Families in transition: Introduction and overview.

Outlines topics of concern regarding families in transition, noting that high rates of divorce, single parenting, and remarriage have created a generation of adults and children who regularly experience multiple marital and family transitions. Marital transitions set in motion a series of changes in residential arrangements, economic circumstances, and family roles, all of which have implications for family adjustment. How family members adapt to these reorganizations depends on the timing of the transition, characteristics of the individual, situational variables associated with each stage of the transition, and familial and extrafamilial resources available to promote adaptation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Relations between early child care and schooling.

The purpose of this article is to examine relations between aspects of early child care (age entered, full- or part-time structure, and number of child-care arrangements and their quality) and school adjustment. The early child-care experiences of 87 children who entered a laboratory elementary school at 3 years, 9 months of age were documented, and their first-grade adjustment was assessed 3 years after school entrance. Although single-parent families and families in which the mother was employed used more child care and enrolled their children at earlier ages, maternal education was more closely associated with children's school adjustment than was maternal employment or marital status. After family characteristics were accounted for, academic progress, school skills, and few behavioral problems were predicted by high-quality, stable child care. The structure of the early child care (full- or part-time) was not associated with school adjustment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Consequences of fathers' participation in family work: Parents' role strain and well-being.

Examined the relation of fathers' participation in child care and home chores to parents' role strain and well-being in an interview study of 160 Caucasian middle-class fathers (mean age 41.11 yrs) and mothers (mean age 39.38 yrs) of kindergarten and 4th-grade children. In half of the families, mothers were employed. Four forms of paternal participation were examined. Role-strain items referred to immediate and specific problems such as time and energy constraints and role conflicts. Well-being measures assessed self-esteem, life satisfaction, and quality of experience in the parental and marital roles. Regression analyses indicated that when the level of fathers' participation was controlled maternal employment did not condition the relation between participation and the outcome variables. Findings varied for the different forms of participation. For fathers, higher levels of participation were associated with feeling more involved and competent as a parent and with being more critical of wives' patterns and parenting. For mothers, those whose husbands were more participant praised their husbands' parenting, but they were lower in life satisfaction and were more self-critical about their balance of work and family responsibilities. (33 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Factors influencing ratings of marital quality by individuals within dual-career marriages: A conceptual model.

In the present study, the authors proposed and tested a model of marital quality among individuals (52 men, 55 women) in dual-career marriages. The model was constructed within a social role framework and includes variables that positively influence marital quality, those that negatively influence marital quality, and those that mediate the relationship between the negative factors and marital quality. A path analysis indicated that marital quality was predicted directly by love, sexual satisfaction, communication, and satisfaction with the dual-career lifestyle. Objective demands of job and family roles predicted perceived job-family role strain. Coping, but not perceived equity, mediated the relationship between role strain and marital quality. Combined income and social support impacted marital quality indirectly through satisfaction with the dual-career lifestyle. Implications for counselors are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The Dynamic Spillover of Satisfaction Between Work and Marriage: The Role of Time and Mood.

Previous research has indicated important linkages between work and family domains and roles. However, the nature of the dynamic spillover between job and marital satisfaction remains poorly understood. The current study tests both the concurrent and lagged associations between job and marital satisfaction at a within-individual level of analysis using a diary study of 76 fully employed, married adults. The authors further examine the mediating role of mood in this spillover process. Consistent with their hypotheses, findings indicate both a concurrent and a lagged (job to marital and marital to job) job satisfaction-marital satisfaction association at the within-subject level of analysis and lend some support for the mediating role of mood (most notably positive affect) in these associations. The authors hope these findings stimulate new research that uses more complex designs and comprehensive theoretical models to investigate work-family links. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Testing a family intervention hypothesis: The contribution of mother-infant skin-to-skin contact (kangaroo care) to family interaction, proximity, and touch.

The provision of maternal-infant body contact during a period of maternal separation was examined for its effects on parent-infant and triadic interactions. Participants were 146 three-month-old preterm infants and their parents, half of whom received skin-to-skin contact, or kangaroo care (KC), in the neonatal nursery. Global relational style and micropatterns of proximity and touch were coded. Following KC, mothers and fathers were more sensitive and less intrusive, infants showed less negative affect, and family style was more cohesive. Among KC families, maternal and paternal affectionate touch of infant and spouse was more frequent, spouses remained in closer proximity, and infant proximity position was conducive to mutual gaze and touch during triadic play. The role of touch as a constituent of the co-regulatory parent-infant and triadic systems and the effects of maternal contact on mothering, co-parenting, and family processes are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Family economic stress and adjustment of early adolescent girls.

Proposes a family process model that links economic stress in family life to prosocial and problematic adolescent adjustment. With a sample of 220 7th-grade girls living in intact families in the rural Midwest, the theoretical constructs in the model were measured using both trained observer and family member reports. In general, results were consistent with the proposed model. Economic pressures led to depression and demoralization for both parents, the result of which was greater marital conflict and disruptions in skillful parenting. The emotions and behaviors of both mothers and fathers were almost equally affected by financial difficulties, and disruptions in each parent's childrearing behaviors had adverse consequences for adolescent development. Parents' depressed mood and disrupted childrearing practices both directly affected girls' adjustment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Multiple roles, social networks, and women's well-being.

In contrast to earlier approaches to the study of multiple roles, our research was concerned with the frequency and conditions under which both positive and negative outcomes occur. Using data from a random sample of 235 married female nurses, we focused on marital and job satisfaction as important criteria of success in managing multiple roles. In the first phase of the research, a cluster analysis identified five different profiles of marital and job satisfaction. Of the two most positive profiles, one was defined by high scores in both areas, the other by high job satisfaction but only moderate marital satisfaction. In two other profiles, women were very dissatisfied with one role and at best moderately satisfied with the other. In the second phase, the profiles were found to be meaningfully associated with measures of psychological symptomatology and overall life satisfaction. The third phase considered how the profiles were linked to measures of social support and social rejection provided by five key network members. The strongest univariate profile discriminator was the level of work rejection from the spouse. A discriminate function analysis revealed that the level of spouse's work rejection was even more powerful when it was compared to the level of work rejection received from the next closest family member (typically the mother). (53 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Career choices of married women: Effects on conflict, role behavior, and satisfaction.

Sent a questionnaire concerning marital status, work activities, roles and role conflicts, and satisfaction to 450 female college graduates (classes of 1948, 1953, 1958, 1963, and 1968). 261 usable responses were received. 3 groups were studied: full- and part-time employment and full-time housekeeping. The main hypothesis, that satisfaction would be related to the extent to which women actually did what they ideally preferred to do, was supported in the case of housekeeping and volunteer activities but not for full- or part-time employment. Role involvements and conflicts were generally greater for workers than housewives, although full-time workers differed greatly from part-timers and were the most satisfied of the 3 groups. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Workload and the trajectory of marital satisfaction in newlyweds: Job satisfaction, gender, and parental status as moderators.

Stress, on average, is bad for relationships. Yet stress at work is not always associated with negative relationship outcomes. The premise of the current study was that associations between workload and trajectories of marital satisfaction depend on circumstances that may constrain or facilitate partners' ability to negotiate their multiple roles. We hypothesized that the covariance between changes in workload and marital satisfaction over time should be moderated by (a) the extent to which spouses like their work, (b) their parental status, and (c) their gender. Analyses drawing upon eight waves of data on workload, work satisfaction, and marital satisfaction from 169 newlywed couples assessed over four years confirmed these predictions. Specifically, across couples, demands at work covaried positively with marital satisfaction for spouses who were more satisfied with their jobs. For nonparent couples, increases in husbands' workload covaried with increases in marital satisfaction for both spouses. For parent couples, however, increases in husbands' workload covaried with declines in marital satisfaction for both spouses. Unexpectedly, for parent couples, increases in wives' workload corresponded with increased marital satisfaction. Finally, consistent with predictions, wives were more affected by their husbands' workload than vice versa. Thus, tension between work and marriage is not inevitable, instead depending on circumstances that facilitate or impair performance in multiple roles. Couples, employers, and practitioners should recognize the role that external circumstances play in determining how work and marital life interact. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Lien entre la qualité des relations familiales et sociales à l'adolescence et à l'age adulte.

Fifty-seven families with adolescent children participated in a study of a) the quality of family and friendship relationships in adolescence, and b) the quality of family, friendship, and romantic relationships of adolescents 7 years later. Observation measures and self-report questionnaires were used to examine the variables. Regression analyses showed that mothers' marital satisfaction, conjugal conflict, and quality of mother-daughter relationship in adolescence predicted daughters' satisfaction with romantic relationships in adulthood. However, only the parental variables during adolescence predicted the quality of friendship relationships in adulthood. This study highlighted the contribution that quality of family relationships in adolescence makes to the quality of interpersonal relationships in adulthood. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The continuance and spillover of everyday tensions in distressed and nondistressed families.

This study compared 38 distressed and 35 nondistressed families on 2 interaction processes: the continuance of tensions involving the same family members and the spillover of tensions from one family subsystem to another. One parent reported perceptions of family tensions and satisfaction ratings each day for 2 wks. Sequential analyses revealed that distressed, compared with nondistressed, families experienced (1) greater continuance of tensions, particularly tensions that occurred the following day during the same time period, and (2) more spillover, particularly between marital and child-related tensions. Correlations with daily satisfaction ratings indicated that marital dissatisfaction in distressed families is highly related to the occurrence of marital tensions. These data support the importance of examining daily events and multiple family subsystems in order to understand family distress. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Gender role conflict and family environment as predictors of men's marital satisfaction.

Investigated the relationship between male gender role conflict, family environment, and marital satisfaction. 70 married men completed self-report instruments measuring 4 aspects of male gender role conflict, 2 aspects of family environment, and marital satisfaction. Results indicate that restrictive emotionality, conflicts between work or school and family relations, and family cohesion are related to marital satisfaction. The various factors of male gender role conflict and family environment account for 46.8% of the variance in marital satisfaction. The results suggest that men who have lower levels of marital satisfaction are less able or willing to express emotions, have higher levels of conflict between work or school and family relationship, and have lower levels of family cohesion. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Commitment to family roles: Effects on managers' attitudes and performance.

The authors tested the premise that family role commitment (i.e., marital role commitment, parental role commitment) has simultaneous negative and positive effects on managers' (N = 346) life satisfaction, career satisfaction, and performance through family-to-work interference and enhancement. The authors also explored whether psychological strain mediates the effects of interference and enhancement on outcomes. The authors expected family role commitment to reduce the favorability of outcomes by increasing interference. To the contrary, they found that neither marital nor parental role commitment was associated with increased interference. The authors expected family role commitment to improve outcomes by increasing enhancement. As expected, marital role commitment was associated with increased enhancement, which, in turn, seemed to reduce strain and strengthen outcomes. Parental role commitment was also associated with increased enhancement. However, parental role commitment had direct positive effects on outcomes that were more substantial than its indirect effects through enhancement. Overall, marital and parental role commitment had more benefits than costs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A longitudinal investigation of the affective environment in families with young children: From infancy to early school age.

We examined the affective environment in 102 families studied longitudinally when children were 7, 15, 25, 38, 52, and 67 months of age. At each assessment, every mother–child and father–child dyad was observed in typical daily contexts. Each person's emotions of affection, joy, and anger were coded. Both parents rated marital satisfaction when children were 15, 52, and 67 months. Growth curve analyses, using Actor-Partner Interdependence Modeling, examined (a) developmental changes in emotions, (b) within-relationship influences of the partner's emotions, (c) across-relationship influences of emotions in other parent's interactions with the child, and (d) associations between marital quality and emotions over time. Parents' emotional expressiveness was highest early in the child's development, and declined thereafter. Children's anger was highest at 15 months of age, and declined thereafter, and their positive emotions, particularly with mothers, increased over time. Generally, one's positive emotions and better marital quality were associated with greater positive emotion within- and across-relationships, whereas one's anger was associated with greater anger within- and across-relationships. However, any emotion expression elicited greater affection in the interaction partner. Parents' neuroticism did not account for the convergence of emotions across relationships. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Families of the baby boom: Parents' division of labor and children's adjustment.

Assessed lesbian couples' division of labor, their satisfaction with division of labor and with their relationships, and their children's psychosocial adjustment. The 26 participating families were headed by lesbian couples, each of whom had at least 1 child between 4 and 9 yrs of age. Parents' relationship satisfaction was generally high but was unrelated to measures of parental division of labor or of children's adjustment. Although both parents reported sharing household tasks and decision making equally, biological mothers reported greater involvement in child care, and nonbiological mothers reported spending longer hours in paid employment. Parents were more satisfied and children were more well-adjusted when labor involved in child care was more evenly distributed between the parents. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Parents' marital functioning and adolescent psychotherapy.

Parents' marital functioning and adolescent psychopathology were investigated in 2 studies. The first study compared parents' marital satisfaction, conflict over childrearing, affective communication, and traditional role orientation in matched samples of psychiatric inpatient and control-group adolescents. The second study examined associations between specific dimensions of marital functioning and adolescent depression severity, suicidal ideation, and social adjustment in a larger sample of adolescent inpatients. In Study 1, parents of inpatients reported less marital satisfaction and more conflicts over childrearing than parents of control-group adolescents. In Study 2, marital conflicts over childrearing were associated with a less active or involved father–adolescent relationship and more severe school behavior and spare time problems. Marital functioning was not associated with depression severity or suicidal ideation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The development of Israeli children's images of Jews and Arabs and their expression in human figure drawings.

The development of images of "a Jew" and "an Arab" in Jewish Israeli children who were 4–15 years of age was investigated by means of human figure drawings followed by the administration of questionnaires. The drawings were scored on structural and thematic variables. The questionnaires assessed beliefs and intentions. The hypotheses predicted a differential perception of in- and out-groups and peaks in negativity toward the out-group at preschool age and in early adolescence. Results indicate that, irrespective of age, Jewish Israeli children have generalized images of the two ethnic groups. Preschoolers expressed both positive biases toward the in-group and negativism toward the out-group, and early adolescents manifested mainly negative biases toward the out-group. Children in middle childhood and mid-adolescents manifested reductions in both in-group favoritism and out-group negativity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Parents' hostility in dyadic marital and triadic family settings and children's behavior problems.

The authors examined the relation between parents' hostility during conflict-focused discussions and child behavior problems. Parents engaged in 3 discussions: a dyadic marital discussion of marital disagreements, a dyadic marital discussion of child-related disagreements, and a triadic family discussion with the child about the child-related disagreements. Eighty-nine 2-parent community families with a child aged 9–13 years participated. A significant 3-way interaction between interparental hostility, parent-to-child hostility, and child sex accounted for variance in children's behavior problems. Among boys, higher levels of parent-to-child hostility during family discussions exacerbated the effects of interparental hostility on boys' adjustment. Thus, exposure to higher levels of both interparental and parent-to-child hostility may put boys at risk for developing internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Provider role attitudes, marital satisfaction, role overload, and housework: A dyadic approach.

Treating the marital dyad as the unit of analysis, this study examined the within-couple patterning of 272 dual-earner spouses' provider role attitudes and their longitudinal associations with marital satisfaction, role overload, and the division of housework. Based on the congruence of husbands' and wives' provider role attitudes, couples were classified into one of four types: (a) main-secondary, (b) coprovider, (c) ambivalent coprovider, and (d) mismatched couples. Nearly half of all spouses differed in their attitudes about breadwinning. A series of mixed model ANCOVAs revealed significant between- and within-couple differences in human capital characteristics, spouses' perceptions of marital satisfaction and role overload, and the division of housework across 3 years of measurement. Coprovider couples reported higher levels of marital satisfaction and a more equitable division of housework than the other couple groups. Wives in the ambivalent coprovider couples' group reported higher levels of role overload than their husbands to a greater extent than was found in the other couple groups. As the first study to adopt a dyadic approach that considers the meanings that both spouses in dual-earner couples ascribe to paid employment, these findings advance understanding of how dual-earner spouses' provider role attitudes serve as contexts for marital quality, behavior, and role-related stress. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)