Three‐Generation Family Households: Differences by Family Structure at Birth

Using data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 4,898), this study investigated how the share, correlates, transition patterns, and duration of 3‐generation households vary by mother's relationship status at birth. Nine percent of married mothers, 17% of cohabiting mothers, and 45% of single mothers lived in a 3‐generation family household at the time of the child's birth. Incidence over time was much higher and most common among single‐mother households: Sixty percent lived in a 3‐generation family household at least 1 wave. Economic need, culture, and generational needs were associated with living in a 3‐generation household; correlates varied by mother's relationship status. Three‐generation family households were short lived, and transitions were frequent. Kin support through coresidence was an important source of support for families with young children and in particular families in which the parents were unwed at the time of their child's birth.     

Single Mothers' Religious Participation and Early Childhood Behavior

Using data on 1,134 single mothers from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, this study examined trajectories of religious participation among single mothers and whether these trajectories were associated with early childhood behavior. The results suggested that single mothers experienced diverse patterns of religious participation throughout their child's early life; some mothers maintained a consistent pattern of religious participation (or nonparticipation), and other mothers increased their participation. The results also suggested that religious participation was associated with greater involvement with children, reduced parenting stress, and a lower likelihood of engaging in corporal punishment. Young children raised by mothers who frequently attended religious services were less likely to display problem behaviors, and this relationship was partially mediated by increased child involvement, lower stress, and less frequent corporal punishment. Overall, religious participation may provide resources for single mothers that encourage them to engage in parenting practices that promote positive child development.     

Responding to the needs of youth who are homeless: Calling for politicized trauma-informed intervention

Trauma in the lives of youth who are homeless is a pervasive reality. In this article, a politicized understanding of trauma is taken up to explore the complex psychological, relational, and social/political challenges experienced by many young persons facing homelessness. Their needs are contrasted with the dominant framework for assessing and addressing homelessness among youth, which fails to adequately account for the effects of trauma in their lives. The authors argue for therapeutic approaches to address the negative effects of trauma; development of community services that adequately respond to the consequences of traumatic life experiences; and socially responsible policies that ensure provision of adequate services and also aim to address root causes of youth homelessness. While current conceptualizations of trauma-informed services go some distance toward achieving these goals, the authors argue that it is only by taking up a more radical understanding of trauma that interventions will be employed to better achieve these targets. Toward this end, the authors introduce a framework that integrates the SPECs model (Evans & Prilleltensky, 2007; Prilleltensky, 2005) with trauma-informed service provision, thereby infusing a social and political analysis to guide more effective trauma-informed solution building in response to the issue of youth homelessness.     

生育政策、姊妹结构与教育福祉关系研究

为进一步探究现行生育政策下独生子女、非独生子女以及多孩家庭姊妹结构与青少年教育福祉之间的独立关系,使用2000年人口普查数据,比较了独生子女与非独生子女教育福祉的异同。模型分析结果表明,由于独生子女可以享受更多的家庭教育资源,故在每个年龄段,他们的教育福祉都显著超过非独生子女,尤其超过有多个兄弟或（和）姐妹的孩子。可见,生育政策至少通过限制孩子数量、简化姊妹结构改善了青少年的教育福祉,但其影响呈现出两头高、中间低的态势：对小学、高中教育获得和机会的影响大于初中阶段。     

Indebted Relationships: Child Support Arrears and Nonresident Fathers' Involvement With Children

Low‐income, nonresident fathers owe a disproportionate amount of child support arrears, creating potential challenges for these fathers and their family relationships. This article uses mediation analysis to provide new evidence about how and why child support debt is related to paternal involvement using information from 1,017 nonresident fathers in the Fragile Families Study. Results show that child support arrears are associated with nonresident fathers having significantly less contact with children, being less engaged with them in daily activities, and providing less frequent in‐kind support 9 years after the birth. This negative association between child support debt and father involvement is most strongly and consistently mediated by the quality of the relationship between the biological parents. Although child support policies are designed to facilitate fathers' economic and emotional support, these results suggest that the accruement of child support debt may serve as an important barrier to father involvement.     

Austerity plan announcements and the impact on the employees’ wellbeing

This study investigates the impact of austerity plan announcements on employees’ wellbeing. We exploit the unexpected announcement of a drastic wage cut (25%) related to public sector employees in Romania. Using data from the Eurobarometer Surveys and the European Quality of Life Survey, we employ a difference-in-difference research design combined with matching, based on entropy balancing, to identify the causal effects. Our results reveal that the mere announcement of austerity measures leads to an overall drop in life satisfaction among those working in the public sector. We also show that men, and especially married individuals, are most affected by the substantial wage cut announcement. Contrary to previous research, we find that public sector employees with higher levels of education are more likely to be affected by this policy communication compared to those with only secondary or primary levels of education. Our results also suggest that the negative effect of the announcement is not persisting over time.     

Top incomes and human well-being: Evidence from the Gallup World Poll

The share of income held by the top 1 percent in many countries around the world has been rising persistently over the last 30 years. But we continue to know little about the relationship between the rising top income shares and human wellbeing. Using data from 24 countries and years ranging from 2005 to 2013 in the Gallup World Poll and the World Income Database, this study examines the relationship between top income share and different dimensions of subjective wellbeing. The results are mixed, with the negative relationship between top income shares and average life ladder being driven largely by the European sub-sample. For the European countries, we also document evidence that top income is statistically significantly associated with lower average enjoyment and being well-rested yesterday, and higher average stress and sadness yesterday. Overall, our findings suggest that, at least for individuals in Europe, an economic policy that increases national incomes may have significant crowding-out effect on aggregate evaluative wellbeing if it only increases the share of income at the very top of income distribution. More generally, our results highlight the complex relationships between income inequality and subjective wellbeing across different countries.     

Poverty and Wellbeing at the ‘Grassroots’—How Much is Visible to Researchers?

This paper discusses the grassroots level understanding of poverty and wellbeing. There is rich debate and ever expanding literature on the meaning of wellbeing and poverty and their relationship in developing countries. In recent times wellbeing and poverty have been scrutinised within the discourse on multidimensionality of poverty. Most research outputs though are grounded in quantitative data. Investigations that focus on the perceptions and understandings of poor people about their situations remain sparse in the literature. The current study is an attempt to address this gap. The paper explores the common grounds and the points of departure between the researchers’ views of poverty and wellbeing and the perception at the grassroots. The paper presents findings of primary research conducted by the author in Dhar district of Madhya Pradesh and Madhubani district of Bihar in India. Semi-structured survey instruments were deployed to interview a selection of poor, marginal and non-poor households. In addition to identifying the commonalities in grassroots and researchers’ understandings of poverty, the paper draws attention to factors that may be outside the radar of the researchers. It is envisaged that mapping a more holistic understanding of poverty and wellbeing will have important long-term policy implications for poverty reduction.

How Can Children Tell Us About Their Wellbeing? Exploring the Potential of Participatory Research Approaches within <Emphasis Type="Italic">Young Lives</Emphasis>

‘Wellbeing’ is a key concept in the study of children’s lives over time, given its potential to link the objective, subjective, and inter-subjective dimensions of their experiences in ways that are holistic, contextualized and longitudinal. For this reason wellbeing is one of the core concepts used by Young Lives, a 15-year project (2000–2015) that follows the lives of 12,000 children growing up in the context of poverty in Ethiopia, Peru, Vietnam and Andhra Pradesh (India) (see ). This paper examines a selection of methods being used by Young Lives to capture aspects of child wellbeing in the context of a range of children’s life experiences related to poverty, specific risks and protective processes. It draws on a review of the literature on child-focused methods and on recent experiences piloting three core qualitative methods in the four study countries. The paper reports the development of a methodology that is child-centred, but also acknowledges that every child is embedded within a network of social and economic relationships.

环境“二维化”视角下的居民幸福感量化研究：来自中国CGSS数据的新证据

幸福不仅是影响人们行为的重要因素,更是人们生活追求的最终目标。本文基于中国综合社会调查（CGSS）数据,创新性地从环境“二维化”这一研究视角,将环境因素划分为两个维度,即客观存在的环境污染因素与居民主观的环境行为,采用优化的两阶段有序Probit回归模型,沿着“客观存在的环境污染因素——居民幸福感”和“居民幸福感——居民主观的环境行为”两条研究思路展开实证分析,在实证过程中引入控制变量及工具变量,同时对经济因素及地区因素可能导致的组群差异进行考量和比较。结果显示,无论是环境污染对居民幸福感,还是居民幸福感对居民环境行为,其影响均是显著的,且具有异质性;环境污染通过影响居民的身体健康、生活质量和社会活动对居民幸福感产生影响,而居民环境行为则因个体收入和居民幸福感程度的不同产生差异。本文对环境与居民幸福感之间的作用机制展开深入分析,为政府出台环境政策的制定、提升居民幸福感及居民环境行为贡献度奠定理论基础。