Same-Sex Parent Socialization: Understanding Gay and Lesbian Parenting Practices as Cultural Socialization

ABSTRACT

Cultural socialization refers to the processes by which parents communicate cultural values, beliefs, customs, and behaviors to their children. To date, research on cultural socialization has focused primarily on racial- and ethnic-minority families, and more contemporary studies have examined these practices among international and transracial adoptive families. In general, four main themes have emerged in the literature: Cultural Socialization, Preparation for Bias, Promotion of Mistrust, and Egalitarianism. Since families with same-sex parents continue to experience stigma in society, there is reason to believe these parents engage in cultural socialization strategies specifically around issues of sexual orientation. Yet, current research on cultural socialization has not explicitly investigated same-sex parenting. Thus, the present study examined same-sex parent socialization among families headed by sexual-minority parents (52 fathers, 43 mothers) using a preexisting socialization framework. Findings revealed that the majority of parents endorsed behaviors designed to promote children's awareness of diverse family structures and prepare them for potential stigma-related barriers socialization along three dimensions: Cultural Socialization, Preparation for Bias, and Proactive Parenting. These results contribute to our empirical understanding of same-sex parenting and justify the need to broaden our conceptualization of cultural socialization to be more inclusive of these diverse family structures.     

The terrible twos: How children cope with frustration and tantrums and the effect of maternal and paternal behaviors

Experimental Frustration Procedures with 158 children (15–39 months) of two-parent families were conducted, with each parent separately involved. We examined diverse characteristics of children's frustration and focused on specific behaviors of how children coped and parents supported them. In addition, external observers measured child attachment security (via Attachment Q Sort) toward the mother and the father during two home visits. Children with high attachment security became frustrated later and for a shorter time, and fathers, as compared to mothers, relieved these frustration patterns and reduced them. Although 22.2% children exhibited intense frustration responses up to tantrums, levels remained unaffected by child gender, but decreased with child age. Time-lag analyses revealed that children's self-comforting behaviors reduced frustration responses only by around 20%, but self-distracting (in younger children) and pretend-playing (in older children) by around 50% and 70%. Of the parent behaviors, demonstrating reduced children's frustration by up to 40% whereas distracting and reframing by around 60% (mothers) and 80% (fathers). In general, mothers tended to protect the child from distress, whereas fathers assisted the child in coping with frustration. However, if mothers soothed and fathers encouraged, children's frustration intensified.     

The Attitudes of Australian Heterosexuals Toward Same-Sex Parents

SUMMARY

This is the first study of attitudes of Australian heterosexuals toward heterosexual, gay male, and lesbian parents and the children raised by these parents. A sample of Australian heterosexual males and females read one of six vignettes describing a family situation. Participants assessed the parents' emotional stability, responsibility, and competence; how loving, sensitive, and nurturing they were; the amount of quality time they spent with their child; and their ability to be good role models. Results indicated participants held negative attitudes toward gay male and lesbian same-sex parents. Participants believed that children raised by same-sex parents are more likely to experience confusion over their sexual orientation and gender identity, more likely to be homosexual, and more likely to experience strained peer relationships as well as stigma and teasing than children raised by heterosexual parents. Level of sexual prejudice was the key predictor of attitudes toward same-sex parents and the expected outcomes for their children. Being male, older, and having fewer children were additional predictors of attitudes towards same-sex parents, whereas being older and less religious was associated with expected negative outcomes for the children. Substantial attitudinal shifts are required before gay male and lesbian parents and their children are fully accepted into Australian communities.     

Same‐Sex Parent Families and Children's Academic Achievement

Children in traditional families (i.e., married, 2 biological parents) tend to do better than their peers in nontraditional families. An exception to this pattern appears to be children from same‐sex parent families. Children with lesbian mothers or gay fathers do not exhibit the poorer outcomes typically associated with nontraditional families. Studies of same‐sex parent families, however, have relied on a static conceptualization of the family and discounted the importance of the timing and number of family transitions for understanding children's outcomes. To examine whether same‐sex parent families represent an exception among nontraditional families, the author used data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study—Kindergarten cohort (N = 19,043) to create a dynamic indicator of children's family structure and tested its association with math assessment scores. The results indicated that children in same‐sex parent families scored lower than their peers in married, 2‐biological parent households, but the difference was nonsignificant net of family transitions.     

IMPLICATIONS OF INTERNET TECHNOLOGY FOR MEDICAL SOCIOLOGY IN THE NEW MILLENNIUM

This research examines how parental heterosexism—negative attitudes toward homosexuals and homosexuality—and other family characteristics relate to the development of children's attitudes toward people with HIV/AIDS (PWA). Attention is directed to the overall relationship between parents’ and children's attitudes and to the potential mechanisms through which these linkages are manifested. Based on social learning theories of childhood socialization, a range of mechanisms is considered, focusing on heterosexist attitudes in parents and communication with children about AIDS. Findings indicate that parental attitudes concerning homosexuals influence children's attitudes toward PWA, implying that there can be negative as well as positive consequences of parents’ beliefs on children's attitudes. The possibility of negative parental effects on children's prejudices toward PWA suggests that in-school HIV/AIDS education at younger ages is more important than previously thought.     

Sexism,Heterosexism, and Attributions About Undesirable Behavior in Children of Gay,Lesbian, and Heterosexual Parents

SUMMARY

Existing research on heterosexuals' attitudes toward gay and lesbian parenting typically focuses on heterosexuals' views about whether or not gay men and lesbians should be parents. Although a significant literature describes positive outcomes for actual gay and lesbian parenting, research has not specifically examined the effect of these attitudes on heterosexuals' evaluations of parenting skills, competency in parenting situations, or attributions about behavior in children of lesbian and gay parents. Two hundred twenty participants responded to a series of vignettes describing a restaurant scene in which two parents respond to their child's public tantrum. Sexual orientation and gender of the active parent in the heterosexual condition were varied. Heterosexism, evaluation of parenting skills, and attributions for child's behavior were assessed. Unexpectedly, gay male parenting skills were rated most positively, and heterosexual parenting skills (where a woman was the active parent) most negatively. Both traditional and modern heterosexism predicted negative evaluations in the same-sex parenting conditions with modern heterosexism (denial of continued discrimination) explaining a larger portion of the variance in several outcome measures. It is suggested that differences in gender role expectations for men and women encourage excessive praise for men who interact with children and condemnation of women who disappoint unrealistic expectations.     

Caseworkers' perspective on risk factors in the family environment influencing mothers' difficulties in meeting children's needs

ObjectivesThis study examines, from the caseworkers' point of view, which needs of children are the most difficult for parents in neglectful contexts to respond to and which risk factors make this response more difficult.MethodA sample of 55 parents being followed by child protection services for neglect or high risk of neglect accepted to participate in the study. Their caseworker filled out a grid regarding the response provided to the children's needs and the risk factors in the family environment.ResultsThe results indicate that the children's age is related to the difficulties of responding to their needs. The caseworkers are particularly concerned about guidance and boundaries provided to preschool-age children, but less so about that provided to school-age children. When the children's age is controlled for, parents' mental health problems explains a significant proportion of the variance in parents' response to their children's need for stimulation, emotional warmth, and guidance and boundaries. Caseworkers' worries about drug and alcohol misuse also explain a significant proportion of their concerns about the mothers' ability to ensure their child's safety.ConclusionCaseworkers are more worried about the parental response offered to preschool children than to school-age ones. However, a constant and coherent response to growing children is still important for their developmental trajectories. Moreover, mental health and substance abuse explain caseworkers' concerns about mothers' engagement toward their child. These data raise questions about which type of services to offer, because intervening in families where parents deal with personal issues while addressing child neglect is complex.     

Black Mothers' Perceptions of the Role of Race in Children's Education

Many Black parents consider racial climate and academic quality when thinking and making decisions about their children's schooling experiences. However, few studies have directly asked Black parents about the role they believe race will play in their children's schooling, if any. The authors interviewed 76 Black mothers (M_age = 34; SD_age = 6.67) of children entering first grade (M_age = 6.13; SD_age = 0.36), asking what role they believed race would play in their children's schooling. The authors found that mothers considered the racial composition of the school and the perspectives and behaviors of teachers and the administration to be important factors when assessing the role of race in their children's education. Mothers were also particularly concerned about the discrimination their sons may face because of their position as Black boys. Given these contextual factors, mothers considered themselves to be protective agents through their involvement in their children's academic lives.     

Growing Up in One-Parent Families in Asia

This article provides the socioeconomic contexts in Asia and summarizes findings of the nine articles in this special issue that examine the trend and patterns of one-parent families in Asia and the consequences of such family structure for children's well-being. In Asia, out-of-wedlock births remain uncommon to date. Divorce and migration are the major causes of one parenthood. The articles present diverse forms of one-parent families in Asia and show how culture and policies shape the experience of growing up with one parent. Although children living with one parent often face challenges, depending on gender and socioeconomic status of the lone parent, and the causes living with one parent has varying consequences. Public assistance for lone parents are typically limited in Asia, and extended families may play a bigger role in the lives of lone parents and their children in some countries than in Western societies. Theoretical implications are discussed.     

Immigration and the Family Circumstances of Mexican‐Origin Children: A Binational Longitudinal Analysis

Using data from the birth cohort of the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (n = 1,200) and the Mexican Family Life Survey (n = 1,013), this study investigated the living arrangements of Mexican‐origin preschool children. The analysis examined children's family circumstances in both sending and receiving countries, used longitudinal data to capture family transitions, and considered the intersection between nuclear and extended family structures. Between ages 0–1 and 4–5, Mexican children of immigrants experienced significantly more family instability than children in Mexico. They were more likely to transition from 2‐parent to single‐parent families and from extended family households to simple households. There were fewer differences between U.S. children with immigrant versus native parents, but the higher level of single parenthood among children of natives at ages 0–1 and the greater share making transitions from a 2‐parent to a single‐parent family suggest ongoing erosion of children's family support across generations in the United States.     

Ambivalence in the Relationship of Adult Children to Aging Parents and In‐Laws

The concept of ambivalence emphasizes the complexity of family relations and the potential for individuals to evaluate relationships as both positive and negative. Using multilevel models, we investigate ambivalence in adult children's relationships with their aging parents and in‐laws (N= 1,599). We focus on factors predicting adult children's ambivalence toward parents and in‐laws within a gendered kinship structure that shapes these relations. We conclude that ambivalence is a useful concept for representing the complexity of parent‐child relationships and is produced within the context of social relations structured by gender and kinship. Results show greater ambivalence among dyads of women, toward in‐laws, among those in poor health, for daughters providing assistance, and for adult children with poor parental relations in early life.     

Understanding Grandfamilies: Characteristics of Grandparents,Nonresident Parents,and Children

Using data from the Year 9 Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N ～ 3,182), we investigated the characteristics grandfamilies (grandparents raising their grandchildren with no parent present, N = 84) and compared them to other key groups, including children's nonresident parents and other economically disadvantaged families with children. Results show that grandparents raising their grandchildren were generally better off in terms of educational attainment, marital status, and economic well‐being than the child's parents. Grandparents raising their grandchildren also had characteristics very similar to other disadvantaged mothers. Academic and socioemotional well‐being were poorer among children in grandfamilies compared with those living with their mothers, but parenting practices were very similar. These findings suggest that although children in grandfamilies may be at a disadvantage academically and socioemotionally, grandparent caregivers are in many ways similar to other fragile‐family mothers. Overall, this study enhances our knowledge of an important yet understudied family type.     

Caucasian Parents and Korean Adoptees

Abstract

This study explored the transracial adoption experiences of Caucasian parents who adopted children from Korea. Self-report data from parents of 117 adoptive families were used to compare mothers and fathers' perceptions in three key areas: parent reasons for adopting, family adjustment related to the adoption, and racial identity of adoptees. On the topic of adoptee's racial identity, parents' perceptions were compared over a seven-year period. Overall, mothers and fathers' perceptions were more similar than different, and parents appear to downplay their Korean children's race. The findings have implications for post-adoption training for transracial adoptive families.     

The Influence of Parental Identification on Attitudes in Same-Sex Families

ABSTRACT

Without the ability to be legally married in most U.S. states until 2015, same-sex couples did not have the rights and privileges of married or once-married couples. Even with the changing legality and increasing social acceptance of same-sex marriage, the relationship between nonbirth parents and children in same-sex parented families is often not recognized as a legitimate child-parent bond. The focus of this article is to investigate how attitudes related to social networks and the language used to identify parental figures likely contribute to the binary gender-role structure of the family. Using data from a self-administered survey, I examine whether nonbirth and birth parents hold distinct attitudes about social concepts that are relevant to their lives.     

Family Structure and Child Well‐being: Integrating Family Complexity

Although children's family lives are diverse, the measurement of children's living arrangements has lagged, focusing on the relationships of children to parents while largely ignoring sibling composition. Using data from the 2008 Survey of Income and Program Participation (N = 23,985) the authors documented patterns of family complexity among a nationally representative sample of children ages 0–17 living in a range of family structures. They also examined the independent and joint associations of family structure and family complexity on child economic well‐being. Family complexity was independently related to economic disadvantage, namely, a lower income‐to‐needs ratio and a higher likelihood of public assistance receipt. The role of family complexity was partially contingent on family structure, with the positive association between family complexity and receipt of public assistance more pronounced for children in families with 2 married biological parents. This study demonstrates the utility of integrating family structure and family complexity in studies of children's well‐being.     

Do As I Say and Not As I Think: Parent Socialisation of Lie‐Telling Behaviour

This study explored parent (N = 146) perspectives about situations in which they think it is acceptable to lie, how this corresponds to how they socialise their children about lie‐telling and their children's actual behaviour. Results indicated the methods parents report using to teach their children about the acceptability of lie‐telling are consistent with what they report teaching their children about lie‐telling overall. Also, the frequency of lies that children told (N = 88) to protect themselves from psychological distress or conflict differed between those who were taught that lying is sometimes acceptable versus those taught it is never acceptable.     

Parental Linguistic Input and Its Relation to Toddlers’ Visual Attention in Joint Object Play: A Comparison Between Children with Normal Hearing and Children With Hearing Loss

Parent–child interactions are multimodal, often involving coordinated exchanges of visual and auditory information between the two partners. The current work focuses on the effect of children's hearing loss on parent–child interactions when parents and their toddlers jointly played with a set of toy objects. We compared the linguistic input received by toddlers with hearing loss (HL) and their chronological age‐matched (CA) and hearing age‐matched (HA) normal‐hearing peers. Moreover, we used head‐mounted eye trackers to examine how different parental linguistic input affected children's visual attention on objects when parents either led or followed children's attention during joint object play. Overall, parents of children with HL provided comparable amount of linguistic input as parents of the two normal‐hearing groups. However, the types of linguistic input produced by parents of children with HL were similar to the CA group in some ways and similar to the HA group in other ways. Interestingly, the effects of different types of linguistic input on extending the attention of children with HL qualitatively resembled the patterns seen in the CA group, even though the effects were less pronounced in the HL group. We discuss the implications of these results for our understanding of the reciprocal, dynamic, and multi‐factored nature of parent–child interactions.     

Children's agency and its contradictions in the context of transnational labour migration from Vietnam

In this article, we contribute to the growing and diverse literature on the lived experiences of children and their agency in the context of migration. Drawing on in‐depth interviews with children whose migrant parents have left them behind, as well as with those who care for them in Vietnam, we demonstrate that the various ways in which they affect migration decision‐making and transnational communication shape the children's imaginations of migration. The context‐specific social construction of childhood, or more specifically adult perceptions of children's agency and needs, in turn structures these processes. We emphasize the need for debates on children's agency to take into account both broader socio‐economic processes at the macro level and the concrete and local scale at which children's lives unfold. By outlining how children's experiences of parental migration are constitutive of their attitudes toward this livelihood strategy, we also argue that the ability of those ‘left‐behind’ to exercise agency is closely intertwined with processes of social becoming and navigation in the transnational social fields constructed for them by adults.     

Consequences of Teen Parents' Child‐Care Arrangements for Mothers and Children

Using the nationally representative Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort (2001–2006; N ?7,900), the authors examined child‐care arrangements among teen parents from birth through prekindergarten. Four latent classes of child care arrangements at 9, 24, and 52 months emerged: (a) “parental care,” (b) “center care,” (c) “paid home‐based care,” and (d) “free kin‐based care.” Disadvantaged teen‐parent families were overrepresented in the “parental care” class, which was negatively associated with children's preschool reading, math, and behavior scores and mothers' socioeconomic and fertility outcomes compared with some nonparental care classes. Nonparental care did not predict any negative maternal or child outcomes, and different care arrangements had different benefits for mothers and children. Time spent in nonparental care and improved maternal outcomes contributed to children's increased scores across domains. Child‐care classes predicted maternal outcomes similarly in teen‐parent and nonteen‐parent families, but the “parental care” class predicted some disproportionately negative child outcomes for teen‐parent families.