The Kids are Okay
Does Affluence Impoverish the Experience of Parenting?
Kostadin Kushlev, Claire Ashton-James & Elizabeth Dunn
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Acquiring greater financial resources before having children seems like an intuitive strategy for people to enhance their well-being during parenthood. However, research suggests that affluence may activate an agentic orientation, propelling people to pursue personal goals and independence from others, creating a conflict with the communal nature of parenting. Coherence between one's goals and actions has been theorized to be essential for the experience of meaning in life. Thus, we hypothesized that affluence would be associated with a diminished sense of meaning during childcare. In Study 1, using the Day Reconstruction Method (DRM), we found that socioeconomic status (SES) was negatively related to the average sense of meaning parents reported across episodes of the day when they were taking care of their children. In Study 2, a reminder of wealth produced a parallel effect; when parents were exposed to a photograph of money, they reported a lower sense of meaning in life while spending time with their kids at a children's festival. These findings contribute to our understanding of the relationship between wealth and well-being by showing that affluence can compromise a central subjective benefit of parenting - a sense of meaning in life.
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In Defense of Parenthood: Children Are Associated With More Joy Than Misery
Katherine Nelson et al.
Psychological Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Recent scholarly and media accounts paint a portrait of unhappy parents who find remarkably little joy in taking care of their children, but the scientific basis for these claims remains inconclusive. In three studies, we used a strategy of converging evidence to test whether parents evaluate their lives more positively than do non-parents (Study 1), feel relatively better than non-parents on a day-to-day basis (Study 2), and derive more positive feelings from caring for their children than other daily activities (Study 3). The results indicate that, contrary to previous reports, parents (and especially fathers) report relatively higher levels of happiness, positive emotion, and meaning in life.
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Birth Spacing and Sibling Outcomes
Kasey Buckles & Elizabeth Munnich
Journal of Human Resources, Summer 2012, Pages 613-642
Abstract:
Using the NLSY79 and NLSY79 Child and Young Adult Surveys, we investigate the effect of the age difference between siblings (spacing) on educational achievement. Because spacing may be endogenous, we use an instrumental variables strategy that exploits variation in spacing driven by miscarriages. The IV results indicate that a one-year increase in spacing increases test scores for older siblings by about 0.17 standard deviations. These results are larger than the OLS estimates, suggesting that failing to account for the endogeneity of spacing may understate its benefits. For younger siblings, we find no causal impact of spacing on test scores.
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Are first-borns more likely to attend Harvard?
Antony Millner & Raphael Calel
Significance, June 2012, Pages 37-39
Abstract:
Between 75% and 80% of students at Harvard are first-borns. Do first-born children work harder academically, and so end up overrepresented at top universities? So claims noted philosopher Michael Sandel. But Antony Millner and Raphael Calel find a simple fault in the statistical reasoning and give a more plausible explanation.
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System Justifying Functions of Myths that Exaggerate the Emotional Rewards of Children
Richard Eibach & Steven Mock
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Popular beliefs exaggerate the emotional rewards of caring for children. These beliefs may persist because they provide ideological legitimacy for policies that otherwise might appear to exploit parents' contributions to the public good. Studies 1a and 1b tested whether information suggesting that parents' labor is unjustly exploited by society motivates people to exaggerate the emotional rewards of parenthood. Study 2 manipulated participants' exposure to parenthood idealizing myths to test whether these myths reduce support for expanding government assistance to parents. Across these studies support was found for the hypothesis that exaggerating the emotional rewards of children functions to legitimize and maintain low public assistance to parents. Theoretical insights into system justifying ideologies and practical implications for social justice movements are discussed.
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The Well-Being of Children Living With Interethnic Parents: Are They at a Disadvantage?
Jennifer Pearce-Morris & Valarie King
Journal of Family Issues, July 2012, Pages 898-919
Abstract:
An increasing number of U.S. children are living with interethnic parents, yet we know relatively little about how they are faring. Using data from the first wave (1987-1988) of the National Survey of Families and Households, this study examines differences in child well-being between children living with interethnic parents and those living with same-ethnic parents. Results provide only limited evidence that child well-being is lower among children living with interethnic parents. Compared with children in same-ethnic families, children living with interethnic parents exhibited higher levels of negative affect, and this difference could not be explained by differences in background or family characteristics, levels of parents' relationship stressors, or parenting quality. At the same time, however, no differences were found in global well-being, positive affect, or behavior problems. Children living with interethnic parents may face some greater difficulties that warrant concern, but they do not appear to face pervasive disadvantages.
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Mark Regnerus
Social Science Research, July 2012, Pages 752-770
Abstract:
The New Family Structures Study (NFSS) is a social-science data-collection project that fielded a survey to a large, random sample of American young adults (ages 18-39) who were raised in different types of family arrangements. In this debut article of the NFSS, I compare how the young-adult children of a parent who has had a same-sex romantic relationship fare on 40 different social, emotional, and relational outcome variables when compared with six other family-of-origin types. The results reveal numerous, consistent differences, especially between the children of women who have had a lesbian relationship and those with still-married (heterosexual) biological parents. The results are typically robust in multivariate contexts as well, suggesting far greater diversity in lesbian-parent household experiences than convenience-sample studies of lesbian families have revealed. The NFSS proves to be an illuminating, versatile dataset that can assist family scholars in understanding the long reach of family structure and transitions.
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Same-Sex Parent Families and Children's Academic Achievement
Daniel Potter
Journal of Marriage and Family, June 2012, Pages 556-571
Abstract:
Children in traditional families (i.e., married, 2 biological parents) tend to do better than their peers in nontraditional families. An exception to this pattern appears to be children from same-sex parent families. Children with lesbian mothers or gay fathers do not exhibit the poorer outcomes typically associated with nontraditional families. Studies of same-sex parent families, however, have relied on a static conceptualization of the family and discounted the importance of the timing and number of family transitions for understanding children's outcomes. To examine whether same-sex parent families represent an exception among nontraditional families, the author used data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten cohort (N = 19,043) to create a dynamic indicator of children's family structure and tested its association with math assessment scores. The results indicated that children in same-sex parent families scored lower than their peers in married, 2-biological parent households, but the difference was nonsignificant net of family transitions.
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Henny Bos et al.
Gender & Society, forthcoming
Abstract:
This article focuses on the influence of male role models on the lives of adolescents (N = 78) in the U.S. National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study. Half of the adolescents had male role models; those with and those without male role models had similar scores on the feminine and masculine scales of the Bem Sex Role Inventory, as well as on the trait subscales of the State-Trait Personality Inventory (anxiety, anger, depression, and curiosity) and the Child Behavior Checklist (internalizing, externalizing, and total problem behavior). A positive association was found between feminine gender role traits and curiosity, and a negative correlation between this trait and internalizing problem behavior; these associations were independent of the gender of the adolescents and the presence of male role models. In sum, the absence of male role models did not adversely affect the psychological adjustment of adolescents reared by lesbian mothers.
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Loren Marks
Social Science Research, July 2012, Pages 735-751
Abstract:
In 2005, the American Psychological Association (APA) issued an official brief on lesbian and gay parenting. This brief included the assertion: "Not a single study has found children of lesbian or gay parents to be disadvantaged in any significant respect relative to children of heterosexual parents" (p. 15). The present article closely examines this assertion and the 59 published studies cited by the APA to support it. Seven central questions address: (1) homogeneous sampling, (2) absence of comparison groups, (3) comparison group characteristics, (4) contradictory data, (5) the limited scope of children's outcomes studied, (6) paucity of long-term outcome data, and (7) lack of APA-urged statistical power. The conclusion is that strong assertions, including those made by the APA, were not empirically warranted. Recommendations for future research are offered.
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Joseph Mahoney & Andrea Vest
Journal of Research on Adolescence, forthcoming
Abstract:
Concern exists that youth who spend a lot of time participating in organized out-of-school activities (e.g., sports) are at-risk for poor developmental outcomes. This concern - called the over-scheduling hypothesis - has primarily been assessed in terms of adolescent adjustment. This longitudinal study of a nationally representative sample of 1,115 youth (ages 12-18) assessed long-term relations between intensity of participation during adolescence and adjustment at young adulthood (ages 18-24). Time diaries measured intensity as hours per week of participation. Results showed that, controlling for demographic factors and baseline adjustment, intensity was a significant predictor of positive outcomes (e.g., psychological flourishing, civic engagement, and educational attainment) and unrelated to indicators of problematic adjustment (e.g., psychological distress, substance use, and antisocial behavior) at young adulthood.
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The Tragic (but Hidden) Toll of The Great Recession on Children
Seth Stephens-Davidowitz
Harvard Working Paper, February 2012
Abstract:
I test the effects of the recent recession, and resulting budget cuts, on both the incidence and reporting of child maltreatment using a variety of sources. States comparatively affected by the recession have seen relative increases in children dying from neglect and Google searches suspecting child abuse. These two proxies suggest child maltreatment was 8.1 to 11.7 percent higher due to the recent recession than it otherwise would have been. However, states comparatively affected by the recession have seen relative decreases in reported cases of child maltreatment. The decrease in reports is more likely in states that significantly cut their budgets. While the marginal child maltreatment report has a lower-than-average probability of being substantiated, evidence suggests that many cases that would have been substantiated were not reported due to cuts. Budget cuts led to roughly 40,000 American maltreated children annually not receiving assistance.
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Linda Witek-Janusek et al.
Brain, Behavior, and Immunity, forthcoming
Abstract:
Women respond differentially to the stress-associated with breast cancer diagnosis and treatment, with some women experiencing more intense and/or sustained behavioral symptoms and immune dysregulation than others. Childhood adversity has been identified to produce long-term dysregulation of stress response systems, increasing reactivity to stressors encountered during adulthood. This study determined whether childhood adversity increased vulnerability for more intense and sustained behavioral symptoms (fatigue, perceived stress, and depressive symptoms), poorer quality of life, and greater immune dysregulation in women (N = 40) with breast cancer. Evaluation was after breast surgery and through early survivorship. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to examine intra-individual and inter-individual differences with respect to initial status and to the pattern of change (i.e. trajectory) of outcomes. At initial assessment, women exposed to childhood emotional neglect/abuse had greater perceived stress, fatigue, depressive symptoms and poorer quality of life, as well as lower natural killer cell activity (NKCA). Although these outcomes improved over time, women with greater childhood emotional neglect/abuse exhibited worse outcomes through early survivorship. No effect was observed on the trajectory for these outcomes. In contrast, childhood physical neglect predicted sustained trajectories of greater perceived stress, worse quality of life, and elevated plasma IL-6; with no effect observed at initial assessment. Thus, childhood adversity leaves an enduring imprint, increasing vulnerability for behavioral symptoms, poor quality of life, and elevations in IL-6 in women with breast cancer. Further, childhood adversity predisposes to lower NKCA at a critical time when this immune-effector mechanism is most effective at halting nascent tumor seeding.
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Basal Cell Carcinoma: Stressful Life Events and the Tumor Environment
Christopher Fagundes et al.
Archives of General Psychiatry, June 2012, Pages 618-626
Context: Child emotional maltreatment can result in lasting immune dysregulation that may be heightened in the context of more recent life stress. Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is the most common skin cancer, and the immune system plays a prominent role in tumor appearance and progression.
Objective: To address associations among recent severe life events, childhood parental emotional maltreatment, depression, and messenger RNA (mRNA) coding for immune markers associated with BCC tumor progression and regression.
Design: We collected information about early parent-child experiences, severe life events in the past year as assessed by the Life Events and Difficulties Schedule, depression, and mRNA for immune markers associated with BCC tumor progression and regression from patients with BCC tumors.
Setting: University medical center.
Participants: Ninety-one patients with BCC (ages, 23-92 years) who had a previous BCC tumor.
Main Outcome Measures: The expression of 4 BCC tumor mRNA markers (CD25, CD3ϵ, intercellular adhesion molecule 1, and CD68) that have been linked to BCC tumor progression and regression were assessed in BCC tumor biopsy specimens.
Results: Both maternal and paternal emotional maltreatment interacted with the occurrence of severe life events to predict the local immune response to the tumor (adjusted P = .009 and P = .03, respectively). Among BCC patients who had experienced a severe life event within the past year, those who were emotionally maltreated by their mothers (P = .007) or fathers (P = .02) as children had a poorer immune response to the BCC tumor. Emotional maltreatment was unrelated to BCC immune responses among those who did not experience a severe life event. Depressive symptoms were not associated with the local tumor immune response.
Conclusions: Troubled early parent-child relationships, in combination with a severe life event in the past year, predicted immune responses to a BCC tumor. The immunoreactivity observed in BCCs and the surrounding stroma reflects an anti-tumor-specific immune response that can be altered by stress.
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The Intergenerational Continuity of Fathers' Absence in a Socioeconomically Disadvantaged Sample
Erin Pougnet et al.
Journal of Marriage and Family, June 2012, Pages 540-555
Abstract:
Fathers' absence is a pattern that shows intergenerational continuity, most notably within disadvantaged populations. The process whereby this pattern is repeated across generations is not well understood. Using data from the Concordia Longitudinal Risk Project, the authors investigated pathways between fathers' absence in 1 generation and the experience of fathers' absence by their children. The current sample included 386 socioeconomically at-risk individuals across 2 waves of data collection: (a) when they were children and (b) when they were adults with their own children. Analyses based on structural equation modeling revealed that men whose fathers were absent when they were children were more likely to become absent fathers, and women whose fathers were absent when they were children were more likely to have children with absent partners. Indirect pathways between fathers' absence in 2 generations through aggression, education, and substance abuse were illustrated for women. These findings add to the literature suggesting that fathers' absence during childhood has intergenerational effects.
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"Like Parent, Like Child?": The Intergenerational Transmission of Nonmarital Childbearing
Robin Högnäs & Marcia Carlson
Social Science Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Data from the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth (N=11,180) are used to examine the intergenerational transmission of nonmarital childbearing for U.S. men and women. Findings suggest that being born to unmarried parents increases the risk of offspring having a nonmarital first birth, net of various confounding characteristics. This intergenerational link appears to particularly operate via parents' breaking up before offspring are age 14 and offspring's young age at first sex. While the link across two generations in nonmarital childbearing is not accounted for by parents' socioeconomic status (measured as fathers' education), several mediating factors vary by socioeconomic background. Gender and race/ethnicity also moderate the intergenerational transmission of nonmarital childbearing. This research sheds light on the prevalence of, and process by which, nonmarital childbearing is repeated across generations, which has important implications for long-term social stratification and inequality.
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Children's Behavior Problems in the United States and Great Britain
Toby Parcel, Lori Ann Campbell & Wenxuan Zhong
Journal of Health and Social Behavior, June 2012, Pages 165-182
Abstract:
We analyze the effects of family capital on child behavior problems in the United States and Great Britain by comparing a longitudinal survey sample of 5- to 13-year-old children from the 1994 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (N = 3,864) with a similar sample of children from the 1991 National Child Development Study "British Child" (N = 1,430). Findings suggest that in both societies, male children, those with health problems, and those whose mothers are divorced are at increased risk for behavior problems, while those with stronger home environments are at reduced risk. Family structure effects are more pervasive in Great Britain than in the United States, although some of these findings are a function of our racially diverse U.S. sample. We conclude that parents are important in both societies in promoting child social adjustment, and evidence that the more developed welfare state in Great Britain may substitute for capital at home is weak.
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How important is family background for labour-economic outcomes?
Anders Björklund & Markus Jäntti
Labour Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper uses Swedish register data to examine four classical outcomes in empirical labour economics: IQ, noncognitive skills, years of schooling and long-run earnings. We estimate sibling correlations - and the variance components that define the sibling correlation - in these outcomes. We also estimate correlations for MZ-twins, who share all genes. We also extend the variance-component decomposition by accounting for birth order. We find that conventional intergenerational approaches severely underestimate the role of family background, and that future research should follow a more multidimensional approach to the study of family background.
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Multiple-Father Families and Welfare
Eirik Evenhouse & Siobhán Reilly
Journal of Family Issues, July 2012, Pages 966-995
Abstract:
In the United States, multipartnered fertility (MPF) has become commonplace. This study provides the first nationally representative measures of women's MPF, across multiple years, using the U.S. Census Bureau's Surveys of Income and Program Participation. Because welfare rules contain strong incentives for MPF, and because MPF is especially common among welfare recipients, the authors also examine the relationship between welfare and MPF. Focusing on the pre-TANF period 1985 to 1996, when welfare rules were more comparable across states and the absence of time limits made the incentives for MPF larger, the authors find little behavioral response. Among low-income mothers, MPF does not appear to be driven by program design. Because the incentives were relatively large and reached well up the income distribution, the findings amplify those of earlier studies that show little demographic response to antipoverty programs and invite reconsideration of how much these incentives should constrain transfer programs that target children.
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The Legacy of Leaving Home: Long-Term Effects of Coresidence on Parent - Child Relationships
Thomas Leopold
Journal of Marriage and Family, June 2012, Pages 399-412
Abstract:
This study investigated how early, "on-time," and late home leavers differed in their relations to parents in later life. A life course perspective suggested different pathways by which the time spent in the parental home may set the stage for intergenerational solidarity in aging families. Using fixed-effects models with data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (N = 14,739 parent - child dyads), the author assessed the effects of previous coresidence on intergenerational proximity, contact frequency, and support exchange more than 5 years after children had left home. The results indicated that, compared with siblings who moved out "on time," late home leavers lived closer to their aging parents, maintained more frequent contact, and were more likely to be providers as well as receivers of intergenerational support. Overall, this evidence paints a positive picture of extended coresidence, revealing its potential to promote intergenerational solidarity across the life course.
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"Keep on Keeping On, Even When It's Hard!": Predictors and Outcomes of Adolescent Persistence
Laura Padilla-Walker et al.
Journal of Early Adolescence, forthcoming
Abstract:
The current study examined adolescent persistence as a mediator between authoritative parenting and adolescents' school engagement, prosocial behavior, and delinquency. Participants were taken from Time 2, 3, and 4 of the Flourishing Families Project and included 325 two-parent families with a child between the ages of 11 and 14 at Time 2 (mean age = 12.34, SD = 1.06, 52% female), 96% of whom had complete data for Time 4 (2 years later). Analyses suggested that authoritative fathering at Time 2 (but not mothering) was positively associated with adolescent persistence at Time 3, and adolescent persistence was positively related to school engagement and negatively related to delinquency at Time 4. Discussion focuses on the importance of the socialization of persistence during adolescence.
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Social Antecedents of Children's Trustworthiness
Ken Rotenberg et al.
Infant and Child Development, May/June 2012, Pages 310-322
Abstract:
A total of 1329 children were tested twice across 1 year (M = 7 years 5 months of age at Time 1 (T1)) in the Zurich Project on Social Development. The measures at T1 were corporal punishment, neighbourhood trustworthiness and children's trustworthiness (not lying/cheating and not stealing). At Time 2 (T2), children reported the promise keeping of their classmates, which, via social relations analyses, yielded evidence for individual differences in reliability trustworthiness. Structural equation modelling analyses confirmed that there was stability in children's trustworthiness as a latent variable. The structural equation modelling further yielded evidence that (1) corporal punishment at T1 was negatively associated with children's trustworthiness at T1 and negatively predicted changes in children's trustworthiness and (2) neighbourhood trustworthiness at T1 was positively associated with children's trustworthiness at T1 and positively predicted changes in children's trustworthiness. The findings yielded support for the hypotheses that corporal punishment negatively, and neighbourhood trustworthiness positively, contributes to the development of trustworthiness in children.
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Assessing Causality and Persistence in Associations Between Family Dinners and Adolescent Well-Being
Kelly Musick & Ann Meier
Journal of Marriage and Family, June 2012, Pages 476-493
Abstract:
Adolescents who share meals with their parents score better on a range of well-being indicators. Using 3 waves of the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health (N = 17,977), the authors assessed the causal nature of these associations and the extent to which they persist into adulthood. They examined links between family dinners and adolescent mental health, substance use, and delinquency at Wave 1, accounting for detailed measures of the family environment to test whether family meals simply proxy for other family processes. As a more stringent test of causality, they estimated fixed-effects models from Waves 1 and 2, and they used Wave 3 to explore persistence in the influence of family dinners. Associations between family dinners and adolescent well-being remained significant, net of controls, and some held up to stricter tests of causality. Beyond indirect benefits via earlier well-being, however, family dinners associations did not persist into adulthood.
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The neural correlates of maternal sensitivity: An fMRI study
Erica Musser, Heidemarie Kaiser-Laurent & Jennifer Ablow
Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, forthcoming
Abstract:
Research on maternal neural response to infant distress highlights circuits that may underlie differences in quality of maternal behavior. However, it is far from clear which circuits are relevant to maternal sensitivity, as opposed to other maternal behavioral dimensions, particularly after the early postpartum. This study examined maternal sensitivity, intrusiveness, and mother-infant dyadic harmony as correlates of mothers' neural responses to the cries of their own infants. Twenty-two primiparous mothers were observed during an interaction with their infants at 18 months postpartum. In a separate functional neuroimaging session, mothers were exposed to their own infant's cry sound, as well as unfamiliar infant's cry and control sounds. Mothers who displayed more sensitive behaviors with their infant exhibited greater activation to their own infant's cry compared to that of an unfamiliar infant in the right frontal pole and inferior frontal gyrus. Mothers who displayed more intrusive behaviors with their infant showed greater activation in the left anterior insula and temporal pole, while mothers who had more harmonious interactions with their infant displayed greater activation in left hippocampal regions. The roles of these areas in the regulation of maternal emotion and stress, self and other awareness, and empathy are examined.
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Child-Care Subsidies: Do They Impact the Quality of Care Children Experience?
Anna Johnson, Rebecca Ryan & Jeanne Brooks-Gunn
Child Development, forthcoming
Abstract:
The federal child-care subsidy program represents one of the government's largest investments in early care and education, but little is known about whether it increases low-income children's access to higher quality child care. This study used newly available nationally representative data on 4-year-old children (N = 750) to investigate whether subsidy receipt elevates child-care quality. Results indicate that subsidy recipients use higher quality care compared to nonrecipients who use no other publicly funded care, but lower quality care compared to nonrecipients who instead use Head Start or public pre-k. Findings suggest that subsidies may have the potential to enhance care quality but that parents who use subsidies are not accessing the highest quality care available to low-income families.
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Revising Our Thinking About the Relationship Between Maternal Labor Supply and Preschool
Maria Donovan Fitzpatrick
Journal of Human Resources, Summer 2012, Pages 583-612
Abstract:
Many argue that childcare costs limit the labor supply of mothers, though existing evidence has been mixed. Using a child's eligibility for public kindergarten in a regression discontinuity instrumental variables framework, I estimate how use of a particular subsidy, public school, affects maternal labor supply. I find public school enrollment increases only the employment of single mothers without additional young children. I compare this result to previous work, focusing on striking increases in a similar setting but earlier period (Gelabch 2002). Differences in the population of mothers, labor supply, and patterns of lifecycle events likely drive the discrepancy in results.
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The Value of Family Routines for the Academic Success of Vulnerable Adolescents
Kathleen Roche & Sharon Ghazarian
Journal of Family Issues, July 2012, Pages 874-897
Abstract:
This study examined associations between mother reports of family routines and adolescent academic success. The authors used prospective data from "Welfare, Children, and Families: A Three City Study" (N = 1,147), a study of low-income urban youth and mothers. The vast majority of youth were African American (43%) or Latino (47%); youth were an average of 12-years-old at Time 1. Academic success was assessed by youth's self-reported grades, self-reported educational expectations, and standardized achievement scores. Results from structural equation models indicated that Time 1 family routines were associated with better academic success at Time 2, which, in turn, was associated with higher academic achievement and educational expectations at Time 3. Routines were less strongly associated with higher educational expectations and achievement when mothers reported more destabilizing family life events. Moderating effects of family instability varied by youth gender and whether youth were in earlier versus later phases of adolescence.
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Intergenerational Transmission of Values over the Family Life Course
Joohong Min, Merril Silverstein & Jessica Lendon
Advances in Life Course Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Literature consistently shows that parents transmit their values to children, but less is known about the persistence and timing of value transmission over the life course, how the quality of intergenerational relationships moderates the strength of transmission, and how transmission may be sensitive to the type of value considered. We addressed our research questions using 1971 and 2000 waves of the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG). The sample consisted of 775 parent-child dyads in which parents averaged 44 years old in 1971 and their offspring averaged 48 years old in 2000. Religious beliefs and gender role attitudes were the two values considered. We found intergenerational value similarity with regard to children's values in 2000 were mostly the result of early transmission. The quality of the parent-child relationship strengthened the contemporaneous transmission of religious beliefs and the lagged transmission of gender role attitudes. The transmission of gender role attitudes was considerably weaker and less stable over time than it was for religious orientation but tended to have a lagged impact under conditions of high solidarity. We discuss the role of parents' influence on their children's value orientations in terms of a relational, life course, and societal process.
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Poverty and Single Parenting: Relations with Preschoolers' Cortisol and Effortful Control
Maureen Zalewski et al.
Infant and Child Development, forthcoming
Abstract:
Poverty and single parent status, which often co-occur, have been shown to relate to lower effortful control, and this may be in part due to disruptions in hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis activity. Both poverty and single parent status may compromise parenting, which in turn may disrupt HPA axis activity and the development of effortful control. We examined whether parenting and HPA axis activity accounted for the effects of poverty and single parent status on the development of effortful control in preschool children (N = 78). Effortful control was measured at two time points, 6 months apart. Individually, poverty and single parent status were related to blunted HPA axis activity, characterized by low AM and PM cortisol. However, when examined together, the effects were present only for preschoolers whose parents were in poverty. Parental warmth and negativity accounted for the relations between poverty and blunted cortisol. Blunted cortisol was related to lower effortful control at Time 2. These results suggest a pathway through which poverty may impact children's developing effortful control through parenting, which in turn may shape HPA axis activity.
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Rianne Kok et al.
Developmental Psychobiology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Maternal discipline is an important predictor of child committed compliance. Maternal stress can affect both parenting and child development. In a large population-based cohort study (N = 613) we examined whether maternal discipline mediated the association between maternal stress during pregnancy and child compliance, and whether COMT or DRD4 polymorphisms moderated the association between maternal discipline and child compliance. Family-related and general stress were measured through maternal self-report and genetic material was collected through cord blood sampling at birth. Mother-child dyads were observed at 36 months in disciplinary tasks in which the child was not allowed to touch attractive toys. Maternal discipline and child compliance were observed in two different tasks and independently coded. The association between family stress during pregnancy and child committed compliance was mediated by maternal positive discipline. Children with more COMT Met alleles seemed more susceptible to maternal positive discipline than children with more COMT Val alleles.
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Getting a High-Speed Family Connection: Associations Between Family Media Use and Family Connection
Laura Padilla-Walker, Sarah Coyne & Ashley Fraser
Family Relations, July 2012, Pages 426-440
Abstract:
The way families have used the media has substantially changed over the past decade. Within the framework of family systems theory, this paper examines the relations between family media use and family connection in a sample of 453 adolescents (mean age of child = 14.32 years, SD = 0.98, 52% female) and their parents. Results revealed that cell phone use and watching television or movies were the most common mediums used in families. Analyses also revealed that greater amounts of family cell phone use, coviewing of TV and movies, and coplaying of video games were associated with higher levels of family connection. Conversely, engagement over social networking sites was related to lower levels of family connection, at least from the adolescent's perspective. Implications for practitioners are discussed.