Residential Parents Research Articles

Are the Kids Alright? An Examination of Antisocial Behavior During Emerging Adulthood Among Justice-Involved Teen Parents

Research has highlighted the role that childbearing and parenting can have in reducing involvement in antisocial behavior among adults. While some studies have similarly examined the short-term implications of parenthood for teen parents, very little research has considered the role that parenthood might have as they enter emerging adulthood. Accordingly, using data from the Pathways to Desistance study, the current study examines whether, among justice system involved young people, adolescent parenthood is associated with offending, incarceration, and drug dependency during emerging adulthood. Results indicate that adolescent parents, particularly teen fathers, are more likely to have continued justice system involvement during emerging adulthood. The opposite is true, however, for teen parents who live with their children (residential parents).

Supported Visitation in Cases of Violence: Political Intentions and Local Practice in Sweden

In Sweden, supervised visitation has been replaced with a new measure called supported visitation. In the reform process, it was emphasized that if face to face visitation cannot be organized without risk for the child, indirect visitation or no visitation are to be considered better options. The aim of this article is to explore social work practice regarding supported visitation in cases involving violence. It draws on a study of a local visitation centre and the data consists of case files from the social services regarding 37 children where a court ordered visitation support, interviews with seven members of staff, ten parents and three children, and local documents and guidelines. For 18 of the 37 children, case files contained credible information about a history of violence. The study shows that district courts sometimes order visitation support in cases where there is a risk for the child and where in the near future normalization of visitation is unlikely. Thus, the measure of visitation support is sometimes used in a way that was not intended. Regarding social work practice, the analysis indicates that, although the guidelines developed at the local support centre under study adhere to the national policy intentions, both professionals’ validation and invalidation of violence can be seen. For service users previously subjected to violence, the documented court and social services’ practices may actively contribute to children’s and residential parents’ continued vulnerability.

HIV-related sexual decisions made by African-American adolescents living in different family structures: study from an ecodevelopmental perspective.

PurposeThe purpose of this study was to explore the association between the dynamics of family structure and sexual behaviors of African-American adolescents using the ecodevelopmental theory.MethodsThis study stratified data from 1,617 African-American adolescents of the Add Health Wave I respondents with an identified family composition. It examined the associations between family structure, parenting function, and adolescents’ sexual decision-making: age of first sexual intercourse, sexual initiation before age 16, and using a condom during the first and last sexual intercourse.ResultsEmotional connection between parents and children (feeling more love from the father: β=0.17, P=0.0312; feeling more love from the mother: β=0.3314, P=0.0420) and mothers’ less permissive attitude toward adolescents’ sexual experience in their teens (β=0.33, P=0.0466) are positively associated with late age of sexual initiation of adolescents living in two-parent households. School-level factors (β=0.07, P=0.0008) and the adolescents’ characteristics (being older: 0.42, P=0.0002; heterosexuality: β=2.28, P=0.0091) are the factors most positively related to the age of sexual initiation for those living with a single parent. Immediate social determinants, other than family factors (such as land use of immediate area [rural]: β=9.84, P<0.0001; the condition of living unit: β=1.55, P=0.0011; and safety of neighborhood: β=4.46, P=0.004), are related to late age of sexual initiation among those living with other relatives/alone. A higher tendency of condom use consistency was present in adolescents living with two parents compared to those living in other family structures.ConclusionLess parent/child connection and parent/family influence were found in African-American adolescents living with other relatives or alone, suggesting that living with two residential parents plays an essential role in their late sexual initiation and could account for an important element to combat high HIV incidence of African-American adolescents.

Adult Children Living With Aging Parents: The Association Between Income and Parental Affect.

This study examined the moderating effect of parental income on the association between parent-child coresidence and parental affect. Secondary analysis was conducted with data from the ORANJ BOWL panel, a representative sample of adults in New Jersey, aged 50 to 74 years ( N = 5,688). Results indicated that income had a significant moderating effect on the association between the adult child's residential status and parents' positive and negative affect. Among parents with coresident adult children, an observed decline in positive affect and rise in negative affect were amplified as parental income level increased, suggesting differential strains on parental well-being across income levels.

Coparental Communication With Nonresidential Parents as a Predictor of Children’s Feelings of Being Caught in Stepfamilies

This study tested the degree to which remarried couples’ coparental communication with nonresidential parents predicted young adult children’s feelings of being caught between their parents (i.e., the ex-spouses). Participants included 120 stepfamily triads from the United States. Results indicate that residential parents’ and stepparents’ antagonistic coparental communication with the nonresidential parent are positively associated with young adults’ feelings of being caught, whereas parents’ supportive coparental communication is inversely associated with feeling caught. When combined, coparents’ reports of antagonistic coparental communication account for 22.5% of the shared variance in young adults’ feelings of being caught.

Repartnering and Childbearing After Divorce: Differences According to Parental Status and Custodial Arrangements

We use a stepfamily formation perspective to study two dimensions of the family life course following the dissolution of a first marriage. First, we examine how the presence of children from a prior union and the custody arrangements of those children influence the process of repartnering. In doing so, we extend the traditional explanations of union formation in terms of needs, attractiveness, and opportunities by taking into account the parental status of the new partners and a detailed classification of the custody arrangement of the children. Next, we investigate the likelihood of childbearing within those post-separation unions with a particular emphasis on the prior parental status of both partners. By studying post-separation union formation and fertility behavior together, we get a more complete depiction of stepfamily formation especially in their more complex forms. Our analyses are based on survey data for 2077 divorced men and 2384 divorced women collected in the Divorce in Flanders study. The results show that compared with other divorcees, full-time residential parents are the least likely to start a new union following separation and that parents are more likely to start a union with another parent than with a childless partner. Several of our results suggest that parenthood may not be a particularly attractive status on the partner market. Potential partners without children themselves appear especially reluctant to assume a (residential) step parental role. In contrast with the results for union formation, it is not the custody arrangement of the child(ren) but parental status itself that predicts childbearing within higher order unions. Our findings are important from a policy perspective as they stress the consequences of gender-neutral childrearing patterns following divorce for the repartnering of women after separation.

Lesbian and Heterosexual Adoptive Mothers’ Experiences of Relationship Dissolution

Little research has explored same-gender couples’ experiences of relationship dissolution, and no research has explored relationship dissolution in same-gender adoptive parents. Drawing from feminist and social constructionist perspectives, the current qualitative study examined the perspectives of 13 adoptive mothers (seven lesbian, six heterosexual) who had separated from their partners over the course of a longitudinal study on adoptive families. Participants were interviewed via telephone and represented a geographically diverse sample of mothers in the U.S. Becoming a parent (to a high-needs child in particular), differences in parenting style, parent problems (e.g., substance abuse), and infidelity were perceived as contributing to relationship dissolution by all types of participants. Lesbian mothers were especially likely to emphasize problems with emotional and sexual intimacy, and inequities in the division of labor, as contributors. Lesbian mothers were more likely to describe shared custody arrangements than heterosexual mothers, who were typically the primary residential parents. Participants described both practical challenges (e.g., financial insecurity) and emotional challenges (e.g., feelings of guilt, especially in light of the child’s history of loss) in the wake of relationship dissolution. However, participants also identified positive changes that had occurred post-dissolution, including personal growth and improved co-parenting, with the latter being noted by lesbians in particular. Findings have implications for professionals wishing to support diverse families during key life transitions, such as parental relationship dissolution.

Coparenting and Relationship Quality Effects on Father Engagement: Variations by Residence, Romance

We focused on coparenting support, partner relationship quality, and father engagement in families with young children that did not change structurally over 4 years of participation in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing study (N = 1,756). There was a significantly stronger and more robust positive association between fathers' perceived coparenting support at age 1 and father engagement at age 3 among nonresidential nonromantic parents compared with residential (married or cohabiting) and nonresidential romantic parents. There was a significantly stronger and positive association between relationship quality at age 1 and father engagement at age 3 among nonresidential nonromantic parents compared with residential parents. The findings emphasize the importance of considering both family structure and romantic involvement contexts of fathering when tracking father engagement over time.

Coparental Communication with Nonresidential Parents as a Predictor of Couples' Relational Satisfaction and Mental Health in Stepfamilies

This study tested the degree to which coparental communication with nonresidential parents predicted couples' relational satisfaction and mental health in stepfamilies. Participants included 127 stepfamily dyads. Results revealed that stepparents' coparental communication with nonresidential parents positively predicted their satisfaction with their current partners (i.e., with residential parents). For mental health, stepparents' coparental communication with nonresidential parents reduced their mental health symptoms, but positively predicted their partner's mental health symptoms (i.e., indicating poorer mental health). Consequently, the results highlight the ambivalence residential parents may experience as they manage the tensions associated with having their new partners coparent with their ex-spouses.

Fathers’ and Mothers’ Parenting Predicting and Responding to Adolescent Sexual Risk Behaviors

Transactional models of problem behavior argue that less effective parenting and adolescent problem behaviors coevolve, exerting bidirectional influences. This article extends such models by analyzing growth trajectories of sexual risk behaviors and parenting processes among 3,206 adolescents (aged 13-18) and their residential parents. Within individuals, increases in regular family activities prospectively predicted declines in adolescents' risky sexual activities. In contrast, increases in risky sexual activities predicted heightened father knowledge. Between-individual comparisons revealed bidirectional links between more involved parenting, particularly family activities and father knowledge, and lower adolescent risky sexual activity. Results highlight the importance of family activities as a protective force for adolescents and suggest that fathers may react differently than mothers in the face of youth problem behaviors.

The Continued Importance of Quality Parent–Adolescent Relationships During Late Adolescence

The quality of adolescents' relationships with residential parents has been found to predict many different health and behavioral youth outcomes; strong associations have also been found between these outcomes and family processes, and between relationship quality and family processes. Data from Rounds 1–5 of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1997 were used to examine hypotheses about the influence of the parent–adolescent relationship on subsequent adolescent mental well‐being and delinquency, as mediated by family processes. Using structural equation modeling, we found that the influence of a positive residential parent–adolescent relationship on better mental well‐being and fewer delinquency was entirely mediated by family routines, parental monitoring, and parental supportiveness, net of sociodemographic controls.

Family and Work Role-Identities of Divorced Parents

There is a plethora of research on work and family. However, there has been less study of the work-family interface of divorced parents. This study of 240 divorced parents examined how they perceived their parenting and work role-identities and how these role-identities are associated with role balance and well-being. Findings suggest that divorced parents' perception of their parent and worker role-identity is in part influenced by others' view. The salience of parenting for both residential and nonresidential parents is significantly associated with well-being, suggesting the importance of this role-identity for mothers and fathers. Additionally, parents who experience greater role balance have greater well-being.

PROGRAMS FOR PROMOTING PARENTING OF RESIDENTIAL PARENTS: Moving From Efficacy to Effectiveness

This article reviews prevention programs that target primary residential parents as change agents for improving children's postdivorce adjustment. First, we review parental risk and protective factors for children from divorced families, including parenting quality, parental mental health problems, interparental conflict, and contact with the nonresidential parent. Following a discussion of brief informational interventions, we describe the findings of evaluations of three multisession, skill‐building interventions for divorced parents. Impressive evidence is presented that parenting is a modifiable protective factor and that improving parenting leads to improvements in children's postdivorce adjustment. We then discuss, in greater detail, the New Beginnings Program, which we highlight because it has shown repeated, immediate effects on children's mental health outcomes as well as long‐term effects on a wide array of other meaningful outcomes, such as diagnosis of mental disorder in the past year, externalizing problems, alcohol and drug use, and academic performance. Also, mediational analyses have shown that program‐induced changes in parenting accounted for changes in mental health outcomes. The remainder of the article describes a research and action agenda that is needed to successfully implement the New Beginnings Program in domestic relations courts.

Legal and Social Ties Between Children and Cohabiting Fathers

The article examines whether legal ties between the members in the nuclear family affect the father-child relationship after domestic breakup. Data were taken from a sample of 419 younger Danish children from previous marital unions, and consensual unions with either sole or joint legal custody before family dissolution. The study found no evidence that civil status as a single factor could explain possible differences in the post-separation organization of parenting, but a sole legal custody arrangement from the child's birth may disfavour cohabiting fathers as future residential parents. The results further suggested that father's potential as breadwinner together with his involvement in preseparation childcare care constitutive elements of modern fatherhood.

Gender and Age Differences in Child Adjustment to Parental Separation

The present study examined gender and age differences in adjustment among children whose parents have separated. Measures designed specifically to assess family functioning during the divorce process (the Divorce Adjustment Inventory-Revised, and Child Divorce Adjustment Inventory), along with a measure of self-esteem and interviews with children, provide an in-depth exploration of the experience of families during the transitional period of separation. Results indicate that (1) parents of girls reported higher resolution of the separation, (2) high self-esteem for girls was mediated by residential parents' high socioeconomic status, (3) older children exhibited higher adjustment than younger children, and (4) father-headed families indicated higher adjustment before and after separation. Using a model of divorce as a process, results are discussed in relation to findings from studies of post-divorce and pre-separation families to provide a more complete picture of the divorce experience and child adjustment to that experience.

Residential and Nonresidential Parents' Perspectives on Visitation Problems

Visitation problems were examined from the perspectives of residential and nonresidential parents on 3 occasions. Visitation problems were common at all assessments and moderately stable over time. Residential parents ' perceptions of visitation problems were significantly correlated with concerns about their ex-spouse's parenting abilities shortly after filing for divorce and 3 years later. Also, shortly after filing for divorce, anger/hurt about the divorce uniquely predicted residential parents' reports of visitation problems. Implications for practice are discussed. RESIDENTIAL AND NONRESIDENTIAL PARENTS' PERSPECTIVES ON VISITATION PROBLEMS * Sharlene A. Wolchik, Andrea M. Fenaughty, and Sanford L Braver ; Currently, over one million children in the United States face the transition of parental divorce each year (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1992; U.S. National Center for Health Statistics, 1991), and it is estimated that over 50% of American children will spend some time in a single-parent home (Bumpass & Sweet, 1989; Furstenberg & Cherlin, 1991). Divorced parents and their children are at risk for a variety of negative outcomes; members of divorced families show greater social and psychological problems and children show greater academic difficulties than those from intact families (Amato & Keith, 1991a, 1991b; Bloom, Asher, & White, 1978). Given the high prevalence of divorce and its potential negative consequences, research focused on understanding the challenges and stressors that occur during this transition in family structure can have important implications for both the design of interventions and the development of public policy. According to a family systems conceptualization of the divorce process, the single most important psychological challenge for former partners involves redefining power and intimacy boundaries (Emery, 1994). For many families, visitation represents the only remaining linkage between the ex-spouses. Thus, it provides a critical arena for redefining power and intimacy boundaries and disentangling ex-spouses' continuing roles as parents from their past roles as spouses (for a fuller discussion of family systems perspectives of divorce, see Arditti & Kelly, 1994; Emery, 1994; Emery & Dillon, 1994). Although many researchers and clinicians view visitation as a significant potential stressor (e.g., Barnum, 1987), there is little research on the extent and nature of visitation difficulties. Most of the research on visitation has focused instead on the relation between visitation and children's adjustment. Although the findings are not entirely consistent, most researchers suggest that children who have frequent, high quality contact with the noncustodial parent have more favorable adjustment than those who have less frequent or poor quality contact (e.g., Balls, Pillow, Wolchik, & Sandler, 1988; Engleman, 1988; Furstenberg, Morgan, & Allison, 1987; Guidubaldi, Perry, Cleminshaw, & McLoughlin, 1983; Hess & Camara, 1979; Hetherington, Cox, & Cox, 1978; Wallerstein & Kelly, 1980a; Wolchik, Sandler, & Braver, 1986). Researchers also have shown that the positive benefits of visitation by nonresidential parents vary as a function of interpersonal and intrapersonal variables such as the quality of the relationship between the spouses (Hetherington, Stanley-Hagen, & Anderson, 1989; Wolchik et al., 1986). Unfortunately, many nonresidential parents eventually cease to play an active role in their children's lives (Furstenberg & Nord, 1985; Furstenberg, Nord, Peterson, & Zill, 1983; Selzter,, 1991; Wallerstein & Kelly, 1980b), although the extent of such disengagement is a matter of some debate (Arditti, 1992; Braver, Wolchik, Sandler, Fogas, & Zvetina, 1991; Braver, Wolchik, et al., 1993). Most children experience a strong sense of loss as contact with their nonresidential parents diminishes (e. …

Parental divorce: From the children's viewpoint

Sixty-three children aged 7-18 years were interviewed individually 2 years after their Parents' divorce about their experiences of this event, and their feelings about it. Their residential parents were interviewed in parallel. The results indicated that thoughts about the divorce were more prevalent among the children than the parents realized. The boys and the younger children accepted the divorce to a lesser extent relative to what the parents thought. The children's knowledge about the divorce before the event and the extent to which the divorce had been discussed by the children and their parents crystallized to be of great importance for the children's ability to cope with and accept the divorce. Additional findings suggested that about one-third of the children wished for more frequent contact with their divorced parent. In conclusion, there was both a lack of information to the children and a lack in communication between children and parents about the divorce. It seems of importance to teach pare...

Patterns of Courtship for Remarriage: Implications for Child Adjustment and Parent-Child Relationships

Most children who experience their parents' divorce also experience their custodial parent's remarriage. However, research has not addressed how patterns of courtship for remarriage influence the developing child and his or her relationships in the new family. This longitudinal study focuses on 57 remarried, stepfather families with a target child aged 9 to 13, using multimethod, multi-informant measures of child adjustment and parent-child relationships. Comparisons were made to determine whether the custodial mother's number of dating partners, remarriage courtship length, or the timing and sequence of typical courtship stages affected the child's adjustment and his or her relationships with the residential parents after remarriage. Results indicated that a longer time spent in a divorced, mother-custody household was associated with continuing difficulty in stepfather-stepchild relationships and lower levels of the child's social competence during the initial months following remarriage. In addition, children whose custodial mother cohabited before remarriage appeared to be more socially competent throughout the two years after remarriage, while also experiencing less negative family relationships. Assertions about the ideal timing of courtship for remarriage are challenged.

Locus of control as a mediator of negative divorce-related events and adjustment problems in children.

Beliefs about whether locus of control mediates the relationship between negative divorce-related events and children's adjustment were explored in a group of 78 children and their primary residential parents. In the children's self-reports of adjustment, locus of control was found to be a partial mediator in the relationship. Analyses of the parents' reports of the children's adjustment did not support a mediational model.

Nonresidential and Residential Parents' Perceptions of the Former Spouse Relationship and Children's Social Competence following Marital Separation: Theory and Programmed Intervention

The purposes of this study are (a) to examine the relationships among dimensions of the former spouse reiationship and children's social competence (CSC) post-separation using data collected from nonresidentiai and residential separated parents, and (b) to examine the impact of a community-based, educational prevention program for divorcing parents on the quality of the former spouse relationship. The sampie consisted of 193 separated and divorcing parents identified through court records—773 program participants and 80 nonparticipants. Using conflict theory to conceptualize the former spouse reiationship, coparental conflict, competition, and cooperation were considered distinct dimensions. The resuits indicate that coparentai competition is related more strongly to CSC than is conflict or cooperation. Importantiy, the relationships among the coparentai and CSC variables are much stronger for nonresidential than residential parents. Finally, the analysis of pre to post prevention program change scores indicates that there is a greater trend toward decreased coparentai competition reported by the resldentiai parent participants compared to the nonparticipants but the trend is not statisticaiiy significant. No other group effects are found.