Continuity and Change in Mothers' Favoritism Toward Offspring in Adulthood

The importance of parental favoritism in childhood and adulthood has been well documented; little is known, however, about changes over time in such within‐family differentiation. Drawing on theories of life course processes and developmental psychology, the authors used 7‐year panel data collected from 406 older mothers about their relationships with 1,514 adult children to explore patterns of favoritism regarding caregiving and emotional closeness. The findings demonstrated continuity in patterns of mothers' favoritism. Mothers tended to prefer the same children across time, particularly regarding preferred caregivers. It was anticipated that children's social‐structural characteristics, similarity to their mothers, structural position in the family, and support provision to mothers would predict favored child status across time; however, only similarity and support processes were strong and consistent predictors of change and continuity in patterns of mothers' favoritism.     

Sexual Revictimization in Adult Women: Examining Factors Associated with Their Childhood and Adulthood Experiences

Using data collected from a sample of adult women (n = 234), this study examined the relationship between the experience and disclosure of childhood sexual abuse and subsequent adult sexual violence. Multivariate analyses revealed that physical force during the childhood sexual abuse experience was significant in both children's decisions to disclose as well as in adult revictimization experiences. Furthermore, childhood disclosures were significantly associated with adulthood disclosures about revictimization, but only when there was no action following the childhood disclosure. The implications for enhancing training and education about understanding and responding to children and women's disclosures about sexual violence are discussed.     

Influence of Expectations for Parental Support on Intergenerational Coresidence Behavior

Abstract

Using the 1988 and 1992 waves of the National Survey of Families and Households (NSFH), this study examines whether the expectation of support by young adults is widely held and if such a belief predicts if young adults will at some point live with their parents before their final launch. At issue is whether or not the increase in young adults in the parental home represents a normative shift in the expectations that children have of their parents or perhaps is indicative of some other process. The findings suggest that expectation of support does in fact predict living at home but only 31% of the respondents felt that parents were obligated to let their adult children live with them. Findings are placed within a broader context of how shifts in age at first marriage and educational attainment influence young adults' transitions out of the home.     

‘Coming Out Tales’: Adult Sons and Daughters' Feelings About Their Gay Father's Sexual Identity

Coming out to their children is a dilemma that concerns many gay, bisexual, and lesbian parents with children from previous heterosexual relationships. How children found out about having a father who identified himself as gay, and their feelings about their father's sexual identity, were explored through qualitative analysis of semi‐structured interviews with 36 sons and daughters (aged 19 to 36 years) whose gay fathers participated in the Gay & Bisexual Parenting Survey (Barrett and Tasker, 2001). Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis revealed that awareness of their father's sexual identity was often left unspoken for various reasons, and that acceptance came about through gradual understanding as well as direct discussion. Interview data indicated the complexity of the relationship between the young adult's personal acceptance of their father's gay identity and their consideration of social context when deciding how open to be to others about their father's sexual identity. This research has varied implications for therapeutic work with gay and bisexual fathers coming out to their children from previous heterosexual relationships.     

Men's and Women's Pathways to Adulthood and Their Adolescent Precursors

This study compared men's and women's pathways to adulthood by examining how role transitions in education, work, marriage, and parenthood intersect and form developmental pathways from ages 18-30. The study investigated how sociodemographic factors and adolescent experiences were associated with these pathways. We used latent class analysis to analyze longitudinal data from a gender-balanced panel of 808 contemporary young adults. We found three similar latent pathways for both genders, but men and women differed in the timing of marriage and when they began to live with children and the likelihood of combining both roles. The present study points to the continued, though differential, relevance of marriage and family in the transition to adulthood for men and women.     

Life Course Stage in Young Adulthood and Intergenerational Congruence in Family Attitudes

We investigated how intergenerational congruence in family‐related attitudes depends on life course stage in young adulthood. Recent data from the Netherlands Kinship Panel Study were used; the present sample included 2,041 dyads of young adults and their parents. Findings are discussed in terms of the elasticity in intergenerational attitude congruence in response to young adults' life course transitions. Our results suggest that intergenerational congruence in attitudes about partnership (e.g., marriage, cohabitation, divorce, women's and men's family roles) decreases after young adults have left the parental home and increases when young adults enter parenthood. Congruence concerning intergenerational obligations was not related to young adults' life course stage.     

Growing up with a sibling with dwarfism: perceptions of adult non‐dwarf siblings

Despite the fact that society seems to have become more tolerant towards human diversity, skeletal dysplasia still carries some extent of stigmatization and negative stereotyping. There seems to be a lack of knowledge regarding psychosocial factors associated with skeletal dysplasia, specifically as it relates to interpersonal relationships. Since the negative attention directed at individuals with dwarfism may also have an impact on family members and family relationships, the aim of this qualitative study was to explore adult non‐dwarf siblings' experiences of growing up with siblings with a skeletal dysplasia. Thematic analyses of semi‐structured interviews with four adult non‐dwarf siblings confirmed both negative and positive effects. These effects were evident in childhood and continued into adulthood. For the adults who took part in this study, the positive effects seemed to be more profound.     

Readiness for independent living of youth in residential childcare: A comparative study

Transition to adulthood is an accelerated and early process for care leavers that requires intensive preparation, training and support from child welfare services. This study aimed to explore the perceived readiness for independent living of a group of care-experienced young people preparing for leaving care in Spain and to compare it with the perceptions of their peers from the general population. A sample of 508 youth (50% women) aged 14–21 (M = 16.67; SD = 1.72) took part, of whom 279 were care experienced and 229 belonged to the general population in Spain. Participants' independent living skills, personal autonomy, self-efficacy and sociodemographic characteristics were assessed through an online survey using standardized instruments. Care-experienced young people displayed higher levels of life skills and autonomy in self-care, daily living at home and employment domains, but not related to making daily arrangements in their community. However, their educational level and self-efficacy levels were lower than in the comparison group. Work experience stood out as a significant predictor of care-experienced young people's life skills level. These findings support the importance of assessing life skills as an outcome of leaving care preparation services and providing care-experienced young people with real-life experiences to develop their life skills.     

Links between parental autonomy support and psychological control and Chinese emerging adults' conceptions of adulthood

Framed through family life course theory, two studies were conducted to examine the relationship between parenting and Chinese emerging adults' conceptions of adulthood. Study 1 identified five important adult criteria among 763 participants (M_age = 23.13; 54.8% girls) through exploratory factor analysis. In Study 2, 616 participants (M_age = 22.51; 71.6% girls) completed measures of parental autonomy support (PAS) and psychological control (PPC), subjective adult status, and adult criteria. Results showed that PAS was positively associated with subjective adult status and endorsement of almost all adult criteria, whereas PPC was both positively and negatively associated with different adult criteria. Findings reveal the influence of family factors on youth transition to adulthood in the Chinese context and may have implications for family based interventions.