An exploratory qualitative study of 16 disadvantaged youth in 5 countries suggests that making both precocious and developmentally appropriate contributions to their families' well-being is advantageous to adolescents coping with chronic adversity. All youth were known to be doing well (as identified by community advisors) and showed patterns of…

This study examined family rules about nutrition, exercise, and sun protection in 164 parent-young adult children dyads. Both parents and their young adult children independently reported on health rules that they perceived throughout their child's adolescent years and the extent to which the rules were articulated, violations sanctioned, and…

Framed by equity theory, fairness beliefs regarding child support modification to account for the financial impact of remarriage and subsequent childbirth were assessed. Based on a random sample of 407 Kentucky residents using a multiple segment factorial vignette approach, modification was supported by 57% of respondents following remarriage, but…

The present study uses observational assessment of 66 two-parent families working and playing together when their eldest child is in kindergarten and again in ninth grade to identify distinct patterns of family functioning derived from structural family systems theory. Whereas concurrent assessment of the relationship between family type and…

To study changes in nonresident father contact since the 1970s, we pooled data from 4 national surveys: the National Survey of Children (1976), the National Survey of Families and Households (1987 - 1988), the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (1996), and the National Survey of America's Families (2002). On the basis of mothers' reports,…

This study investigated how adolescent and parent acculturation (culture-of-origin and U.S. cultural involvement, biculturalism, acculturation conflicts, and parent-adolescent acculturation gaps) influenced family dynamics (family cohesion, adaptability, familism, and parent-adolescent conflict) in a sample of 402 Latino families from North…

This study examined the intergenerational transmission of abuse among a sample of 681 teen, adult low-resource, and adult high-resource first-time mothers. Participants ranged in age from 14 to 36 years, with a mean of 20 years. Exposure to childhood emotional and to physical abuse were associated with 6-month parenting behavior but not with…

The goal of this study was to consider the role of parents in the development of their children's financial independence by the time the children are old enough to enter college. Using data from 2,098 first-year university students, we examined two pathways to emerging adults' financial, psychological, and personal well-being, combining research…

Nonresident fathers' financial support and time are both important to children's well-being, although the association between these two types of involvement is mixed in the literature. Using the 1994-2004 waves of the Current Population Survey-Child Support Supplement, this article examined the associations between mothers' reports of child…

This study examined the role of mother-adolescent emotional reciprocity in connections between marital conflict and adolescent aggression with peers. Data were collected from a racially diverse community sample of 268 adolescents and their mothers. Adolescents reported on parents' marital conflict, and mother-adolescent positive and negative…

This study examined how adolescents raised solely by grandparents navigated their relationships with their parents and grandparents and how these relationships were influenced by the caregiving context. Forty-one adolescents participated in qualitative, semistructured interviews. Findings suggest that relationships with parents were primarily…

Corporal punishment (CP) remains highly prevalent in the United States despite its association with increased risk for child aggression and physical abuse. Five focus groups were conducted with parents (n = 18) from a community at particularly high risk for using CP (Black, low socioeconomic status, Southern) in order to investigate their…

This study examined the relationships among financial stress encountered by families, parents' social support, parental depressive symptoms, parenting practices, and children's externalizing problem behaviors to advance our understanding of the processes by which family financial stress is associated with children's problem behaviors. We also…

This research, comprised of 2 studies, extends current knowledge of parent-child communication about drugs. The first study developed a typology of parental strategies used to deter children's substance use. The second study examined relationships among the parental strategies identified in the first study, which included family communication…

Children affected by maternal incarceration experience challenges maintaining continuous family relationships because of changes in caregivers, separation from siblings, and limited contact with mothers. In this mixed-method study, we investigated maternal and contextual factors associated with continuity in family relationships of children living…