European American Families Research Articles

Parent-Directed Physical Aggression by Clinic-Referred Youths

Identified children and young adolescents who engaged in parent-directed physical aggression from a sample of youths referred for outpatient therapy (N = 606, 151 girls, 455 boys); examined the frequency, severity, and characteristics of such behavior; and compared aggressive youths with nonaggressive youths across several domains of functioning. Twelve percent of the children and young adolescents in this clinical sample engaged in parent-directed aggression. Aggressive, compared to nonaggressive, youths had significantly increased oppositional behavior, lower frustration tolerance, less adaptability to stressful situations, and were more demanding of their parents. Aggressive children had families characterized by significantly greater parental stress, poorer interpersonal relationships, and were more likely to be 2-parent, European American families of higher socioeconomic status. Moreover, lower frustration tolerance and adaptability were significant predictors of parent-directed aggression after controlling for demographic differences and overall level of oppositionality and aggressiveness, suggesting a more specific functional impairment in such children. Parent-directed aggression warrants additional study given the limitations in our understanding of these events and the potential for such behaviors to continue into adolescence and adulthood.

Parent-Directed Physical Aggression by Clinic-Referred Youths

Identified children and young adolescents who engaged in parent-directed physical aggression from a sample of youths referred for outpatient therapy (N = 606, 151 girls, 455 boys); examined the frequency, severity, and characteristics of such behavior; and compared aggressive youths with nonaggressive youths across several domains of functioning. Twelve percent of the children and young adolescents in this clinical sample engaged in parent-directed aggression. Aggressive, compared to nonaggressive, youths had significantly increased oppositional behavior, lower frustration tolerance, less adaptability to stressful situations, and were more demanding of their parents. Aggressive children had families characterized by significantly greater parental stress, poorer interpersonal relationships, and were more likely to be 2-parent, European American families of higher socioeconomic status. Moreover, lower frustration tolerance and adaptability were significant predictors of parent-directed aggression after controlling for demographic differences and overall level of oppositionality and aggressiveness, suggesting a more specific functional impairment in such children. Parent-directed aggression warrants additional study given the limitations in our understanding of these events and the potential for such behaviors to continue into adolescence and adulthood.

Young Adolescents' Experiences with Parents and Friends: Exploring the Connections*

Drawing on social learning and structural family theories, we examined the connections between young adolescents' experiences with their mothers and fathers and their best friends. Young adolescents (N= 143) from Latino and European American families were recruited from a local school district in a rural southwestern community. Adolescents described the emotional qualities of their relationship with each parent, the nature of the parent‐adolescent hierarchy, and their experiences with their best friend. Findings revealed links between European American boys' experiences with their fathers and their best friends and between the nature of the parent‐adolescent hierarchy and both boys' and girls' intimacy with their best friends. The discussion highlights implications for intervention in early adolescence.

Economic pressure in African American families: A replication and extension of the family stress model.

This study of 422 two-caregiver African American families, each with a 10-11-year-old focal child (54% girls), evaluated the applicability of the family stress model of economic hardship for understanding economic influences on child development in this population. The findings generally replicated earlier research with European American families. The results showed that economic hardship positively relates to economic pressure in families. Economic pressure was related to the emotional distress of caregivers, which in turn was associated with problems in the caregiver relationship. These problems were related to disrupted parenting practices, which predicted lower positive child adjustment and higher internalizing and externalizing symptoms. The results provide significant support for the family stress model of economic hardship and its generalizability to diverse populations.

The influence of home-based reading interactions on 5-year-olds’ reading motivations and early literacy development

In order to understand the impact of home-based reading practices on young children’s literacy development, we need to consider both the types of comments made while reading as well as the affective quality of the reading interaction. Five-year-olds, during the summer prior to kindergarten, were observed reading both a familiar and an unfamiliar book with a member of their family, usually a parent but in one-third of the cases, an older sibling. Children came from either African-American or European-American families. Most of the children (about 83%) came from low income families. Both the nature of comments made about each book and the affective quality of the interactions were coded. Parents also were interviewed about the frequency with which their children engaged in reading activities at home. Children’s phonological awareness, orientation toward print, and story comprehension were assessed during the spring of kindergarten; their motivations for reading were assessed at the start of first grade. Comments about the content of the storybook were the most common type of utterance during reading interactions. Reported reading frequency was the only significant correlate of children’s early literacy-related skills. In contrast, the affective quality of the reading interaction was the most powerful predictor of children’s motivations for reading. These results emphasize the importance of the affective quality of reading interactions for fostering children’s interest in literacy.

Predictors of self-esteem for Mexican American and European American youths: a reexamination of the influence of parenting.

Decades of research with European American middle-class families have found significant relations between parenting behavior and child self-esteem. Similar research with minority and low-income families is rare. The present study examined the relation between parenting practices and child self-esteem among 70 Mexican American and 161 European American youths. The analyses consisted of regressing child self-esteem on parenting practices (acceptance, rejection, inconsistent discipline, and hostile control), ethnicity, socioeconomic status (SES), and the interactions between ethnicity, SES, and parenting practices. Several main effects and interactions were significant; for each interaction, behavior of low-income or Mexican American parents had less influence on children's self-esteem than did similar behavior by middle-class or European American parents.

Testing for malignant hyperthermia.

Testing for malignant hyperthermia.

Ethnic Status, Stigmatization, Support, and Symptom Development Following Sexual Abuse

This study examined ethnic group differences in abuse characteristics, appraisal processes, primary caregiver support, and adjustment following sexual abuse discovery. One hundred thirty children from African American, European American, and Hispanic families were seen within 8 weeks of abuse discovery and 1 year later. Hispanic children more often reported abuse by a parent figure of 1 year or longer in duration and living with the perpetrator. European American children reported more internal attributions for the abuse. For European American children, but not Hispanic or African American children, high abuse severity predicted higher levels of shame and a pessimistic attributional style. For Hispanic children, but not the other ethnic groups, high abuse severity was related to lower levels of satisfaction with primary caregiver support. The discussion questions the utility of ethnic group membership as a meaningful way of understanding the role of culture in children's adjustment following sexual abuse discovery.

Extending research on the consequences of parenting style for Chinese Americans and European Americans.

This study examined the effects of parent-adolescent relationships on school performance to provide a clearer understanding of why authoritative parenting does not have as beneficial effects for Asian Americans as it does for European Americans. Over 500 adolescents of Chinese- (148 first and 176 second generation) and European-descent (208 primarily third generation or more) families from seven different high schools completed measures of (1) parenting style, (2) parent-adolescent closeness (cohesion subscale from the Family Adaptability and Cohesion Environment Scales II and relationship satisfaction), and (3) school performance. Positive effects of both authoritative parenting and relationship closeness on school performance were found for European Americans and, to some extent, second-generation Chinese, but not first-generation Chinese. These effects were also stronger for European Americans than first-generation Chinese. Through examination of the mediating role of parent-adolescent relationships, this study also found that among European American families, the beneficial effects of authoritative parenting are explained through relationship closeness.

The home environments of children in the United States part I: variations by age, ethnicity, and poverty status.

Although measures of the home environment have gained wide acceptance in the child development literature, what constitutes the "average" or 'typical" home environment in the United States, and how this differs across ethnic groups and poverty status is not known. Item-level data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth on four age-related versions of the Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment-Short Form (HOME-SF) from five biennial assessments (1986-1994) were analyzed for the total sample and for four major ethnic groups: European Americans, Asian Americans, African Americans, and Hispanic Americans. The percentages of homes receiving credit on each item of all four versions of the HOME-SF are described. For the majority of items at all four age levels differences between poor and nonpoor families were noted. Differences were also obtained among African American, European American, and Hispanic American families, but the magnitude of the effect for poverty status was greater than for ethnicity, and usually absorbed most of the ethnic group effects on HOME-SF items. For every item at every age, the effects of poverty were proportional across European American, African American, and Hispanic American groups.

The home environments of children in the United States part II: relations with behavioral development through age thirteen.

This study examined the frequency with which children were exposed to various parental actions, materials, events, and conditions as part of their home environments, and how those exposures related to their well-being. Part 1 focused on variations by age, ethnicity, and poverty status. In Part 2 of the study, relations between major aspects of the home environment (including maternal responsiveness, learning stimulation, and spanking) and developmental outcomes for children from birth through age 13 were investigated. The outcomes examined were early motor and social development, vocabulary development, achievement, and behavior problems. These relations were examined in both poor and nonpoor European American, African American, and Hispanic American families using hierarchical linear modeling. The most consistent relations found were those between learning stimulation and children's developmental status, with relations for parental responsiveness and spanking varying as a function of outcome, age, ethnicity, and poverty status. The evidence indicated slightly stronger relations for younger as compared with older children.

Examination of genetic linkage of chromosome 15 to schizophrenia in a large Veterans Affairs Cooperative Study sample*

Previous studies have reported genetic linkage evidence for a schizophrenia gene on chromosome 15q. Here, chromosome 15 was examined by genetic linkage analysis using 166 schizophrenia families, each with two or more affected subjects. The families, assembled from multiple centers by the Department of Veterans Affairs Cooperative Study Program, consisted of 392 sampled affected subjects and 216 affected sibling pairs. By DSM-III-R criteria, 360 subjects (91.8%) had a diagnosis of schizophrenia and 32 (8.2%) were classified as schizo-affective disorder, depressed. Participating families had diverse ethnic backgrounds. The largest single group were northern European American families (n = 62, 37%), but a substantial proportion was African American kindreds (n = 60, 36%). The chromosome 15 markers tested were spaced at intervals of approximately 10 cM over the entire chromosome and 2-5 cM for the region surrounding the alpha-7 nicotinic cholinergic receptor subunit gene (CHRNA7). These markers were genotyped and the data analyzed using semiparametric affecteds-only linkage analysis. In the European American families, there was a maximum Z-score of 1.65 between markers D15S165 and D15S1010. These markers are within 1 cM from CHRNA-7, the site previously implicated in schizophrenia. However, there was no evidence for linkage to this region in the African America kindreds.

Narrating Transgressions in Longwood: The Discourses, Meanings, and Paradoxes of an American Socializing Practice

The goal of this study is to deepen our understanding of a set of narrative practices in European‐American families in which young children's transgressions are downplayed or erased, a pattern that is cast in relief by the frequent, foregrounded narration of young children's transgressions in Taiwanese families. Evidence from the mothers'folk theories is used to illuminate these patterns, revealing that the pattern is reversed with respect to the narration of parental transgressions. The Taipei mothers treat parents' past misdeeds as undermining of adult authority and thereby not narratable to children, whereas the Longwood mothers regard parental misdeeds, including "hell‐raising," as highly repor table for their humor and their power to humanize parents. These findings are discussed in relation to contrasting ideals and understandings of the dynamics of selves over time.

The Psychological Sense of Economic Hardship: Measurement Models, Validity, and Cross‐Ethnic Equivalence for Urban Families

Poverty is a community stressor that disproportionally affects ethnic minority families. One aspect of programmatic research on poverty focuses on the psychological sense of economic hardship. In a study of 319 African American, European American, and Mexican American urban families, parents completed objective measures of economic status and scales of perceived economic hardship that were adapted from previous research. Measurement models identified a coherent construct of psychological sense of economic hardship that was essentially equivalent for mothers and fathers, English- and Spanish-speaking Mexican Americans, and the 3 ethnic groups. In support of the validity of this construct, relations between objective indicators of economic status and perceived economic hardship showed equivalence across these same groups.

It Takes an Urban Village

This study examined the extent to which an urban village exists, in a sample of 206 African American, European American, and Hispanic American families with an elementary schoolaged child. The urban village was evident in parental social networks with family, friends, and neighbors, although the nature of these networks varied. Multiple regression analyses indicated that parental social networks have an indirect effect on children's socioemotional development, mediated by parenting. Parents who received more emotional support and had less homogeneous social networks were more warm and responsive, provided a more stimulating home environment, and felt more effective as parents. These parenting characteristics, in turn, were associated with fewer behavior problems and more social competence in the children.

An Agenda for Studying Ethnicity and Family Communication

Communication research conducted on European American families may or may not generalize to non-European American families. Our purpose in this article is to present a theoretical model derived from cross-cultural research that can be applied to studying the ways ethnicity influences family communication. We argue that the strength of cultural and ethnic identities and the content of ethnic and cultural identities are important factors that influence how family communication varies within and across ethnic groups. Based on our theoretical arguments, we proffer predictions for future research.

Genome Scan of Human Systemic Lupus Erythematosus by Regression Modeling: Evidence of Linkage and Epistasis at 4p16-15.2

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a complex autoimmune disorder involving at least hormonal, environmental, and genetic factors. Familial aggregation, a 2%-3% sibling recurrence rate, monozygotic twin concordance >20%, association with several candidate genes, as well as the results of five genome scans support a genetic component. We present here the results of a genome scan of 126 pedigrees multiplex for SLE, including 469 sibling pairs (affected and unaffected) and 175 affected relative pairs. Using the revised multipoint Haseman-Elston regression technique for concordant and discordant sibling pairs and a conditional logistic regression technique for affected relative pairs, we identify a novel linkage to chromosome 4p16-15.2 (P=.0003 and LOD=3.84) and present evidence of an epistatic interaction between chromosome 4p16-15.2 and chromosome 5p15 in our European American families. We confirm the evidence of linkage to chromosome 4p16-15.2 in European American families using data from an independent pedigree collection. In addition, our data support the published results of three independent studies for nine purportedly linked regions and agree with the previously published results from a subset of these data for three regions. In summary, results from two new analytical techniques establish and confirm linkage with SLE at 4p16-15.2, indicate epistasis between 4p16-15.2 and 5p15, and confirm other linkage effects with SLE that have been reported elsewhere.

Parents’ Goals for Adolescents Diagnosed with Developmental Delays in Early Childhood

Parents’ developmental goals for their children were investigated in a 12-year study of middle-class European American families of children diagnosed with an early developmental delay of unknown etiology. The relation of parents’ developmental goals for children at child age 13 and child characteristics at ages 3, 7, and 11 were examined. Results showed that parents’ developmental goals at adolescence were associated with a range of child characteristics. Early child characteristics also were stronger predictors of parents’ goals at adolescence than parents’ goals for children at earlier ages. These findings indicated that parents adjust their goals over time in response to children’s functioning and abilities. Findings from this study could contribute to early intervention efforts by helping practitioners anticipate parents’ goals for their adolescent children based on children’s functioning at earlier ages.

AFRICAN American Family Dynamics as Perceived by Family Members

The need to study culture-specific family patterns is becoming well recognized among family therapists (Fullilove, Carter, & Eversley, 1986; Kazak, McCannell, Adkins, Himmelberg, & Grace, 1989; McGoldrick, Pearce, & Giordano, 1982; Spaights, 1990). Although cognizant of the risk that any attempt to identify general patterns may be misused in the form of stereotypes, therapists also recognize that a prerequisite to understanding a particular family is consideration of the context in which the family operates. Culture is one aspect of that context. There is likewise a need to identify common patterns among African American families (Boyd-Franklin, 1989a; Brinson, 1992; Jones, 1983; Littlejohn-Blake & Darling, 1993; Spaights, 1990). Without minimizing the individual differences and variations among African American families, recognition of predominant patterns provides therapists with a frame of reference, a set of hypotheses, from which to understand a particular family. Criticisms of the greater part of current research on African American families include the lack of empirical data (Boles & Curtis-Boles, 1986) and the tendency to compare African American families with European American families, implying that the latter provide the norms for measurement. This comparison is further compromised by the lack of controls for socioeconomic levels (Fine, Schwebel, & Myers, 1987; Julian, McKenry, & McKelvey, 1994; Lyles & Carter, 1982; Wilson, 1984).

Familial resemblance for hostility: the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Family Heart Study.

The purpose of this study was to examine whether several aspects of hostility as measured by the Cook-Medley Hostility Scale (ie, aggressive responding, hostile affect, cynicism, and overall hostility score) were determined in part by family factors (ie, genes and/or familial environments). Analyses were based on 680 European-American families (2525 individuals) from the NHLBI Family Heart Study (FHS), a population-based study of genetic and nongenetic determinants of CHD, atherosclerosis, and cardiovascular risk factors. The influence of family relationships, age, and education on the variation in each of the four hostility scores were estimated. Significant familial resemblance in all hostility scores was found, accounting for 42% of the variance in total hostility, 30% in cynicism, 38% in aggressive responding, and 18% in hostile affect. Very little of this resemblance could be explained by similarities in education. Familial resemblance for cynicism was solely due to significant parent-offspring and sibling correlations (ie, no spouse resemblance), suggesting the possibility of genetic influences. Gender and generation differences were also evident in the familial correlations. Hostility aggregates in families. Both family environmental and genetic sources of resemblance are suggested for hostility.