mothers and maternal grandmothers. Therefore, this study's objectives were to capture social representations concerning breastfeeding held by women from three different generations of the same family and identify continuities and discontinuities in the practice and representation related to the phenomenon and the work of nurses in this process. This qualitative study based on the Social Representations Theory was developed in a hospital in Itabuna, BA, Brazil. The sample consisted of 21 women. Data were collected between October 2009 and July 2010. We show that the representations move between positive and negative perceptions, and that the teaching-learning process is conducted across generations, especially by nurses, through observation and the media, and that childcare is defined by feeding, body, health and affection. We conclude that it is necessary to understand the representations from both individual and generational perspectives.
Breastfeeding; Family; Generation; Woman; Nursing