Guided by life course and stress process theory, this study investigated pathways of adult child caregivers' family (caregiving, marital, parenting) and nonfamily (employment) roles. Eight waves of data from the Health and Retirement Study were analyzed for 1,300 adult child caregivers. Latent class analysis provided strong evidence for a 4-class…

Family is an important socialization context for youth as they move through early adolescence. A significant feature of this complex socialization context is the accumulation of potential family risk factors that may compromise youth adjustment. This study examined cumulative family risk and adolescents' adjustment difficulties in 416 two-parent…

We review research on families and health published between 2000 and 2009 and highlight key themes and findings from innovative, methodologically rigorous studies. Whereas research in prior decades focused primarily on whether family structure affects child and adult health, contemporary research examines the contextual and processual factors that…

Violence against women has been recognized as both a major public health problem and a human rights violation worldwide. Research has documented the association between physical/sexual intimate partner violence (IPV) and mental health, measured by the 12-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) among women in reproductive age. This study…

In 2012, nearly 16 million U.S. children, or over one in five, lived in households that were food-insecure, which the U.S. Department of Agriculture defines as "a household-level economic and social condition of limited access to food." Even when we control for the effects of other factors correlated with poverty, these children are more…

The association between marital status and health among men has been well documented, but few studies track health trajectories following family structure transitions among unmarried fathers. Using the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study this article examines trajectories of paternal mental health and self-rated health, focusing on…

Purpose: Transitions in caregiving, such as becoming a primary caregiver to grandchildren or having adult children and grandchildren move in or out, may affect the well-being of the grandmother. Design and Methods: This report describes caregiving patterns at 3 time points over 24 months in a sample of 485 Ohio grandmothers and examines the…

Purpose: To examine racial differences in (a) the prevalence of financial exploitation and psychological mistreatment since turning 60 and in the past 6 months and (b) the experience--perpetrator, frequency, and degree of upset--of psychological mistreatment in the past 6 months. Design and methods: Random digit dial telephone recruitment and…

According to the 2000 census report, about 7% of the 1.4 million people 60 years and over in Malaysia live alone. This study investigated socioeconomic factors affecting the quality of life of this vulnerable population. Data from a subsample of the study on Mental Health and Quality of Life of Older Malaysians were used in this paper. About 10%…

This article investigates the importance of household context to subjective well-being among the oldest old (aged 80 years and older) in China. Using data from the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey, the authors find that living arrangements have strong implications for elderly emotional health. First, living alone is associated with…

Jane Waldfogel, Terry-Ann Craigie, and Jeanne Brooks-Gunn review recent studies that use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS) to examine why children who grow up in single-mother and cohabiting families fare worse than children born into married-couple households. They also present findings from their own new research.…

The purpose of this study is to describe the parental burden in families with a food-allergic child under the age of four. This study was carried out using a descriptive correlational research design. The subjects of this study were 104 families with a young food-allergic child who observed a restricted diet. The majority of the children were…

The physical and mental health-related quality of life (QOL) of 89 parents of children with high-functioning autism spectrum disorders (HFASDs) was compared to the health-related QOL of 46 parents of children without disabilities. Parents completed a packet of surveys measuring demographics, parenting stress, coping, resources, and QOL. Results of…

This study examines whether risk factors associated with child externalizing behavior symptoms differ between two similar low-income, urban communities, using baseline parent data of 154 African American youth (ages 9-15) participating in the Collaborative HIV-Prevention and Adolescent Mental Health Project (CHAMP) family program. Separate…

Research on the relationship between cohabitation and mental health tends to ignore social psychological factors that help explain mental health differences between the married and the unmarried, including coping resources and perceived relationship quality. In this paper I draw on social psychological theory and research to clarify differences in…