Preparation for residential treatment: An anticipatory mourning process

This paper discusses the intense emotional bonding between parent and adolescent as it interferes with the adolescent and family's ability to tolerate the physical separation inherent in long-term residential treatment. It describes the mourning process through which both adolescent and parent experience and partially relinquish their attachment to one another in anticipation of the separation. The process is completed when both parent and child accept the need for placement and are ready to accept the possibility of new relationships in the residential treatment setting.     

Postdivorce Parent–Child Contact and Child Well‐being: The Importance of Predivorce Parental Involvement

Frequent parent–child contact after divorce is generally assumed to be in children's best interests, but findings are mixed. This study extends the small body of research about the conditions under which parent–child contact is more beneficial or less beneficial by examining the role of predivorce parental involvement. It is argued that the more a parent was involved in child rearing in the past, the more important postdivorce parent–child contact is for child well‐being. Data from the Netherlands (N = 3,694) show that when children live with the parent who was not the primary caretaker, child well‐being is lower. Similarly, the more the father used to be involved in child rearing, the more beneficial nonresident father–child contact is for children. These findings suggest that it is not so much the frequency of contact per se that matters for child well‐being but, rather, the extent to which postdivorce residence arrangements reflect predivorce parenting arrangements.     

Parental support and outcome in sexually abused children

The purpose of this study was to compare how parental support, attachment of the parent, and the child's report regarding the quality of the parent/child relationship differentially relate to child and parent reports of the child's symptomatology. After controlling for those variables that covary with it, parental support was only significantly related to 2 of 17 scales of parent- and child-reported symptomatology. Parent attachment and the child's report regarding the quality of the parent/child relationship were better predictors than parental support of the child's outcome but varied in the manner in which they contributed to outcome.     

Parent Involvement in Head Start and Children's Development: Indirect Effects Through Parenting

The authors examined the extent to which parent involvement in Head Start programs predicted changes in both parent and child outcomes over time, using a nationally representative sample of 1,020 three‐year‐old children over 3 waves of the Family and Child Experiences Survey. Center policies that promote involvement predicted greater parent involvement, and parents who were more involved in Head Start centers demonstrated increased cognitive stimulation and decreased spanking and controlling behaviors. In turn, these changes in parenting behaviors were associated with gains in children's academic and behavioral skills. These findings suggest that Head Start programs should do even more to facilitate parent involvement because it can serve as an important means for promoting both parent and child outcomes.     

“The troublesome other and I”: Parallel stories of separated parents in prolonged conflicts

This qualitative study aims to explore how noncohabiting parenting couples in prolonged conflict construct the other parent and themselves. Ten parents from five parent couples were interviewed. A dyadic analytical design was used, where parent's stories of conflict were analyzed in parallel with their co‐parent. Drawing on positioning theory, self‐identity as parents emerged as implicit counter positions in storylines, which construct the co‐parent as “the troublesome other.” Two typologies of conflicted storylines were prominent in the findings: storylines of violations of trust, positioning the co‐parents in relation to traumatic events in the past and, storylines of who is bad, positioning the co‐parent as either a disloyal co‐parent or a dysfunctional parent. The findings indicate that prolonged conflicts made it impossible to find available positions for cooperation. We argue that family therapists should aid each household toward promoting child and family resilience rather than continued efforts to solve chronic conflicts.     

Constructing the Transition to Parenthood*

How is the transition to parenthood constructed in a context in which fatherhood and motherhood are therapeutically defined? Relying on ethnographic observations of 66 expectant and new parent couples assigned to 13 different parent educator‐led groups, we show how, with the arrival of a baby, a sense of transition is crafted and often amplified. Our analysis suggests that just as the overall life course is constructed through language and meaningful gesture, so also the transition to parenthood is constructed through verbal and nonverbal signification. Using a vocabulary of contrast and change, parent edu‐cators and expectant and new parents create a collective feeling that they are witnessing a transformation of major proportions. By emphasizing the idea that things are no longer the same, parent educators also establish themselves as authorities whose job it is to steer fathers and mothers through unfamiliar terrain. For their part, expectant and new parents not only listen to but often also replicate the parent educators’ vocabularies and, in so doing, further magnify distinctions between before parenthood and after, and between one stage of parenthood and another. Childbirth stands uncomfortably at the junction of the two worlds of nature and culture. Like death and disease it is a biological event, but the defining feature of biological events in human life is their social character. Ann Oakley (1980:7)     

Treatment foster parent satisfaction: Survey validation and predictors of satisfaction,retention, and intent to refer

Treatment foster parents are invaluable for youth in treatment foster care, therefore it is imperative for programs to measure their satisfaction in their role. However, the concept of treatment foster parent satisfaction is not fully developed, and there is a need to develop measurement tools specifically for treatment foster parents. Based on previous research and available foster parent satisfaction surveys, we developed a brief 28-item scale that measures four constructs related to overall treatment foster parent satisfaction: Professional Parenting Role, Treatment Foster Parent Efficacy, Support from Staff, and Quality of Training. Additionally, the scale assesses overall satisfaction, likelihood to continue as a treatment foster parent, and likelihood to refer others to become treatment foster parents. We also assessed which of the four constructs predict high and low scores on these three metrics. Results can be used to target interventions to improve treatment foster parent satisfaction.     

Time with sons and daughters

We present a model of parental investment in child quality in which the effectiveness??objectively or as perceived by the parents??of parental childcare depends on the sex of the child. In particular, the time of the same-sex parent is more productive than that of the opposite-sex parent. When parents have equal wages, efficiency considerations dictate that a parent spends more time with a same-sex child than with an opposite-sex child, but parents allocate the same total time to boys and girls, and costs of raising a boy are the same as raising a girl. When wage rates differ, and the mother is the lower-waged parent, it is cheaper to produce child quality of girls than of boys. We show that many of the empirical results in terms of a different time allocation pattern, total amount of time invested in a child, expenditures on child consumption goods, and family size and composition can be explained by this technological difference and the gender wage gap, without relying on parental preferences for girls versus boys. Our analysis is largely diagrammatic.     

Like Mother, Like Daughter: Intergenerational Transmission of DK Response Rates

Attitude expression (and its opposite, DK response rate) isan important personal and political characteristic which isrelated to an individual's psychological and demographic traits.It is also transmitted from parent to child. In fact, it istransmitted to a greater degree than other political attitudesexamined here, with the exception of partisanship. Owing tothe fact that males show higher levels of attitude expression,and because this tendency is reinforced by cultural norms, thetransmission process for attitude expression is conditionedby the sex of child and of parent. Compared with the father'simpact, mothers are particularly influential in transmittingattitude expression to daughters. While fathers have a somewhatstronger effect on sons than do mothers, the difference is substantiallysmaller.     

Community Context,Social Integration Into Family,and Youth Violence

The purpose of this study is to analyze the extent to which neighborhood‐level family structure and feelings of family integration are associated with acts of violence among 16,910 adolescents from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. The results from our hierarchical linear models indicate that adolescents who live in neighborhoods with lower proportions of single‐parent families and who report higher levels of family integration commit less violence. We also find that neighborhood‐level family structure shapes the extent to which social integration into family matters: In neighborhoods that are considered higher risk environments (i.e., contain greater proportions of single‐parent families), family integration is often less effective in deterring youth violence than it is in lower risk environments.     

BECOMING A TECHNOLOGIST Days in a girl's life

Studies of the gender relations of information and communications technologies (ICTs) seldom deal with these relations as experienced in early childhood, except as located in schooling. The construction of identity in relation to technology is negotiated from an early age. In this article a technological strand is identified in childhood using 'experience stories', writing about specific situations or events on a specific theme, with the focus of analysis being on the theme, rather than on the individual. In reflecting on this technological strand of childhood the article tries to make sense of how everyday experiences serve as sites for constituting our relations with ICTs, and more personally, how they constitute relations for a young white working-class girl. This article also hopes to make visible technological acts which are essentialized and/or made invisible in later years. This article draws on a multi-layer definition of technology and uses conceptions of locally situated knowledge and practices to explore how a young girl might develop a familiarity with technology as part of everyday living. Class and race relations as well as gender relations are significant in early conceptions of 'knowing and doing' and later awareness of constructions of technology and technological identities and subjectivities. This article therefore attempts to identify these relations within the experience stories. By applying a concept of technology that encompasses the knowledge, skills and practices in the everyday life of a young girl, the author hopes to contribute to a richer understanding of the gender, class and race relations implicit in what is recognized as technological knowledge and to contribute to a more inclusive understanding of the social relations of ICTs.     

Parent loss and childhood bereavement: some theoretical considerations

This paper attempts to review critically the major psychoanalytic positions on the impact of parent loss during childhood. An effort is made to review systematically the issues of the loss of a parent as a love object, the loss of a parent as a narcissistic injury, children's cognitive understanding of death, and the relationship between loss and trauma. Two questions are raised by our efforts to understand the impact of the loss of a parent through death on children under ten years of age. First, what psychological tasks do children confront and what modes of coping do they use to deal with such an event? And, second, does such an event invariably lead to some pathological result for the child, or may its effects be normalized in the course of time? Although these questions may be seen as empirical questions needing to be answered through the collection of data that would confirm or negate the hypotheses generated, the questions are always posed within the context of a theoretical framework that colors how data is collected and which data is collected. By reviewing the theoretical positions, we come to the conclusion that no single approach is sufficient to explain the complexity of the impact of the death of a parent on a child. We propose that since no integrated conceptual framework presently encompasses all that needs to be explained, it is necessary to use a multivariant approach. Such an approach may be helpful in generating hypotheses and in beginning the task of systematic data collection.     

A Conceptualization of Parenting:

The purpose of this paper is to provide a framework for examining the parenting process. Tasks, roles, rules, communication, resources, and relationships are described as essential components of parenting. The conceptualization of parenting is not tied to a particular family structure or type. Rather, parenting is examined as a process undertaken with the goal of ferrying children from conception and birth through developmental challenges and life events to adulthood. As a bridge between the conceptualization of parenting and its application to single parent families, questions are raised concerning what it takes to parent adequately. Notions of the successful or ‘‘good enough’’ parent are derived from facets of the conceptual framework. The challenge of providing adequate parenting for single parent families is presented. Single parent families are not described as automatic ‘‘at risk’’ situations for children. However, identification of the ingredients needed for adequate parenting provides a useful framework for evaluation of the effectiveness of single parent families in the many forms and situations con- sidered in the other papers in this special volume of Marriage & Family Review.     

New Life at the Graveyard: A Method of Therapy for Individuation from a Dead Former Parent

First, the usual form of family-of-origin work with living parents toward the individuation of adult children is briefly illustrated. This is done in order then to compare and contrast this procedure with a method of therapy, presented here, for structuring family-of-origin work towards individuation from a dead parent. Several case illustrations follow. The paper concludes that under certain conditions, it is possible successfully to engage in and to complete individuation work with a parent who is already dead.     

Dating after late-life spousal loss: Does it compromise relationships with adult children?

In Widowhood in an American City (1973), Helena Lopata observed that widows struggle with new romantic relationships because their children often are resentful toward these new partners. Since the publication of Lopata's classic work, however, few studies have explored empirically the ways that widow(er)'s dating affects their relationships with children. We use prospective data from the Changing Lives of Older Couples study (CLOC) to explore: (1) the impact of bereaved spouses' dating on positive and negative aspects of parent–child relationships six and 18 months postloss; (2) the extent to which these associations are explained by preloss characteristics; and (3) the factors that moderate the association between widow(er) dating and parent–child relations. Multivariate analyses show that widowers who are interested in dating six months postloss report low levels of support and high levels of conflict with their children, yet widows report enhanced relationship quality. This pattern reflects the fact that men who are interested in dating do form new relationships, whereas women's interests are not translated into actual dating. Widowers' dating six months postloss compromises parent–child closeness among those with a history of strained parent–child relations, yet enhances closeness among those with historically good relationships. Dating takes a harsher toll on parent–daughter compared to parent–son relationships. Overall, dating threatens parent–child relationships in specific cases, yet it may also strengthen widow(er) s' parent–child bonds. We discuss the implications for the well-being of older widow(er)s and adult children.     

Parent – Adolescent Relationships and Girls’ Unhealthy Eating: Testing Reciprocal Effects

This longitudinal study tested the direction of associations between parent –adolescent relationships and adolescent girls’ unhealthy eating. Girls (N= 184) were seen at Time 1 (M age = 14.30 years), and then again 2 years later (Time 2; M age = 16.04 years). At both assessment periods, they completed measures that assessed their eating attitudes and behaviors, relationships with their parents, height, weight, and age of menarche. Whereas unhealthy family relationships have been hypothesized as a precursor to unhealthy eating attitudes and behaviors, it is also possible that increases in these behaviors contribute to more negative relationships within the family. Structural equation modeling was employed to simultaneously investigate the longitudinal influence of parent – adolescent relationships on girls’ unhealthy eating, and girls’ unhealthy eating on parent – adolescent relationships. The model was tested with the following controls: body mass (kg/m²), pubertal timing and age. A longitudinal direct effect was found for unhealthy eating on parent– adolescent relationships; however, no direct effect was found for parent– adolescent relationships on unhealthy eating over time. For middle– and late–adolescent girls, it appears that unhealthy eating behaviors and attitudes are predictive of less positive parent – adolescent relationships over time.