Longitudinal Study Of Generations Research Articles

Parental emotional support during emerging adulthood and Baby Boomers’ well-being in midlife

This study examined whether parental emotional support around emerging adulthood influenced well-being in midlife. We applied latent growth curve (LGC) models on 337 Baby Boomers who were in their late teens to early 20s when they entered the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG) in 1971. There was a small but significant decline in self-rated health and positive emotions through 2005, but not depressive symptoms. Greater support from fathers in 1971 was associated with better self-rated health, less depression, and a slower decline in self-rated health across midlife. Greater support from mothers was associated with more positive emotions. These associations did not significantly differ among sons and daughters. Findings are discussed in the context of cumulative advantage/disadvantage and life-stage specific challenges to highlight the importance of parental emotional support during life transitions.

Life-span development of self-esteem and its effects on important life outcomes.

We examined the life-span development of self-esteem and tested whether self-esteem influences the development of important life outcomes, including relationship satisfaction, job satisfaction, occupational status, salary, positive and negative affect, depression, and physical health. Data came from the Longitudinal Study of Generations. Analyses were based on 5 assessments across a 12-year period of a sample of 1,824 individuals ages 16 to 97 years. First, growth curve analyses indicated that self-esteem increases from adolescence to middle adulthood, reaches a peak at about age 50 years, and then decreases in old age. Second, cross-lagged regression analyses indicated that self-esteem is best modeled as a cause rather than a consequence of life outcomes. Third, growth curve analyses, with self-esteem as a time-varying covariate, suggested that self-esteem has medium-sized effects on life-span trajectories of affect and depression, small to medium-sized effects on trajectories of relationship and job satisfaction, a very small effect on the trajectory of health, and no effect on the trajectory of occupational status. These findings replicated across 4 generations of participants--children, parents, grandparents, and their great-grandparents. Together, the results suggest that self-esteem has a significant prospective impact on real-world life experiences and that high and low self-esteem are not mere epiphenomena of success and failure in important life domains.

Intergenerational transmission of values over the family life course

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.

The Baby Boomers' intergenerational relationships.

As Baby Boomers enter late life, relationships with family members gain importance. This review article highlights two aspects of their intergenerational relationships: (a) caregiving for aging parents and (b) interactions with adult children in the context of changing marital dynamics. The researchers describe three studies: (a) the Within Family Differences Study (WFDS) of mothers aged 65-75 and their multiple grown children (primarily Baby Boomers) ongoing since 2001; (b) the Family Exchanges Study (FES) of Baby Boomers aged 42-60, their spouses, parents, and multiple grown children ongoing since 2008; and (c) the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSoG) of 351 three-generation families started when the Baby Boomers were teenagers in 1971, with interviews every 3-5 years from 1985 to 2005. These studies show that the Baby Boomers in midlife navigate complex intergenerational patterns. The WFDS finds aging parents differentiate among Baby Boomer children in midlife, favoring some more than others. The FES shows that the Baby Boomers are typically more involved with their children than with their aging parents; Boomers' personal values, family members' needs, and personal rewards shape decisions about support. The LSoG documents how divorce and remarriage dampen intergenerational obligations in some families. Moreover, loosening cultural norms have weakened family bonds in general. Reviews of these studies provide insights into how the Baby Boomers may negotiate caregiving for aging parents as well as the likelihood of family care they will receive when their own health declines in the future.

A Longitudinal Study of the Intergenerational Transmission of Religion

The longitudinal study of religious transmission or influence across generations is an important but underexamined area of research, particularly in terms of the religious influence of grandparents. How much influence do grandparents have on grandchildren's religious beliefs and practices, and has this changed over the past 30 years? As grandparents have become increasingly important in multigenerational families, do they exert an influence on their grandchildren's religiosity that is distinct from that of parents? Drawing on the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG), this article uses grandparent—parent—grandchild triads and a generational sequential design to examine the transmission of three dimensions of religiosity — religious service attendance, religiousness and religious ideology — across generations from 1971 to 2000. Results indicate that in 1971 grandparents significantly influenced grandchildren's religious service attendance and religiousness, but these effects had weakened by 2000. The opposite pattern occurred for the transmission of conservative religious beliefs where there was a significant grandparent on grandchild effect in 2000, but not in 1971. Grandparents were also found to influence all three dimensions of grandchildren's religiosity independent of that of parents, suggesting that religious beliefs and practices formed within nuclear and extended families persist into adulthood with parents and grandparents simultaneously serving as independent and joint agents of religious socialization. In these analyses it was found that the influence of grandmothers on granddaughters' religiosity was especially pronounced. In general, the study shows a significant degree of religious influence across three generations in the family, and offers an expanded view of religious socialization by considering grandparents as active contributors to the religiosity of young adults.

The Transmission of Religious Beliefs across Generations: Do Grandparents Matter?

Despite substantial changes in the family’s structure over the past four decades, parents continue to exert a lasting imprint on the religious ideology and commitments of their children. However, research on the intergenerational transmission of religious beliefs, values and practices to younger generations has not included the ways in which grandparents- particularly grandmothers-influence the religiosity of youth. Drawing on the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG), we examined the extent to which grandmothers and parents influence the religious beliefs of adolescent and young adult grandchildren. First, we asked whether grandmothers influence the religious beliefs of their grandchildren independently of the grandchildren ’s parents. Our results indicated that grandmothers and grandchildren resembled one another on a series of statements conveying conservative religious beliefs and attitudes . Second, we examined patterns of religious transmission from grandmothers and parents to their children. We found that grandmothers transmitted their religious beliefs to grandchildren more strongly when mothers were more religious. Our third research question asked whether parental divorce weakens religious continuity across generations. We found that divorce adversely affected religious transmission from mothers to their children, but not from fathers and grandmothers. In addressing our fourth research question about the role of gender in religious transmission, we found that religious similarity between grandmothers and granddaughters was particularly strong. In general, our study showed a significant degree of religious similarity across three generations in the family, and offers an expanded view of religious socialization by considering grandmothers as active contributors to the religious beliefs of contemporary young adults.

Transmission of Religious Beliefs across Generations: Do Grandparents Matter?

Despite substantial changes in the family’s structure over the past four decades, parents continue to exert a lasting imprint on the religious ideology and commitments of their children. However, research on the intergenerational transmission of religious beliefs, values and practices to younger generations has not included the ways in which grandparents-particularly grandmothers-influence the religiosity of youth. Drawing on the Longitudinal Study ofGenerations (LSOG), we examined the extent to which grandmothers and parents influence the religious beliefs of adolescent and young adult grandchildren. First, we asked whether grandmothers influence the religious beliefs oftheir grandchildren independently ofthe grandchildren’s parents. Our results indicated that grandmothers and grandchildren resembled one another on a series of statements conveying conservative religious beliefs and attitudes. Second, we examined patterns ofreligious transmission from grandmothers and parents to their children. We found that grandmothers transmitted their religious beliefs to grandchildren more strongly when mothers were more religious. Our third research question asked whether parental divorce weakens religious continuity across generations. We found that divorce adversely affected religious transmission from mothers to their children, but not from fathers and grandmothers. In addressing our fourth research question about the role of gender in religious transmission, we found that religious similarity between grandmothers and granddaughters was particularly strong. In general, our study showed a significant degree ofreligious similarity across three generations in the family, and offers an expanded view of religious socialization by considering grandmothers as active contributors to the religious beliefs of contemporary young-adults.

Grandparents' psychological well-being after loss of contact with their grandchildren.

This study examined how loss of contact with grandchildren due to parental separation or divorce, family feud, or a sudden event, such as relocation, affected the emotional well-being of grandparents (N = 442). Using data from the Longitudinal Study of Generations, the depressive symptoms of grandparents were tracked over 15 years. Growth curve analysis was used to compare grandparents who had lost contact with their grandchildren with those who had not and to examine preloss to postloss change in depressive symptoms. Grandparents who lost contact with their grandchildren experienced a steeper increase in depressive symptoms as they aged compared with other grandparents. Depressive symptoms of grandparents who lost contact because of a sudden event increased up to 3 years following the loss but returned to equilibrium thereafter. The authors conclude that grandparents who lost contact with their grandchildren experienced a negative impact on their emotional health.

Norms of Filial Responsibility for Aging Parents Across Time and Generations

This investigation examined the normative expectation that adult children should be responsible for the care of their aging parents, and how this norm changes over the adult life span, across several decades of historical time, in relation to generational position in families, and between successive generations. Analyses were performed using 4 waves of data from the University of Southern California (USC) Longitudinal Study of Generations between 1985 and 2000. A multilevel latent growth model was estimated using 4,527 observations from 1,627 individuals nested within 333 families. Results revealed that filial norms weakened after midlife, in response to parental death, and over historical time, yet strengthened in later‐born generations. Findings are discussed in terms of the malleability of filial responsibility over the life course.

Intergenerational Support to Aging Parents

This investigation examines how norms of filial responsibility influence adult children to provide social support to their aging parents. Relying on intergenerational solidarity and social capital theories, the authors hypothesize that filial responsibility as a latent resource is more strongly converted into support when (a) the parent experiences increased need and (b) the child in question is a daughter. Using data from 488 adult children in the Longitudinal Study of Generations, the authors examine change in support provided between 1997 and 2000. Declining health of either parent increases the strength with which filial norms predisposed children to provide support. The conversion of filial norms into support is stronger among daughters than among sons but only toward mothers. Results are discussed in terms of the contingent linkage between latent and manifest functions and the persistence of gender role differentiation in the modern family.

Social and Personal Factors as Predictors of Earthquake Preparation: The Role of Support Provision, Network Discussion, Negative Affect, Age, and Education1

Panel data collected in 1991 as part of the University of Southern California Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG) were used to predict reported preparation activities prior to and in response to the 1994 Northridge, California, earthquake. In late 1994 and early 1995, 163 panelists (representing 107 multigenerational families) were interviewed by phone about their earthquake experiences. The best 1991 predictor of pre-quake preparation was the extent of instrumental support respondents provided to network members. Earthquake preparation activities undertaken after the quake were associated with the amount and cost of damage experienced during the quake, 1991 neuroticism scores, age (inversely), and having preparedness encouraged by multiple network sources. The results highlight the importance of social roles (e.g., support provision) and discussion by informal network sources in the adoption of public health and safety messages.

Beyond the Nuclear Family: The Increasing Importance of Multigenerational Bonds

Family relationships across several generations are becoming increasingly important in American society. They are also increasingly diverse in structure and in functions. In reply to the widely debated “family decline” hypothesis, which assumes a nuclear family model of 2 biological parents and children, I suggest that family multigenerational relations will be more important in the 21st century for 3 reasons: (a) the demographic changes of population aging, resulting in “longer years of shared lives” between generations; (b) the increasing importance of grandparents and other kin in fulfilling family functions; (c) the strength and resilience of intergenerational solidarity over time. I also indicate that family multigenerational relations are increasingly diverse because of (a) changes in family structure, involving divorce and stepfamily relationships; (b) the increased longevity of kin; (c) the diversity of intergenerational relationship “types.” Drawing on the family research legacy of Ernest W. Burgess, I frame my arguments in terms of historical family transitions and hypotheses. Research from the Longitudinal Study of Generations is presented to demonstrate the strengths of multigenerational ties over time and why it is necessary to look beyond the nuclear family when asking whether families are still functional.

The Micropolitics of Care in Relationships between Aging Parents and Adult Children: Individualism, Collectivism, and Power

This research examines the power and emotional dynamics between aging parents and adult children. A preliminary data analysis found intergenerational power dynamics to be associated with individualist and collectivist systems of organizing family responses to elder care. The study explores that association and what it reveals about how aging parents and adult children negotiate their expectations for care. In-depth interviews with 67 members of 20 three-generation families from the Longitudinal Study of Generations were analyzed. Aging parents in individualist families were found to have greater power than those in collectivist families who received higher levels of care. This suggests a trade-off between power and care. The data also indicate that when aging parents receive care and don't reciprocate with deference, intergenerational relations become strained, and children are likely to set limits on their caregiving. Although the literature on aging families emphasizes values of filial piety and obligation in determining caregiving dynamics, these findings suggest that exchange principles and power processes also need to be considered. Extensive research has focused on identifying factors associated with adult children's delivery of care to aging parents. However, little attention has been paid to the emotional interplay and feeling tone of relationships between aging parents and adult children and how they are related to the delivery of care. Virtually nothing is known about the power dynamics that emerge between aging parents and adult children when they negotiate their expectations concerning filial care and dependency that can shape the nature of caregiving (Kranichfeld, 1987; McDonald, 1980). In part, this is because the interactional subtleties of relationships are difficult to capture with survey measures. The qualitative research presented here examines the intergenerational power processes and emotional nuances of families with aging parents and the nature of the relationship between those dynamics and family caregiving systems. POWER Research on family power has been devoted primarily to dynamics between husbands and wives, leaving power in other family relationships sorely understudied (Kranichfeld, 1987; McDonald, 1980). This is due to concern in recent decades about gender inequality and a willingness to recognize a conflict of interest in heterosexual relationships. Meanwhile, other family relationships, such as those between aging parents and adult children, have been glorified as harmonious due to norms of attachment and filial obligation. Scholars have been reluctant to recognize power dynamics as an important feature of relationships between aging parents and their adult children. As a result, we know little about variations in power dynamics in aging families and what, if any, relationship exists between those dynamics and caregiving strategies. This research contributes to our understanding of these dynamics and does so by relying on new conceptualizations of power. Most researchers draw on Weber (1947) and define power as an individual's ability to carry out her or his will despite the resistance of others. This has resulted in measures of power that focused exclusively on decision-making outcomes and who wins when conflict is overt (Blood & Wolfe, 1960; McDonald, 1980). This one-dimensional view has been criticized for recognizing power only when conflict is manifest and ignoring less visible power processes. Covert power works to prevent issues from being raised. This occurs when more powerful individuals subtly influence the decisions of the less powerful in ways that comply with their interests. Less powerful individuals internalize the needs and interests of the more powerful in selecting actions, sometimes leading to decisions that compromise their own wishes and desires. By bowing to the interests of the more powerful-either deliberately or unconsciously-- the less powerful maintain the peace and avoid costly conflicts that they would be apt to lose (Foucault, 1980; Komter, 1989; Lukes, 1974). …

Trajectories of Grandparents' Perceived Solidarity with Adult Grandchildren: A Growth Curve Analysis over 23 Years

Demographic trends in the U.S. have produced an unprecedented number of grandparents who live long enough to see their grandchildren reach young adulthood and even middle age. In this analysis, data from the Longitudinal Study of Generations are used to identify patterns of change in grandparents' perceptions of affection and in-person contact and geographic proximity with adult grandchildren over five points of measurement between 1971 and 1994. Hierarchical linear modeling reveals quadratic trends in both growth curves. Affection declines over the first 14 years and then modestly reverses. Contact and proximity decline at an accelerating rate. Older grandparents have higher average levels of affection than younger grandparents, but they exhibit sharper rates of decline in contact and proximity over time. When cohorts are equated on age, later cohorts of grandparents decline more rapidly in contact and proximity, suggesting that the grandparent role has changed in recent history. Key Words: grandparents, interetional relations, life course. A dramatic consequence of population aging in the twentieth century is the increase in joint survivorship of family members that produces more years of shared life across generations (Bengtson, Rosenthal, & Burton, 1990; Watkins, Menken, & Bongaarts, 1987). This demographic trend has resulted in an unprecedented number of grandparents who live long enough to see their grandchildren reach adolescence, young adulthood, and middle age, thereby allowing the possibility of long-term relationships between them (Barranti, 1985; Hagestad, 1985; Kivnick, 1982). Because the median age of grandparenthood has remained constant at 45 years over the past century (Hagestad, 1985), gains in life expectancy imply that people are spending more years as grandparents. Most women will spend almost half their lives in this role. Despite the proliferation of adult grandparentgrandchild relations in the population, researchers have paid little attention to the long-term nature of these relationships. Given that the extension of this relationship is relatively recent, we do not know the extent to which grandparents and grandchildren become more or less important as sources of emotional meaning and practical support for each other over the life course. Although some researchers have speculated that the grandparentgrandchild bond becomes more significant in adulthood (Hagestad, 1981; Troll, 1980), the trajectory of solidarity in grandparent-grandchild relationships remains empirically unexamined. Our investigation describes the trajectories of affectual and social-structural solidarity between grandparents and their adult grandchildren over nearly one-quarter century in the life of these intergenerational dyads. Further, we examine sources of variation in the shape of such temporal trajectories. GRANDPARENT-GRANDCHILD RELATIONS IN ADULTHOOD Today it is more the rule than the exception for grandparents to have at least one grandchild who has reached adulthood. In a study of intergenerational family structures in seven economically developed nations (including the United States), Farkas and Hogan (1994) find that slightly more than half the population 65 years of age and older have a grandchild who is at least 18 years old. This percentage is consistent with a 1990 study of intergenerational relations conducted in the U.S., which shows that 56% of those 65 years of age and older have at least one adult grandchild (Bengtson & Harootyan, 1994). Examined from another perspective, it is now more common for grandchildren to reach adulthood in families of three or more generations. Fewer than half of the adolescents living in 1900 had two or more grandparents alive, but by 1976 that figure had grown to almost 90% (Uhlenberg, 1980). There is disagreement in the literature over the nature of life course dynamics in the grandparentgrandchild relationship. Some research suggests that these relations are characterized more by continuity than by change over the life course. …

PARENTING AND CO‐PARENTING OF GRANDCHILDREN: EFFECTS ON GRANDPARENTS' WELL‐BEING AND FAMILY SOLIDARITY

Increasing numbers of grandparents are raising their grandchildren because of problems within the parental generation such as drug and alcohol addiction, AIDS, divorce, and unemployment. Yet little is known about how grandparents who “parent” or “co‐parent” then‐grandchildren differ from other grandparents, or the extent to which parenting or co‐parenting grandchildren affects grandparent's psychological, physical, or financial well‐being, or feelings of family solidarity. The purpose of this research is to: (1) compare the characteristics of grandparents who go on to parent or co‐parent their grandchildren to grandparents who do not, and (2) assess the effects of entering the two caregiving arrangements — parenting and co‐parenting — on changes in grandparent's psychological, physical, and financial well‐being, as well as their feelings of family solidarity. The data for this study came from 659 grandparents from the USC Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSG) who participated in at least two consecutive waves of data collection measured at three year intervals between 1985 to 1994: parenting grandparents (N = 12), co‐parenting grandparents (N = 27), and non‐parenting grandparents (N = 620). Analysis of the quantitative data reveals that grandparents who parent or co‐parent their grandchildren tend to be younger and less healthy than non‐parenting grandparents. Contrary to expectation, the data also indicate that there is no statistically significant decline in psychological, physical, or financial well‐being, nor in normative or marital solidarity after grandparents begin to caregive. Although the majority of grandparents show stability or improvement in overall psychological well‐being, some show decline. The qualitative data suggests that the extent to which grandparents can choose their level of involvement in caregiving influences and the age of the grandchild, whether they experience caregiving as positive or negative.

Social Mobility Across Three Generations

The transmission of values, status, and behaviors from one to the next has been a central concern to family sociologists over the past half century, in part because it sheds light on the family's role in reproducing or modifying the social structure through the socialization of children. One dimension of the debate over American family decline (Popenoe, 1993) is how social changes in the 20th century have affected family transmission of socioeconomic and cultural resources. By tracking members of subsequent generations down family lineages, Bengtson (1975) compared the level of transmission of values (or the generation gap) between two intergenerational dyads: parents (generation 1 or G1s) and their children (G2s) who came of age in the 1940s and 1950s and parents (G2s) and their children (G3s) who came of age in the 1960s and 1970s. The G3s were the grandchildren of the G1s. Thus the analysis involved three related generations rather than separate and unrelated birth cohorts. Bengtson found considerable value similarity between parents and children in both intergenerational dyads. Generation membership did not seem to condition the impact that parents' values had on children's values. This article uses a conceptual framework similar to Bengtson's (1975) to study the intergenerational transmission of occupational stratum across three generations of family members, spanning almost the entire 20th century. Our central research question is: Does condition the effect of the parents' occupational position on their children's occupational position? Drawing on the implications of four 20th-century social changes--expanding universalism, a shift in childrearing values from obedience to autonomy, the growth of alternative family structures, and changing gender roles--we predict that the effect of the status of parents on their children's occupational outcomes declines with each successive generation. Using data from the Longitudinal Study of Generations, we compare the level of inheritance of socioeconomic strata experienced by three successive generations of offspring: grandparents (Generation 1--G1s, most born between 1896 and 1911), who inherit great grandparents' (Generation 0--G0s) socioeconomic positions; parents (Generation 2--G2s, most born between 1916 and 1931), who inherit G1s' socioeconomic positions; and adult children (Generation 3--G3s, most born between 1945 and 1955), who inherit G2s' socioeconomic positions. We assess how the experience of socioeconomic inheritance and social mobility for each of offspring differs from its parent generation's experience of socioeconomic inheritance and social mobility. For the analysis, we fit log-linear models of association to contingency tables, stratified by each generation's occupation at a particular stage in the life course and by gender. SOCIAL MOBILITY ACROSS INTERGENERATIONAL DYADS Mechanisms that give rise to the intergenerational inheritance of socioeconomic position include parental transmission of economic resources, parental transmission of cultural resources, role modeling, and discrimination (Biblarz & Raftery, 1993; Kalmijn, 1994). Parents' occupational positions covary with the amount of economic resources they have to invest in their children, and children's occupational destinations, in turn, covary with the amount of investment parents have made in their children's human capital (Becker, 1964; Becker & Tomes, 1986). The direct intergenerational transmission of property (such as farms and small businesses) can also lead to occupational inheritance (Elder, Rudkin, & Conger, 1995). When raising their children, parents transmit values about what makes up 'earning a living' (Hout, 1984, p. 1,384; also Biblarz, 1992; Kohn, 1977). Through role modeling, children may adopt these orientations for themselves. Kohn's work (Kohn, 1969, 1977; Kohn & Slomczynski, 1990) demonstrates links between parents' occupational conditions (substantive complexity, autonomy, routinization) and the importance parents place on conformity to external authority and, in turn, children's value orientations and children's occupational positions. …