Handbook of Parenting

HANDBOOK OF PARENTING
This highly anticipated third edition of the Handbook of Parenting brings together an array of field-leading
experts who have worked in different ways toward understanding the many diverse aspects of parenting.
Contributors to the Handbook look to the most recent research and thinking to shed light on topics every
parent, professional, and policymaker wonders about. Parenting is a perennially “hot” topic. After all, everyone
who has ever lived has been parented, and the vast majority of people become parents themselves. No wonder
bookstores house shelves of “how-to” parenting books, and magazine racks in pharmacies and airports
overflow with periodicals that feature parenting advice. However, almost none of these is evidence-based.
The Handbook of Parenting is. Period. Each chapter has been written to be read and absorbed in a single sitting,
and includes historical considerations of the topic, a discussion of central issues and theory, a review of classical
and modern research, and forecasts of future directions of theory and research. Together, the five volumes in
the Handbook cover Children and Parenting, the Biology and Ecology of Parenting, Being and Becoming a
Parent, Social Conditions and Applied Parenting, and the Practice of Parenting.
Volume 3, Being and Becoming a Parent, considers a large cast of characters responsible for parenting, each
with her or his own customs and agenda, and examines what the psychological characteristics and social
interests of those individuals reveal about what parenting is. Chapters in Part I, on The Parent, show just
how rich and multifaceted is the constellation of children’s caregivers. Considered first are family systems and
then successively mothers and fathers, coparenting and gatekeeping between parents, adolescent parenting,
grandparenting, and single parenthood, divorced and remarried parenting, lesbian and gay parents and, finally,
sibling caregivers and nonparental caregiving. Parenting also draws on transient and enduring physical,
personality, and intellectual characteristics of the individual. The chapters in Part II, on Becoming and Being
a Parent, consider the intergenerational transmission of parenting, parenting and contemporary reproductive
technologies, the transition to parenthood, and stages of parental development, and then chapters turn to
parents’ well-being, emotions, self-efficacy, cognitions, and attributions as well as socialization, personality in
parenting, and psychoanalytic theory. These features of parents serve many functions: they generate and shape
parental practices, mediate the effectiveness of parenting, and help to organize parenting.
Marc H. Bornstein holds a BA from Columbia College, MS and PhD degrees from Yale University, and
honorary doctorates from the University of Padua and University of Trento. Bornstein is President of the
Society for Research in Child Development and has held faculty positions at Princeton University and New
York University as well as academic appointments in Munich, London, Paris, New York, Tokyo, Bamenda,
Seoul, Trento, Santiago, Bristol, and Oxford. Bornstein is author of several children’s books, videos, and
puzzles in The Child’s World and Baby Explorer series, Editor Emeritus of Child Development and founding
Editor of Parenting: Science and Practice, and consultant for governments, foundations, universities, publishers,
scientific journals, the media, and UNICEF. He has published widely in experimental, methodological,
comparative, developmental, and cultural science as well as neuroscience, pediatrics, and aesthetics.
HANDBOOK OF PARENTING
Volume 3: Being and Becoming a Parent
Third Edition
Edited by Marc H. Bornstein

Third edition published 2019
by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
and by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2019 Taylor & Francis
The right of Marc H. Bornstein to be identified as the author of the
editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been
asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs
and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
First edition published by Laurence Erlbaum Associates 1995
Second edition published by Taylor and Francis 2002
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this book has been requested
ISBN: 978-1-138-22871-9 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-22872-6 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-0-429-43321-4 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
For Marian and Harold Sackrowitz
CONTENTS
Preface to the Third Edition x

About the Editor xv
About the Contributors xvii
PART I
The Parent 1
1 Parenting and Family Systems 3

Patricia K. Kerig
2 Mothering 36
Lynne Murray, Martin P. M. Richards, and Julie Nihouarn-Sigurdardottir
3 Fathers and Families 64

Ross D. Parke and Jeffrey T. Cookston
4 Coparenting in Diverse Family Systems 137

James P. McHale and Yana Segal Sirotkin
5 Parental Gatekeeping 167

Sarah J. Schoppe-Sullivan and Lauren E. Altenburger
6 Adolescent Parenting 199

M. Ann Easterbrooks, Rachel C. Katz, and Meera Menon
7 Grandparenting 232
Peter K. Smith and Lauren G. Wild
vii
Contents
8 Single Parenthood 271

Marsha Weinraub and Rebecca Kaufman
9 Divorced and Remarried Parenting 311

Lawrence H. Ganong, Marilyn Coleman, and Caroline Sanner
10 Lesbian and Gay Parenthood 345

Charlotte J. Patterson
11 Sibling Caregiving 372

Laurie Kramer and Tessa N. Hamilton
12 Nonparental Caregiving 409

Helen Raikes, Abbie Raikes, Jan Esteraich, Amy Encinger,
Aileen S. Garcia, Sukran Ucus, and Elsa Escalante
PART II
Becoming and Being a Parent 441
13 Intergenerational Transmission of Parenting 443

David C. R. Kerr and Deborah M. Capaldi
14 Parenting and Contemporary Reproductive Technologies 482

Susan Golombok
15 Transition to Parenthood 513

Rebecca M. Ryan and Christina M. Padilla
16 Stages of Parental Development 556

Jack Demick
17 Well-Being in Parenting 596

S. Katherine Nelson-Coffey and Diamond Stewart
18 Parenting and Emotions 620

Esther M. Leerkes and Mairin E. Augustine
19 Parenting Self-Efficacy 654

Carlo Schuengel and Mirjam Oosterman
20 Parenting Cognitions 681

George W. Holden and Margaret M. Smith
21 Parental Attributions 722

Daphne Blunt Bugental and Randy Corpuz
viii
Contents
22 Parent Socialization and Children’s Values 762

Joan E. Grusec and Maayan Davidov
23 Personality and Parenting 797

Peter Prinzie, Amaranta de Haan, and Jay Belsky
24 Psychoanalysis and Parenthood 823

Bertram J. Cohler and Susan Paul
Index861
ix
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION
Previous editions of the Handbook of Parenting have been called the “who’s who of the what’s what.”
This third edition of this Handbook appears at a time that is momentous in the history of parent-
ing. The family generally, and parenting specifically, are today in a greater state of flux, question, and
re-definition than perhaps ever before. We are witnessing the emergence of striking permutations
on the theme of parenting: blended families, lesbian and gay parents, teen versus fifties first-time
moms and dads, genetic versus social parents. One cannot but be awed on the biological front by
technology that now renders postmenopausal women capable of childbearing and with the pos-
sibility of parents designing their babies. Similarly, on the sociological front, single parenthood is a
modern-day fact of life, adult child dependency is on the rise, and even in the face of rising insti-
tutional demands to take increasing responsibility for their offspring parents are ever less certain
of their roles and responsibilities. The Handbook of Parenting is concerned with all these facets of
parenting . . . and more.
Most people become parents, and everyone who ever lived has had parents, still parenting remains
a mystifying subject. Who is ultimately responsible for parenting? Does parenting come naturally,
or must parenting be learned? How do parents conceive of parenting? of childhood? What does it
mean to parent a preterm baby, twins, or a child on the autistic spectrum? To be an older parent, or
one who is divorced, disabled, or drug abusing? What do theories (psychoanalysis, personality theory,
attachment, and behavior genetics, for example) contribute to our understanding of parenting? What
are the goals parents have for themselves? for their children? What functions do parents’ cognitions
serve? What are the goals of parents’ practices? What accounts for parents believing or behaving in
similar ways? Why do so many attitudes and actions of parents differ so? How do children influence
their parents? How do personality, knowledge, and world view affect parenting? How do social class,
culture, environment, and history shape parenthood? How can parents effectively relate to childcare,
schools, and their children’s pediatricians?
These are many of the questions addressed in this third edition of the Handbook of Parenting . . .
for this is an evidenced-based volume set on how to parent as much as it is one on what being a parent
is all about.
Put succinctly, parents create people. They are entrusted with preparing their offspring for the
physical, psychosocial, and economic conditions in which their children eventually will fare and
hopefully will flourish. Amid the many influences on each next generation, parents are the “final
common pathway” to children’s development and stature, adjustment, and success. Human social
inquiry—since before Athenian interest in Spartan childrearing practices—has always, as a matter
x
Preface to the Third Edition
of course, included reports of parenting. Freud opined that childrearing is one of three “impossible
professions”—the other two being governing nations and psychoanalysis. One encounters as many
views as the number of people one asks about the relative merits of being an at-home or a working
mother, about what mix of day care, family care, or parent care is best for a child, about whether good
parenting reflects intuition or experience.
The Handbook of Parenting concerns itself with different types of parents—mothers and fathers,
single, adolescent, and adoptive parents; with basic characteristics of parenting—knowledge, beliefs,
and expectations about parenting—as well as the practice of parenting; with forces that shape
parenting—employment, social class, culture, environment, and history; with problems faced by
parents—handicap, marital difficulties, drug addiction; and with practical concerns of parenting—
how to promote children’s health, foster social adjustment and cognitive competence, and interact
with educational, legal, and religious institutions. Contributors to the Handbook of Parenting have
worked in different ways toward understanding all these diverse aspects of parenting, and all look to
the most recent research and thinking in the field to shed light on many topics every parent, profes-
sional, and policy maker wonders about.
Parenthood is a job whose primary object of attention and action is the child. But parenting
also has consequences for parents. Parenthood is giving and responsibility, and parenting has its own
intrinsic pleasures, privileges, and profits as well as frustrations, fears, and failures. Parenthood can
enhance psychological development, self-confidence, and sense of well-being, and parenthood also
affords opportunities to confront new challenges and to test and display diverse competencies. Par-
ents can derive considerable and continuing pleasure in their relationships and activities with their
children. But parenting is also fraught with small and large stresses and disappointments. The transi-
tion to parenthood is daunting, and the onrush of new stages of parenthood is relentless. In the final
analysis, however, parents receive a great deal “in kind” for the hard work of parenting—they can be
recipients of unconditional love, they can gain skills, and they can even pretend to immortality. This
third edition of the Handbook of Parenting reveals the many positives that accompany parenting and
offers resolutions for its many challenges.
The Handbook of Parenting encompasses the broad themes of who are parents, whom parents
parent, the scope of parenting and its many effects, the determinants of parenting, and the nature,
structure, and meaning of parenthood for parents. The third edition of the Handbook of Parenting is
divided into five volumes, each with two parts:
CHILDREN AND PARENTING is Volume 1 of the Handbook. Parenthood is, perhaps first
and foremost, a functional status in the life cycle: Parents issue as well as protect, nurture, and
teach their progeny even if human development is too subtle and dynamic to admit that
parental caregiving alone determines the developmental course and outcome of ontogeny.
Volume 1 of the Handbook of Parenting begins with chapters concerned with how children
influence parenting. Notable are their more obvious characteristics, like child age or devel-
opmental stage; but more subtle ones, like child gender, physical state, temperament, mental
ability, and other individual-differences factors, are also instrumental. The chapters in Part I,
on Parenting across the Lifespan, discuss the unique rewards and special demands of parenting
children of different ages and stages—infants, toddlers, youngsters in middle childhood, and
adolescents—as well as the modern notion of parent-child relationships in emerging adult-
hood and adulthood and old age. The chapters in Part II, on Parenting Children of Varying
Status, discuss common issues associated with parenting children of different genders and
temperaments as well as unique situations of parenting adopted and foster children and chil-
dren with a variety of special needs, such as those with extreme talent, born preterm, who
are socially withdrawn or aggressive, or who fall on the autistic spectrum, manifest intellectual
disabilities, or suffer a chronic health condition.
xi
BIOLOGY AND ECOLOGY OF PARENTING is Volume 2 of the Handbook. For par-

enting to be understood as a whole, biological and ecological determinants of parenting
need to be brought into the picture. Volume 2 of the Handbook relates parenting to its bio-
logical roots and sets parenting in its ecological framework. Some aspects of parenting are
influenced by the organic makeup of human beings, and the chapters in Part I, on the Biol-
ogy of Parenting, examine the evolution of parenting, the psychobiological determinants of
parenting in nonhumans, and primate parenting and then the genetic, prenatal, neuroendo-
crinological, and neurobiological bases of human parenting. A deep understanding of what
it means to parent also depends on the ecologies in which parenting takes place. Beyond
the nuclear family, parents are embedded in, influence, and are themselves affected by larger
social systems. The chapters in Part II, on the Ecology of Parenting, examine the ancient and
modern histories of parenting as well as epidemiology, neighborhoods, educational attain-
ment, socioeconomic status, culture, and environment to provide an overarching relational
developmental contextual systems perspective on parenting.
BEING AND BECOMING A PARENT is Volume 3 of the Handbook. A large cast of
characters is responsible for parenting, each has her or his own customs and agenda, and the
psychological characteristics and social interests of those individuals are revealing of what
parenting is. Chapters in Part I, on The Parent, show just how rich and multifaceted is the
constellation of children’s caregivers. Considered first are family systems and then successively
mothers and fathers, coparenting, and gatekeeping between parents, adolescent parenting,
grandparenting, and single parenthood, divorced and remarried parenting, lesbian and gay
parents, and finally sibling caregivers and nonparental caregiving. Parenting also draws on
transient and enduring physical, personality, and intellectual characteristics of the individual.
The chapters in Part II, on Becoming and Being a Parent, consider the intergenerational
transmission of parenting, parenting and contemporary reproductive technologies, the transi-
tion to parenthood, and stages of parental development, and then chapters turn to parents’
well-being, emotions, self-efficacy, cognitions, attributions, as well as socialization, personal-
ity in parenting, and psychoanalytic theory. These features of parents serve many functions:
They generate and shape parental practices, mediate the effectiveness of parenting, and help
to organize parenting.
SOCIAL CONDITIONS AND APPLIED PARENTING is Volume 4 of the Handbook.
Parenting is not uniform across communities, groups, or cultures; rather parenting is subject
to wide variation. Volume 4 of the Handbook describes socially defined groups of parents and
social conditions that promote variation in parenting. The chapters in Part I, on Social and
Cultural Conditions of Parenting, start with a relational developmental systems perspective on
parenting and move to considerations of ethnic and minority parenting among Latin Ameri-
cans, African Americans, Asians and Asian Americans, Indigenous parents, and immigrant
parents. The section concludes with the roles of employment and of poverty on parenting.
Parents are ordinarily the most consistent and caring people in children’s lives. However, par-
enting does not always go right or well. Information, education, and support programs can
remedy potential ills. The chapters in Part II, on Applied Issues in Parenting, begin with how
parenting is measured and follow with examinations of maternal deprivation, attachment, and
acceptance/rejection in parenting. Serious challenges to parenting—some common, such as
stress, depression, and disability, and some less common, such as substance abuse, psychopathol-
ogy, maltreatment, incarceration—are addressed as are parenting interventions intended to
redress these trials.
THE PRACTICE OF PARENTING is Volume 5 of the Handbook. Parents meet the bio-
logical, physical, and health requirements of children. Parents interact with children socially.
xii
Parents stimulate children to engage and understand the environment and to enter the world
of learning. Parents provision, organize, and arrange their children’s home and local environ-
ments and the media to which children are exposed. Parents also manage child development
vis-à-vis childcare, school, the circles of medicine and law, as well as other social institutions
through their active citizenship. Volume 5 of the Handbook addresses the nuts-and-bolts of par-
enting as well as the promotion of positive parenting practices. The chapters in Part I, on Prac-
tical Parenting, review the ethics of parenting, parenting, and the development of children’s
self-regulation, discipline, prosocial and moral development, and resilience as well as children’s
language, play, cognitive, and academic achievement and children’s peer relationships. Many
caregiving principles and practices have direct effects on children. Parents indirectly influence
children as well, for example, through relations they have with their local or larger commu-
nities. The chapters in Part II, on Parents and Social Institutions, explore parents and their
children’s childcare, activities, media, schools, and healthcare and examine relations between
parenthood and the law, public policy, and religion and spirituality.
Each chapter in the third edition of the Handbook of Parenting addresses a different but central
topic in parenting; each is rooted in current thinking and theory as well as classical and modern
research on a topic; each is written to be read and absorbed in a single sitting. Each chapter in this
new Handbook adheres to a standard organization, including an introduction to the chapter as a
whole, followed by historical considerations of the topic, a discussion of central issues and theory, a
review of classical and modern research, forecasts of future directions of theory and research, and a
set of evidence-based conclusions. Of course, each chapter considers contributors’ own convictions
and findings, but contributions to this third edition of the Handbook of Parenting attempt to present all
major points of view and central lines of inquiry and interpret them broadly. The Handbook of Parent-
ing is intended to be both comprehensive and state-of-the-art. To assert that parenting is complex is
to understate the obvious. As the expanded scope of this third edition of the Handbook of Parenting
also amply attests, parenting is naturally and intensely interdisciplinary.
The Handbook of Parenting is concerned principally with the nature and scope of parenting per
se and secondarily with child outcomes of parenting. Beyond an impressive range of information,
readers will find passim typologies of parenting (e.g., authoritarian-autocratic, indulgent-permissive,
indifferent-uninvolved, authoritative-reciprocal), theories of parenting (e.g., ecological, psychoana-
lytic, behavior genetic, ethological, behavioral, sociobiological), conditions of parenting (e.g., gender,
culture, content), recurrent themes in parenting studies (e.g., attachment, transaction, systems), and
even aphorisms (e.g., “A child should have strict discipline in order to develop a fine, strong charac-
ter,” “The child is father to the man”).
Each chapter in the Handbook of Parenting lays out the meanings and implications of a contribu-
tion and a perspective on parenting. Once upon a time, parenting was a seemingly simple thing:
Mothers mothered. Fathers fathered. Today, parenting has many motives, many meanings, and many
manifestations. Contemporary parenting is viewed as immensely time consuming and effortful. The
perfect mother or father or family is a figment of false cultural memory. Modern society recognizes
“subdivisions” of the call: genetic mother, gestational mother, biological mother, birth mother, social
mother. For some, the individual sacrifices that mark parenting arise for the sole and selfish purpose
of passing one’s genes on to succeeding generations. For others, a second child may be conceived to
save the life of a first child. A multitude of factors influences the unrelenting advance of events and
decisions that surround parenting—biopsychosocial, dyadic, contextual, historical. Recognizing this
complexity is important to informing people’s thinking about parenting, especially information-
hungry parents themselves. This third edition of the Handbook of Parenting explores all these motives,
meanings, and manifestations of parenting.
xiii
Each day more than three-quarters of a million adults around the world experience the rewards
and challenges, as well as the joys and heartaches, of becoming parents. The human race succeeds
because of parenting. From the start, parenting is a “24/7” job. Parenting formally begins before
pregnancy and can continue throughout the lifespan: Practically speaking for most, once a parent,
always a parent. Parenting is a subject about which people hold strong opinions, and about which too
little solid information or considered reflection exists. Parenting has never come with a Handbook . . .
until now.
—Marc H. Bornstein
xiv
ABOUT THE EDITOR
Marc H. Bornstein holds a BA from Columbia College, MS and PhD degrees from Yale Univer-
sity, and honorary doctorates from the University of Padua and University of Trento. Bornstein was a
J. S. Guggenheim Foundation Fellow, and he received a Research Career Development Award from
the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. He also received the C. S. Ford
Cross-Cultural Research Award from the Human Relations Area Files, the B. R. McCandless Young
Scientist Award and the G. Stanley Hall Award from the American Psychological Association, a
United States PHS Superior Service Award and an Award of Merit from the National Institutes of
Health, two Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Fellowships, four Awards for Excellence
from the American Mensa Education & Research Foundation, the Arnold Gesell Prize from the
Theodor Hellbrügge Foundation, the Distinguished Scientist Award from the International Society
for the Study of Behavioral Development, and both the Distinguished International Contributions
to Child Development Award and the Distinguished Scientific Contributions to Child Develop-
ment Award from the Society for Research in Child Development. Bornstein is President of the
Society for Research in Child Development and a past member of the SRCD Governing Council
and Executive Committee of the International Congress of Infancy Studies.
Bornstein has held faculty positions at Princeton University and New York University as well as
academic appointments as Visiting Scientist at the Max-Planck-Institut für Psychiatrie in Munich,
Visiting Fellow at University College London, Professeur Invité at the Laboratoire de Psychologie
Expérimentale in the Université René Descartes in Paris, Child Clinical Fellow at the Institute for
Behavior Therapy in New York, Visiting Professor at the University of Tokyo, Professeur Invité at
the Laboratoire de Psychologie du Développement et de l’Éducation de l’Enfant in the Sorbonne
in Paris, Visiting Fellow of the British Psychological Society, Visiting Scientist at the Human Devel-
opment Resource Centre in Bamenda, Cameroon, Visiting Scholar at the Institute of Psychology
in Seoul National University in Seoul, South Korea, Visiting Professor at the Faculty of Cognitive
Science in the University of Trento, Italy, Professor Visitante at the Pontificia Universidad Católica
de Chile in Santiago, Chile, Institute for Advanced Studies Benjamin Meaker Visiting Professor,
University of Bristol, Jacobs Foundation Scholar-in-Residence, Marbach, Germany, Honorary Fel-
low, Department of Psychiatry, Oxford University, Adjunct Academic Member of the Council of the
Department of Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy, and International Research Fellow at
the Institute for Fiscal Studies, London.
Bornstein is coauthor of The Architecture of the Child Mind: g, Fs, and the Hierarchical Model of Intel-
ligence, Gender in Low- and Middle-Income Countries, Development in Infancy (five editions), Development:
xv
About the Editor
Infancy Through Adolescence, Lifespan Development, Genitorialità: Fattori Biologici E Culturali Dell’essere
Genitori, and Perceiving Similarity and Comprehending Metaphor. He is general editor of The Crosscur-
rents in Contemporary Psychology Series, including Psychological Development From Infancy, Com-
parative Methods in Psychology, Psychology, and Its Allied Disciplines (Vols. I–III), Sensitive Periods in
Development, Interaction in Human Development, Cultural Approaches to Parenting, Child Development and
Behavioral Pediatrics, and Well-Being: Positive Development Across the Life Course, and general editor
of the Monographs in Parenting series, including his own Socioeconomic Status, Parenting, and Child
Development and Acculturation and Parent-Child Relationships. He edited Maternal Responsiveness: Char-
acteristics and Consequences, the Handbook of Parenting (Vols. I–V, three editions), and the Handbook of
Cultural Developmental Science (Parts 1 and 2), and is Editor-in-Chief of the SAGE Encyclopedia of
Lifespan Human Development. He also coedited Developmental Science: An Advanced Textbook (seven
editions), Stability and Continuity in Mental Development, Contemporary Constructions of the Child, Early
Child Development in the French Tradition, The Role of Play in the Development of Thought, Acculturation,
and Parent-Child Relationships, Immigrant Families in Contemporary Society, The Developing Infant Mind:
Origins of the Social Brain, and Ecological Settings and Processes in Developmental Systems (Volume 4 of
the Handbook of Child Psychology and Developmental Science). He is author of several children’s books,
videos, and puzzles in The Child’s World and Baby Explorer series. Bornstein is Editor Emeritus
of Child Development and founding Editor of Parenting: Science and Practice. He has administered
both Federal and Foundation grants, sits on the editorial boards of several professional journals, is a
member of scholarly societies in a variety of disciplines, and consults for governments, foundations,
universities, publishers, scientific journals, the media, and UNICEF. He has published widely in
experimental, methodological, comparative, developmental, and cultural science as well as neuro-
science, pediatrics, and aesthetics. Bornstein was named to the Top 20 Authors for Productivity in
Developmental Science by the American Educational Research Association.
xvi
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS
Lauren E. Altenburger is a PhD candidate in Human Development and Family Science at The
Ohio State University. She received her BS and MS in Human Development and Family Science
from The Ohio State University. Altenburger’s research focuses on the contributions of family rela-
tionship quality to young children’s social and emotional development. In particular, she applies a
family systems perspective to better understand predictors of fathers’ parenting quality as well as
consequences for child adjustment. She is currently supported by a Presidential Fellowship from the
graduate school at The Ohio State University.
Mairin E. Augustine is a Carolina Consortium for Human Development postdoctoral fellow

at the Center for Developmental Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and
department of Human Development and Family Studies at the University of North Carolina at
Greensboro. Augustine received her BS and MS from Lehigh University and her PhD from Penn-
sylvania State University. She studies how parent-child interactions relate to varying socioemotional
and self-regulatory outcomes for children of different temperament types.
Jay Belsky is the Robert M. and Natalie Reid Dorn Professor of Human Development at the
University of California, Davis. Belsky obtained his PhD in Human Development and Family Stud-
ies from Cornell University and was previously on the faculty of Pennsylvania State University and
Birkbeck University of London, where he founded the Institute for the Study of Children, Families,
and Social Issues. Belsky researches child development and family studies, with work focusing on
effects of day care, parent-child relationships and other developmental experiences, and environmen-
tal exposures early in life on psychological and behavioral development, the transition to parenthood,
the etiology of child maltreatment, and the evolutionary basis of parent and child functioning.
Daphne Blunt Bugental is Distinguished Professor Emerita at the Department of Psychological

and Brain Sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Bugental was educated at the Uni-
versity of California, Los Angeles. She has been Associate Editor of Journal of Personality and Psychol-
ogy and the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. She was the recipient of the Kurt Lewin Award.
She is author of Thriving in the Face of Childhood Adversity.
Deborah M. Capaldi obtained her PhD from the University of Oregon and is currently a Senior
Scientist at the Oregon Social Learning Center. Capaldi is a fellow of APA Division 43 (Family) and
xvii
About the Contributors
the Association for Psychological Science. She has expertise in the development of psychopathology,
including family and peer factors related to substance use and to associated risk behaviors such as
conduct problems, depression, sexual risk behavior, and intimate partner violence. Her research cur-
rently centers on understanding intergenerational transmission of substance use and related behaviors
within a dynamic developmental systems framework. To this end, she and colleagues are conducting
a prospective three-generational study.
Bertram J. Cohler was William Rainey Harper Professor of the Social Sciences, The College and
The Committee on Human Development, The Departments of Psychology and Psychiatry, and The
Committee on General Studies in the Humanities at the University of Chicago. Cohler received his
education at the University of Chicago and Harvard University and his psychoanalytic education
at The Institute for Psychoanalysis (Chicago) in clinical and theoretical aspects of psychoanalysis.
He was a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, The Gerontological Society, and past
President of the American Orthopsychiatric Association. He was editor of Psychoanalytic Psychology.
His research interests included parenthood and intergenerational relationships, the study of parents
with chronic psychiatric illness and their offspring, and narrative methods and study of life history.
He coauthored Mentally Ill Mothers and Their Children, Mothers, Grandmothers, and Daughters: Personal-
ity and Child Care in Three Generation Families, The Essential Other, and The Course of Gay and Lesbian
Lives and coedited The Psychoanalytic Study of Lives Over Time.
Marilyn Coleman is a Distinguished Curators’ Professor Emerita of Human Development and Fam-
ily Science at the University of Missouri. Coleman is also an Affiliate Faculty Emerita with Women’s
and Gender Studies at the University of Missouri. She is a Fellow in the National Council on Family
Relations. She has conducted research on stepfamilies focused on intergenerational family responsi-
bilities following divorce and remarriage and the development and maintenance of step-relationships
over time. She coauthored 10 books and is a past editor of the Journal of Marriage and Family.
Jeffrey T. Cookston is a Professor of Psychology at San Francisco State University. Cookston has
researched family processes among separated and divorced families and is author of empirical and
theoretical works on the social construction of the fathering role and the effects of divorce and sepa-
ration on family dynamics and the implications of transitions on child adjustment in Asian, Latino,
and European American groups.
Randy Corpuz is Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Mas-
sachusetts. Corpuz received his PhD from the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences,
University of California, Santa Barbara, where he received a National Science Foundation fellowship.
Maayan Davidov is a faculty member at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Paul Baerwald
School of Social Work and Social Welfare and the Joseph J. Schwartz Graduate Program in Early
Childhood Studies. Davidov completed her PhD studies at The University of Toronto. Her research
focuses on parent-child relationships and children’s socioemotional development. She is particularly
interested in how different aspects of parenting are linked to different child outcomes, in how the
cultural context can influence socialization processes, and in the early development of empathy and
prosociality in infancy and toddlerhood. Davidov served as a guest editor for special sections in Devel-
opment and Psychopathology and Child Development.
Amaranta de Haan is Assistant Professor of Pedagogical Sciences at Erasmus University Rotter-

dam, Department of Psychology, Education & Child Studies. De Haan was educated at Utrecht Uni-
versity and was previously affiliated with Utrecht University, the Netherlands, and Ghent University,
xviii
Belgium. Her research interests are the interrelated development of the Big Five personality dimen-
sions, maternal, and paternal parenting behaviors, and girls’ and boys’ externalizing adjustment prob-
lems between middle childhood and the end of adolescence.
Jack Demick, a clinical and developmental psychologist, is currently a Research Fellow in the Psy-
chology Department at Harvard University. Demick was trained at Yale University, Clark University,
and the McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School. He has held research, teaching, and/or clinical
appointments at Brown University, Clark University, Harvard University, and the University of Mas-
sachusetts Medical School where, as Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry, he served as Research
Director of the Center for Adoption Research and Policy. His research interests include life span
cognitive and social development. He has coedited eight volumes and serves as the editor-in-chief
of the Journal of Adult Development. He is author of Toward Integrating Psychology: Holistic/Systems-
Developmental Theory.
M. Ann Easterbrooks is Professor in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Study and Human
Development at Tufts University. Easterbooks received her PhD in Developmental Psychology from
the University of Michigan and is a founder of the Tufts Interdisciplinary Evaluation Research
Center. She focuses on supporting healthy family relationships, well-being, and resilience.
Amy Encinger is a PhD student in the Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies special-
izing in Child Development/Early Childhood Education at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Encinger’s foci of study include how household characteristics, such as socioeconomic status, family
composition, food insecurity, and parent stress influence children’s developmental outcomes.
Elsa Escalante is Assistant Professor at the Universidad del Norte, Colombia. Escalante Barrios
holds MScs from the Universidad del Norte and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and a PhD
from the Universidad del Norte. Previously, she was an instructor for the Organization of American
States, and she was awarded the Patrice L. Engle Dissertation Grant for Global Early Child Devel-
opment by the Society for Research in Child Development. Her areas of professional experience
focus on the design, strategic planning, coordination, and evaluation of intervention and education
initiatives for families, children, and community members to promote policies and programs related
to health, nutrition, education, protection, and children’s rights in national and international con-
texts. She is author of three books related to teacher professional development and early childhood
education.
Jan Esteraich is a PhD candidate at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She was a production
assistant for Reading Rainbow, an educational television program created for PBS broadcast. Estera-
ich’s current focus of study includes quantitative and qualitative research on young children’s use of
technology and mobile media, teachers’ professional development, and international approaches for
early childhood education, specifically the Reggio Emilia Approach.
Lawrence H. Ganong is a Chancellor’s Professor of Human Development and Family Science and
Nursing at the University of Missouri. Ganong has coauthored 10 books. His primary research pro-
gram focuses on what postdivorce family members, especially in stepfamilies, do to develop satisfying
and effective relationships. He is a Fellow in both the National Council on Family Relations and the
Gerontological Society of America.
Aileen S. Garcia is Assistant Professor in the Department of Counseling and Human Development
at South Dakota State University. She holds a PhD in Child,Youth and Family Studies and a master’s
xix
in psychology, with concentration in developmental psychology, from Ateneo de Manila, Philippines.

Her current research interests include the influence of culture on parenting and child development,
and the effects of poverty on children’s socioemotional and academic outcomes.
Susan Golombok is Professor of Family Research and Director of the Centre for Family Research
at the University of Cambridge, and Professorial Fellow at Newnham College, Cambridge. Golom-
bok took her first degree in Psychology at the University of Glasgow in Scotland, a MA in Child
Development at the Institute of Education, University of London, and a PhD at the Institute of
Psychiatry, University of London. At the City University, London, she founded the Family and Child
Psychology Research Centre. Her research contributes to theoretical understanding of family influ-
ences on child development and addresses social and ethical issues that are of relevance to family life,
including lesbian mother families, gay father families, single mothers by choice, and families created
by assisted reproductive technologies including in vitro fertilization, donor insemination, egg dona-
tion and surrogacy. She is the author of Parenting: What Really Counts? and Modern Families: Parents
and Children in New Family Forms and coauthor of Bottling it Up, Gender Development, Modern Psycho-
metrics and Growing Up in a Lesbian Family.
Joan E. Grusec is Professor Emerita of Psychology at the University of Toronto. Grusec was edu-
cated at the University of Toronto and Stanford University and previously was affiliated with Wes-
leyan University and the University of Waterloo. She has been an Associate Editor of Developmental
Psychology and Chair of the Examination Committee of the Association of State and Provincial
Psychology Boards. She is coauthor of Punishment and Social Development and coeditor of Parenting
and Children’s Internalization of Values and the Handbook of Socialization.
Tessa N. Hamilton is a PhD student in School Psychology at Northeastern University. Hamilton

completed her undergraduate training at the University of Arizona and master’s degree and Cer-
tificate of Advanced Study at Harvard University. As a licensed school social worker, Hamilton has
provided clinical assessment, prevention, and intervention services to children and families through
Boston-area public schools. Her research is aimed at fostering positive prosocial relationships among
siblings through the More Fun With Sisters and Brothers Program.
George W. Holden is Professor and Chair of the Psychology Department at Southern Methodist
University in Dallas, Texas. Holden’s research interests are in the area of social development, with a
focus on parent-child relationships. His work, into the determinants of parental social cognition and
behavior, discipline, and positive parenting, and the causes and consequences of family violence, has
been supported by grants from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development,
National Institute of Justice, Department of Health and Human Services, the Guggenheim Foun-
dation, the Hogg Foundation for Mental Health, the Timberlawn Research Foundation and, most
recently, the U.S. State Department. He is the author or editor of five books. Holden was President
of the Society for Research in Human Development.
Rachel C. Katz is a PhD candidate in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Study and Human
Development at Tufts University. She received a BA in Psychology from Bates College. She works
on the Massachusetts Healthy Families Evaluation, a randomized controlled trial of an intervention
for young parents focused on promoting positive life course trajectories for mothers and children,
supporting positive parenting, reducing child maltreatment, and enhancing maternal well-being.
Katz’s research focuses on exploring the influence of children’s early experiences on developmental
outcomes, including how development can be modified by factors such as childcare, caregiver-child
relationships, and adversity.
xx
Rebecca Kaufman is the Senior Research Coordinator for the Fatherhood Research and Practice
Network. Kaufman received both her MA and MSW degrees from Temple University.
Patricia K. Kerig is a Professor and the Director of Clinical Training in the Department of Psy-
chology at the University of Utah. Kerig completed her undergraduate work at the University of
California at Irvine and received her PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of California
at Berkeley. She is Codirector of the Center for Trauma Recovery and Juvenile Justice. She serves as
the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Traumatic Stress and is the author of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder
in Childhood and Adolescence, Developmental Psychopathology, Child Maltreatment: A Developmental Psy-
chopathology Perspective, and Adolescence and Beyond: Family Processes in Development.
David C. R. Kerr is Associate Professor in the School of Psychological Science at Oregon State
University, a Research Scientist at Oregon Social Learning Center, and a licensed clinical psycholo-
gist. Kerr received his undergraduate degree at Willamette University and completed his PhD and
postdoctoral fellowship at University of Michigan. His research interests concern intergenerational
transmission of parenting and problem behavior, including substance abuse, and suicide risk and
prevention among adolescents.
Laurie Kramer is Professor of Applied Psychology and Director of the University Honors Program at
Northeastern University. Kramer is also Emerita Professor of Applied Family Studies at the University
of Illinois. She earned her PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Illinois and performed
her residency at Northwestern University Medical School and the Family Institute of Chicago. She
was the founding Director of the Family Resiliency Center at the University of Illinois. Her research
focuses on the mechanisms by which young children develop positive relationships with their siblings.
She has coedited special sections or issues on children’s sibling relationships in the Journal of Family
Psychology, Child Development Perspectives, and New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development.
Esther M. Leerkes is Professor of Human Development and Family Studies and Associate Dean
for Research in the School of Health and Human Sciences at the University of North Carolina at
Greensboro. Leerkes received her BA from the State University of New York at Potsdam and her
PhD from the University of Vermont. She has served on the editorial boards for Infancy, Parenting:
Science and Practice, Family Relations, and the International Journal of Behavioral Development and is a
Consulting Editor for Child Development. She studies biological, contextual, and psychological pre-
dictors of maternal sensitivity, particularly in response to infant distress, and its impact on children’s
socioemotional development.
James P. McHale is Executive Director of the USF St. Petersburg Infant-Family Mental Health
Center at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital and directs the USFSP Family Study Center. He is
a Professor and Founding Chair of USF St. Petersburg’s Department of Psychology and past Director
of Clinical Training at Clark University. His area of expertise is coparenting in diverse family systems,
and his books include Coparenting: A Conceptual and Clinical Examination of Family Systems and Chart-
ing the Bumpy Road of Coparenthood: Understanding the Challenges of Family Life.
Meera Menon is a PhD student in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Study and Human
Development at Tufts University. Menon received a BS in Human Development at Cornell Univer-
sity. She works at Tufts Interdisciplinary Evaluation Research and the Friedman School of Nutrition
Science and Policy at Tufts University. Her research interests include the creation and evaluation
of programs and policies that support parents and caregivers in promoting childhood health and
well-being.
xxi
Lynne Murray is Professor of Developmental Psychology at the University of Reading, U.K., and
honorary Professor at the Departments of Psychology at the University of Cape Town and Stellen-
bosch University, South Africa. Murray was educated at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, and
was previously affiliated to the University of Cambridge, U.K. Her work has focused on parenting
and the development of children growing up in conditions of adversity, including maternal post-
natal depression and anxiety, socioeconomic adversity and congenital disorder. She is past president
of the Marcé Society and is a Fellow of the British Academy. She is cofounder and codirector of a
charity to support parenting and child development in conditions of adversity, The Mikhulu Trust,
principally through book sharing. She is the author of The Social Baby and The Psychology of Babies:
How Relationships Support Development From Birth to Two and Coeditor of Postpartum Depression and
Child Development.
S. Katherine Nelson-Coffey is Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of the South

in Sewanee, Tennessee. Nelson-Coffey earned her BS in Psychology from the University of Mary
Washington and her MA and PhD in Psychology from the University of California, Riverside. Her
research focuses on what leads people to live happy and fulfilling lives, with a specific focus on fam-
ily life.
Julie Nihouarn-Sigurdardottir is a PhD researcher within the Centre for the Developing Brain
at King’s College London. She completed a MSC in Neuroscience from University College London
and further postgraduate qualifications in Development and Psychopathology at the University of
Reading. Nihouarn-Sigurdardottir investigates the impact of maternal medical and psychological
health during pregnancy on the brain development of the fetus and longitudinally into infanthood.
Mirjam Oosterman is Associate Professor at the section of Clinical Child and Family Studies at
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Oosterman obtained her MA degree in Clinical
Psychology at the University of Groningen, The Netherlands, and her PhD in Educational Science
at Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Her research focuses on parenting, mental health,
attachment (disturbances), stress-reactivity, and regulation.
Christina M. Padilla is a PhD candidate in the Psychology Department at Georgetown University.

Padilla received a MPP from Georgetown University and BA in Psychology from Johns Hopkins
University. She was previously affiliated with the National Institute of Child Health and Human
Development, where she completed an Intramural Research Training Award with the Section on
Child and Family Research.
Ross D. Parke is Distinguished Professor of Psychology Emeritus at the University of California,

Riverside. Parke was educated at the Universities of Toronto and Waterloo and previously was
affiliated with the Universities of Wisconsin and Illinois and the Fels Research Institute. His is a past
President of the Society for Research in Child Development and the Developmental Psychology
Division of the American Psychological Association. He has been editor of Developmental Psychology
and the Journal of Family Psychology. Parke is author of Fathers, Future Families: Diverse Forms, Rich Pos-
sibilities and coauthor of Child Psychology, Social Development, and Throwaway Dads.
Charlotte J. Patterson is a Professor in the Department of Psychology and Chair of the Depart-
ment of Women, Gender and Sexuality at the University of Virginia. Patterson is a Fellow of the
Association for Psychological Science as well as of the American Psychological Association and a
past President of the Society for Psychological Research on Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Issues. She
was also the recipient of APA’s Distinguished Contributions to Research in Public Policy Award and
xxii
served as a member of the United States Institute of Medicine Committee on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual,
and Transgender Health Issues and Research Gaps and Opportunities.
Susan Paul received a BA from Beloit College, MA, from the School of Social Service Administra-
tion of The University of Chicago, and PhD from the Committee on Human Development, The
University of Chicago.
Peter Prinzie is Professor of Pedagogical Sciences at the Erasmus University. Prinzie obtained his
PhD in Pedagogical Sciences from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. He was previously affili-
ated with Leiden University and Utrecht University. His research spans the field of developmental
psychopathology, personality psychology, and developmental psychology in questions of how parent
and child factors influence parental behavior, how personality develops from early childhood into
emerging adulthood, and how the dynamic interplay between parenting and personality predicts
(mal)adaptation.
Abbie Raikes is Assistant Professor at the College of Public Health, University of Nebraska Medical
Center, and a Fellow at the Buffett Early Childhood Institute. Raikes’s PhD is from the University
of Nebraska-Lincoln and MPH is from Columbia University. Her work focuses on improving early
childhood programs and policies in low- and middle-income countries.
Helen Raikes is Willa Cather Professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Raikes received a
PhD from Iowa State University and MS from the University of California, Davis. She was a Society
for Research in Child Development Executive Policy Fellow, Consultant for the Office of Planning,
Research and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services, and Research Director of the Donald O. Clifton Child Development Center at the
Gallup Organization. Her area of study is early childhood education, focused on research to inform
outcomes and opportunities for low-income children before school begins. She is author of two
books, including a Monograph of the Society for Research in Child Development.
Martin P. M. Richards was Professor of Family Research and Director of the Centre of Family
Research at Cambridge University, U.K. Richards received his education at Cambridge University.
He has researched a number of aspects of child development and family life including divorce, family
change, and the impact of pediatric and obstetric practice for families and children, including issues
related to the separation of parents and children and relevant sociolegal issues. He also works on
social and bioethical aspects of the use of assisted reproduction and on the development of children
conceived in this way. He coedited the Blackwell Companion to the Sociology of Families, Reproductive
Donation: Practice, Policy, and Bioethics, and Regulating Reproductive Donation, Birth Rites and Rights and
Regulating Autonomy: Sex, Reproduction and Families.
Rebecca M. Ryan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at Georgetown Uni-

versity. Ryan earned a PhD in Developmental Psychology from Columbia University. Her research
explores how the home environment shapes child development and asks what public policies can
do to enhance the quality of those environments. She has published on how family structure, family
socioeconomic status, and fathers’ involvement are associated with the nature of parenting behavior
and child and family well-being.
Caroline Sanner is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Human Development and Family
Science at the University of Missouri. Sanner received her PhD in Family Science from the Uni-
versity of Missouri. She explores postdivorce relationships and stepfamily dynamics. Her research
xxiii
agendum focuses on understanding the processes through which divorced and stepfamily mem-
bers make meaning of their roles, develop and maintain familial ties, and negotiate relationships in
complex kinship networks. She is also interested on the influence of gendered expectations on role
construction and enactment, particularly for women in stepfamilies.
Sarah J. Schoppe-Sullivan is Professor of Psychology at Ohio State University. She received her
B.A. in Psychology from Northwestern University and her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology
from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Schoppe-Sullivan’s research focuses on how
parents manage their parenting roles and responsibilities together—or coparenting—and the roles of
fathers in families. She is particularly interested in the implications of coparenting and father-child
relationships for child and family functioning and the development of these relationships across
the transition to parenthood. She is a Fellow of the National Council on Family Relations and her
research has been funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and
Human Development and the National Science Foundation. Schoppe-Sullivan is deputy editor of
the Journal of Marriage and Family, and serves on the editorial boards of Parenting: Science and Practice,
the Journal of Family Psychology, and the Journal of Family Theory and Review. She has also received
numerous awards recognizing the high quality of her teaching and mentoring of undergraduate and
graduate students, including Ohio State University’s Alumni Award for Distinguished Teaching.
Carlo Schuengel is Professor of Special Education, leading the section of Clinical Child and Family
Studies at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Schuengel obtained his MS and PhD in
Educational Science at University of Leiden, The Netherlands. He is Associate Editor of Attachment
and Human Development and Child Development. He focuses on parenting, attachment, mental health,
and disabilities from the perspective of preventive and promotive interventions.
Yana Segal Sirotkin is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Psychology at USF St. Petersburg and
Research Coordinator for an NIH-funded randomized controlled trial examining efficacy of a
Focused Coparenting Consultation for unmarried parents. She received her MA in Developmental
Psychology from the University of Haifa in Israel and her PhD in Applied Developmental Psychol-
ogy from George Mason University. Sirotkin is also a coinvestigator for a study of coparenting and
toddler development profiles at the USFSP Infant-Family Center at Johns Hopkins All Children’s
Hospital.
Margaret M. Smith is a clinical psychology PhD student at Southern Methodist University in

Dallas. Smith received her BA in Psychology at the University of Texas in Austin. Her research
interests include evidence-based parenting interventions and emerging positive parenting programs.
Clinically, her interests include providing evidence-based therapy and psychodiagnostic assessments
for at-risk children and adolescents in community mental health and juvenile detention settings.
Peter K. Smith is Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Goldsmiths, University of London, U.K. He

received his BSc at the University of Oxford and his PhD from the University of Sheffield. He was
Head of the Unit for School and Family Studies in the Department of Psychology at Goldsmith’s
and is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society, the Association of Psychological Sciences, and
the Academy of Social Sciences. He has published 28 authored and edited books, including The
Psychology of Grandparenthood: An International Perspective, Childhood Social Development, Understanding
Children’s Development, Understanding School Bullying: Its Nature and Prevention Strategies, and Adoles-
cence: A Very Short Introduction.
xxiv
Diamond Stewart earned her BA from the University of the South. Stewart is now a student at
Savannah Law School, with a specific focus on Entertainment Law.
Sukran Ucus is Assistant Professor at Ahi Evran University. Ucus received her BS, MS, and PhD
degree from Hacettepe University, Ankara-Turkey. She worked for the Ministry of Education in
Turkey as a teacher, Child-Friendly City project expert, and curriculum specialist. Her area of study
is early childhood education, largely focused on research and teaching children’s rights and child
welfare, creativity, and creative thinking for young children, parent involvement in early childhood
education, and social studies for young children.
Marsha Weinraub is the Laura H. Carnell Professor of Psychology at Temple University. Wein-
raub received her BA from Brandeis University and her PhD from the University of Michigan.
Her interests focus on the effects of early childcare, single parenting, and maternal employment on
parent-child relationships and child development. She was a principal investigator on a the NICHD
Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development.
Lauren G. Wild is Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Cape
Town. Wild holds an MA in Research Psychology from the University of Cape Town and a PhD
from the University of Cambridge. Her research interests center on family processes and develop-
mental psychopathology as well as grandparental involvement, caregiving, and child adjustment in
the context of family stress, and risk-taking behavior in adolescence.
xxv
PART I
The Parent
1
PARENTING AND FAMILY
SYSTEMS
Patricia K. Kerig
Introduction
Family systems theory provides a rich conceptual framework and body of research devoted to under-
standing the larger relational context in which parenting takes place. Although in some ways inherent
to research on parenting more broadly, family systems thinking also stands apart as an independent
body of thought. Indeed, given that the term “family” inherently refers to a constellation includ-
ing parents and children, it might be thought that all parenting theory and research concerns the
family system. However, family systems theory stands apart from mainstream parenting research and
provides an umbrella for a group of theoretical perspectives that, although diverse in some respects,
share a number of assumptions that can be best summed up as “the effect of relationships on relation-
ships” (Emde, 1988, p. 354). For example, a distinction can be made between family-related variables
that affect children and their parents (e.g., poverty, community violence, adversity) and family systemic
processes that affect the entire system of interrelationships within the family, including their struc-
ture, patterns, and reciprocal transactions (Cowan and Cowan, 2006; Kerig, 2016) To this end, this
chapter reviews key theoretical propositions underlying the family systems approach, describes the
research and interventions that have derived from this perspective, and discusses future directions in
the field.
Fundamental Concepts Underlying Family Systems Theories
Holism
The concept of holism is central to all family systems theory, expressed pithily in the adage that “the
whole is more than the sum of its parts” (Bertalanffy, 1968, p. 55). Moreover, as Wynne (1984/2004,
p. 2) expressed it,
Systems theory begins with the observation that nature can be viewed in a hierarchically
arranged continuum, with the more complex, larger units superordinate to the less com-
plex, smaller units. . . . Each level needs to be regarded as an organized whole, with distinc-
tive properties and characteristics that are altered by interchange with other levels, but with
no level reducible to simpler levels. Thus, organs are more than simple aggregates of cells,
3
Patricia K. Kerig
the person is more than an aggregate of organs, and the family is more than an aggregate
of persons.
One implication of holism is that families are systems that have properties that are not reducible
to the individual characteristics of their members (Kerig, 2001a). Thus, in family systems theory as
applied to clinical work, it is families, and not just individuals, who are seen as the sources of pathol-
ogy; for example, Minuchin’s (1974) observations of the dysfunctional family interactions among
eating-disordered clients led him to posit the existence of an “anorexic family.” Systemic processes
affect individuals’ behavior, such as when parents move from dyadic couple interactions to triadic
relationships that include their children. Family interactions involving two parents and the child
add a new level of complexity in that they require the simultaneous coordination of three different
relationships—mother-child, father-child, and the couple—each of which has specific role demands
(e.g., parent versus intimate partner) that need to be synchronized and balanced (Kerig, 2016). It is in
coordinating these different roles, as Gjerde (1986, p. 297) put it, that “the parent-child dyad is trans-
formed into a family system.” In turn, each of these relationships can have an effect on the others; for
example, when interparental tensions “spill over” differentially onto mother-child versus father-child
relationships. Parents also may act in ways that affects the relationship of the other parent with a child,
such as by excluding the partner from their emotionally close bond with the child, or by covertly
encouraging a child’s disrespect or misbehavior toward the partner (Parke, 1990).
One point of contention in the family systems literature has been whether families can be
summed up using holistic constructs, such as terming a family as an “enmeshed” or “disengaged”
system. In particular, descriptions of pathological family relationships often involve one enmeshed
relationship (e.g., between a mother and child) that creates imbalances among other family subsys-
tems (e.g., by increasing disengagement between the mother and father; Cowan and Cowan, 1990).
In this regard, McHale, Kuersten-Hogan, and Lauretti (2001) offered a helpful distinction between
these abstract whole-family constructs and observable processes that take place when family mem-
bers are considered as a group, which they term family-level variables. Family-level processes do not
require the presence of all family members simultaneously; for example, covert coparenting conflict
can occur when, in his or her absence, one parent denigrates the other to the child (McHale, 1997),
just as coparenting cooperation can be demonstrated by the ways in which parents support or vali-
date one another when they are alone with their children (Kerig, 2001a). Therefore, family dynamic
processes have been proposed as a more inclusive term, which refers to “those interactions that have
implications for family-level functioning even when they do not take place in the presence of all
family members” (Kerig, 2001a, p. 10). As Belsky, Putnam, and Crnic (1996, p. 46) summed up this
idea, “[Family] dynamics include events and processes that involve all family members together or a
family subsystem (parent-child or husband-wife) that affects and is affected by the other subsystems
in the family.”
Interdependency
A second key family systemic idea is that of interdependency: that relationships have effects on other
relationships (Emde, 1988). Thus, in contrast to other parenting perspectives that focus on how
parenting relationships affect the child, family systems theory proposes that relationships affect other
relationships in the family system (Gjerde, 1986): “Thus the family is viewed as an interrelated web in
which perturbations in one strand send reverberations along the threads interconnecting other parts
of the system” (Kerig, 2016, p. 587). One example of such interrelatedness of relationships is the con-
cept of compensatory processes (Engfer, 1988; Kerig, Cowan, and Cowan, 1993) in which unhappiness
in the couple relationship, for example, leads to a compensatory overly close relationship between a
4
Parenting and Family Systems
parent and child that imbalances the family system (Kerig, 2005) and potentially leads to heightened
tensions and loyalty conflicts for the child (Grych, Raynor, and Fosco, 2004).
Circularity
The term “circularity” refers to the notion that cause-and-effect in family systems is not unidi-
rectional but rather reciprocal and bidirectional. For example, negativity in parenting relationships
increases child misbehavior, which, in turn, increases parenting stress and negativity. In the larger
developmental psychopathology literature, the term used to refer to circularity is that of “transac-
tions” (Kerig, Ludlow, and Wenar, 2012; Sameroff, 1995, 2010), which refers to the processes by
which individuals in a family shape one another’s behavior over time. Research supports the idea
that there are reciprocal effects among couple, parenting, and parent-child relationships. For example,
behavioral analyses have shown that conflicts between parents are followed by increases in parent-
child interactions, just as conflicts between fathers and children are associated with subsequent inter-
parental conflict (Almeida, Wethington, and Chandler, 1999).
Homeostasis
“Homeostasis” refers to the fact that the regulatory processes that keep a family system intact tend
to keep the system consistent over time, for better or for worse. On the positive side, homeostasis
is “a way in which normal families maintain constancy and predictability in the face of constantly
changing environmental demands . . . [and] maintain a sense of regularity in the presence of everyday
stresses and changes” (Wagner and Reiss, 1995, p. 697). On the problematic side, as family therapists
have long noted ( Jackson, 1965), homeostasis can stubbornly return a family system to its set-point
in ways that do not allow for adaptive change.
Organization and Coherence

The systemic perspective also posits that the interrelationships among family members are organ-
ized by the larger family system in ways that confer coherence and lawful continuity across contexts
(P. Minuchin, 1985; Sroufe and Fleeson, 1988). This overall coherence in family structure means that
there are ways in which the behavior and development of members of the system are constrained by
the larger family organizational framework; for example, in an enmeshed family, achieving independ-
ence is more challenging for children. Just as with homeostasis, however, this organizational property
of the family could have benefits or deficits for its members. Whereas negative characteristics, such
as high levels of family conflict, increase the risk for psychopathology in all members of the fam-
ily system, “adaptive family functioning confirms positive benefits that radiate outward from the
individual and enhance the capacity for all family members, and the system itself, to thrive” (Kerig,
2016, p. 589).
Boundaries, Subsystems, and Boundary Dissolution

Inherent in family systems theory is also the idea that the larger whole is composed of subsystems
that are demarcated, ideally, by clear boundaries (Kameguchi, 1996; Minuchin, 1974): “Like the
membrane of a cell, boundaries need to be permeable enough to allow communication and emo-
tional contact to traverse the divide while at the same time being firm enough to ensure the integrity
of each separate unit” (Kerig, 2016, p. 589). For most family theorists, the heart of the family system is
the couple relationship, and the boundary demarcating it as distinct from the parent-child and sibling
5
Patricia K. Kerig
relationships is the key to adaptive family functioning (Kerig, 2005). Dissolution of these boundaries
can take a number of forms, which are described next:
Enmeshment
In contrast to family cohesion, which connotes a level of healthy closeness among all members of a
family (Barber and Buehler, 1996), enmeshment refers to relationships in which family members are
overly involved with and highly emotionally reactive to one another (Minuchin, 1974). Enmeshment
may take place at the level of the whole family (when all relationships are overly close) or at the level
of a particular dyad in the family (when a parent is overly involved in the life of his or her child).
Research has linked enmeshed relationships in the family to negative child outcomes, particularly
internalizing disorders ( Jacobvitz, Hazen, Curran, and Hitchens, 2004; Jewell and Stark, 2003; Kerig,
2005) and attachment insecurity (Allen and Hauser, 1996). However, a caution is needed here, in that
cultural construals of what is adaptive and typical regarding family members’ closeness come into
play. In contrast to the negative associations between parent-child enmeshment and child outcomes
in societies that prize independence, such as the United States, such findings are not always seen
in samples drawn from more interdependent societies ( Jackson, Raval, Bendikas-King, Raval, and
Trivedi, 2016; Manzi, Vignoles, Regalia, and Scabini, 2006).
Parentification
Parentification, also termed “role reversal,” refers to a child stepping into—or being pressed to take
on—developmentally inappropriate tasks, such as nurturing a parent, acting as a companion, or pro-
viding adult-like forms of instrumental support (Boszormenyi-Nagy and Spark, 1973; Jacobvitz and
Bush, 1996; Jurkovic, 1997; Kerig, 2005; MacFie, Houts, McElwain, and Cox, 2005). Consistent with
family systems theory, problems in the couple relationship increase the likelihood that children will
be parentified by one parent or the other (Kerig, 2005). Moreover, perhaps because children often
cannot successfully fulfill these roles, and thus are disappointing to an emotionally needy parent, par-
entification often coincides with parental maltreatment of children (MacFie et al., 1999).
Two caveats are in order regarding the research on this construct, however. First, some con-
struals of parentification include dynamics that may not confer the same risk for child maladaptation.
For example, a subtype of parentification, termed “adultification” (Kerig, 2005), refers to a parent
forming an egalitarian relationship with the child, either by acting like the child’s peer (the child-
like parent) or by promoting the child to adult status (the adultlike child). Particularly for adoles-
cents, adultification may combine some potential deficits (e.g., “I need to stay home on Saturday
nights to keep my father company.”) with some potential perceived benefits (e.g., “My dad and I are
best friends and I love feeling so important to him.”). Further, just as with enmeshment, concepts
involving parentification need to be culturally informed and to take into account norms and values
regarding familism (Gibbs and Huang, 2003), parent-child mutuality (Anderson, 1999), and inter-
dependence (Kağıtçıbaşı, 2005). Particularly in economically disadvantaged families (Boyd-Franklin,
2003), children may routinely be assigned responsibilities, such as helping to rear younger siblings or
helping with the family finances. Termed “filial responsibilities,” these tasks have been shown to be
associated with child distress only when they are perceived as unfair or the child is not adequately
trained or supported in carrying them out ( Jurkovic, Kuperminc, Sarac, and Weisshaar, 2005).
Spousification
Another construct that is sometimes subsumed under parentification is that of “spousification,” the
elevation of the child to the role of intimate partner. Sroufe and Ward (1980) coined this term to
6
describe their observations of “seductive” behavior by mothers who were effusively affectionate and
flirtatious toward their young children, mostly sons. Subsequent research by Sroufe and his team
found that mother-child spousification is associated with negative behavioral and emotional out-
comes throughout childhood and adolescence (Carlson and Sroufe, 1995; Jacobvitz and Sroufe, 1987;
Shaffer and Egeland, 2011), above and beyond other negative family and parenting variables (Shaffer
and Sroufe, 2005). In one of the only studies to investigate spousification by fathers, Rowa, Kerig, and
Geller (2001) found that such relationships were more prevalent among young women with eating
disorders than among controls.
Intrusiveness
Intrusive parenting, also termed “psychological control,” is a form of boundary dissolution that
involves “parental behaviors that are intrusive and manipulative of children’s thoughts, feelings, and
attachments to parents” (Barber, 2002, p. 15). Psychologically controlling behaviors may be overt,
such as threatening a child with a loss of the parent’s love, or more covert and subtle, such as incul-
cating guilt to gain a child’s compliance. A large body of cross-cultural research has demonstrated
that intrusive parenting is associated with negative child outcomes (Bean, Barber, and Crane, 2006;
Barber, Stolz, and Olson, 2005; Bean and Northrup, 2009; Kerig, 2005).
Families as Open Systems

The flip side to homeostasis, which lends continuity and stability to families, is the systemic concep-
tualization of families as open systems that are capable of change, whether that change is driven by
forces within or outside the family (Cox and Paley, 2003):
According to family systems theory, the family unit is an open system in which family per-
turbations and stressors (e.g., parent psychopathology, relationship disturbances, disruptive
family events) may provoke subsequent reorganizations in family functioning and function
as architects of interdependencies between family subsystems.
(Davies, Cummings, and Winter, 2004, p. 775)
A Brief Historical Walk Through the Development

of Family Systems Theories
Early Architects of Family Systems Theory

In a reaction against the prevailing psychoanalytic perspective of the 1950s, a number of clinically
oriented theorists began to promote the family as the unit of analysis and treatment For example,
Ackerman (1958) pioneered working conjointly with parents and children in therapy, and Lidz and
his colleagues (Lidz, Cornelison, Fleck, and Terry, 1957) also pushed the envelope by including
fathers in their sessions, making important observations about the centrality of the couple relation-
ship for understanding childhood emotional and behavioral problems. Key concepts introduced
by Lidz’s group include marital schism, characterized by high levels of overt conflict, or marital skew,
involving covert forms of conflict, such as verbal agreement accompanied by subtle signs of invali-
dation. Simultaneously, Wynne and his colleagues (Singer and Wynne, 1965; Wynne, Ryckoff, Day,
and Hirsch, 1958) were conducting observations of individuals with schizophrenia that showed their
thinking and behavior were more disordered when they were interacting with family members
than when they were alone, suggesting that what was disordered was not the patient but the family
system.
7
Patricia K. Kerig
Bowen Family System Theory

One of the first fully fleshed family systemic theories to emerge during this era was that of Bowen
(1961, 1978), who originated many of the concepts important to modern family systems perspec-
tives, especially those related to enmeshment or, as he termed it, the family “undifferentiated ego
mass.” Bowen also contributed important ideas regarding the role of triangulation in disturbed family
processes (Bowen, 1978; Kerr and Bowen, 1988). Like a stool with two legs, Bowen believed that a
system composed of only two persons was inherently unstable and inclined toward inveigling a third,
especially when the members of the system are undifferentiated and anxious about any conflicts or
“overheated” closeness that might arise. An example of this process is the child who misbehaves as
a way of drawing parents’ attention—and away from their conflicts. Consequently, Bowen viewed
“detriangling” as “probably the most important technique in family systems therapy” (p. 150). Like
many of the theorists of his day, Bowen also incorporated psychodynamic concepts into his under-
standing of pathological family processes, such as family projection, in which parents deflect attention
from their couple conflicts by projecting the problem onto the child.
Mental Research Institute (MRI)

The MRI group brought together a number of innovative thinkers in the fields of social work (Satir),
anthropology (Bateson), psychiatry ( Jackson), and communications theory (Haley, Weakland, and Wat-
zlawick). The latter perspective had an important influence on the group’s key proposition: that dis-
torted communication patterns in the family were responsible for the development of schizophrenia.
A resulting concept was that of the “double bind,” literally a form of “crazy-making” in which family
members confronted one another with irreconcilably contradictory messages. Some of the longest last-
ing contributions of this group to the family systems pantheon were the theoretical contributions made
by Bateson, incorporating Bertalanffy’s (1973) general systems theory (e.g., the family as an organized
system), cybernetics (e.g., the role of homeostasis), and game theory. Bateson’s theorizing laid the
groundwork for a number of approaches to family therapy, including Haley’s (1963) Strategic Family
Therapy and the work of the Milan group in Italy (Palazzoli, Cecchin, Prata, and Boscolo, 1978).
Borzormenyi-Nagy’s Contextual Theory

Another important early theorist in family systems thinking is Borzormenyi-Nagy (Boszormenyi-
Nagy and Framo, 1965; Boszormenyi-Nagy and Spark, 1973), who focused on the concept of par-
entification, “the subjective distortion of a relationship as if one’s partner or even children were his
parent” (p. 151). Although such dynamics might reflect or precipitate problems in the family, Bor-
zormenyi-Nagy and Spark emphasized that they were normative relational processes that were not
necessarily associated with maladaptation. Borzormenyi-Nagy and Spark viewed parentification as
implicated in pathological family processes, and in psychopathologies that were passed on intergen-
erationally. Adults who were parentified, and thus did not have their legitimate childhood needs met
by their own parents, were likely to turn to their own children to fulfill unmet needs: “In effect, this
‘account due’ or ‘debit’ perspective suggests that a parent who was deprived of nurturance in child-
hood will feel entitled to balance the ledger by extracting those provisions from the emotional stores
of their own offspring” (Kerig, 2016, p. 583).
Minuchin’s Structural Family Theory

One of the most influential clinicians from the family systems perspective is Salvador Minuchin
(1967, 1974), who established the Philadelphia Child Guidance Clinic as a beacon of family systems
8
clinical training. Building on the work of Bowen (1978) and Haley (1976) regarding the importance
of healthy boundaries in the family, Minuchin elaborated on the roles of the subsystems that those
boundaries should define. In particular, he posited, the parental subsystem, which defines the executive
team in the family, should be clearly demarcated from the hierarchical and nonreciprocal role that
each partner plays in parent-child subsystems as well as from the egalitarian sibling subsystem shared by
the children. These boundaries, in Minuchin’s view, should be clear and yet not rigid:
For proper family functioning, the boundaries of subsystems must be clear. Boundaries
must be defined well enough to allow subsystem members to carry out their functions
without undue interference, but they must allow contact between the members of the
subsystem and others.
(p. 54)
Minuchin also described the different pathological family forms that might emerge when bound-
aries are not maintained, which he referred to as rigid triangles. One such triangle involves a coalition
in which one parent forms an overly close relationship with a child that excludes the other parent.
A second form, which he called triangulation, involves each parent attempting to form such a coalition,
putting the child in the middle of their conflicts. Third, detouring involves parents distracting atten-
tion from their couple problems by reframing the problem as the child—whether supportive (e.g., that
the child is ill or in need of special attention and care) or attacking (e.g., that the child is scapegoated,
rejected, or blamed). Detouring in particular can serve an essential function to the family by creating
an “identified patient” who allows the family to remain intact and preserve its homeostasis.
The Social Learning Perspective

Subsequent to the 1980s, social learning theory gained a major foothold in academic psychol-
ogy. A principal contributor to incorporating family systems thinking into this new zeitgeist was
Patterson (1975, 1982), the founder of the Oregon Social Learning Center. One of Patterson’s
important contributions was the recognition of—and development of observational strategies to
study—reciprocal processes in the family, and the ways that mothers, fathers, and children affect one
another. Patterson introduced the seminal construct of the coercive family process in which parents and
children inadvertently reinforce one another for aversive behavior. Children with conduct problems,
the Patterson team observed, were twice as likely as other children to persist in negative behavior
even when their parents attempted to set limits. Even though these parents tended to respond ini-
tially to children’s misbehavior in ways that were harsh and punitive, they ultimately were ineffective.
Not only did these parents not follow through on their commands but also, as their children’s misbe-
havior escalated, the parents were likely to simply give in and abandon the effort to assert discipline.
Thus, children learned a valuable lesson in the power of negative reinforcement: By ceasing their
aversive behavior only when their parents ceased attempting to set limits, children had reinforced
their parents for backing down. Correspondingly, parents had reinforced their children’s misbehavior
by rewarding it with their own compliance.
The Parent Management Training Oregon (PMTO) model, as it is now called, not only pro-
vides a stand-alone effective model of family intervention, but also has been enfolded into other
evidence-based treatments targeting a wide range of childhood and adolescent problems, including
aggression (Bank, Rains, and Forgatch, 2004; Patterson, Chamberlain, and Reid, 1982), substance
use (Dishion, Patterson, and Kavanagh, 1992), conflict in foster (Eddy, Whaley, and Chamberlain,
2004) and stepfamilies (Forgatch, Patterson, DeGarmo, and Beldavs, 2009), and families in diverse
cultures (Domenech Rodríguez, Baumann, and Schwartz, 2011; Ogden and Hagen, 2008; Tremblay,
McCord, Boileau, and Charlebois, 1991).
9
Patricia K. Kerig
Subsequent Developments in Family Systems Theory

In the most recent decades, the most significant developments in the family systems field have not
been in the creation of new “grand theories” so much as in the strengthening of the evidence base
supporting family treatments for various forms of psychopathology. In part, this trend reflects the
fact that many major theoreticians and architects of the field worked in clinical settings and private
institutes outside of academic psychology, in which their focus was the application of their meth-
ods to clients and the training of new clinicians rather than theory building or empirical research.
Nonetheless, in this context, a number of specific schools of family systems thought have compiled
especially strong evidence bases and have become widely disseminated interventions.
Multisystemic Therapy
Multisystemic Therapy (MST; Henggeler, Schoenwald, Borduin, Rowland, and Cunningham, 2009)
is one of the best empirically supported interventions for child and adolescent conduct problems,
with an impressive and rigorous body of carefully controlled clinical trials. Grounded in family sys-
tems theory, this intensive home-based intervention targets the family system of relationships but
does so in a way which is flexible, individualized, and also addresses the many different systems that
are implicated in the development of antisocial behavior, including schools, neighborhoods, and
peer relationships. Parent training is an important component of the model, with the goal to get
parents back “in charge” and able to more effectively set limits and provide support for their child.
Evidence has shown the effectiveness of MST in intervening with some of the most severe forms of
youth problem behavior, including chronic violence and sexual offending, with follow-up measures
evidencing improvements in family communication and reductions in parent-child and interparental
conflict, with some studies showing treatment effects maintained over periods as long as 5 years.
Functional Family Therapy

The Functional Family Therapy (FFT; Alexander and Parsons, 1982; Alexander, Robbins, Waldron,
and Neeb, 2013) is unique for combining a family systemic perspective with interpersonal theory.
FFT posits that the key to understanding and addressing youth behavior problems is to understand
the relational functions that they are designed to serve, whether those concern a drive for greater
autonomy versus greater connection. FFT also is concerned with relational functions related to hier-
archy in the family but, unlike many other family systems, does not assume that the ideal hierarchy in
every family is one in which parents are “in charge” (Kerig and Alexander, 2013). A diversity of fam-
ily forms may be adaptive, including those in which relational functions of family members are met
through asymmetrical relationships in which children are “one-up” on their parents and assume an
executive position in the family. The tasks of the therapist are to diagnose and uncover the relational
functions that problem behavior might be attempting to fulfill (e.g., a connection-seeking youth
who acts out because that is the only way she or he can gain the attention of an autonomous father),
to reframe these behaviors with family members in ways that detoxify their attributions about one
another, and to help family members find more adaptive ways of seeking the means to their relational
ends. FFT also has compiled an impressive empirical dossier, including clinical trials carried out in a
wide variety of cultures and geographic regions (Robbins, Alexander, Turner, and Hollimon, 2016).
Multidimensional Family Therapy

Multidimensional Family Therapy (MDFT; Liddle, 2002) is another well-established evidence-
based family systems intervention, which has especially targeted adolescents with problems related
10
to substance abuse. The multiple components of the intervention include working directly with
the adolescent to redirect a drug-using antisocial lifestyle to a healthier developmental course
by enhancing positive identity, improving prosocial peer relationships, and encouraging positive
bonding with school and social institutions. Interventions with the parents focus on repairing lost
motivation and emotional investment, improving parenting skills and communication with their
adolescent, and attending to their own emotional needs. The therapist then joins with the parent(s)
and adolescent together for family sessions to help them to experience more positive interactions
with one another, and then, as needed, builds on additional components that incorporate inter-
ventions with other family members or important systems outside of the family. Randomized
controlled trials have evidenced the effectiveness of the treatment among families of adolescent
substance abusers for as long as a year following the end of treatment (Liddle, Rowe, Dakof, Hen-
derson, and Greenbaum, 2009).
Empirical Investigations of the Association Between

Family Systems and Parenting
Whole-Family Constructs
Cohesion
One of the best studied whole-family constructs is that of family cohesion, the idea that family
members experience a positive sense of emotional bond and unity. Along with flexibility and com-
munication, cohesion is a key dimension of the Circumplex Model of Marital and Family Systems
(Olson, Sprenkle, and Russell, 1979). Implicit in the construct is that cohesion is uniform across
the dyads and triads in the family and, therefore, that there is an absence of the kinds of unbalanced
coalitions or triangles that are associated with pathological family structure in structural family
theory (Minuchin, 1974). A large body of research has confirmed the positive benefits of living
in a cohesive family system for both adults and children (Favez et al., 2012; Leary and Katz, 2004;
Olson, 2011).
As might be expected, family cohesion is low in families with high levels of interparental conflict;
moreover, episodes of conflict between parents result in reduced family cohesion as well as unbal-
anced alliances (Kitzmann, 2000). By contrast, family cohesion can buffer children against the nega-
tive impact of interparental conflict (Davies, Harold, Goeke-Morey, and Cummings, 2002). Lindahl,
Malik, Kaczynski, and Simons (2004) found that negative family processes, such as low family cohe-
sion and cross-generational coalitions, were more strongly associated with internalizing problems
among European American than Latin American children, perhaps because of the greater availability
of extended family support systems in Latin culture.
Hierarchical Organization
Another tenet of family systems theory is that well-functioning families are characterized by a hier-
archical structure in which parents are in leadership and executive positions, rather than children
running the show (Haley, 1976; Minuchin and Fishman, 1975). Lack of a clear hierarchy of family
roles—confusion over who is the parent and who is the child (Kerig, 2005)—is characteristic of clin-
ically distressed families (Howes, Cicchetti, Toth, and Rogosch, 2000; Shaw, Criss, Schonberg, and
Beck, 2004). Again, however, cultural norms may come into play in that too rigid an authoritarian
hierarchy is associated with behavior problems among European American youth, whereas an overly
permissive absence of hierarchy is associated with externalizing problems among Latin American
youth (Lindahl and Malik, 1999).
11
Patricia K. Kerig
Family Structural Types

Minuchin’s (1974) typology of family triangular types was validated in a study that specified the
distinct and discriminable forms that rigid triangles might take in the family system. One such inves-
tigation (Kerig, 1995) elicited self-reports from mothers, fathers, and children about their perceptions
of the family structure using a revised version of Cooper, Holman, and Braithwaite’s (1983) Family
Cohesion Index. Parents and children who described their families as consistent with Minuchin’s
“triangulation” type rated their families as highest in interparental conflict and negative affect.
Children in families typologized as “detouring” were highest in self-blame, anxiety, and depression,
whereas children in “disengaged” families demonstrated the most externalizing problems. In a second
study, Fivaz-Depeursinge, Lopes, Python, and Favez (2009) found evidence for three of Minuchin’s
rigid triangular types in families with toddlers: Detouring, in which parents shifted their conflicts onto
the child and children engaged in parentified behaviors; triangulation, in which parents each vied to
form a coalition with the child and children either became go-betweens or withdrew during family
interactions; or families in which one parent formed a stable coalition with the child.
From a somewhat different conceptual framework, Davies et al. (2004) used observational and
self-report measures to typologize families into one of four clusters: (1) cohesive (high in interparental
affection and acceptance of children; low in interparental conflict, inconsistent discipline, and psy-
chological control); (2) enmeshed (moderate levels of interparental affection and parental acceptance
with very high levels of interparental conflict, inconsistent discipline, and psychological control); (3)
disengaged (low levels of interparental affection and parental acceptance along with moderately high
levels of the other variables); and (4) adequate (similar to cohesive families except for demonstrating
high levels of psychological control). Family disengagement predicted children’s emotional insecu-
rity, which, in turn, predicted increased internalizing symptoms over the course of a year. In contrast,
family enmeshment was associated with both internalizing and externalizing problems in children,
suggesting that diffuse boundaries in enmeshed families allow for greater spillover of interparental
conflicts onto children, thus potentiating their negative effects.
Spillover of Couple Relationships Onto Parenting and Family Process

Although a large body of research has documented the ways in which couple conflict spills over onto
parent-child dyadic relationships, only a smaller set of studies has examined these processes in the
context of whole-family interactions (Buehler and Gerard, 2002). In one observational study, Katz
and Gottman (1996) found that hostility between parents was related to increased parental rejection
of children during triadic family interactions, which was, in turn, predictive of increased aggression
among boys. Similarly, Margolin, Gordis, and John (2001) found that hostility between parents was
associated with increased hostility toward children during observed family interactions, which, in
turn, was associated with child withdrawal, anxiety, and behavior problems.
Triangulation
Apart from studies that have investigated Minuchin’s “types” of rigid triangles in families, other stud-
ies have conceptualized triangulation as a variable lying along a continuum. In particular, research
deriving from Grych and Fincham’s (1990) cognitive contextual model operationalized triangulation
as the child’s perception of being implicated or caught in the middle of parents’ quarrels (Grych,
Harold, and Miles, 2003; Grych, Raynor, and Fosco, 2004; Kerig, 1998). Such appraisals are evidently
not only perceptions of children; interparental conflict increases the likelihood that parents form
cross-generational coalitions with children and involve them in discussions of couple issues (Chris-
tensen and Margolin, 1988; Lindahl, Clements, and Markman, 1997). In turn, children who become
12
involved in such coalitions are at increased risk for the development of behavior problems (Davis,
Hops, Alpert, and Sheeber, 1998).
Lindahl and colleagues (2004) demonstrated the interrelations among interparental discord,
whole-family processes, and child adjustment. These authors found in a multiethnic sample that
a latent construct of family functioning (composed of observed cohesion, triangulation, and cross-
generational boundary violations) fully mediated the association between couple conflict and child
behavior problems. This study points to the value of understanding the family as an organized sys-
tem in which the parts are inextricably interrelated with one another. As the authors noted, “In the
language of structural family systems theory, conflicts that erode the solidity of the marital subsystem
can create fault lines in the family structure, affecting dyadic, triadic, and whole-family subsystem
relationships as well as child functioning” (p. 625).
Coparenting and Family Process

Whereas couple conflict refers to anger or disagreements that are focused on the intimate relation-
ship between adult partners, coparenting conflict refers to parents’ disagreements related to the shared
tasks of parenting (McHale, 1997; McHale and Sirotkin, 2019). The construct of coparenting follows
from the structural family tenet that healthy family functioning requires that parents form a united
front within the parental subsystem that is clearly demarcated from the child/sibling subsystem.
Thus, coparenting is a whole-family process that concerns how parents coordinate with one another
in relation to their child. Coparenting warmth and cooperation are associated with positive couple
and parent-child relationships as well as child well-being (McHale, Kuersten, and Lauretti, 1996).
In contrast, hostile-competitive coparenting is associated with couple dissatisfaction and increased
interparental violence as well as internalizing and externalizing problems among children (Leary and
Katz, 2004; McConnell and Kerig, 2002; McHale and Rasmussen, 1998). Similarly, hostile-detached
coparenting, characterized by a combination of couple anger and withdrawal, has been associated
with negative child outcomes (Katz and Low, 2004; Katz and Woodin, 2002). In addition, longi-
tudinal research has shown that coparenting conflict and negativity contribute to the development
of child behavior problems over and above measures of the quality of the couple relationship itself
(McHale and Rasmussen, 1998). Coparenting also seems to have effects that radiate throughout the
family system, affecting the quality of parenting in individual mother-child and father-child rela-
tionships. For example, supportive parenting by one coparent may decreases the likelihood of harsh
parenting by the other coparent (Conger, Schofield, and Neppl, 2012).
Boundary Dissolution in the Family System

Jacobvitz and colleagues (Hazen, Jacobvitz, and McFarland, 2005; Jacobvitz and Bush, 1996; Jacob-
vitz, Riggs, and Johnson, 1999; Jacobvitz and Sroufe, 1987) carried out a series of studies examining
boundary dissolution in the context of the family system. For example, in a study that followed
children from 2 to 7 years of age, Jacobvitz, Hazen, Curran, and Hitchens (2004) observed mothers,
fathers, and children interacting together and found that blurred parent-child boundaries were asso-
ciated with negative child outcomes, with enmeshed patterns particularly related to inattentiveness
among boys and depression among girls.
Boundary dissolution in the family also has been related to the spillover of couple tensions onto
children. “When clear boundaries exist between the couple and the parent-child subsystem, spouses
have their own separate adult relationship, and also are available to meet the needs of their children.
Without clear boundaries, conflict from the couple relationship may intrude on the parent-child
relationship and alter the nature of that relationship” (Margolin, Gordis, and Oliver, 2004, p. 754). For
example, in observational studies, Margolin and colleagues (2004) found that among interparentally
13
Patricia K. Kerig
violent versus nonviolent families, hostility within the couple were likely to leak into parent-child
relationships, taking the form of reduced empathy among fathers and increased negative affect among
mothers. In another study of emerging adults exposed to interparental conflict, Kerig and Swanson
(2010) found that maternal intrusiveness and parentification, as well as both maternal and paternal
hostile spousification, acted as mediators of the association between interparental conflict and mal-
adjustment, including the intergenerational transmission of aggression toward romantic partners.
Gender Dynamics in Family Systems
Fathering and Spillover

Although long neglected in psychological research, fathers make a unique contribution to the fam-
ily system that deserves recognition (Lamb, 2010; Parke and Cookston, 2019). Some research on the
spillover of couple conflict has suggested that fathering behavior is particularly vulnerable to the
disruptive effects of an unhappy couple relationship. For example, couple conflict is associated more
strongly with fathers’ behavior than that of mothers when whole-family interactions are observed
(Katz and Gottman, 1996; Lindahl and Malik, 1999). Specifically, fathers in distressed couples evi-
dence higher levels of observed withdrawal, rejection, and lack of support. One explanation proposed
for these gender differences in parental behavior is that mothers are prototypically considered the
parenting “experts” in the family, and, therefore, fathers look to their partners to be the “architects”
of family process and to model how to interact with their children; consequently, if the interparental
relationship is conflictual or distant, so will the father-child relation be (Cowan, Cowan, and Kerig,
1993; McHale et al., 2004).
Variations in Family Systemic Processes by Child Gender

It has been pointed that “parents” and “children” each come in different genders and are more accu-
rately identified as mothers, fathers, sons, and daughters (Cowan et al., 1993); therefore, it might be
expected that family processes would be enacted differently depending on the genders of the parties
involved. However, the empirical research on gender differences and family systems is largely incon-
sistent and resists firm conclusions (Davies and Lindsay, 2004). For example, some studies have shown
that interparental conflict differentially affects the mother-son relationship (Osborne and Fincham,
1996), whereas other studies find the father-daughter relationship to be more vulnerable (Kerig,
Cowan, and Cowan, 1993), and yet others find neither to be the case (Erel and Burman, 1995). In
still other research, gender effects emerge across all other-gender dyads in the family (Cox, Paley, and
Harter, 2001). In one such study involving a sample of emerging adults, Kerig and Swanson (2010)
found that interparental discord was associated with parents’ denigration of their partner’s gender
role characteristics, which was, in turn, associated with denigration of those characteristics in their
child; moreover, children whose parents viewed their gender-role characteristics in a negative light
demonstrated higher levels of emotional distress.
A more developmentally sensitive way in which gender may affect family process relates to soci-
etal expectations that girls orient toward relationships in general and caregiving in the family in
particular. As Davies and Lindsay (2004) also pointed out, girls’ relational tendencies are intensified
during the teenage years when consolidation of their gender role emerges as an important stage-
salient task for adolescents. This interpersonal orientation may offer a potential source of strength
and resilience for girls in general. However, when levels of family stress such as interparental conflict
are high, an interpersonal orientation may confer a heightened risk for involvement in intergenera-
tional boundary violations, such as compelling girls to become mediators between warring parents,
confidantes, or simply “worriers” who feel responsible for but unable to assist their emotionally
14
distressed parents (Kerig, Fedorowicz, Brown, Patenaude, and Warren, 1998). These risks also may
be heightened in the case of mothers and daughters. For example, research on maternal depression
points to a particular sensitivity that girls display to their mothers’ affect, which may intensify in the
teenage years (Sheeber, Davis, and Hops, 2002).
Not only may adolescent daughters increasing cognitive and interpersonal capacities lead
them to feel obligated or even equipped to take on the burden of caring for mothers
who are depressed or maritally distressed, but unhappy mothers also may tend to perceive
their nearly adult daughters as potential sources of companionship, solace, and emotional
support. . . . As has been pointed out, although daughters and mothers may both report
finding such “special” bonds to be gratifying, and they even may be associated with high
levels of apparent competence, there may be hidden costs related to the burden of providing
friendship or parenting to a parent . . . and being a “pleasing” child at the expense of one’s
own childhood.
(Kerig, 2016, p. 620)
What about boys? Some research findings suggest a higher level of competition among distressed
couples who are parenting a son. For example, McHale (1995) found that conflictual parents of
sons were differentially likely to engage in hostile-competitive coparenting, each vying for an alli-
ance with the child. In contrast, fathers of daughters were more likely to simply withdraw from the
interaction when couple conflict was high. In contrast, Jouriles and Norwood (1995) found evidence
that conflictual parents were more likely to involve sons than daughters in interactions that were
characterized by scapegoating or detouring patterns. Moreover, this transfer of couple hostility onto
sons was posited as an explanation for their finding that boys were more likely than girls to act out
behaviorally in reaction to interparental conflict.
Other Studies of Parenting in the Context

of the Family System
As Bornstein (2016) suggested, “In family systems theory, what transpires in parenting is governed
not only by the characteristics of the individual child but also by patterns of transaction between the
parents and others” (p. 215). In this regard, it is notable that research shows that mothers and fathers
behave differently toward children when interactions take place in the whole-family context than
when parents are alone with the child (e.g., Cox and Paley, 2003). Moreover, some parental influ-
ences may be mediated through one parent’s influence on the other parent (Walker and McGraw,
2000). An example of this kind of family is “gatekeeping,” in which one parent shapes, regulates, and
interprets the other parent’s behavior with the child (Brown, Cannon, Mangelsdorf, and Schoppe-
Sullivan, 2008; Fagan and Cherson, 2017). Akin to cross-generational alliances in the context of
conflictual coparenting relationships, one parent may discourage, bar, or block the other parent’s
involvement or emotional closeness with the child (Meteyer and Perry-Jenkins, 2010); in contrast, in
a positive family climate, one parent may encourage and foster the other parents’ relationship with
the child (Schoppe-Sullivan, Brown, Cannon, Mangelsdorf, and Sokolowski, 2008). Although gate-
keeping most often has been studied as a process by which mothers act as architects of the family and
either enhance or constrain parenting by fathers, a recent study examining diverse family types found
that gatekeeping behaviors also were prevalent among men in same-sex relationships; beyond gender
and sexual orientation, low levels of work-related autonomy, ambivalence about the relationship, and
perceptions of superior parenting skills relative to the partner increased the likelihood that a parent
would regulate and limit the involvement of the other parent in childcare (Sweeney, Goldberg, and
Garcia, 2017).
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Patricia K. Kerig
Theoretical and Empirical Challenges to Family Systems Theory
“Where’s Poppa?”
One of the features of family systems research that sets it apart from much of the work on parent-
child relationships is the importance it places on including all members of the family system into its
frame. One such member who has been much-neglected in the majority of psychological research is
the father, as Phares (1992) pointed out in her works entitled, “Where’s Poppa?” and “Still Looking
for Poppa” (Phares, Fields, Kamboukos, and Lopez, 2005). Despite the challenges of recruiting fathers
into psychological research, this is a necessary and important effort to understanding the reciprocal,
complementary, and mutual influences of couple, father-child, mother-child, and father-mother-
child relationships on the dynamics of the family (Lamb, 2013).
An example of the important role that fathers play in the family system comes from Vakrat,
Apter-Levy, and Feldman’s (2017) research on the role of family processes in maternal depression.
Following a cohort of depressed mothers and community controls from the time of the birth of their
child to that child’s sixth year of life, the investigators’ observations showed that maternal depression
was associated with a number of negative parenting qualities displayed by both parents, including
insensitivity and intrusiveness, and children evidenced low levels of social engagement with their
parents. However, the quality of the father-child relationship moderated the influence of the moth-
er’s depression on the family process. Although in families in which fathers were low in sensitivity
and high in intrusiveness the family system was rated as low in cohesion, there was no association
between maternal depression and family process when fathers were high in sensitivity, low in intru-
siveness, and encouraging of child engagement. These findings point to an important protective role
that father-child relationships can play in the family system and suggest that fathers are an overlooked
but critical family component to be included by researchers and by clinicians intervening with fami-
lies at high risk for psychopathology such as those characterized by maternal depression.
Cultural and Ethnic Diversity

Another challenge to family systems theories has been to demonstrate that its models of family
adaptation and psychopathology, many of which were developed in the context of clinicians working
with White, middle class, U.S. dominant culture families, are relevant across a range of cultural and
ethnic groups (McGoldrick, Giordano, and Garcia-Preto, 2005). Cultural and ethnic differences are
important to consider in that family-level processes may affect children differently depending on the
larger social context in which they are enacted. For example, overarching cultural values of familism
may confer different meanings on family processes that have been defined in individualistic Western
culture as suggestive of enmeshment or boundary dissolution (Lindahl and Malik, 1999). Similarly,
the expectations for and valuing of children’s ongoing familial obligations to their parents and sib-
lings in some cultures may make presumably problematic family processes such as parentification, in
fact, normative and benign ( Jurkovic et al., 2005).
Kağıtçıbaşı (2007) proposed that any attempt to understand the family system must situate itself
within the context of the larger culture in which families operate. Culture provides a sense of pur-
pose that guides the family, informs parents’ socialization goals, and provides continuity in family
practices and rituals. In particular, the larger social context informs family members about what is
expected of them, and parents then interpret, operationalize, and convey norms, customs, and val-
ues to their children (Bornstein and Cheah, 2006). For example, Kağıtçıbaşı differentiates between
cultural expectations that promote autonomy versus closeness and those that promote interpersonal
distance versus and relatedness. In turn, these two dimensions of culture promote distinct family
16
interaction patterns that influence parents’ socialization goals. The family pattern of independence,
characterized as high in autonomy and low in relatedness, and is typical among families in urban-
ized Western societies. The accompanying socialization goals of parents are to help their children
to develop attributes of autonomy and self-reliance. To achieve those goals, parents in independent
families interact with children in an egalitarian fashion, whereas the family structure is defined by
clear interpersonal boundaries that foster the development of a separate sense of self. In contrast,
the family pattern of interdependence is one that is high in relatedness and low in autonomy. Such
families are typically hierarchical with parents adopting an authoritarian parenting style and dis-
couraging the autonomy of children, who are expected to remain both emotionally and materially
supportive of their parents throughout their lives. Kağıtçıbaşı further proposed an additional, and
typically overlooked, family form, characterized by psychological interdependence, combining high
levels of relatedness with high promotion of autonomy. Often seen in modernizing societies, parents
in psychologically interdependent families strive to achieve culturally appropriate goals of preparing
children to function independently in material context to but to remain emotionally connected with
the family. Consequently, psychologically interdependent parents engage in authoritative parenting,
combining structure with warmth, to foster both a sense of relationality and independence in their
children (Bond et al., 2004; Kağıtçıbaşı, 2005; Kağıtçıbaşı and Ataca, 2005).
Social and Historical Changes Affecting the Family System

Yet another challenge to family systems theory is to ensure the relevance of models derived during
the 1950s to how families operate and are construed today. For example, a marked change in family
systems over the last decades in the United States has been the rising rates of divorce and resulting
single-parent families. According to recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau (2010), only 67% of
children in the United States currently live with both biological parents; thus, the mother-father-
child nuclear family is far from universal. Single-parenting may introduce new vulnerabilities as well
as sources of resilience for family systems (Murry, Bynum, Brody, Willert, and Stephens, 2001). More-
over, families in which only one biological parent is present may take divergent forms, including
three generation families, nonmarried cohabitating partners, and shared living arrangements among
multiple families. At the same time, there are changing norms among some subcultures regarding
the role of fathers, with an increasing expectation that men will be actively involved in the lives of
their children whether they remain in an intimate relationship with the child’s mother (Lamb, 2013).
Another change that is fairly recent in mainstream U.S. culture is the definition of the phase
of childhood deemed adolescence, which now extends into the mid-20s, an age that in other eras
would have been considered to be part of adulthood (Easterbrooks, Katz, and Menon, 2019). A lack
of clarity about when the adolescent period ends and adulthood begins also is reflected in recent
writings about developmental psychopathology and the stage-salient tasks involved in the transitions
between childhood and adolescence, and between adolescence and adulthood. As Kerig and Schulz
(2012) observed, developmental tasks, such as achieving individuation and psychological independ-
ence from parents, are listed variously by stage theorists as emerging during the early, mid-, or late
adolescent period, just as leaving the family home and assuming responsibility for independent
decision-making are variously associated with late adolescence and emerging adulthood (Arnett and
Tanner, 2006; Micucci, 2009). In fact, the changing economic prospects for middle-class youth in
the United States mean that fleeing the family nest and living independently are developmental goals
that remain only aspirational well into their 20s. We know little about how these changing norms
affect family systems and the extent to which there is consensus or conflict across the generations
when grown children continue to cohabit with their parents, and thus in some ways do, and in other
ways do not, achieve the social accouterments associated with the developmental status of adulthood.
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Patricia K. Kerig
Diversity in Family Structures and Composition

A frequent criticism of classic family systems theories is that they are based on a stereotypical
“nuclear” notion of what constitutes a family whereas, across cultures, families always have taken a
diversity of forms (Ganong, Coleman, and Sanner, 2019). Therefore, to be universally relevant, fam-
ily systems theory must rise to the challenge of recognizing and understanding the wide range of
diverse family forms, including those constituted by single parents (Murry et al., 2001), same-gender
parents (Farr and Patterson, 2013), multigenerational households ( Jones and Lindahl, 2011), never-
married “fragile” families (Carlson and Högnäs, 2011), blended/stepfamilies (Burton and Hardaway,
2012), and sibling-headed households (Richter and Desmond, 2008). Each of these represents a
legitimate family form, and in virtually all of these kinds of families, the same sorts of processes arise
as do in two-parent families, requiring the coordination of relationships across multiple boundaries
(e.g., parent-child, child-sibling, sibling-parent) as well as synchronization among those involved in
coparenting the child (Kerig, 2016). Moreover, as Cicchetti and Howes (1991, p. 274) pointed out,
“it may be important to take into account family members who are absent as well as those who are
present.” For example, bereaved families, or those in which a biological parent maintains no relation-
ship with the child, still engage in family-level process in which that absent parent is implicated, such
as “in how the resident parent permits or disallows [the absent parent’s] emotional presence in the life
of the child and in the defining parameters of who is ‘family’ ” (Kerig, 2016, p. 604).
Extended Family and Fictive Kin

Another neglected category of family member includes those who play a familial role not because of
genetics but because of choice. They include extended family members (e.g., cousins, aunts, uncles)
who are often viewed as members of the proximal family unit in certain cultural and ethnic groups,
such as African American families groups ( Jones and Lindahl, 2011). Unmarried romantic partners
also often play a role in parenting one another’s children, particularly in low-income families (Burton
and Hardaway, 2012). In addition, close friends (who may be referred to as “aunts” and “uncles”) are
identified as contributing to the parenting of their children by the majority of African American sin-
gle mothers ( Jones, Shaffer, Forehand, Brody, and Armistead, 2003). In other groups, such as Latino
families, there are culturally defined family roles for other adults that involve important parenting
functions, such as godparents (Luna et al., 1996). Thus,
[t]he meaning of the term “family” in and of itself also is a subjective and diversely defined
one, in that among some subcultures and individuals, the term refers not to blood relations
only—or even at all—but rather to those who are perceived to be one’s core source of sup-
port, emotional intimacy, protection, and identity.
(Kerig, 2016, p. 604)
Although the term “fictive kin” is applied to these nonbiologically related individuals in the
research on family systems, seeming to suggest that their role is peripheral, their importance may be
significant even if unexamined. Because the role of fictive kin is largely unexamined, it raises many
interesting questions for future research. For example, it is possible that the role of fictive kin in a
child’s life may change with age, as adolescents become increasingly able to select their own inter-
personal environments and harness their own support systems (Becker-Blease and Kerig, 2016; Reiss,
Neiderhiser, Hetherington, and Plomin, 2000; Scarr, 1992). By the same token, seeking support
outside the family system may provide youth with a source of either protection or risk. Although
access to a prosocial support system, whether composed of biological or fictive kin, can be a source
of resilience, research shows that troubled youth tend to gravitate toward peers and adults who
18
reinforce maladaptive patterns of thinking and behaving (van der Zwaluw et al., 2009). For example,
gang-involved youth often identify the gang as a “family” and fellow gang members as “brothers” and
“sisters” (Kerig, Wainryb, Twali, and Chaplo, 2013).
Three-Generational Families
Particularly among economically disadvantaged families, a not-uncommon family form is that of
parents, or a single parent, living in their own parents’ home, resulting in a three-generational family
(Goodman and Silverstein, 2006). Even when grandparents and parents do not live in the same home,
for many single mothers, especially in the African American community, children’s grandparents are
their chief coparenting partners ( Jones et al., 2011). The three-generational family is one that raises
to a new level the question of “who is the parent and who is the child” (Kerig, 2005) in that moth-
ers and fathers are simultaneously in the roles of parents and children in the same household. The
challenges of navigating these multiple roles are not well understood. As Pittman, Wakschlag, Chase-
Lansdale, and Brooks-Gunn (2012) stated in their work on single-parent African American mothers
in three-generational households:
Grandmothers who support the young mothers’ independence while remaining emotion-
ally available facilitate their daughters’ assumption of adult roles, [however] the specific
dimensions of a supportive relationship between mothers and grandmothers that are linked
to positive parenting have not been well-delineated.
(p. 183)
In one of the few studies to examine this family form in depth, these authors found a clear pattern of
intergenerational continuity in that grandmothers’ support for mothers’ individuation predicted the
mother’s own authoritative parenting and a balance between emotional responsiveness and appro-
priate parental control. Moreover, in a demonstration of reciprocal effects, the children of moth-
ers whose grandmothers supported individuation demonstrated both independent problem-solving
skills and responsivity to maternal direction.
Grandparent-Headed Households
In addition to three-generational families just described in which parents, children, and grandparents
live together, family systems theory also needs to accommodate family forms in which the par-
ents themselves are absent and the household is headed by a grandparent (Smith and Wild, 2019).
Although little empirical research is available on this family form, there are a number of ways in
which grandparents, even when playing a parental role, might not be interchangeable with parents.
Because their role as executives in the family is not fully socially sanctioned, grandparents may not
feel fully enfranchised to make decisions and interface authoritatively with schools and social welfare
agencies. In particular, sometimes the placement of grandchildren in their grandparents’ custody is
an informal and not legally codified one, lending an additional level of insecurity for both grandpar-
ent and grandchildren (Boyd-Frankin, 2003). A developmental perspective on family systems also
suggests that grandparents are in a time of life when they may be winding down their investment in
childrearing tasks to meet their own existential tasks as their near the end of life (McGoldrick and
Carter, 2003). Thus, the parenting of young grandchildren can be a source of strain, especially for
elderly grandparents or those who are facing health challenges. Nevertheless, as Jones and Lindahl
(2011) pointed out, grandparent-headed households have long existed, particularly among minority
communities, and have been found over the course of many generations to rise to the challenge and
provide adaptive context for children’s development.
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Patricia K. Kerig
Adolescent Fathers
Studies of nontraditional family forms to date have generally focused on teenage mothers to the
exclusion of teenage fathers (Easterbrooks et al., 2019). Young fathers rarely coreside with their
child’s mother, and these couple relationships are highly fragile and subject to dissolution, after which
many teen fathers disengage from parenting (Carlson, McLanahan, and Brooks-Gunn, 2008; Easter-
brooks et al., 2019). However, as Florsheim and Moore (2012, p. 201) noted,
Not all young fathers fail as relationship partners nor as parents; some are in fact able to
manage the frustration, anxiety, and demands that accompany the monumental responsibil-
ity of parenthood and maintain (or establish for the first time) positive relations with both
their partners and children.
In this light, a small but informative body of work has investigated the factors that allow adoles-
cent fathers to successfully establish a coparenting relationship with their child’s mother (Carl-
son and McLanahan, 2006; Florsheim et al., 2003) and to engage positively with their children
and play an ongoing parenting role in their lives (Fagan, Palkovitz, Roy, and Farrie, 2009). In
addition, research from a family systems perspective has begun investigating reciprocal relations
between these coparenting and father-child dynamics in teen-parent families (Florsheim et al.,
2003; McHale and Sirotkin, 2019; Moore and Florsheim, 2008). As might be expected, positive
relationships with the child’s mother are one of the best predictors of adolescent fathers’ contin-
ued involvement with their biological children (Gavin et al., 2002). However, given the frequency
with which unwed teenage mothers reside with their own parents, the influence of grandparents
on these processes needs to be understood. For example, Krishnakumar and Black (2003) found
that teen mothers enjoyed better relationships with their baby’s father if their own mothers were
more affiliative with both teenagers.
The Neglect of Development in Family Systems Theory

Given that the term “family” connotes parents together with their children, family system theory
might be expected to be inherently concerned with child development. However, surprisingly, fam-
ily systems theory has not consistently attended to developmental factors. In fact, many early systemic
theory builders based their observations on families of adult children, or lumped into the category of
“child” infants, toddlers, preschoolers, school-agers, adolescents, and emerging adults without giving
due consideration to how family processes might relate differently to parents with children at differ-
ent developmental stages.
Nonetheless, considerations of developmental differences are essential to our understanding of
how family processes might contribute to psychopathology or resilience, in that what comprises an
adaptive family process at one stage of development may be maladaptive at another (Barnett, Manly,
and Cicchetti, 1993; Cicchetti and Toth, 2005). For example, the kind of close parental emotional
attunement that is critical for the fostering of a secure attachment in infancy could take on tones
more suggestive of enmeshment if demonstrated by a parent of an adolescent. By a similar token, the
high level of autonomy granting that promotes positive adolescent development might smack more
of adultification if allotted to a preschooler.
There are at least seven ways in which parenting within a family systems framework might be
affected by developmental processes (Kerig, 2005, 2016). First, the stage-salient issues that rise to
the fore at each epoch of a child’s life require the family system to respond in ways that support
those developmental tasks. Some family system dynamics might present challenges to parents’ ability
to support those stage-salient developmental needs; for example, an enmeshed family might have
20
difficulty supporting the differentiation of self that is the key stage-salient task of the toddler years,
just as families in which children are triangulated in their parents’ conflicts might interfere with the
achievement of autonomy in the adolescent period.
Second, and related, as children’s developmental needs change over the course of childhood
and adolescence, parents must adapt and change their parenting practices to accommodate these
changing developmental needs, a process that may be complicated or constrained by whole-family
processes. For example, enmeshed families provide a level of warmth and closeness that is highly
conducive to young children’s security, whereas that same quality can become a source of strain in
emerging adulthood if now-grown children seek to extricate themselves from the family nexus.
Third, over time, children’s advancing cognitive, emotional, and interpersonal capacities allow
them to become increasingly active agents in the family process, participating in transactions in
which they reciprocally influence their parents, their parents’ relationship with one another, their
siblings, and associations among these subsystems in the family (Becker-Blease and Kerig, 2016;
Cummings and Schermerhorn, 2003). Age also opens up opportunity for children to select their
own interpersonal niches, which may include extricating themselves from the family to transfer
their attention and attachments to agemates or extrafamilial adults. Although this agency can serve
as a source of risk when troubled youth gravitate toward others who are troubled, it also proffers a
potential source of protection when youth can find prosocial sources of support in their expanding
interpersonal environments. In particular, and most related to family systems theory, over the course
of development, children demonstrate increases in what Fivaz-Depeursinge and Corboz-Warner
(1999) term “triangular capacity”: The child’s ability to coordinate and participate in the three-way
interaction between mother, father, and child. Although this is a capacity that to date has been stud-
ied only in young children (McHale, Fivaz-Depeursinge, Dickstein, Robertson, and Daley, 2008),
we would expect that, over development, this is a capacity too that becomes more sophisticated and
allows children to enter into—or extricate themselves from—family conflicts or problematic interac-
tions in increasingly complex ways.
Fourth, observations of family systems processes need to be guided by an understanding of how
expressions of those processes are transformed over the course of development (Sroufe, 1990). Tri-
angulation of an infant in interparental conflict, for example, may take a very different form from
triangulation of an emerging adult, just as the behavioral patterns representing spousification of
children have been found to differ across early childhood to adulthood (Shaffer and Sroufe, 2005).
Fifth, by the same token, the ways in which parents meet a given socialization goal may involve
different family systems processes over the course of a child’s development. For example, highly
interdependent families may engage in intrusive parenting behaviors to limit differentiation of
young children but utilize more cognitively sophisticated forms of autonomy limiting, such as psy-
chologically controlling and guilt-inducing strategies, with adolescents. Related to this, some fam-
ily systems processes may, in fact, be developmental antecedents of others; for example, enmeshment
in the early years might be a key developmental precursor to role reversal, increasing children’s
vulnerability to feeling exquisitely sensitive to and responsible for taking care of the emotional
needs of their parents.
Sixth, parents and families themselves go through stages of development in which different family-
level stage-salient issues successively come to the fore. As McGoldrick and Carter (2003) suggested,
the first stage of the family life cycle involves the formation of a couple, whose tasks are to establish a
new partnership and redefine themselves in relation to their respective families of origin. The second
stage is ushered in by the birth of a child, dramatically reorganizing the family system and requiring
major renegotiations of the roles within the couple subsystem. The developmental tasks of the family
cross paths with the developmental tasks of adolescence when children begin moving out into the
world and families must shift their emphasis from providing protection and safety to accommodating
autonomy and exploration. In the next stage of the family life cycle, families again must realign to
21
Patricia K. Kerig
embrace new members, as emerging adult children develop relationships with their own intimate
partners and those partners’ families of origin. In the final stage mid-adulthood, parents are typically
able to celebrate their adult children’s independent status while at the same time they are confronted
with new responsibilities for caring for their own aging parents.
Future Directions and Growth Points for Research

on Family Systems and Parenting
Family Resilience
As P. Minuchin, Colapinto, and S. Minuchin (2007) noted, the focus of most of the research and
clinical attention to families has been on the “dark side” and the ways in which family systems act
as sources of risk for psychopathology; however, there is indeed a bright side involving the ways that
families can serve protective functions and foster resilience. Even among the most distressed families,
they argued, characteristics such as loyalty, connection, affection, and shared identification serve as
potential sources of strength. Although family factors research has identified a number of charac-
teristics that bolster resilience, such as economic advantage, social support, and cultural engagement
(Masten and Powell, 2003; see Kerig, Ludlow, and Wenar, 2012), few of these reflect a family systemic
perspective. However, Walsh (2006) articulated a model of resilience from a family systems perspec-
tive that is promising, if not yet empirically validated. Walsh proposed that familial adaptation in
the face of stress involves three key domains of resilience: Organizational patterns, which refer to the
family’s clarity of structure, capacity for flexibility, and ability to mobilize resources; communication
and problem-solving, including clear communication, open emotional expression, and collaboration;
and belief systems that allow for meaning-making, hopefulness, and harnessing spirituality. An intrigu-
ing empirical investigation of the importance of meaning-making is illustrated by Fivush, Bohanek,
and Duke’s (2005) “naturally occurring experiment” in which they recorded participant families’
conversations around the dinner table before and after the events of September 11, 2001. The youth
who were most resilient to the negative repercussions of the terrorist attacks were growing up in
families whose narratives depicted a shared history of facing adversities and overcoming them. The
researchers characterized the legacy of this type of family narrative as promoting an “intergenera-
tional self ”—the perception that one is “part of something bigger” in the grand scheme of things
(Fivush, Bohanek, and Zaman, 2011).
Yet another promising future direction might be to incorporate Rutter’s (1990) ideas regard-
ing protective processes into family systems research. Rutter proposed that these processes provide
important insights by uncovering the underlying mechanisms by which protective factors exert their
positive effects, and these concepts can be applied readily to resilience in the family system (Kerig,
2016). For example, Rutter’s protective process of reduction of risk impact may be observed in fami-
lies that provide children with a sense of safety, warmth, and security that buffers children from the
effects of external stressors; for example, a family with a shared positive ethnic identity may protect
children from the harmful effects of racial discrimination. Rutter’s concept of interruption of negative
chain reactions may be observed when positive transactions between family members shift interac-
tions from conflict to cooperation, such as when one family member intervenes to diffuse tensions
between the others. Rutter’s third protective mechanism, self-efficacy and coping, may be observed
when family members make meaning of adverse events in ways that leave them with a shared sense
of hopefulness and affirmation of the family’s strengths (Walsh, 2006). Last, Rutter’s concept of open-
ing of opportunities may be observed when family members are receptive to, supportive of, and even
grow as a function of validating one another’s attempts differentiation, risk-taking, and extrafamilial
explorations, such when a family is actively supportive of and engaged with a sexual minority status
member (Kerig, 2016, p. 599).
22
Reciprocal and Transactional Processes

An important feature of the transactional perspective underlying the family systems model is the
idea that children are not passive recipients of parental behaviors but rather that both parents and
children are active agents in the family process (Cummings and Schermerhorn, 2003; Kerig, 2001a).
For example, a distinction can be made between family processes that are child driven versus parent
driven (Kerig, 2001b). For example, in some families, parents may drive the process of triangulation
by putting their children directly in the middle of their conflicts, such as by asking the child to side
with them against the other parent. Alternatively, some children may volunteer for that role unbid-
den by parents; whether overtly, such as walking into the room during an argument and attempting
to referee, or covertly, such as causing a disturbance that distracts their parents’ attention from the
argument. Similarly, parentification may be a process that arises when adults turn to their children
for nurturance and care or could occur as a function of children attempting to care for their parents
(Kerig, 2005). The transactional nature of these dynamics is such that they may reinforce each other
(Kerig, 2016); for example, children who have been socialized to be responsive to their parents’ emo-
tional needs may begin anticipating those needs and offering such care without prompting.
Children also influence in the family system in other ways, such as through the characteristics
they bring to family dynamics. Some child characteristics may confer sources of risk; for example,
parents have been found to be differentially vulnerable to coparenting conflicts when they have a
temperamentally difficult child (McHale et al., 2004). Other child characteristics may be protective;
for example, children with high physiological self-regulation capacities may be relatively protected
from family stress. Leary and Katz (2004) found that hostile-withdrawn coparenting was predictive
of poor peer relationships only for children with low vagal tone and poor abilities to regulate their
emotional state. Further, the concept of resilience suggests that
children who have characteristics that represent valued family attributes (e.g., academic
prowess, social skill, athleticism) might bring sources of esteem back to the family from
extrafamilial contexts (e.g., positive reports from teachers, sporting or academic accolades,
social contacts with prosocial peers and their parents), which buffer not only the child but
the family itself from discord, thereby conferring upon all family members a more harmo-
nious home life.
(Kerig, 2016, p. 610)
Dynamic Systems Approaches

The study of transactional, reciprocal, and complex dynamics in family systems has taken a major step
forward with the development of the theory and methods involved in dynamic systems (DS) theory.
As defined by Granic and Hollenstein (2003), DS is a metatheoretical framework for understanding
how systems emerge, stabilize, form, and change as a function of their own internal feedback pro-
cesses. A key to understanding these complex interrelations is the mathematical modeling of nonlinear
parameters that allow for the analysis of complex patterns of behavior as these emerge and are shaped
by each partner, and the interactions between them, over time (Granic, Hollenstein, and Lichtwarck-
Aschoff, 2016; van Geert, 1998). Consistent with the family systems constructs of holism, homeostasis,
and organization, DS posits that patterns of behavior act as attractors that draw the system in the direc-
tion of continuity, limiting the degrees of freedom available for variation and requiring more significant
effort to wrest new patterns from the orbit of old ones. Thus, participants in family systems
influence each other in transactional fashion: the daily interactive experiences of mother
and child lead, over time, to the emergence of relatively few but enduring behavioral
23
Patricia K. Kerig
patterns, or order parameters, that are characteristic of their relationship. In turn, these pat-
terns modulate their ongoing interactions, channeling them to approximate what they have
been in the past, thereby maintaining the relationship across time.
(Dumas, Lemay, and Dauwalder, 2001, p. 318)
Another way in which systems form and consolidate themselves is through the coupling of interac-
tional partners’ emotions, appraisals, and behavior. In this way, patterns of interaction are not only
behavioral but also inextricably woven into the thoughts, feelings, and perceptions of each partici-
pant in the relationship. The resulting tendency again is toward continuity and even rigidity when
family members fall into a repetitive and narrowly defined set of behavioral repertoires (Granic and
Patterson, 2006). Moreover, these patterns tend toward increasing escalation over time:
For example, past experience with negative transactions leads family members to become
sensitized to even subtle signs that the cycle is beginning (e.g., a huff of exasperation, a roll
of the eyes) and to respond to these mild provocations with a level of intensity that matches
the increasingly hostile exchange they anticipate coming.
(Kerig, 2016, p. 611)
One example of the insights that can be drawn from DS analyses of family interactions comes from
Dumas and colleagues’ (2001) work on mother-child dyadic interactions in clinically distressed ver-
sus normative families. After conducting careful minute-by-minute coding of maternal controlling,
positive, and aversive behaviors, as well as child compliance, noncompliance, positive, and aversive
behaviors, the investigators studied the phase transitions that took place during these interactions.
Their analyses showed that, despite the interaction being initiated in a positive way, mothers and
children in the clinical group repeatedly ended up in coercive cycles in which mothers commanded
and children refused to comply. Thus, negative processes appeared to have dominated the organiza-
tion of the family system in ways that mothers and children could not extricate themselves even
with the best intentions. In contrast to the nonclinical families, in which children tended to respond
positively to their mothers’ requests and instructions, among the clinically referred families, moth-
ers and children engaged in repeated cycles in which mothers’ directions were followed by child
noncompliance—as the investigators termed it, these mothers seemed to “spin their wheels” (p. 328)
in fruitless attempts to get their children to comply.
Another example of a DS analysis of mother-child interactions, this one focused on the adoles-
cent period, comes from Crowell and colleagues’ (2017) observations of self-harming girls engaged
in discussing an area of disagreement with their mothers. The researchers coded the interactions
moment to moment for indicators of emotionally positive versus aversive (e.g., hostile, angry, violent)
behaviors. In addition, during this interaction, mother and daughters were both connected to psy-
chophysiological monitoring equipment that assessed during each of these moments any changes in
their electrodermal activity, an index of sympathetic nervous system activation indicating inhibition
and anxiety, and respiratory sinus arrhythmia, an index of parasympathetic nervous activity indicating
self-regulation. Analyses of these data examined patterns in cross-lagged relationships between moth-
ers’ and daughters’ behavior and psychophysiology to investigate who was “driving” the interaction.
Among the self-harming girls, mothers’ aversiveness negatively affected the behavior and psycho-
physiological reactivity of their daughters, but daughters had no such influence on their mothers. In
contrast, among the healthy controls, neither mother nor daughter appeared to “drive” the behavior
of the other. These results were interpreted as consistent with multidimensional theories of the ori-
gins of self-harming and dysregulated behavior among adolescents, which implicate not only aversive
and invalidating family environments, but also a biological vulnerability in which affected girls have
a heightened sensitivity to these pathological contexts (Crowell, Beauchaine, and Linehan, 2009).
24
To date, most of the work utilizing DS in family systems research has focused on exchanges
in parent-child dyads. However, an important contribution to our conceptualization of dynamical
systems from a whole-family perspective is offered by Schermerhorn and Cummings (2008). Their
proposed model of transactional family dynamics is designed to capture complex processes involving
mutual influences and transactions among larger systems of family relationship. In a 3-year longi-
tudinal investigation starting when children were in kindergarten, Schermerhorn, Cummings, and
Davies (2008) used this model to demonstrate transactional associations among children’s representa-
tions of interparental, mother-child, and father-child relationships. Over time, children’s representa-
tions of interparental hostility predicted exacerbations in their reactivity to those conflicts which,
in turn, were associated with increasingly insecure representations of their relationships with moth-
ers and fathers. Moreover, evidence of bidirectional processes among interparental conflict, child
behavior, and child adjustment were found in a subsequent investigation from this laboratory: Over
a 3-year period, interparental conflict led to increasing child negative emotional reactivity, which, in
turn, led to increased behavioral reactivity (Schermerhorn, Cummings, DeCarlo, and Davies, 2007).
Moreover, children had an effect on the family system of relationships in that when children’s behav-
ioral reactions took the form of attempting to intervene in interparental conflicts, such as by trying
to distract, comfort, or help parents achieve a resolution, their parents’ conflict tended to decrease.
In contrast, when children’s reactions took the form of dysregulated and acting-out behavior, their
parents’ conflicts tended to increase, as did child maladjustment.
Incorporation of Biological Processes Into Family System Theory

Another future direction for family systems theory will be to incorporate all of the dimensions of the
biopsychosocial perspective that is becoming increasingly mainstream in psychology. In the biopsy-
chosocial perspective, childhood adaptation and maladaptation are viewed as arising from complex
interactions among biological, cognitive, interpersonal, and emotional developmental processes, as
these take place within the context of the family system, and the larger societal context that guides,
shapes, and constrains family relationships: “The biopsychosocial model assumes that illness in one
family member affects the psychological health and relationships of other members, and, in turn, that
the reactions of these members affect the functioning of the person with the illness” (Miklowitz,
2004, p. 669).
Among the biological approaches that are beginning to be integrated into research on family
systems are behavioral genetic, molecular genetic, and epigenetic perspectives (Beach and Whis-
man, 2013). For example, gene-environment correlations have been found to play a role in the
development of externalizing disorders (Harold et al., 2013), whereas evocative gene-environment
associations have been found to account for the associations between family process such as inter-
parental conflict and poor parenting, and consequent child behavior problems (Brody et al., 2013;
Ulbricht et al., 2013). An important idea in this area of research is that of differential sensitivity
to context, which suggests that biological characteristics may render some children more vulner-
able to negative environmental influences than others (Hartman and Belsky, 2016). For example,
individual differences in the oxytocin receptor and serotonin transporter genes have been found
to increase family members’ reactivity to interparental conflict (Sturge-Apple, Cicchetti, Davies,
and Suor, 2012).
Another promising development for family systems theory is the integration of biological pro-
cesses into observational studies of transactional processes in the family. For example, Mills-Koonce
and colleagues (2007) found that biological characteristics of children, specifically, child polymor-
phism in the dopamine receptor gene, could have an evocative effect on parents’ behavior. First,
children with this polymorphism elicited lower levels of sensitivity from their parents. Further, over
time, presence of this characteristic also moderated the association between maternal sensitivity and
25
Patricia K. Kerig
the development of childhood depression, such that children with the polymorphism evidenced
heightened vulnerability to the effects of an insensitive caregiving environment.
Translational Research on Family Systems

An important new development in the field of clinical psychology is the move toward translational
research—that is, the translation of research into clinical applications, and the back-translation of
clinical findings into theory and research that help us to refine and advance our understanding of
abstract concepts in real-world contexts in ways that can positively affect the lives of others (Cic-
chetti and Gunnar, 2009; O’Connor, 2013; Spoth, 2008). A preeminent example of translational
research in family systems theory is the body of work that has emerged utilizing the PMTO model
originated by Patterson. This research team has used the insights gathered from their observations
of family process to advance both research and theory, particularly in regard to developing models
and methods for understanding families as dynamic systems (Granic and Patterson, 2006). One
of the ways in which the PMTO model exemplifies translational research is through investiga-
tions that test the underlying theory regarding the “key ingredients” by which the treatment has its
effects (Chamberlain, Fisher, and Moore, 2002; DeGarmo and Forgatch, 2004; Patterson, Forgatch,
and DeGarmo, 2010). In an iterative process, the findings of this research are used to further refine
the underlying theory and, in turn, to modify and improve the intervention (Patterson, 2005). For
example, research findings from clinical trials with families involved in PMTO have provided such
insights as the added value of targeting parental attributions for child behavior (Bugental and Corpuz,
2019; Snyder, Cramer, Afrank, and Patterson, 2005), increasing family members’ emotion regulation
skills (Leerkes and Augustine, 2019; Stoolmiller and Snyder, 2004), attending to sibling interactions
(Bank, Rains, and Forgatch, 2004), and focusing on the role of deviant peer associations (DeGarmo
and Forgatch, 2004).
Conclusion
Family systems perspectives have both a long historical pedigree and contemporary relevance to the
study of parenting and child development. Although there remain a number of lively debates in the
field, such as the relative utility of whole-family constructs for capturing the complexity of the inter-
relations among multiple family members and their generationally differentiated subsystems, a number
of family systems variables have demonstrated have received strong empirical validation in this rich
literature. Family systems constructs of cohesion, boundary dissolution, triangulation, and coparenting
conflict and cooperation have proven particularly valuable for understanding the ways in which family
dynamics affect parenting and, in turn, child development. Family systems theory also promises to enjoy
a new resurgence, with the emergence of sophisticated dynamic systems observational, methodologi-
cal, and statistical procedures that allow for the modeling of complex processes such as transactions
and reciprocal effects among family members as they interact and influence one another over time.
On the other hand, challenges remain for the field, in that stereotypical definitions of the “family” as
a nuclear, father-headed household must give way to a more accurate appreciation of the diversity of
family forms that are represented in culturally diverse societies. Nevertheless, important and encourag-
ing strides are being taken to employ family systems constructs in the service of generating translational
research that promises to inform effective interventions for parents and their children.
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35
2
MOTHERING
Lynne Murray, Martin P. M. Richards, and Julie
Nihouarn-Sigurdardottir
Introduction
It is a characteristic of our species that, as children, we have an extended period of dependency during
which we require the care and attention of others for nurture, and indeed for survival (Konner, 2010).
Our mothers give birth to us and typically play the major role in in our care, especially in the early
months of our lives. Their role, first as progenitor and then as nurturer, gives mothers and mothering
great symbolic and emotional power—think of the phrases used in our own society “mother love,”
“mother tongue,” and “mother land” for the place where we grew up. Nevertheless, how much and
what mothers do vary between individuals and across cultures. There are basic differences, for exam-
ple, in how many children women have: In the United States and Europe, it is typically between one
and two, whereas in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) in general women have, on aver-
age, three children, with the number being five in sub-Saharan Africa (United Nations, 2015). The
extent to which women have roles other than that of mother also varies widely between societies,
even within high-income countries (HICs); for example, in the United Kingdom, only 33% mothers
of children under 15 are in full-time paid employment, whereas this figure is over 70% in Denmark
(Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD Family Database, 2016).
If the amount of time mothers care for their children varies, so too does the way in which they
do so, and, therefore, the experience of their infants and children. Consider two contrasting examples
of infant worlds: One young infant in a sling in contact with their mother’s body, able to feed at her
breast at will as the mother moves around doing her daily tasks. Another infant may spend much
of the day and night in a crib, interspersed with periods for feeds, cuddles, nappy changes and talk,
before being returned.Thus, although certain components of mothering are fundamental (e.g., lacta-
tion or infant feeding, provision of nurture, and core ways of relating), children nevertheless thrive
in contexts that differ widely in the way their care is expressed (Feldman, 2015). A critical task for
researchers is, therefore, to identify the key aspects of maternal care, and the tipping points where
variability ceases to be just part of the “rich tapestry” of human experience, and becomes dysfunc-
tional in terms of child development.
There are often strong views about what mothers should or should not be doing. The values and
norms will vary across cultures. Often, new parents will have a childcare manual to consult if in doubt
(particularly in HICs), or perhaps a relative will be at hand to support and advise. Analyses of the
contents of childcare manuals provide one kind of window on mothering.The historian Hardyment
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Mothering
(2007) analyzed the advice given in childcare books over the last couple of centuries and identified
changing trends: For example, the more restrictive and controlling advice of the 1930s—that picking
up crying infants aside from their regular feed times will only “spoil” them and encourage crying and
night waking—contrasts sharply with the more easygoing advice of the Spock era. Benjamin Spock’s
Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care (1946) was outsold only by the Bible, and went through
seven revised editions from 1946 to 1998, illustrating the influence of this respected childcare guru.
Although the extent to which advice is evidence-based may vary, most contemporary gurus at least
imply that it is important to do things in the right way to ensure the optimal development of the
child. The evidence may, however, be complex: Thus, although research has now accumulated to
inform parents about the effects of many different parenting practices on diverse aspects of child
development (L. Murray, 2014), effects are not always simple. For example, although the claim that
“breastfeeding is best” is well established for many child outcomes, it does not apply to all of them.
Thus, a meta-analysis of worldwide data (Victora, Bahj, and Barros, 2016) has confirmed that, as far
as child health is concerned, exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months provides protection against
child infections and malocclusions, and is associated with an increase in intelligence (IQ), and prob-
ably reductions in over weight and diabetes. For nursing mothers there are benefits too, with protec-
tions against breast cancer and improved birth spacing (Victora et al., 2016). Nevertheless, although
it is also often assumed that breastfeeding has a positive effect on the mother-infant relationship, that
particular claim is not supported by empirical evidence (Jansen, de Weerth, and Riksen-Walraven,
2008). The absence of a positive association between breastfeeding and the quality of the mother-
child relationship may be related to the fact that the incidence and duration of breastfeeding vary
widely across countries: For example, in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries,
rates are particularly low, and the duration shorter than in resource-poor countries, and should be
regarded as suboptimal (Victora et al., 2016). Although the reasons for this variation are not well
understood, including the role of differing cultural values, it is likely that such factors moderate any
association between breastfeeding and the quality of the mother-infant relationship. Such complexi-
ties point to an important role for scientists and those in the media to collaborate to ensure that the
most balanced representations of research findings are made available to the public.
The turn of the 20th century brought with it the beginning of a shift in how mothers and chil-
dren were seen in Western societies. It was around this time that Sigmund Freud (1955) made the
claim that there was no love like that of a mother. He stated that this relationship was the strongest
of all relationships, enduring for a lifetime, and the root of future intimate relationships. His ideas led
to the belief that mothers were crucial to the development of an emotionally stable and successful
adult, with maternal satisfaction in the relationship with her son comprising “the most perfect, the
freest from ambivalence of all human relationships” (S. Freud, 1933, p. 133).
As the psychoanalyst and researcher Raphael-Leff (2010) has noted, the idealization of the
mother-infant relationship on the part of early psychoanalysts excluded negative feelings, and instead
equated the infant’s need to be mothered with the woman’s need to mother (Balint, 1939; Raphael-
Leff, 2010). Since the time of Freud and his immediate followers, however, notions of motherhood
and its significance have undergone several transformations, drawing on evidence concerning its
physical as well as psychological characteristics. Views regarding the role played by maternal care in
the development of children have also changed, with research on this topic increasing enormously.
Evidence from a range of sources, including studies of the effects of severe institutional deprivation,
throws light on the significance of mothering itself. Similarly, research on the impact on children
of variations in maternal care that may occur when mothers experience clinical disorders, such as
depression, has contributed to the understanding of which components of mothering are important
for different child outcomes (Dix and Moed, 2019). This accumulation of clinical evidence has been
accompanied by a similar surge in what is known from low-risk populations concerning the very
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Lynne Murray et al.
different parenting functions subsumed under the term “mothering” and their effects on child devel-
opment (Bornstein, 2015; L. Murray, 2014).
In the first half of this chapter, we consider different accounts of the experience of becoming
and being a mother, many of them influenced by psychoanalytic thinking, and its more recent
developments in attachment theory and feminism. In the second half, we consider the effects of
mothering on child development, including studies of maternal deprivation and of different facets
of maternal behavior. For a number of reasons, we focus on the effects of mothering in the child’s
first 2 years: First, this period, compared to when the child is older, is one when mothers are
more likely to be present as the principal caregivers of their children and, therefore, exert a major
influence in children’s lives. Second, this is a period when the core foundations for later child
behavior and development are laid. Finally, child functioning has generally started to stabilize by
age 2 years, and is a good predictor of subsequent functioning (see L. Murray, 2014, for a review of
this research). Before our review of these findings on the effects of different aspects of mothering,
however, an important note of caution is warranted, namely, that the clear majority of studies con-
ducted on mother-child relationships have been carried out in what are referred to as “WEIRD”
environments—that is, in Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic Societies
(Henrich, Hein, and Norenzayan, 2012; Tomlinson, Bornstein, Marlow, and Swartz, 2014). Given
that the majority of the worldwide population of children do not live in such environments, and
that the extremes of poverty and climate that are prevalent in non-WEIRD countries exert major
influences on families, the findings emerging from the conclusions from the research published
on parenting to date cannot necessarily be generalized to the wide range of parenting conditions
that exist across the world.
Accounts of the Nature of Motherhood

Psychologists have regarded conception as marking the beginning of a transformation from being a
woman to being a mother and, with this, the taking on of a new female identity, one that is continu-
ingly updated through the ongoing experience of motherhood (Pines, 1972). (But see Golombok
(2019) and Patterson (2019) for diverse other groups enabled by advances in reproductive technolo-
gies to bear or rear children, including those who are infertile, or who are lesbian or gay). Pregnancy
obviously changes women physically, altering the form and appearance of their bodies, as well as
activating and altering a wider range of physiological functions, and these transformations are, in
turn, accompanied by psychological changes.
Physiological Changes
Childbearing, childbirth, and the subsequent postpartum adjustment to caring for the newborn
carry substantial physical strain, with each phase being accompanied by important physiological
changes. During pregnancy, a woman retains around half a liter of fluid, and has a blood volume
increase of about 45%, as well as an increase in cardiac output by as much as 45–50% to adjust
to the increased demand for uterine blood flow (Heidemann and McClure, 2003; Ouzounian
and Elkayam, 2012; Sanghavi and Rutherford, 2014). Women also experience hormonal fluctua-
tions that influence not only their metabolism, but also their mood and their ability to cope with
stress, changes that they may be aware could affect the development of the fetus (Costantine,
2014; Reynolds, Labad, Buss, Ghaemmaghami, and Räikkönen, 2013). Additionally, factors such as
age are relevant to physiological as well as psychological processes (Bornstein, Putnick, Suwalsky,
and Gini, 2006; Bornstein and Putnick, 2007). Regarding physiology, for example, older mothers
(>35 years) are more likely to incur complications during gestation and delivery (Cleary-Goldman
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Mothering
et al., 2005). During gestation, they are at a higher risk of miscarriage and of developing gesta-
tional diabetes, and of the infant’s having chromosomal or congenital abnormalities; during labor,
age older than 35 years increases the risk of complications that may require assisted delivery or
cesarean section. Awareness of such risks, although they are low, may, in turn, alter the psychologi-
cal experience of the pregnancy, for example, by raising levels of anxiety (Lampinen,Vehviläinen-
Julkunen, and Kankkunen, 2009).
Physiological changes continue during the postpartum period to return the body to its nonpreg-
nant state. These changes can cause women to experience a transient period of heightened reactiv-
ity in the early days following the birth, when they may experience irritability, emotional liability
and frequent, unprovoked crying (Miller, 2002). The mother’s energy levels become progressively
depleted as she approaches the end of her pregnancy, and they continue to be low in the postpartum
weeks and months because of her childcaring role, and the reduced time to rest (Tulman and Fawcett,
2003).
Pregnancy also affects the brain, bringing about complex changes in the functioning of neuro-
endocrine systems (Feldman, 2015; Feldman, Weller, Sharon-Zagoory and Levine, 2007; Slade and
Sadler, 2018). These include the oxytocin system that supports the mother’s feelings of connection
and attachment to the infant; the HPA axis system, regulating stress responses; and dopaminergic
changes that concern feelings of reward and pleasure. There is also evidence for structural brain
alterations, lasting up to 2 years. Thus, imaging techniques have detected a loss of gray matter
volume in areas involved in social judgment processing (the “Theory of Mind” network), which
partially overlap with those that show stronger responses to images of a mother’s own versus an
unfamiliar infant, and that correlate with measures of maternal attachment. Similarly, EEG studies
show differentiated brain activity in first-time mothers’ responses to faces of their own, compared
with those of unfamiliar infants (Bornstein, Arterberry, and Nash, 2013). Such findings have been
hypothesized to reflect an adaptive prenatal fine-tuning of neural processes to prepare mothers
to empathize, become attached to, and provide care for their newborn infants (Hoekzema et al.,
2017; Kim et al., 2010).
Psychological Changes
Intergenerational Identity Dynamics

In general, women prepare to become the mothers of their children while they are still children
of their own mothers (Pines, 1972). But even if the new mother’s own mother is no longer alive,
it is still the case that she will bring to motherhood her internalized representations of childhood
experiences of care (Main, Kaplan, and Cassidy, 1985). As Slade and Sadler (2018) noted, pregnancy
invariably “reactivates” these internalized representations of early care, such that “thoughts, feelings
and memories of [the new mother’s] relationship with her mother and/or other maternal caregiv-
ers that may have been quiescent for years are awakened at both a conscious and unconscious level”
(p. 26). Managing this new alignment with the actual or remembered mother has often been seen
as a core part of the developmental shift to motherhood. At a conscious level, new mothers may
come to understand their own mothers from the perspective of another mother, creating a new level
of relating. They may feel that they need to understand more about who their mothers are, what
they represent to them, which aspects of their mothers they want to take on themselves, and how
to incorporate the “ideal” mother images they have developed and carried within their own minds
(Solchany, 2001). Unconscious processes may also come into play, with the transition to motherhood
awakening what Fraiberg (1980) called “ghosts in the nursey” that may challenge the new mother’s
psychological equilibrium.
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Lynne Murray et al.
The corollary of the pregnant woman’s reworking of her relationship with her own mother
is the establishment of her representation of her relationship with her infant. Some theorists
have conceived this reworking as requiring a psychological reckoning with the babies that the
mother has long-imagined throughout her development (Pines, 1972; Priel and Besser, 2001).
Pines (1972, p. 336) summarized these processes by stating, “Motherhood is a three-generation
experience.”
In the last 30 years, a considerable body of research has been conducted within the frame-
work of attachment theory (Main et al., 1985) that has largely confirmed these intergenera-
tional links. Thus, using the Adult Attachment Interview, studies have consistently shown how a
mother’s representation of her relationship with her own mother influences her responses to her
infant and, in turn, the nature of the attachment her infant forms with her (Verhage et al., 2016).
Those new mothers who have secure attachment representations appear to be better equipped
to manage the range of emotions, including any negative feelings, provoked by pregnancy and
the demands of infant care, than are mothers who recall their early relationship with their own
mother as characterized by rejection. These latter women may struggle to keep the intensity
of emotion normally provoked by pregnancy at bay, but to the extent that they succeed, they
may later find it difficult to respond to their infant’s vulnerability and needs for closeness, and
thereby risk perpetuating an intergenerational cycle of the avoidance of dependency. For moth-
ers who have developed a preoccupied style of attachment representation in relation to their
own mother, by contrast, pregnancy can be emotionally overwhelming, and produce a kind of
“inchoate negativity” that can similarly transfer to her relationship with her infant (Slade and
Cohen, 1996; Slade and Sadler, 2018). Finally, for mothers with unresolved/disorganized attach-
ment representations, pregnancy can evoke early memories of trauma or abuse that risk being
perpetuated with the next generation (Slade and Sadler, 2018). In summary, attachment theory
and research show the influence of mothers’ representations of their own care on the care they
provide for their infant and, in turn, the nature of their developing child’s attachment to them.
Nevertheless, although such intergenerational patterns of relating have been consistently found,
they are by no means inevitable, and other factors, such as the presence of clinical problems, may
weaken such associations (Verhage et al., 2016).
Some theorists, as described earlier, have focused on the new mother’s representations of
her relationship with her mother as fundamental to her own identity as a mother; others, by
contrast, have emphasized the transformation in self-identity that is catalyzed by motherhood
as being principally bound up with the actual experience of caring for the infant. For example,
one prominent psychoanalytic account by Benedek (1959) held that if the mother finds she can
satisfy her infant’s needs, she experiences feelings of accomplishment, success, and competence;
by contrast, if she is unable to satisfy her infant, feelings of failure and inadequacy are generated.
Benedek called this “emotional symbiosis” and described it as the reciprocal interaction between
mother and child which “creates structural change in each of the participants” (p 392). In other
words, just as the infant’s experience with the mother affects the infant’s psychological processes,
so the mother’s experience with her infant affects the mother’s psychological processes (Barnard
and Solchany, 2002). Whether the experience is one of satisfaction or else frustration, according
to Benedek, it becomes integrated into the personalities of both infant and mother and, when
positive, the mother’s ego is fed and nurtured, whereas unsatisfying experiences in attempting to
care for the infant may contribute to considerable strain and even clinically significant problems.
Notably, this perspective receives empirical support from research showing that having an infant
with good capacities to engage, even in the neonatal period (e.g., with good motor control such
that they are able to hold their heads steady and make eye-to-eye contact with their mother),
is associated with a significant reduction in the risk of maternal depression, whereas this risk
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Mothering
is increased when infants are hard to engage, or are prone to become easily distressed and are
harder to soothe (L. Murray, Stanley, Hooper, King, and Fiori-Cowley, 1996).
The Path to Motherhood

Classical accounts of motherhood tended both to idealize the condition and to assume that its nature
was uniform. Rubin (1984) noted, for example, that “enduring love, altruistic self-denial, and empa-
thy are not exclusive to the maternal woman or to the mother-child relationship . . . yet comprise
the characteristics of maternal behavior which are seen as the bottom line” (p. 2; cited by Barnard
and Solchany, 2002, p. 8). Rubin herself was one of the most influential figures in theories of moth-
erhood. On the basis of her nursing work with women through their pregnancies, conducted over
many years, she fostered research on prenatal attachment and described the transition to motherhood
as the “development of the capacity for mothering” (Rubin, 1967a, 1967b, 1977, 1984). She set out
four fundamental tasks of pregnancy and the early postpartum period: (1) seeking safe passage for
herself and her child through pregnancy, labor, and delivery; (2) ensuring the acceptance of her child
by significant persons in the family; (3) “binding-in” to her unknown child and the idea of having a
“real” child; and (4) learning to give of herself.
“Seeking safe passage” included, in the first trimester, a concentration on personal well-being,
with a concern about consumption and avoidance of toxins. By the second trimester, concern shifted
to fetal well-being, and the impact on the fetus of environmental influences, along with a close
monitoring of their activity. With the third trimester, the pregnant woman was seen to view herself
as at “one” with her child, often developing fears about her infant and herself successfully navigating
the delivery.
Rubin saw the second task—“Ensuring the acceptance of the child” by others—as particularly
important.This involved the mother developing both a physical and psychological space for the child
within the family, and included adjusting bonds and relationships. Fantasies about the unborn child
were ideally shared between family members as a way of preparing for, and ensuring, the infant’s
acceptance, with any conditionality on their part (e.g., based on infant gender or normalcy) provok-
ing the mother-to-be’s deep worry about the child’s possible rejection.
“Binding-in,” the third task, was the process resulting in a bond between mother and infant being
in place by the time of the birth. It started in the first trimester with the awareness of feelings of
acceptance or rejection of the pregnancy. During the second and third trimesters, physical changes
in the mother and the growing fetus’s activity and the sense of “life within her”, now vividly shown
by ultrasound scans, made the mother more especially aware of her infant, and supported the process
of representing them as a person.
“Learning to give of oneself,” the fourth task, began in the first trimester, as the woman assessed
the demands of pregnancy, with its changes in appearance, function, relationships, and lifestyle, and
weighed what would be given up and what gained. In the second trimester, identification shifted to
the child, and by the third, the realization of the commitment required was brought to the surface
and processed.
Rubin saw these tasks of pregnancy as preparing the woman for her continuing maternal role, a
role characterized by the long-term giving of time and interest in the form of enduring love, altru-
ism, self-denial, and empathy (cited in Barnard and Solchany, 2002, p. 8). Other researchers broadly
followed this formulation of motherhood, and developed widely used questionnaires to assess the
extent of maternal attachment to the child during pregnancy (Condon, 1993; Cranley, 1981). Nev-
ertheless, as Slade noted, most of the studies adopting these formulations have been limited by using
low-risk populations, and there has also been concern that the measures may actually reflect the
expression of socially desirable attitudes (Slade and Sadler, 2018).
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Lynne Murray et al.
Complexities of the Transition to Motherhood—Losses as Well as Gains

In contrast to classical portrayals of motherhood, subsequent views have been more ready to con-
sider the complexities of the experience. On the one hand, these accounts recognize that becoming
a mother is, for many women, a much-wanted experience and the fulfillment of long-held desire to
care for a significant and fragile human being (Priel and Besser, 2001). In similarly positive vein, the
fact of having a child may also be associated with strengthening the woman’s relationship with her
partner as they prepare for parenthood together (Nelson, 2017). Nevertheless, on the other hand,
increasing prominence has been given to the major adjustments required in making the transition
to motherhood, including accepting and working through intense feelings of loss and grief. This
position has been an important plank of feminist writing, challenging the romanticized version
of self-effacing motherhood (Bassin, Honey, and Kaplan, 1994; Benjamin, 1988; Chodorow, 1989;
Dinnerstein, 1976; Raphael-Leff, 1980), and was particularly prominent in the work of scholars of
motherhood in the decade around the turn of this century. Barclay and her colleagues, for example
(1997), described women as going through a period of realization of “the overwhelming process of
becoming a mother and the consequences this has on one’s life” (p. 721), and experiencing of a loss
of sense of self, of how they used their time, of freedom and independence, and of their life as it used
to be, a process that could breed feelings of conflict, ambivalence, hostility, regression, and negativ-
ity. Women were noted to grieve the changes in their bodies, their relationships, their professional
lives, their activities, and the context in which they viewed and experienced life, and as needing to
reconcile themselves to the fact that they would never again be women without children—even if
their pregnancy tragically ended through miscarriage or fetal death—with their bodies and their lives
forever altered (Solchany, 2001). In similar vein, Hartrick (1997) described the transition to mother-
hood as a period when “the taken for granted infrastructure” that women had, or had assumed they
had, in their lives “is questioned and begins to crumble” (p. 271).
Managing Identity Changes

If, in facing the psychological challenges identified earlier, and, as Trad described, motherhood
is “a dynamic process in which change is virtually unceasing,” then “flexibility and the ability
to deal with these transformations and concomitant losses are necessary traits of the adaptive
mother” (Trad, 1990, p. 359). Hartrick (1997) described the resolution of the challenges of
becoming a mother being achieved through a process of women reclaiming aspects of who they
were, and of recognizing that they did, in fact, have choices. Such recognition would mean that
the notion that motherhood had taken things away would then be reduced in force, with any
loss taking on a different meaning if understood within the context of personal choice. This
perspective, developed in response to an account of motherhood framed in terms of women’s
disempowerment (Squire, 2009), thus elaborated a theory of motherhood that encompassed the
complexities and diversities of women’s experience, and the possibilities for self-determination.
Of course, the extent to which motherhood is experienced with a sense of either gain or loss is
inextricably bound up with both the personal and the societal context in which the transition
to motherhood occurs, including the value placed on the motherhood role by society, as femi-
nist accounts make clear. Thus, on a personal level, mothers’ responses are likely to reflect the
circumstances of the conception (a much-desired pregnancy, or a result of failed contraception,
or even rape; and whether it follows previous miscarriages, stillbirth, or assisted reproduction).
The wider societal context includes legal rights to retain a place in the workforce, whether
promotion policies and practices accommodate time taken from paid work to care for children,
as well as the degree to which the state provides financial support for those sharing childcare
with the mother, paternity leave conditions being the most obvious. These arrangements vary
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Mothering
widely between countries: For example, in Sweden, parents can share parental leave through the
first year, and receive 80% pay during this period, funded by social security; in the United States,
although there is a right to take the minimum period of 14 weeks of leave required by the 2000
Maternity Protection Convention, C 183, of the International Labour Organization, this leave
is not statutorily funded. Overall, women in HICs, and particularly those in formal and standard
jobs, benefit the most in terms of statutorily prescribed support and rights, whereas those in
Africa and Asia benefit the least (International Labour Organization, 2014).
Diversity in Women’s Models of Motherhood

One influential contemporary psychoanalytic theorist, Raphael-Leff (2010), has countered classical
accounts that have normalized “The” mother, by charting the diversity of psychological orientations
that accompany pregnancy and the postnatal experience. She proposes three main groupings. The
first, the “Facilitator” orientation, overlaps in important ways with the classical conception of moth-
erhood. For Facilitators, pregnancy is often the culmination of the woman’s aspirations and desires,
and they are happy to suspend their own subjectivity; they aim to devote themselves to their child,
and may find early childcare intensely satisfying. Other mothers, termed “Regulators,” are more
vulnerable to feeling persecuted by the changes brought about by pregnancy and early motherhood;
they are likely to resist the upheaval of emotions provoked by the experience, and seek to control
events, usually through the application of routines for infant care. The third group, “Reciprocators,”
are mothers who are able to tolerate ambivalence and negotiate a balance between meeting their
own and their infant’s needs. The key point of Raphael-Leff ’s argument is, then, that there exists a
variety of orientations to motherhood and that it is neither a unitary experience, nor one that sim-
ply varies in its strength on a single continuum. Furthermore, in this view, it is only at the extremes
of the Facilitator and Regulator orientations that functioning becomes pathological, and whether
these qualitatively different orientations can function is influenced by a range of factors that either
facilitate or prevent each group of mothers fulfilling their own model of motherhood. For example,
the Facilitator may become particularly vulnerable if complications arise that seem to threaten her
involvement with her infant, such as being unable to breastfeed; toward the end of the first year and
beyond, such mothers may also find the infant’s normal bids for independence difficult to manage.
A regulator, by contrast, may find the emotional upheaval provoked by the intensity of the infant’s
needs in the early postpartum months, together with any practical life changes that restrict her self-
esteem (e.g., her role in the workplace), extremely challenging.
Since Raphael-Leff ’s formulations, a number of empirical studies have broadly confirmed this
grouping, both within and across cultures, and the clinical implications have begun to be investigated.
For example, Sharp and Bramwell (2004) found, as predicted, that Regulator mothers, who seek to
minimize the inevitable, substantial disruption to their lives brought about by pregnancy and early
infant care, were more vulnerable than other women to becoming depressed in the early postnatal
months. In a similar vein, other psychoanalytic researchers have sought to identify the different
kinds of defense mechanisms that are used by mothers in response to pregnancy and the prospect
of motherhood. In one study, Porcerelli, Huth-Bocks, Huprich, and Richardson (2016) used the
Working Model of the Child Interview. Similar to the Adult Attachment Interview for assessing
representations of the parenting one has received, this interview assesses parents’ representations of
their infant, themselves as caregivers, and the parent-child relationship on a number of measures,
including acceptance, coherence, and involvement, and classifies them as balanced, disengaged, or
distorted. Porcerelli and colleagues applied the DSM-IV Defensive Functioning Scale to the resultant
narratives, and found that mothers who used flexible prenatal defense mechanisms (including humor,
anticipation, and suppression) had more secure relationships with their infant, and the children had
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Lynne Murray et al.
better adjustment, than was the case for mothers who used rigid defenses like “disavowal,” even when
taking important background factors into account.
Breakdown in Adjustment to Mothering

It is clear from the different perspectives outlined earlier that psychological adjustment accom-
panying the transition to motherhood is highly variable, and it is by no means inevitable that it
is smooth. Indeed, during pregnancy and after childbirth, a substantial number of women expe-
rience clinically significant anxiety and depression. In fact, the rate of depression is raised in the
early months following childbirth relative to other periods in the lifespan, occurring in around
15% women in HICs and even more, around 30%, in LMICs (L. Murray, Halligan, and Cooper,
2018). Just as at other times across the life span, depression occurring after childbirth causes sig-
nificant impairment in everyday functioning, being characterized by persistent low mood and
loss of interest in aspects of experience that normally bring pleasure as well as a range of other
symptoms (e.g., sleep disturbance not attributable simply to having an infant waking the mother,
appetite loss, suicidal feelings and thoughts). Anxiety is rather less common than depression, but
is nevertheless present in a significant minority (around 8% in Northern European and U.S.
populations). The occurrence of maternal postnatal depression has been particularly extensively
studied, and it is well established that social factors play a significant role. Key risks include, for
example, conflict with the partner and lack of social support. The fact that rates are so much
higher in LMICs compared with HICs also reflects the importance of background adversity and
poverty. In summary, the evidence regarding the occurrence of depression, one of the most com-
mon disorders of early motherhood, shows that a positive transition to motherhood is a function
not only of individual maternal characteristics, but also the economic and social conditions in
which it takes place.
Effects of Mothering
Having outlined some of the diverse experiences of mothers, we next consider the impact of moth-
ering.The issue of the impact of mothering on child development has traditionally been approached
in studies of the effects on children of its absence, or of relatively stark variations in its form. This
work is important, both historically and scientifically, but it is also important to bear in mind when
considering this evidence that the majority of studies, and particularly those on maternal “depri-
vation” have involved deprivation of a range of experiences, going far wider than the absence of
mothering alone. Nevertheless, it remains striking that, even when physical care has been adequate,
the effects of deprivation of close, consistent human contact are profound.
Maternal Deprivation
Eight hundred years ago, Fredrick II, who was a German King, King of Sicily, and the Emperor of
the Holy Roman Empire, created an experiment in which he wanted to find out which language
children would speak “naturally,” or on their own (Stone and Church, 1957). He ordered that a group
of infants be taken from their mothers and cared for by foster mothers and nurses. These caregivers
were told to feed, bathe, and see to the needs of these children, but no one was to speak to them
in any language. He wondered which of the great languages the children would naturally speak:
Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Arabic, or the language of their birth parents. King Edward never found out
which language the children would have spoken. Tragically, without adequate mothering the infants
became withdrawn, depressed, and died (Stone and Church, 1957).
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Mothering
Older Studies of Institutional Care

At the turn of the 20th century, it was not uncommon for children to be placed in state-run
institutions or foundling homes. During the early 1900s, several medical doctors looked into the
extreme death rates that were occurring—between 90% and100%—in some of these institutions.
They found that even the few children who survived early childhood in these homes developed
delays and disturbances in the normal course of development. Rene Spitz, the Austrian-born
doctor who settled in the United States, described these child survivors of institutions as “asocial,
delinquent, feeble-minded, psychotic, or problem children . . . practically without exception,” and
he related these findings to the lack of maternal nurturance (1945, p. 54). Wanting to understand
what effects the lack of mothering would have, Spitz (1946) observed and recorded what hap-
pened to a group of 123 infants who were deprived of emotional and physical contact with others
by virtue of their institutional environment. This environment provided these motherless infants
with basic care, but very little human interaction. They existed in dimly lit, but clean and hygienic
conditions. They had adequate food, appropriate clothing with pastel colors, blankets, and regular
medical care. They initially had no toys, although this changed with time. The infants had little
visual stimulation and, in fact, had sheets hanging in between the cribs or cots—essentially creat-
ing a “solitary confinement.” The infants also had minimal human contact, limited primarily to
feeding times. Spitz observed these children to deteriorate over time and to develop a group of
symptoms, which he later termed “Anaclitic Depression.” This syndrome includes symptoms of
apprehension, sadness, weepiness, rejection of the environment, withdrawal, retardation of devel-
opment and of reaction to stimuli, slowness of movement, dejection, stupor, food refusal, weight
loss, and insomnia. He added that one more symptom should be included, although he found it
difficult to describe. He portrayed it as a physiognomic expression, likening it to the expression in
a depressed adult.
In 1945, Spitz compared children who were confined to institutions with same-age children liv-
ing with their parents in either an urban or rural area. The institutionalized children were the chil-
dren of poor Latina women who did not have enough money to care for their infants. Their infants
were generally healthy at first and were able to continue being breastfed. Nonetheless, they remained
in an institutional setting.
The other subgroup of institutionalized infants were the children of those whom Spitz termed
“delinquent minors as a result of social maladjustment or feeblemindedness, or because they were
psychically defective, psychopathic, or criminal” (p. 60). These mothers were prisoners in a penal
institution. The infants of these women were weaned early but continued to receive care from their
own mothers, with coaching from others.
The Latina foundling infants, who had no maternal care, fared the worst. These infants expe-
rienced a drop in IQ from 124 to 72 over the first year (the other groups remained the same or
improved) and fell to 45 by the end of the second year. In addition, Spitz found increased illness and
infection rates in the foundling infants, high death rates, and developmental delays. Sadly, only 2 of
26 surviving 2.5-year-olds could speak a couple of words, most were unable to perform any self-care
behaviors, and none had been toilet trained. Spitz argued that, even though the Latina infants had
caregivers who were very sincere in their work with the children, the caregivers did not have the
time or resources to adequately care for the infants. Essentially, he said, these infants were in “solitary
confinement” as they rarely saw or interacted with a caregiver.
Freud and Burlingham (1944), Provence and Lipton (1962), and Dennis (1973), who also studied
institutionalized children deprived of a mothering relationship, all came to the same general con-
clusions—that, in spite of proper physical care, the lack of opportunity to bond emotionally with a
“mother or mother-substitute” can lead to extreme forms of dysfunction in the child. For example,
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Lynne Murray et al.
children without such maternal care often demonstrated decreased growth, delayed development,
increased risk of psychiatric disturbances, increased levels of illness, and higher death rates.
Research Studies of Institutionalized Care

Despite awareness of these early findings, institutional care is still shockingly prevalent. In 2010,
more than 2 million children were known to be being reared in institutions (United Nations Gen-
eral Assembly, 2010), and this figure is likely a gross underestimation. Institutional care for young
children is particularly common in Eastern Europe, Asia, Central and South America, Africa, and
the Middle East (The St. Petersburg-USA Orphanage Research Team, 2008). It is by no means
the case that all children reared in institutions are orphans; some children may have been removed
from abusive families, and others are children of poor parents, including those who may believe
that their offspring will have better prospects by being cared for in an institutional setting. Com-
mon features of institutional care still include a high child-to-staff ratio, poorly paid and trained
staff, shift working and regimented, nonindividualized care, and a lack of psychological investment
in the children.
A number of controlled studies have been conducted to examine the effects of institutionalized
care, and adverse impacts on every domain of child development have been identified (Dozier, Zea-
nah, Wallin, and Shauffer, 2012). Children from institutions in Romania, which were characterized
by high degrees of emotional neglect, have been a focus of particular research attention. In one set
of studies, assessments were made of children who were adopted from Romania into homes in the
United Kingdom, and compared with children adopted from within the United Kingdom. In this
study, institutional deprivation beyond the first 6 months of age was associated with a combination
of autism spectrum disorder, indiscriminate sociability, cognitive impairment, and inattention/over
activity and, despite an adequate diet, a major impairment in head growth. These effects were as
strong in adolescence as they had been in early childhood. Furthermore, by adulthood, emotional
problems (anxiety and low mood) had also begun to emerge (Kennedy et al., 2016; Sonuga-Barke
et al., 2017), although the earlier cognitive impairments had gradually resolved. Notably, children
who were adopted before 6 months developed similarly to U.K. adopted children and, even within
the group who were later adopted, a substantial minority (a fifth) showed no signs of impairment
from the age of 6 years onward. The reasons why a minority of child appear resilient in the face of
institutional deprivation are not well understood, and further research on this topic is required. In
another, particularly well-controlled, study of Romanian orphans, Zeanah, Humphreys, Fox, and
Nelson (2017) compared children who stayed in institutions with both those who were noninstitu-
tionalized family-reared Romanian children, and children from institutions who were randomized
between 6 and 33 months of age to receive foster care. At 12 years, children exposed to prolonged
institutional care (i.e., not receiving foster care until at least 18–24 months) showed particularly
clear signs of difficulties, including social communication problems, low IQ and impaired execu-
tive function, more internalizing symptoms associated with insecure attachment (particularly of the
disorganized kind), and blunted responses to stress. A finding of particular note was that, despite a
change in the nurturing environment, early deprivation affected children’s neurobiological trajecto-
ries, including decreased brain circuitry and activity (low white matter volume, more slow-frequency
theta activity compared with more mature high-frequency alpha/beta waves). In summary, both sets
of Romanian studies suggest that institutional care up to only 6 months is likely to have no major
adverse impact on child development. Beyond this time, however, and particularly where institutional
care lasts more than 24 months, there is a stepwise impact of the duration of institutionalization, with
large, long-lasting, adverse effects across a range of developmental domains, with psychopathology
showing the least benefit of subsequent foster care.
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Deprivation of Night-Time Maternal Care

Another way in which researchers have examined the impact of an absence of maternal care has been
to study children reared in the kibbutzim system in Israel. Under this system, which lasted for more
than 70 years, many children slept at night in communal, group settings, where deliberate regular
changes of staff were implemented. Not only, therefore, did they experience parental non-accessi-
bility and nonavailability at night, they were also exposed to inconsistent care by unfamiliar adults.
Even though daytime contact with parents was available, those children experiencing the communal
kibbutzim night-time regime were more likely to be insecurely attached than children in kibbutzim
who slept with their families (Aviezer, Sagi, and van IJzendoorn, 2002; Sagi, van IJzendoorn, Aviezer,
Konnell, and Mayseless, 1994). Remarkably, some 60 years later, some of these individuals were
reported to be unable to recall any significant memories of their parents (Tikotzky, Sharabany, Hirsch,
and Sadeh, 2010). For secure attachment, at least, then, it appears that children need regular access to
their parents at times when they may be more vulnerable, as at night time.
Effects of Different Aspects of Mothering Behavior

In 1951, in a postwar world where so many children had lost their parents, the World Health Orga-
nization gave the U.K. psychoanalyst John Bowlby the task of exploring the needs of orphaned or
homeless children. In understanding these children, he determined that
what is believed to be essential for mental health is that the infant and young child should
experience a warm, intimate, and continuous relationship with his mother (or permanent
mother substitute—one person who steadily mothers him) in which both find satisfaction
and enjoyment. It is this complex, rich, and rewarding relationship with the mother in early
years. . . [that we] now believe to underlie the development of character and mental health.
(Bowlby, 1953, p. 11)
While the importance of close, consistent, parental care is dramatically shown in studies of the effects
of its total absence (as in institutionalization), or absence during key times of need for closeness (as
in kibbutzim), most research demonstrating the effects of mothering per se have been conducted
with children living in the family context. This research, in large measure generated by Bowlby’s
statement, has supported the idea that our mothering is important in who we become as individu-
als, and it has consistently shown that, even for young children receiving care from other sources, an
overwhelming influence on their development is the quality of the mother-child relationship, out-
weighing, for example, both the effects of the amount of time in, and the quality of, day care (Lamb
and Ahnert, 2006; NICHD, 2002).
Two key conclusions emerge from decades of research into mother-child relationships and their
association with aspects of child development. First, it is clear that mother-child relationships are not
unidirectional, with all the effect being from mother to child. The temperament and behavior of
young infants exert an active impact on parental experience, with some infants being placid and easy
to care for, and engaging positively with others from their first days, whereas others are far more reac-
tive to their environment and may become more easily and intensely distressed (Belsky and Pluess,
2009). In addition to their psychological characteristics, physical differences between infants can
also affect parental responses. The minor structural abnormality of a cleft lip, for example, appears to
interfere with the normal, intuitive parenting brain responses to infant, as compared with adult, faces
(Parsons et al., 2013) as well as maternal gaze and behavior during social interactions with the infant
(De Pascalis et al., 2017; Murray et al., in press). Thus, infant differences have an important influence
47
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on how other people respond to the child, and, as noted earlier, can even affect the risk that a mother
may become depressed (L. Murray, Stanley et al., 1996). In such ways, therefore, child characteristics
contribute to the nature of the child’s own rearing environment.
The second key conclusion to emerge from research is that mothering skills are not unidimensional—
it is not just a matter of the extent to which mothers show some generic quality, such as being
“loving” or even “sensitive” that affects child development. Although no one would advocate not
being sensitive toward their infant or child, the usefulness of such a general term is rather limited.
Instead, what has emerged from research is that different kinds of parental responsiveness, all of
which might be termed “sensitive,” are associated with different developmental outcomes in the
child (L. Murray et al., 2006). Thus, parenting is viewed as multifaceted, with its precise character-
istics varying according to the domain of child development and the age of the child, with each of
its different characteristics having a differing impact on the child, that is, a “specificity of effects”
(Bornstein, 2019; L. Murray, 2014).
Ahead, we consider the specificity of effects of maternal behavior, and outline the key facets
of mothering that research has shown are associated with good child functioning in four distinct
domains of development—social relationships and social understanding, security of attachment,
emotion regulation, and cognitive functioning—and we illustrate their effects from research on both
nonclinical populations, and in clinical samples with particular reference to maternal depression. As
noted in our introduction, we focus on the evidence concerning effects of mothering in the first
2 years. In fact, although we use the term “mothering,” on which the great majority of studies have
focused, the same relationships between the form of care and child functioning would apply regard-
less of the identity of the carer. (For characteristics of care by fathers that are distinctive from that of
mothers, see Parke and Cookston, 2019.)
Maternal Behavior That Promotes Child Social Understanding

Important developments in social understanding take place over the first 2 years. These include the
acquisition of an awareness of “self,” as reflected in the ability of infants around 1.5 years old, at least
in research in HICs, to start to recognize their reflection in a mirror as an image of themselves. A sec-
ond, related, development within the first 2 years is acquiring an implicit sense of others’ experience.
This begins with the child’s capacity to apprehend the correspondence between their own and someone
else’s experience, and then develops as the capacity to realize that other people can have a different
perspective on the world from our own. This latter capacity then develops, by 3 years, as a conscious,
explicit knowledge, or representation, of others’ mental states—having a “Theory of Mind” (ToM)—
a capacity that is a good predictor of children’s peer relationships and social adjustment. A third, and
fundamental, aspect of social understanding that develops within the same period is the ability to
cooperate with other people.
A number of specific parenting behaviors have been shown to support these various aspects of
social development. The first concerns the way in which mothers engage with their infants dur-
ing face-to-face interactions during the first few postpartum weeks. This is a period that has been
considered almost purely social, or “intersubjective” (Trevarthen, 1979). During these early weeks,
infants do not have independent mobility, or the manual control to reach out and grasp or manipu-
late objects, and their vision is limited. Their interest is, therefore, predominantly focused on their
immediate environment, and they are particularly sensitive to social stimuli, for example, showing
a preference for the sound of the human voice over other sounds, and the appearance of faces over
other visual stimuli. These natural propensities of infants to be drawn to other people is matched by
adults’ attraction to the Kindchenschema, or baby schema (the facial features of newborns across mam-
malian species, including large eyes and full cheeks). This attraction response is held to occur out of
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conscious awareness, and to facilitate the parent’s care for their infant (Lorenz, 1971; Papousek and
Papousek, 1987), and it is in line with the distinctive neurological activation provoked in adults when
viewing infant, as opposed to adult, facial stimuli (Parsons, Young, Murray, Stein, and Kringelbach,
2010).
The mutual “social fittedness” of infant and mother that is reflected in their perceptual prefer-
ences has been shown to extend to complex behavioral responses during early face-to-face engage-
ments. Thus, within the first 2 months, infants, although helpless in many ways, nevertheless develop
a rich repertoire of communicative expressions and gestures that they show while face-to-face with
an attentive, responsive adult partner. As well as different emotional expressions, these infant behav-
iors include positive vocalizations, active movements of lip and tongue, and wide-open shapings of
the mouth that have, collectively, been termed “prespeech” (Trevarthen, 1979), and that mothers
perceive as the infant’s attempts to be social (L. Murray et al., 2017). On the parent’s side, mothers
intuitively place their face in the infant’s mid-line, and at a distance that is in line with infant visual
capacities. Furthermore, they modify their voice, changing from the speech register used to converse
with adults to adopt what is referred to as “motherese” or “parentese.” As with their adjustment to
the infant’s visual preferences, the speech changes made by mothers when they talk to their infants
match infant auditory preferences, with speech becoming simplified, slower, and with an overall
higher pitch frequency, and clear modulations of intonation contours that attract, and sustain, the
infant’s attention.
In terms of social responsiveness, mothers react moment by moment to the infant’s facial and
vocal displays during interactions in the first 2 or 3 months in highly structured ways, showing
different forms of response to the different infant expressions, such that the joint behavior of the
two interactants has been described as reflecting a “functional architecture” of early mother-infant
communication (L. Murray, De Pascalis et al., 2016). In a detailed U.K. study of video-recorded
mother-infant interactions conducted on five occasions in mothers’ homes over the first 9 weeks
of life, Murray and colleagues showed two forms of maternal response to be particularly important
for infant social development (L. Murray, De Pascalis et al., 2016). One is “positive marking”: This
behavior is selectively deployed by mothers in response to infant social expressions (as opposed,
for example, to biological events, such as sneezes, or to negative facial expressions), and it serves to
emphasize them and mark them out as significant. Positive marking typically combines strong, highly
visible, signals, including eyebrow flashing, head nodding, and smiling, and its occurrence not only
encourages positive infant engagement during the current interaction, but also predicts a significant
increase in infant social expressiveness over time (L. Murray, De Pascalis et al., 2016).
The second, key, maternal behavior shown during early social interactions is “mirroring,” whereby
the mother follows on the infant’s behavior by clearly imitating it (Lavelli and Fogel, 2013; L. Mur-
ray, De Pascalis et al., 2016). To a greater extent, even, than positive marking, mothers selectively
use mirroring to respond to infant social, as opposed to nonsocial, facial and vocal signals, and this
maternal behavior has an even greater positive impact than marking on the development of infant
social expressiveness over the subsequent weeks (L. Murray, De Pascalis et al., 2016). Notably, this
study found that mothers’ simple “contingent responsiveness,” even when occurring in the context
of infant social expressions, conferred no benefit to infant social development, in contrast to the
role played by mirroring. The specific benefit to infant social development conferred by maternal
mirroring is likely rooted in the infant’s capacity, from the neonatal period, to detect the correspon-
dence between their own actions and those of other people, as evidenced, for example, in neonates’
imitation of others’ facial gestures, such as tongue protrusion (Meltzoff et al., 2017; Simpson, Murray,
Paukner, and Ferrari, 2014). This ability appears to be based on the operation of the “mirror neuron
system,” a well-established neural mechanism, demonstrated even in neonates in nonhuman primate
research, to map observed and executed gestures (Ferrari et al., 2012). The fundamental importance
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Lynne Murray et al.
of early maternal mirroring for longer term infant social development and understanding has been
shown by Rayson, Bonaiuto, Ferrari, and Murray (2017), who found that infants of mothers who
showed high, as opposed to low, rates of mirroring of infant social expressions during interactions
in the first 2 months postpartum showed more neurological activation indicative of mirror neuron
system involvement (mu suppression in EEG responses) to facial displays of emotion at 9 months
postpartum, suggesting that early maternal mirroring improved the infant’s later capacity to process
others’ emotions.
Importantly, even though mirroring seems likely to be a core aspect of early maternal respon-
siveness, it does not invariably occur, and its expression can be affected by maternal mental state.
Depressed mothers, for example, were found in a U.K. study (the Cambridge Longitudinal Study
by Murray and colleagues) to be more likely than non-affected mothers to show heightened mir-
roring of infant negative, but not positive, infant expressions (L. Murray, Fiori-Cowley, Hooper, and
Cooper, 1996).
Cross-cultural studies have also shown variability in maternal mirroring, and these differences
have also been important in elucidating the role of mirroring in child social development. Thus,
despite common levels of general responsiveness between cultures, there are systematic differences
in maternal mirroring behavior, with societies where affiliation, rather than individuation, is valued
favoring the use of affectionate touch, rather than facial mirroring, to respond to the infant during
early social interactions. In turn, these differences are associated with cultural differences in child
social development. One study showed, for example, that the lower rates of early maternal mirroring
of infant facial cues in the first few weeks characteristic of a rural African society, compared with a
German society, predicted less awareness in the African children of their identity in the mirror in
later infancy, suggesting they had developed a less individuated sense of self (Keller, Kartner, Borke,
Yovsi, and Kleis, 2005).
Other parenting practices that are important in influencing the development of social under-
standing include “pretend” play (Bornstein, 2007;Youngblade and Dunn, 1995). Thus, games where
the mother helps the infant think about others’ experiences, for example, in a pretend meal in
which the infant is encouraged to wonder whether their teddy is hungry, or whether the toy food
might be too hot for him to eat, predict better child ToM abilities. Parental talk to their children
about mental states and emotions in everyday conversations also helps children develop the ability
to understand other people and their feelings. One particularly good medium for this kind of talk
is sharing picture books with suitable content (i.e., including characters with different experiences
and feelings; Fletcher and Reese, 2005). In this context, time can be taken to reflect on what is hap-
pening in the story narrative, and different points of view can be discussed; this is likely to be easier
to achieve during book-sharing than in the hurly burly of real-life encounters, where emotions may
be running high and render reflection more difficult. Indeed, evidence shows that parents are more
likely to talk about mental states and emotions when sharing picture books with small children than
in other contexts, and that such talk is a good predictor of children’s later theory of mind and social
relationships, including cooperation.
Maternal Behavior That Promotes Child Emotion Regulation and Self-Control

Acquiring the ability to manage difficult emotions and exercise self-control is one of the greatest
challenges for children in their first 2 years, and problems with regulating behavior in early child-
hood are common:The Copenhagen Child Cohort Study of over 6,000 children, for example, found
significant problems in 18% of 1.5-year-olds (Skovgaard, 2010). Although there are individual differ-
ences in child temperament that influence this process, parents can make a significant difference to
how well the child becomes able to manage difficult experiences and emotions. This is particularly
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Mothering
relevant to managing aggression, but also to normal developmental challenges, such as managing to
get off to sleep without difficulty and without requiring a great deal of parental support.
With regard to aggression, humans are typically at their most aggressive around the age of 2, and
then the level typically declines, as children develop strategies for managing frustration and anger.
For a minority, however, aggressive behavior becomes established in a pervasive and persistent pattern
(i.e., the child is frequently angry, across contexts, and this behavior persists over time), and longitu-
dinal studies show that this early pattern of pervasive and persistent aggression is associated with the
development of significant problems, with risk for violent and antisocial behavior in later life being
much increased (Tremblay, Hartup, and Archer, 2005). One longitudinal New Zealand study found,
for example, that the small proportion of children (22%) whose behavior was rated as showing poor
control (emotionally reactive and negative, and oppositional) at 3 years accounted for over 80% of
violent crime in the population in adulthood (Caspi et al., 2016).
As with the development of social understanding, longitudinal research shows that specific aspects
of parenting reduce the risk that emotion regulation difficulties and pervasive and persistent aggres-
sion will develop. In the early weeks, physical holding, including rocking, stroking, and close con-
tainment, is the most appropriate way of supporting a distressed infant (Bornstein et al., 2017), and
these maternal behaviors reduce the infant’s physiological stress. With increased age, however, more
opportunities are available for parents to support the infant’s own capacities to deal with difficulties.
One aspect of early social interactions that may be particularly effective has been highlighted by
Tronick and colleagues as the “mismatch-repair” process (Tronick and Gianino, 1986). Like Win-
nicott, Tronick drew attention to the fact that parental responsiveness is not perfect, and indeed, that
being “good-enough,” rather than perfect, has important advantages for the infant (Bornstein and
Manian, 2013). For example, infants may increase their own capacity to recover from dysregulated
states if, following difficult interactive moments, maternal support is provided that helps the infant
recover, with prospective studies showing that sensitive “repairs” to the normal mis-attunements
that inevitably occur during social interactions predict better infant regulation in the face of more
significant challenges (Gunning, Halligan, and Murray, 2013; Halligan, Murray, Cooper,Wheeler, and
Crosby, 2013).
Later in development, playful interactions between infants and their mothers typically become
more physically boisterous. This additional dimension gives infants the opportunity to experience
extreme feelings- of excitement, surprise, and so forth within the containment of a safe affectionate
relationship. As this kind of play develops through the second year (albeit more often with fathers),
infants are able to learn more about their potentially aggressive feelings and how to manage them
without harming their parent. When infants experience this kind of play, it can benefit their rela-
tionships with other children, helping them to manage aggression in this context, too (Peterson and
Flanders, 2005).
How mothers handle conflicts with their infant and young child is particularly important in
preventing normal early aggression becoming settled into a difficult pattern of behavior; indeed, a
certain pattern of parenting problems in the child’s early years is consistently highlighted as a key risk
mechanism in the development of persistent antisocial behavior and aggression (Moffitt and Caspi,
2001) as well as subsequent violence (J. Murray, Anselmi, Gallo, Fleitlich-Bilyk, and Bordin, 2013).
Meta-analyses show the particular importance of the occurrence of harsh and coercive parenting
behavior (Gershoff, 2002; Rothbaum and Weisz, 1994), with genetically sensitive studies providing
strong evidence that the association between harsh and coercive parenting and child antisocial behav-
ior is causal (Jaffee, Strait, and Odgers, 2012). Corporal punishment of children is especially important
in the development of child aggressive and antisocial behavior, with effect sizes of d = .36 and d = .42,
respectively (Gershoff, 2002) across a range of surveys. A further key aspect of parenting implicated in
child aggressive behavior is inconsistency: If the mother at first says “no” to the infant’s angry demands,
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Lynne Murray et al.
and then relents when the infant’s anger escalates, this reinforces the infant’s aggression. Similarly, if the
mother attempts to get the infant to do something and the child becomes angry and the mother gives
up, this may also reinforce infant anger. By contrast, if parents are consistent without being authoritar-
ian, that is, imposing their will by harsh, forceful means, but rather achieve a balance of being firm but
warm, child aggressive behavior problems are less likely to develop.
Other positive behaviors that can help reduce risk for aggression include the provision of routines,
as this is something that can help infants feel that their world is reliable, and this can help them tol-
erate frustrations and delays. Parents’ use of praise, encouragement, and demonstrations of affection
toward their infant also protect against later child regulatory problems such as disruptive behavior
and substance abuse (Kumpfer and Bluth, 2004). Finally, parents’ building on developments in their
infant’s social understanding through the second year, and supporting their motivation to cooperate,
can promote prosocial, rather than oppositional, behavior.
Although many aspects of maternal care that are relevant to aggression are particularly clear
throughout the second year, difficult patterns of relating that can underlie such problems can occur
even in the early months. These difficult patterns are particularly likely in clinical contexts such as
maternal depression, where the irritability and anger that often accompanies the disorder can extend
into early mother-infant contacts. The Cambridge Longitudinal Study found, for example, that
postnatally depressed mothers were likely to show hostility toward their infants, even at 2 months
postpartum. Although this did not affect the infants’ responses to other people at the time, by just 4
months, the infants had become more emotionally dysregulated, a pattern that persisted and, in turn,
provoked increased maternal negativity, such that by 5 years, a vicious cycle of negative, coercive
parenting, together with child conduct problems, had developed (Morrell and Murray, 2003).
Maternal Behavior That Promotes the Development of Child Secure

Attachment
The period from around 6 months, when an awareness of dependency on other people emerges,
through to 2 years, is when infants typically develop strong feelings of attachment to the particular indi-
viduals who are involved in caring for them.The main distinction in attachment quality is that between
infants who are “securely” attached to their mother or other carer, and those who are “insecurely”
attached. The provision of care and sensitive maternal responsiveness is particularly important for the
development of a secure attachment in situations where the infant is vulnerable, for example, when
ill, frightened, or distressed. Accordingly, simply observing a mother and infant during play may not
be so informative about how well the mother can meet her infant’s attachment needs (McElwain and
Booth-LaForce, 2006). Studies have also shown that aside from behaving sensitively to the infant’s needs
in distressing circumstances, the mother’s ability to show the infant or young child that she understands
how the child feels is important for secure attachments to develop, a capacity sometimes referred to as
“reflective functioning” (Koren-Karie, Oppenheim, Dolev, Sher, and Etzion-Carasso, 2002). (For a full
account of parenting and attachment, see Cummings and Warmuth, 2019.)
Of all the developments in infant behavior studied in the first 2 years, attachment quality is one
of the strongest predictors of later adjustment, and it is particularly relevant to the older child’s, ado-
lescent’s, and even adult’s close, intimate relationships. Some research has also found that the lack of a
secure attachment in late infancy can pose a risk for the development of affective disorder. Insecure
attachment is more common in infants of mothers who are postnatally depressed (Martins and Gaf-
fan, 2000), and the Cambridge Longitudinal Study found, for example, that insecurity in infants of
postnatally depressed mothers was associated with poor “ego resilience” in early childhood (manifest
in poor coping with a mild challenge), and this child vulnerability, in turn, increased the risk for
depression in adolescence (L. Murray et al., 2011).
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Maternal Behavior That Promotes Child Cognitive Development

Just as each of the three domains of development outlined earlier is facilitated by specific kinds
of maternal care, so infant cognitive development is more likely to flourish when particular
forms of maternal support are available. Sensing “contingencies” between one’s own actions and
external events is a basic building block of learning and, in fact, infants do much to advance
their own cognitive development, as they work at exploring the links between their own actions
and what happens around them. Nevertheless, one of the best sources of contingent informa-
tion for infants is others’ social responsiveness. During face-to-face interactions in the first few
months, mothers’ responses to infant social cues enable infants to learn about links between
their own actions and other events (Stanley, Murray, and Stein, 2004). The impact of mater-
nal responsiveness is well demonstrated in studies that experimentally disrupt it—for example,
when the mother stops responding and adopts a still face (Mesman, van IJzendoorn, and Baker-
mans-Kranenburg, 2009), or when their responses are made noncontingent via replayed video
sequences (L. Murray and Trevarthen, 1985). These studies show that the infant’s attention and
affect are quickly disturbed by such disruptions, and the infant typically becomes withdrawn
from the environment and self-absorbed, thereby reducing the cognitive stimulation available to
them and opportunities for learning.
Aside from the early patterns of contingent face-to-face responsiveness, mothers continue to
support infant cognitive development with specific forms of support. A key behavior is “scaffolding”
(Vygotsky, 1978). This comprises the facilitation of infants’ exploration and mastery of the world by
providing support that is pitched just at the limits of their capacity and that allows them to progress
to the next step. A particularly effective way of supporting cognitive development, and especially
language, is through responsive “book-sharing,” when mothers indicate and label the book contents,
elaborate on them, and draw infants into active two-way exchanges (Fletcher and Reese, 2005; L.
Murray, De Pascalis, Tomlinson et al., 2016).
If mothers are unable to provide these kinds of input, and their interactions with infants are
disrupted, for example, by clinical conditions such as depression, then the impact on child cogni-
tive development can be far reaching (L. Murray, Halligan, and Cooper, 2018). The Cambridge
Longitudinal Study found, for example, that boy infants of depressed mothers were likely to experi-
ence particularly low levels of responsiveness during interactions in the first few months (L. Mur-
ray, Kempton, Woolgar, and Hooper, 1993). Notably, these difficulties were predictive of poorer IQ
scores in late infancy and early childhood (L. Murray, Fiori-Cowley et al., 1996; L. Murray, Hipwell,
Hooper, Stein, and Cooper, 1996) that, in turn, were associated with poorer exam results even at
16 years of age (L. Murray et al., 2010).
Interventions for Difficulties in Mothering

In view of the consistent associations found between parenting and children’s development, together
with the evidence that many long-term child problems often have early origins and incur con-
siderable economic burden to society, an important issue is whether aspects of the experience of
motherhood and of mothering behaviors that pose risk for adverse child outcome can be improved
by intervention. A comprehensive account of parenting interventions is provided by Powell (2019).
Here, we focus on two particular topics: First, given that maternal postnatal depression is associ-
ated with a range of problems in child development, we consider the evidence for the efficacy of
interventions for postnatally depressed mothers in preventing poor child functioning. Second, we
consider the implications for interventions of the evidence for the specificity of effects of different
parenting dimensions on different child outcomes.
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Lynne Murray et al.
Interventions for Postnatal Depression

The negative effects of maternal postnatal depression on child development are particularly marked
when the depression persists beyond the first few months postpartum, when the mood disturbance
tends to be severe—a course that applies to about one third of women who experience postnatal
depression. For example, one U.K. study of a large community sample of mothers followed up
from pregnancy showed that those who had postnatal depression that persisted through the first 8
months after childbirth were likely to have elevated symptoms of depression over the subsequent
11 years; further, when such persistent postnatal depression was severe, it substantially increased
the risk for a range of child difficulties, including behavior problems in the preschool years, poorer
grades in math at 16 years, and the occurrence of depression in adolescence (Netsi et al., 2018).
It is unfortunate, therefore, that treatment trials that have aimed to alleviate maternal postnatal
depression and, in some cases, also mother-infant interaction difficulties and child outcomes asso-
ciated with the disorder, have rarely targeted these more prolonged and, therefore, more severe,
postnatal depressions. Instead, they have typically evaluated relatively brief interventions delivered
in the early postnatal months, and the results have been disappointing. Thus, although such inter-
ventions, including a range of different psychotherapeutic approaches, do help resolve mothers’
depressed mood, they are only moderately effective; and the scant evidence available on longer
term outcome fails to show enduring benefits to either maternal mood or child development.
Similarly, although some interventions focusing on the early difficulties in mother-infant interac-
tions, rather than the depression itself, have shown short-term benefits, the few studies regarding
child outcome beyond late infancy have had negative findings (see L. Murray et al., 2018 for a
review). These findings from studies in HICs also apply to LMICs (where there is a similar adverse
effect of postnatal depression on child development (Black et al., 2007; Cooper et al., 1999; Tom-
linson, Cooper, and Murray, 2005), with studies showing that although short-term benefits can be
achieved by psychological intervention (Rahman, Mali, Sikander, Roberts, and Creed, 2008), they
are not sustained (Maselko et al., 2015).
In the light of the largely negative evidence concerning interventions that have mostly been brief,
and that have been conducted in the early postnatal months, it seems reasonable to conclude that, for
both maternal depression and child outcome, more intensive treatments that continue beyond the first
few postnatal months might be required in order to bring about sustained benefits.This may be because
mothers are otherwise likely to relapse, and particularly if such relapse occurs during the period up to
2–3 years postpartum when the child’s developmental trajectory is still stabilizing, the maternal depres-
sion may still carry substantial risk to the child. This suggestion is supported by the contrasting, posi-
tive findings of intervention studies involving more intensive treatment and continued into the child’s
second year, conducted by Cicchetti and Toth and colleagues in the United States (Cicchetti, Rogosch,
and Toth, 2000;Toth, Rogosch, Manly, and Cicchetti, 2006), and by Stein and colleagues in the United
Kingdom (Stein et al., 2018). In the former, mothers who had been depressed in the first postpar-
tum year received prolonged toddler-parent psychotherapy (average 57 weeks), starting on average at
20 months. The intervention, which focused on promoting positive maternal attachment representa-
tions and mother-infant interactions, showed significant benefits in terms of both child cognition and
attachment relative to a non-treated control group. In the U.K. study, mothers with persistent postnatal
depression identified around 6 months postnatally received an intensive intervention of 11, 90-minute
sessions lasting through the remainder of the first year, followed by two booster sessions in the child’s
second year. The intervention was delivered in mothers’ homes, and it comprised Cognitive Behavior
Therapy, specifically adapted to the postnatal period, together with either Video-Feedback Treatment
focusing on the mother-infant relationship or else Progressive Muscle Relaxation. At 2 years, over 80%
mothers in both groups were free from depression, and the children’s outcome in both groups was in
line with local population norms on measures of behavior problems, attachment security, and cognitive
54
Mothering
development.Together, these studies suggest that tackling postnatal depression and its associated parent-
ing problems may be effective in preventing adverse child outcome as long as treatments are sufficiently
intensive and rigorous to resolve the core difficulty.
Implications of the Specificity of Parenting Effects for Interventions

The evidence that particular aspects of parenting are associated with different child outcomes can
be harnessed in delivering successful interventions, and can also potentially help explain why some
interventions are not successful. By way of illustration, we consider two interventions delivered to
mothers of children under 2 years old in a LMIC, South Africa. Initial epidemiological work in a
poor, peri-urban community near Cape Town had shown the rate of insecure infant attachment to
be high (Tomlinson et al., 2005), as was the rate of maternal depression and difficulties in mother-
infant interactions (Cooper et al., 1999). Accordingly, an intervention, “Thula Sana,” was subse-
quently mounted in this same community that was designed to address the precursors of insecure
attachment (Cooper et al., 2009). Mothers were identified in pregnancy and randomized to receive
either routine health services care, or else a home visiting program from late pregnancy through to
6 months postpartum, delivered by local trained community workers. The intervention included
nondirective counseling and specific support for the mother’s management of attachment-relevant
infant behavior. This support included encouraging the mother to think of her infant as a sentient
individual with the motivation and capacity to communicate, and helping her to handle distressed or
difficult infant behavior sensitively: At 18 months, infants whose mothers had received the interven-
tion were significantly more likely than the control infants to be securely attached. Nonetheless, in
spite of the positive benefits to attachment of the Thula Sana intervention, there were no gains in
terms of infant cognitive development, with the IQ of both groups of infants being only 85, and,
notably, there was no association between the infants’ security/insecurity of attachment and their IQ
(L. Murray, Cooper, et al., 2016).
Considering the principle of specificity of parenting effects, the negative results from Thula
Sana concerning infant IQ are not altogether surprising: The intervention had targeted parent-
ing practices of particular relevance to attachment, but there had been no support for infant
cognitive exploration or mastery of their environment. In fact, cognitive failure is a pressing
problem in the South African context, with a recent review, for example, showing the coun-
try to be bottom of the international league table in terms of literacy (Twist, 2007). A further
intervention was, therefore, implemented that focused on providing mothers with specific tools
to support their infants’ cognitive functioning, and particularly their language and attention.
On the basis of the evidence from observational studies (Fletcher and Reese, 2005), together
with results of a small number of trials in HICs in which parents had been trained in “dialogic
reading” (Whitehurst et al., 1994), a supportive book-sharing program was developed for the
South Africa peri-urban context. Parents of 1.5-year-old infants, who had almost invariably not
had any experience of sharing books with their infants before, attended weekly sessions in small
groups over a period of 6 weeks, during which a local trained facilitator instructed them, using
slideshow presentations with accompanying video examples, in good book-sharing practices.
These included following the infant’s interest, pointing to and naming elements of the pictures,
elaborating on the content and linking it to the infant’s own experience, and seeking to draw
the infant into an active, two-way engagement. Both an initial pilot trial (Cooper et al., 2014)
and a full randomized controlled trial (Vally, Murray, Tomlinson, and Cooper, 2015) showed
substantial benefits of the program to infant language and attention that were mediated by
improvements in parental book-sharing (L. Murray, De Pascalis, Tomlinson et al., 2016). A recent
review confirms the generality of these positive effects of book-sharing training on child lan-
guage development, but also, and as with interventions for postnatal depression, highlights the
55
Lynne Murray et al.
importance of providing an intervention that is more intensive if benefits are to be obtained

(Dowdall et al., 2018).
The examples concerning interventions for mothers and for mothering, drawn from a wide range
of populations, are encouraging on a number of fronts. With regard to postnatal depression, even in
the context of persistent episodes with relatively severe symptoms and associated difficulties in the
mother-infant relationship, psychological treatments can be highly effective if delivered intensively
during the period when the child is developing core skills. Support for mothering delivered by
trained community workers in LMIC contexts can also be highly effective, and benefits to different
child outcomes can be enhanced when programs integrate evidence from developmental psychology
concerning the specificity of parenting effects.
Conclusions
Models of motherhood have undergone significant changes over the decades, with increasing
acknowledgment of its complexity and of the lack of uniformity in the way different mothers adapt.
A common theme to emerge is that better adjustment involves taking on board the complexities of
the experience, and finding the means to face and resolve the inevitable emotional demands and life
changes that follow the transition to motherhood. This is not just an individual matter, however, but
is influenced by the woman’s network of social relationships and by wider societal structures.
Studies of the impact of mothering on child development have often drawn on research con-
cerning severe deprivation, as occurs in some notable examples of institutional care, where profound
and long-lasting effects have been demonstrated. Caution is required, however, in equating such
conditions with the absence of mothering, because in most studies of this kind, institutional depriva-
tion has been pervasive. The impact of mothering has also been informed by studying not only the
effects of clinical disorders (e.g., maternal depression), where parenting can often be impaired but
also variation within typical samples. These studies show that the nature of mothering is not simply
a function of the mother herself, but is a two-way process to which children actively contribute. It is
also evident that mothering is not unidimensional, and subsumed under some generic quality such
as “sensitivity,” but is multifaceted, with distinctive parenting practices being associated with different
dimensions of child developmental outcome.
For a number of reasons, this chapter has focused on mothering during the first 2 years. This is
a time when maternal care may be particularly important, as it is a period when the foundations of
core capacities that underlie later child functioning are laid. Nevertheless, mother-child relationships
do, of course, continue, and although the same dimensions of support for social and cognitive devel-
opment and for attachment and emotion regulation still apply, the way in which they play out neces-
sarily involves important shifts and changes in their patterns. For example, in the United States and
many European societies, mothers will, with the preschool years, increase the degree of autonomy
they allow their children; in the school years, they will generally play a critical role in supporting
their child’s peer relationships; the child in middle school will need more support from mother to
become self-reliant; the preteen years require mothers to support their children taking appropriate
risks that will help prepare them for achieving individuation into adulthood; and in adolescence,
mothers will give their children guidance in finding resources, and will increasingly negotiate conse-
quences and responsibilities in relation to the young person’s behavior (Barnard and Solchany, 2002).
Notwithstanding such changes, as children grow up and eventually leave home, mothers still typically
remain significant people in their children’s lives. This enduring significance is particularly likely to
be the case when mothers become grandmothers, when their support may become important in
new ways (Smith and Wild, 2019), and mothers are also likely to be particularly significant to their
children, when, in time, the tables may turn, and offspring may become engaged in the support and
care of their aging and dependent parents (Fingerman, Kim, Tennant, Birditt, and Zarit, 2016).
56
Mothering
Acknowledgments
We are grateful to Kirsten Arendse for her helpful comments on the manuscript, and Joan Raphael-
Leff and Arietta Slade for sharing their latest work on mothering with us.
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3
FATHERS AND FAMILIES
Introduction
Theoretical assumptions that guide research on fathers and families both explain the choice of topics
and provide an organizational structure for this chapter. We draw attention to 11 themes of impor-
tance. First, to understand fully the nature of father-child relationships, it is necessary to recognize
the interdependence among the roles and functions of all family members. Families are best viewed
as social systems. Consequently, to understand the behavior of one member of a family, the comple-
mentary behaviors of other members also need to be recognized and assessed. For example, as men’s
roles in families shift, changes in women’s roles in families are also in flux (Parke, 1996, 2013).
Second, family members—mothers, fathers, and children—influence each other both directly
and indirectly (Cox and Paley, 2003; Parke, Power, and Gottman, 1979). Examples of fathers’ indirect
impact include various ways in which fathers modify and mediate mother-child relationships. In
turn, women affect their children indirectly through their husbands by modifying both the quantity
and the quality of father-child interaction. Children may indirectly influence the husband-wife rela-
tionship by altering the behavior of either parent that consequently changes the interaction between
spouses.
Third, different levels of analysis are necessary to understand fathers. The individual level—child,
mother, and father—remains a useful and necessary level of analysis, but recognition of relationships
among family members as levels or units of analysis is also necessary. The marital, the mother-child,
and the father-child relationships require separate analyses. The family as a unit that is independent
of the individual or dyads within the family requires recognition (McHale and Lindahl, 2011).
Fourth, families are embedded within a variety of other social systems, including both formal
and informal support systems as well as the cultures in which they exist. These include a wide range
of extrafamilial influences such as extended families, informal community ties such as friends and
neighbors, work sites, and social, educational, and medical institutions (Leventhal, Dupéré, and Shuey,
2015; Parke, 2013).
Fifth, the role of biology in shaping father roles has become more widely recognized. Fathers and
families are embedded in a network of biological and neurological systems, and we will examine the
biological basis of fathering. This perspective suggests that fathers (as well as mothers) are biologi-
cally prepared for the parenting role due to hormonal changes as well as neurological predispositions
to respond to infants as part of their preparation for the caregiving role (Feldman, Gordon, Influs,
Gutbir, and Ebstein, 2013; Swain et al., 2014).
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Fathers and Families
A sixth assumption concerns the importance of considering father-child relationships from a vari-
ety of developmental perspectives. Developmental changes in child perceptual-cognitive and soci-
oemotional capacities represent the most commonly investigated types of development. In addition,
a life-span perspective (Elder, Shanahan, and Jennings, 2015; Parke and Elder, in press) suggests the
importance of examining developmental changes in the adult because parents continue to change
and develop during adult years. For example, age at the time of the onset of parenthood can have
important implications for how females and males manage their maternal and paternal roles. Adult
age involves an exploration of the tasks faced by adults such as self-identity, education, and career and
examination of relations between these tasks and the demands of parenting.
A seventh assumption involves recognition of the impact of secular shifts on families. In recent
years, a variety of social changes in the United States has had a profound impact on families. These
include the decline in fertility and family size, changes in the timing of the onset of parenthood,
increased participation of women in the workforce, an initial rise in rates of divorce that has become
more stable, and subsequent increase in the number of single-parent families (Golombok, 2015;
Parke, 2013). The ways in which these society-wide changes impact on interaction patterns between
parents and children merit examination.
Another closely related eighth assumption involves recognition of the importance of the his-
torical time period in which the family interaction is taking place (Parke and Elder, in press). His-
torical time periods provide the social conditions for individual and family transitions: Examples
include the 1930s (the Great Depression), the 1960s (the Vietnam War Era), or the 1980s (Farm
Belt Depression). Across these historical time periods, family interactions may be quite different due
to the peculiar conditions of the particular era (Elder et al., 2015). These distinctions among differ-
ent developmental trajectories, as well as social change and historical period effects, are important
because these different forms of change do not always harmonize (Elder et al., 2015; Parke, 1988).
For example, a family event such as the birth of a child—the transition to parenthood—may have
very profound effects on a man who has just begun a career in contrast to the effects on one who has
advanced to a stable occupational position. Moreover, individual and family developmental trajecto-
ries are embedded within both the social conditions and the values of the historical time in which
they exist (Elder et al., 2015). The role of parents, as is the case with any social role, is responsive to
such fluctuations (Cabrera, Fitzgerald, Bradley, and Roggman, 2014).
A ninth assumption addresses the major challenge concerning the universality of theories about
fathers and families and the error of assuming that generalizations from a single culture (e.g., United
States) to other cultures are appropriate (Rogoff, 2003). Cultures vary enormously in how they
organize their families, how they allocate family roles to different individuals, what outcomes they
value in their children, and even what childrearing tactics they choose to achieve their socialization
goals. Although there are many similarities across and within cultural groups around the globe, we
need to recognize the variations and how to learn from these variations. Closely related to the issue
of cross-cultural variation in fathering is recognition that intracultural variations in ethnicity need to
be considered as well. It is important not only to examine the diversity of familial organization, roles,
goals, and strategies across ethnic groups but also it is equally critical to explore variations within
different ethnic groups (Parke, 2013). Recognizing the ethnic diversity within our own culture is
necessary both for understanding variations in fatherhood and for guiding social policy.
A tenth assumption concerns the role of cognitive factors in understanding father-child relation-
ships. Specifically, we assume that the ways in which parents perceive, organize, and understand both
their children and their roles as parents will affect the nature of father-child interaction (Cookston
et al., 2012; Goodnow and Collins, 1990).
The eleventh and final assumption observes that research on fathering benefits from an inter-
sectional framework that operationalizes both identity and social position simultaneously (Shields,
2008). Because fathers have authority over their children, they are imbued with power in the lives
65
of others that nonfathers lack. Similarly, when men enact the role of father, they assume a gendered
identity that differs from mothering in the types of experiences a man might provide his child, his
expectations for the child’s behavior when they are together, and his expectations for how the child
should act when alone with the father versus when in public. Themes of identity and social position
abound when fathers are the focus of study, such as the father’s sex assignment at birth, ethnicity,
socioeconomic opportunities and disadvantage in childhood, and availability of male role models
during childhood, among others.
To understand the nature of father-child relationships within families, a multilevel and dynamic
approach is required. Multiple levels of analysis are necessary to capture the individual, dyadic, and
family unit aspects of operation within the family itself as well as to reflect the embeddedness of
families within a variety of extrafamilial social systems. The dynamic quality reflects the multiple
developmental trajectories that warrant consideration in understanding the nature of families in
children’s development.
Figure 3.1 serves as a theoretical guide for the chapter and aims to capture the transactional nature
of the linkages among predictors and father and child outcomes.
The substantive portion of this chapter begins with a discussion of the nature of father-child rela-
tionships and how these shift across development of the child. Next, the chapter moves to an exami-
nation of the determinants of father involvement to examine the impact of the marital relationship
on the parent-child relationship. The effect of historical changes, namely, shifts in work patterns of
family members and changes in the timing of the onset of parenthood on father-child relationships,
will be reviewed. Finally, the implications of fathering for men themselves, their wives, and their
children are examined.
This chapter is a review of recent work on fatherhood and devotes less attention to the historical
aspects of the topic. However, several reviews caution against any simple and linear set of histori-
cal trends that lead clearly from the past to the present (LaRossa, 1997; 2012; Parke and Stearns,
1993; Pleck, 2004; Rotundo, 1993). Perhaps most striking is the continued tension and variability in
fathering behavior—a set of characteristics that have long marked definitions of fatherhood. There
have always been counteracting forces that have both promoted and limited father involvement with
their children and families. There have been “good dads and bad dads” (Furstenberg, 1988) through-
out the course of the history of fatherhoods, and this theme of variability in the amount, type, and
consistency of fathering across time and context continues (Furstenberg, 2014). It is encouraging to
note that there has been an increase in research attention to fathers from diverse family structures as
reflected in journal articles focused on fathers (Goldberg, Tan, and Thorsen, 2009). Stearns (1991,
p. 50) characterized the shifts over the last century as follows:
The most pressing context for fatherhood over the past century has been the change in
work—family relationship. . . . An 18th Century father would not recognize the distance
contemporary men face between work and home or the importance of sports in father-
child relationships or the parental leadership granted to mothers or indeed the number
of bad fathers. An 18th Century father would, however, recognize certain contemporary
tensions such as a balance between seeking and giving love on the one hand and defining
proper authority and he might feel kinship to present-day fathers who sense some tension
between responses they regard as male and special restraints required for proper family life.
In summary, many of the themes that characterize contemporary thinking about fatherhood have
clearer antecedents over the last century than we often assume. There has been a tendency to confuse
the resurgence of interest in fathering as a research topic with the assumption that the changes in
fathering activities have been only recent as well.
66
Biological
Paternal hormones Men
Temperament Self-identy
Neurological influences Psychological adjustment
Emoonal processes Generavity
Encoding and decoding
Physical health
Individual Emoonal regulaon
Relaonship with partner
Relaonship with family of origin Display rule skills
Work paerns
Preparaon for parenng
Paternal mental health
Child (e.g., temperament, age, sex) Aenon regulaon
Ability to aend to relevant cues,
Coparental sustain aenon, and refocus
Father
Couple relaonship aenon
involvement
Maternal gatekeeping
Coresidenal status
Timing of parenthood Cognive processes
Cognive working models Children
Representaons of relaonships Emoonal development
Contextual Perceived maering Social development
Socioeconomic status Language development
Employment opportunies Cognive development
Ethnicity
Governmental policies
Other social influences
Societal condions changing over me

Figure 3.1 Theoretical overview of the predictors and consequences of father involvement
Paternal Versus Maternal Involvement With Children

There are overall differences in the quantity of involvement for mothers and fathers, and there are
important stylistic or qualitative differences as well. Not all forms of father involvement are concep-
tually equivalent (Lamb, Pleck, and Levine, 1985; Palkovitz, 1997; Parke, 2000). The most influential
scheme was offered by Lamb and his colleagues (Lamb, Pleck, Charnov, and Levine, 1987; Lamb
et al., 1985), who suggested three components: Interaction, availability, and responsibility.
Interaction refers to the father’s direct contact with his child through caregiving and shared activi-
ties. Availability is a related concept concerning the father’s potential availability for interaction, by
virtue of being present or accessible to the child whether direct interaction is occurring. Responsi-
bility refers to the role the father takes in ascertaining that the child is taken care of and arranging
for resources to be available for the child (Lamb et al., 1987, p. 125).
As several previous authors (e.g., Palkovitz, 1997; Parke, 2000; Pleck, 2010) found, the focus of
research on fathers has been primarily on face-to-face parent-child interaction. To a large degree,
this emphasis reflects the common assumption that parental influence takes place directly through
face-to-face contact or indirectly through the impact of the interaction on another family member.
Pleck (2010) modified this conceptual scheme to further distinguish specific qualitative aspects of
interaction, namely, warmth, responsiveness, and control. This has encouraged researchers to meas-
ure not only time with the child but also the quality of the interactions as well. In turn, the goal
was to increase the strength of the links between aspects of father engagement and child outcomes.
However, it is still useful for cross-time comparisons to continue to track changes in the relative
level of father and mother overall involvement as part of the goal of monitoring shifting family roles
by mothers and fathers. If the goal is to assess the effects of parental behavior on child outcomes,
qualitative measures of the type of involvement are generally better than simply the amount of time
in parental activities (Maccoby and Martin, 1983). Other updates on the paternal involvement meas-
ure have been suggested. Absolute and relative involvement need to be distinguished because these
two indices are independent and may affect both children’s and adults’ views of role distributions
in different ways (Pleck, 2010; Pleck and Masciadrelli, 2004). It is important to distinguish among
domains of involvement, because fathers and mothers vary in their distribution of time across dif-
ferent child and household activities (Doucet, 2013). Several distinctions have been made including
personal care activities, involvement in play, leisure, and affiliative activities with children (Beitel
and Parke, 1998; Palkovitz, 2002; Pleck, 2010). Others (Yeung, Sandberg, Davis-Kean, and Hofferth,
2001) have expanded the domain list to include not just personal care and play but also achievement-
related activities (homework, reading), household activities (housework, shopping), social activities
(conversation, social events), and other activities (time in school, sleep). As noted ahead, both the
amount of time that fathers spend on these different activities and the determinants of involvement
in these domains vary across fathers. Finally, estimates of father involvement have usefully distin-
guished between weekdays and weekends because both the types of activities and levels of father
involvement vary as a function of the time period being assessed (Yeung et al., 2001).
Although the availability issue has been addressed largely through the research on father absence as
a consequence of either divorce or unwed parenthood (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010; McLanahan
and Sandefer, 1994; Stevenson et al., 2014), studies of the quantity and quality of fathers’ nonfamily
work have begun to shed light on variations in father availability (O’Brien and Moss, 2010; Williams,
2010). Finally, researchers and theorists have recognized the “managerial” function of parents (Lamb
et al.’s “responsibility” notion) and have examined the impact of variations in how this managerial
function influences child development (Furstenberg, Cook, Eccles, Elder, and Sameroff, 1999; Parke
et al., 2003). By managerial, we refer to the ways in which parents organize and arrange the child’s
home environment and set limits on the range of the home setting to which the child has access and
the opportunities for social contact with playmates and socializing agents outside the family. The
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managerial role may be just as important as the parent’s role as stimulator, because the amount of
time that children spend interacting with the inanimate environment far exceeds their social interac-
tion time (White, Kaban, Shapiro, and Attonucci, 1976). Nor are fathers always mere helpers; in over
20% of married employed mother families, fathers served as the primary care provider during the
hours that the mother was working (U.S. Census Bureau, 2008). So fathers are active contributors to
childcare not only in U.S. culture but in other places as well. Mothers still do more than fathers of
the child caregiving, such as feeding and diapering in infancy and in providing meals, school lunches,
and clothing, as the child develops (Gray and Anderson, 2010; Pleck, 2010). And mothers continue
to assume more managerial responsibility than fathers, such as arranging social contacts, organizing
schedules, taking the child for medical checkups, and monitoring homework and school-related
tasks. However, these patterns change as a function of the time of the week and the age of the child.
For example, fathers are more involved in household activities (shopping) and social activities on
weekends than weekdays, and play as the focus of fathering decreases as the child develops (Yeung
et al., 2001).
Mothers and fathers differ in their degree of responsibility for management of family tasks. From
infancy through middle childhood, mothers are more likely to assume the managerial role than
fathers. In infancy, this means setting boundaries for play, taking the child to the doctor, or arranging
day care (Doucet, 2013; Power and Parke, 1982). In middle childhood, mothers continue to assume
more managerial responsibility (e.g., directing the child to have a bath, to eat a meal, to put away toys)
(Russell and Russell, 1987). Nor is the managerial role restricted to family activities but includes initi-
ating and arranging children’s access to peers and playmates (Ladd, 2005; McDowell and Parke, 2009),
and maintaining contact with teachers and schools (Kim and Hill, 2015), tasks which fathers are less
likely to undertake than mothers. In addition, parents function as supervisors or overseers of especially
younger children’s interactions with age mates. Both mothers and fathers are equally capable of this
type of supervisory behavior as shown in laboratory studies (Bhavnagri and Parke, 1991) and in home
contexts, but fathers are less likely than mothers to perform this supervisory role in everyday settings
(Bhavnagri and Parke, 1991; Ladd, Profilet, and Hart, 1992). As Doucet (2013) observed, this dispar-
ity between men and women’s managerial/responsibility roles has persisted: “The responsibility for
childcare and domestic life has remained overwhelmingly in women’s hands” (pp. 302–303).
The extent to which fathers in intact families participate in childcare needs to be distinguished
from the level of involvement of fathers who are not coresident with their children for a variety of
reasons including divorce, out-of-wedlock births, economic hardship, or incarceration. In fact, this
conceptual distinction reflects the contradictory trends in the fathering literature that Furstenberg
(2014) characterized as the “two-tier family system.” On the one hand, well-educated and economi-
cally viable fathers seem to be increasing their involvement and moving slowly toward more equal
participation with their wives in the care and rearing of children. On the other hand, due to lack
of education and limited employment opportunities, many men forgo marriage and, in many cases,
coresidency due to lack of education and limited employment opportunities and develop different pat-
terns of involvement with their children than fathers in intact families. Similarly, other groups of fathers
who are separated from their children due to military deployment, incarceration, or immigration are
receiving attention. By recognizing these various groups of fathers beyond traditional intact, residential
family-based fathers, the variability in contemporary fathering becomes evident and reminds us that
change across time in fathering is not linear and straightforward but is contradictory and inconsistent
and open to influence by changing societal conditions.
Father Involvement in Intact, Majority Families in the United States

Most attention in the research literature has been devoted to the study of fathers in two-parent intact
families. According to a survey of over 1,100 journal articles from 1930 to 2006, 76% of the fathers
69
were from two-parent families and the rest were focused on divorced, single or nonresident father
families (Goldberg, Tan, and Thorsen, 2009). In spite of shifts in cultural attitudes concerning the
appropriateness and desirability of shared roles and equal levels of participation in routine caregiving
and interaction for mothers and fathers, the shifts toward parity are small, but nonetheless real (Pleck,
2010). More mothers are entering the workforce, but current occupational arrangements still mean
that the vast majority of fathers have less opportunity for interaction with their children than mothers.
Bianchi, Robinson, and Milkie (2006) using a national survey of parents, found that in the year 2000,
resident American fathers with children under 18 spent an average of 2.4 hours per week in interactive
activities with their children in comparison to 3.3 hours for mothers. Fathers spent 72% of the time as
mothers. Across time there is a marked increase. In comparison with 1965, the interactive engagement
time in 2000 increased 94% while mothers’ time increased even more from 1.5 hours to 3.3 hours.
However, the gap is closing, as data from 2003 to 2004 indicate that fathers’ engagement had increased
to 3.0 hours (Wang and Bianchi, 2009). To place these trends in perspective, fathers also increased their
time in routine care as well as direct interactive activities. Fathers spent 4.1 hours per week in routine
childcare activities and were present and accessible to their children another 26.5 hours per week. This
was an impressive 33 hours per week in total time with their children.
Compared with mothers, fathers’ total time in 2000 was 64.7% of time as mothers compared with
44.7% in 1965 (Bianchi et al., 2006). Others report similar trends. Yeung et al. (2001) found that the rel-
ative time fathers in intact families were directly engaged with children was 67% of the time that moth-
ers were involved on weekdays and 87% of mothers’ engagement on weekends. Accessibility showed
similar shifts across time and in accord with earlier estimates were higher than levels of engagement.
Involvement Among Ethnic Minority Fathers in the United States

The historical view of the African American father as absent or uninvolved in the lives of their
children is no longer valid, and recent work has corrected the scholarly neglect of this large ethnic
minority group (12% of U.S. population). Comparisons across ethnic groups (African and European
American) revealed either few differences in level of father involvement (Yeung et al., 2001) or in
some studies African American fathers are higher in their levels of caregiving and play than Euro-
pean American fathers (Cabrera, Hoffreth, and Schae, 2011; Hofferth, 2003). The greater level of
caregiving involvement is consistent with the less traditional attitudes of African American fathers
toward gender roles than European American fathers (Gadsden, 1999). However, studies of African
American families confirm the pattern found for European Americans, namely, that fathers were
less involved in caregiving their infants than mothers (Roopnarine and Hossain, 2013). In a study
of Head Start fathers, African American fathers of sons reported more involvement in physical play
and social activities (taking children out with friends and visiting relatives) than European American
fathers (Leavell et al., 2012). In terms of responsibility, African American fathers are higher in moni-
toring than European American fathers, in part possibly due to their residence in more dangerous
neighborhoods (Deater-Deckard and Dodge, 1997). As we note ahead, even nonresidential African
American fathers are more involved with their children than is commonly assumed.
Another ethnic group that has received increased attention is Latin American fathers. Today,
Latino Americans constitute 18% of the U.S. population, and it is projected that by 2065, Latin
American families will be the most prominent minority in the U.S. culture at 24% (Pew Charitable
Trust, 2015). Historically, it was assumed that Latino fathers are “traditional patriarchs, authoritar-
ian, and emotionally uninvolved, and not very engaged in the daily care of their children” (Cabrera,
Aldoney, and Tamis-Lemonda, 2013, p. 248). Recent research suggests that this portrait is outdated
and misleading. In contrast to this characterization, Latino fathers typically rear their children in
two-parent families where fathers are often involved in their children’s lives from an early age, even
beginning in the prenatal period (Cabrera et al., 2009). The importance of focusing on Latino fathers
70
stems from Latin American fathers having been found to be more involved in household and per-
sonal care activities than European American fathers (Yeung et al., 2001) and spending more time
in caregiving activities than fathers of other ethnic groups (Cabrera et al., 2011; Hofferth, 2003).
Finally, Latino fathers show similar levels of affection and warmth to their children as fathers of
other ethnicities (Hofferth, 2003; Toth and Xu, 1999). Studies of responsibility among Latino fathers
have focused on monitoring and restrictiveness of their children’s behavior. Some reports increased
restriction of their children’s behavior (Toth and Xu, 1999), especially for daughters (Wilson, Dal-
berth, and Koo, 2010). At the same time, as in the case of other groups, fathers spend less time than
mothers in routine caregiving and more time in play (Roopnarine and Hossain, 2013). These find-
ings are consistent with Latino values of familism, which stress the centrality of family life in Latino
culture. Acculturation is important as well. More acculturated Latino fathers are more involved with
their children than less acculturated men (Glass and Owen, 2010)
Asian Americans are another rapidly growing ethnic minority. Although Asian Americans cur-
rently constitute 6% of the U.S. population, this will increase to 14% by 2065 (Pew Charitable Trust,
2015). Asian American fathers in comparison with mothers have typically been viewed as aloof and
uninvolved with their children (Ishii-Kuntz, 2009). Again, this stereotype has some historical basis,
but the portrait of the modern Asian father is changing due to both patterns of immigration and
acculturation as well as shifting economic conditions in some Asian countries (Chao and Tseng,
2002; Ishii-Kuntz, 2009; Li and Lamb, 2013). In both Asian American and Asian families, there are
some general findings that characterize maternal and paternal roles in the family. The strong com-
mitment to the breadwinner role among Asian fathers has resulted in men’s limited involvement
with the care of their children (Ishii-Kuntz, 2009; Li and Lamb, 2013) compared with mothers as
well as to men in other cultures. For example, Japanese fathers are less involved with their children
compared with mothers and less than fathers in other countries (Ishii-Kuntz, 2009). Similar lower
levels of father involvement in childcare relative to mothers have been reported for Chinese families
(Chuang and Zhu, 2018; Jankowiak, 2010; Lau, 2016) as well as Taiwanese families (Sun and Roo-
pnarine, 1996). In China, fathers were not viewed as sufficiently competent or trustworthy to care for
infants. Instead, in Chinese families, a father’s role was focused on children’s education when children
entered middle school (Li and Lamb, 2013). However, the centrality of the men’s breadwinning role
among Asian fathers is changing (Li and Lamb, 2013; Nakazawa and Shwalb, 2013). In one study,
81% of Japanese fathers ranked the paternal role as first or second in importance among five paternal
roles—evidence that the importance of the worker role is lessening (Shwalb et al., 2010). An increase
in the labor force participation of women in both China and Japan has contributed to this decline. In
Japan, fathers are more likely to be involved in childcare when their wives were employed full time
(Ishii-Kuntz, 2009). In China, a similar pattern has emerged with a shift away from the focus only on
the provider role for father to a more multifaceted set of roles including a more active role in child-
care (Chuang and Su, 2008; Chuang and Zhu, 2018), although some evidence suggests that paternal
involvement is more evident among preschoolers and older children than with infants ( Jankowiak,
2010). There are also rural/urban and regional differences. Urban Chinese fathers are less oriented
to traditional gender roles, more likely to be more involved with their children, and tend to have
closer relationships with their children than their rural counterparts, in part due to higher employ-
ment rates among urban mothers as well as more exposure to contemporary cultural messages con-
cerning parental roles (Song, 2004). In terms of regional variations, fathers in Asian Indian families
are less likely to participate in household and childcare work even when their wives are employed,
which suggests that patriarchal values may persist in some Asian regions more than others (Suppal
and Roopnarine, 1999). As in the case in other cultures, Asian fathers are more likely to be play-
mates or as children enter school to act as an educational guide than as caregivers, a reminder that
involvement still often follows gender-based scripts (Chuang and Su, 2008; Song, 2004). Similarly, in
the United States and Canada as Asian families become more acculturated, there is a trend toward
71
greater equality in the division of household labor including more equity in childcare responsibili-
ties among Japanese Americans (Ishii-Kuntz, 2009), Chinese Canadian (Costigan and Su, 2008), and
Asian Indian immigrant fathers in the United States ( Jain and Belsky, 1997). However, the patterns
are not uniform across Asian subgroups that vary in terms of immigration patterns and levels of
economic participation. It is clear from these brief examples that cultural factors will either enhance
or diminish differences between mothers and fathers and underscore the plasticity of parental roles.
These findings are important in light of past negative characterizations of low-income African
American and Latin American fathers as uninvolved. Clearly, the stereotypes surrounding fathers of
different ethnic backgrounds are inaccurate and outdated and needs to be revised in light of recent
evidence (Cabrera et al. 2013; Roopnarine and Hossain, 2013). Much of the earlier work concern-
ing fathering among ethnic minority fathers was based on single-parent families and/or on young
unwed fathers and failed to recognize differences within ethnic groups.
Father Involvement in International Perspective

An examination of non-U.S. countries reveals a pattern similar to the one observed in the United
States. From 1965 to 2000, fathers in Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, France, and the United
Kingdom showed a similar increase over time in the amount of “child care time” (Bianchi et al.
2006). However, with the exception of France, “childcare time” for U.S. fathers is lower than fathers
in many industrial countries, with British fathers being highest (Bianchi et al., 2006). The most com-
prehensive cross-national examination of this issue comes from the Multinational Time Use Study
in which time use diary surveys across 16 countries were utilized to assess cross-time shifts from the
1960s to the 2000s in men’s and women’s household roles (Kan, Sullivan, and Gershuny, 2011). As
expected, women continue to devote more time to routine housework (e.g., cooking, cleaning, other
care) than men who, in turn, have increased their contribution to nonroutine household tasks (e.g.,
shopping, gardening, house repairs). Over time, the gender gap is closing, in part, due to a reduction
in routine household activities by mothers and an increase in men’s contributions to these tasks.
Small-scale studies in several countries including Sweden, Israel, and Japan confirm this general
pattern (see Shwalb, Shwalb, and Lamb, 2013). These findings are consistent with the more general
proposition that pregnancy and birth of a first child, in particular, are occasions for a shift toward a
more traditional division of roles regardless of whether their initial role division between husbands
and wives was traditional or equalitarian (Cowan and Cowan, 2010).
Developmental changes in father involvement

The overall pattern of contact time between mothers and fathers and their infants and toddlers contin-
ues into middle childhood and adolescence. In a study of middle childhood (6- to 7-year-olds), Russell
and Russell (1987) found that Australian mothers were available to children 54.7 hours/week compared
with 34.6 hours/week for fathers. Mothers also spent more time alone with children (22.6 hours/week)
than did fathers (2.4 hours/week). However, when both parents and child were together, mothers and
fathers initiated interactions with children with equal frequency and children’s initiations toward each
parent were similar. Adolescents spend less time with their parents than younger children and less time
alone with their father than with their mother (Larson and Richards, 1994).
Part of the explanation for the greater involvement of mothers versus fathers is because the
maternal parenting role is more mandatory and more clearly scripted by our culture, whereas pater-
nal parenting is less clearly scripted and more discretionary. The gendered nature of parenting roles
is illustrated by custody decisions which, in spite of shifts toward more equal custody arrangements
across mothers and fathers, continue to favor mothers. In a study with a national probability sample,
Kelly, Redenbach, and Rinaman (2005) found that in 80% of the cases, the mother received sole
72
physical custody of the minor child or children. However, the number of fathers with sole custody
has increased over the last several decades as a result of the growing national fatherhood movement,
the growing recognition of fathers as significant parental figures and perhaps father-friendlier courts
(Stevenson et al., 2014).
A caveat is in order. The lower level of father involvement in caregiving and other forms of inter-
action does not imply that fathers are less competent than mothers to care for infants and children.
Competence can be measured in a variety of ways; one approach is to measure the parent’s sensitivity
to infant cues in the feeding context. Success in caregiving, to a large degree, depends on the parent’s
ability to correctly “read” or interpret the infant’s behavior so that the parent’s own behavior can be
regulated to respond appropriately. Decades of research has documented that maternal and paternal
behavior that is contingent on, sensitive to, and responsive to a child’s signals and behavior is critical
for adequate development (Tamis-LeMonda and Baumwell, 2001; Tamis-LeMonda, Baumwell, and
Cabrera, 2013). Beginning in infancy, fathers’ sensitivity to a variety of cues (e.g., auditory distress
signals during feeding [sneeze, spit up, cough], vocalizations, mouth movements) is just as marked as
mothers’ responsivity to these cues (Parke and Sawin, 1976, 1980) in spite of the fact that fathers may
spend less time in caregiving activities. Moreover, the amount of milk consumed by infants when
either their mothers and fathers were the feeding agent is similar; fathers and mothers are equally
successful in feeding their infant. Other evidence is similar: Mothers and fathers show similar levels
of sensitivity to their 24- and 30-month-old children’s behavior during play (Tamis-LeMonda et al.,
2004) and are responsive to their 12-month-olds when engaged in an interactive task (Notaro and
Volling, 1999). Invoking a competence/performance distinction, fathers may not necessarily act
as a caregiver or interactive partner as often as mothers, but when called on, they are sensitive and
competent interactive agents. Fathers’ ability to perform caregiving tasks matches mothers’ skill in
middle childhood as well. As Russell and Russell (1987) found, both parents reported that they were
involved on a regular basis in a variety of caregiving activities (e.g., having a cuddle, sit and have a
talk) even though mothers were higher in their frequencies. Finally, fathers can function effectively as
managers and supervisors of their children’s activities, but do so less than mothers on a routine basis
(Ladd, 2005; Parke et al., 2003). Again, it appears that fathers are capable of this type of caregiving
function but execute this function less regularly than mothers. On balance, the evidence suggests that
fathers are competent caregiving agents.
Qualitative Effects: Stylistic Similarities and Differences

in Mother and Father Interaction
Although the levels of involvement may differ for mothers and fathers, their childrearing styles do
not differ greatly. Both mothers and fathers express warmth and responsiveness in their interactions
with their children, and in general, the notion of the aloof and unresponsive father is an outdated
view. For example, among residential fathers with preteens, 73% reported that they showed affec-
tion (87% for mothers),62% expressed love (85% for mothers), and 37% offered appreciation to
their children (55% for mothers; Child Trends, 2006). Similarly, evidence from other ethnic groups
reveals a similar picture. African American fathers showed moderate levels of responsiveness and low
levels of negative behavior directed toward infants (Shannon, Tamis-LeMonda, and Cabrera, 2006)
and toddlers (Mitchell and Cabrera, 2009). In the case of Asian fathers, Chao and Tseng (2002)
observed, “Parenting differences purported between Asian fathers and mothers have been based on
the traditional adage ‘strict father, kind mother’—wherein fathers exert high degrees of authoritar-
ian control and mothers manifest high degrees of warmth” (p. 73). Although there is some support
for this view among Chinese families, other studies of Asian American families fail to support this
profile. Consistent with a view endorsing a more involved mother, in a study of Chinese adolescents’
perceptions, maternal parenting was viewed as being more positive than paternal parenting (Shek,
73
2000). Adolescents stated that fathers showed less concern, less responsiveness, and higher levels of
harshness than mothers. Also, father-adolescent communication was perceived less positively and as
occurring less frequently than mother-adolescent communication (Shek, 2000). Others (Xu and
Zhang, 2008) report similar findings of low levels of communication and emotional support for
Chinese fathers. In contrast to this traditional picture of Asian families, studies of Asian American
immigrant families have found few differences between mothers and fathers in levels of authorita-
tive parenting control and warmth (Chao and Kim, 2000). Again, acculturation clearly plays a role in
helping to understand differences and similarities in mother-father childrearing styles. These patterns
present a clear challenge to our stereotype of the maternal and paternal childrearing styles among
Asian American families. In contrast to traditional portraits of Latino fathers as patriarchal, authori-
tarian, and aloof (Mirande, 2008), Latin American fathers are characterized as warm and nurturing
(Gamble, Ramakumar, and Diaz, 2007; Leidy et al., 2011; Toth and Xu, 1999) especially as a result
of acculturation (Taylor and Behnke, 2005). Similarly, African American fathers showed moderate
levels of responsiveness and low levels of negative behavior directed toward infants (Shannon et al.,
2006) and toddlers (Mitchell and Cabrera, 2009). However, mothers and fathers may exhibit differ-
ences in level of control. For example, African American fathers set limits less often than mothers
but have more sole responsibility for disciplining their children than European American fathers
(Child Trends, 2006). Among Latin American families, fathers often exercise more control over
children than mothers, especially in the case of adolescent daughters. Finally, among Asian American
immigrants, few mother-father differences in strictness have been found (Chao and Kim, 2000) in
contrast to higher levels of paternal compared with maternal strictness among mainland Chinese
families (Berndt et al.,1993). Clearly, acculturation and exposure to new cultural values play a role
in parenting styles.
In spite of similarities in interactive stylistic features, the contexts that mothers and fathers choose
for interacting with their children tend to differ. Fathers participate less than mothers in caregiving
and in providing meals, school lunches, and clothing but spend a greater percentage of the time avail-
able for interaction in play activities. Among North American families, fathers regardless of ethnicity
(European American, Asian American, African American, and Latin American) spent a greater per-
centage of time with their infants in play than mothers (Roopnarine and Hossain, 2013). However, in
absolute terms, mothers spend more time than fathers in play with their children (Yeung et al., 2001).
The quality of play across mothers and fathers differs too. Among young infants, older infants, and
toddlers, fathers’ hallmark style of interaction is physical play with characteristic degrees of arousal,
excitement, and unpredictability in terms of the pace of the interaction. In contrast, mothers’ playful
interactive style is characterized by a more modulated and less arousing tempo. Moreover, mothers
play more conventional motor games or toy-mediated activities and are more verbal and didactic
(Hossain and Roopnarine, 1994; Parke, 1996). They engage in more pretend play and role play than
fathers as well as more teaching activities than fathers (by labeling colors and shapes) as they engage
their infant in play (Power and Parke, 1982). Fathers engage in more physical play with sons than
daughters (Power and Parke, 1982), whereas mothers facilitate pretend play of their daughters more
than of their sons (Bornstein, 2007). In turn, girls engage in more frequent and more sophisticated
pretend play than boys (Bornstein, 2007). Nor are these effects evident only in infancy. MacDonald
and Parke (1984) found that fathers engaged in more physical play with their 3- and 4-year-old chil-
dren than mothers, whereas mothers engaged in more object-mediated play than fathers. The fathers’
distinctive role as a physical play partner changes with age, however. Physical play is highest between
fathers and 2-year-olds, and between 2 and 10 years of age, there is a decreased likelihood that fathers
engage their children physically (MacDonald and Parke, 1986). In spite of the decline in physical play
across age, fathers are still more often physical play partners than mothers. In an Australian study of
parents and their 6- to 7-year-old children (Russell and Russell, 1987), fathers were more involved
in physical/outdoor play interactions and fixing things around the house and garden than mothers.
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In contrast, mothers were more involved in caregiving, household tasks, reading, toy play, and arts
and crafts. In sum, fathers are tactile and physical, and mothers tend to be verbal, didactic, and toy-
mediated in their play. Clearly, infants and young children experience qualitatively different stimula-
tory patterns from mothers and fathers.
In adolescence, the quality of maternal and paternal involvement continues to differ. Just as in
earlier developmental periods, mothers and fathers may complement each other and provide models
that reflect the tasks of adolescence—connectedness and separateness. Across development, the focus
on physical play on the part of fathers declines and is replaced in adolescence by verbal playfulness in
the form of sarcasm, humor, and word play, even though this often increases emotional distance but
perhaps encourages independence and more equal and egalitarian exchanges as well (Shulman and
Klein, 1993): “Fathers, more than mothers conveyed the feeling that they can rely on their adoles-
cents, thus fathers might provide a ‘facilitating environment’ for adolescent attainment of differentia-
tion from the family and consolidation of independence” (Shulman and Klein, 1993, p. 53). Mothers
are more emotionally available to their adolescents, and mother-adolescent dyads spend more time
together than father-adolescent dyads (Larson and Richards, 1994; Larson and Sheeber, 2007). Moth-
ers continue to be more involved in arts, crafts, and reading, and maintain more open communica-
tion and emotional closeness with their offspring during adolescence. Although the style of fathers’
involvement as a play or recreational partner appears to have reasonable continuity from infancy
through adolescence, the meaning and function of this interaction style shift across development.
Why do mothers and fathers play differently? Both biological and environment factors probably
play a role. Experience with infants, the amount of time spent with infants, and the usual kinds of
responsibilities that a parent assumes are all factors that influence parents’ style of play. For example,
as a result of spending less time with infants and children than mothers, fathers may use their distinc-
tive arousing style as a way to increase their salience to compensate for their more limited interaction
time. Mothers who overall spend more time with their infants and young children than fathers focus
on less arousing types of activities such as symbolic pretend play (Bornstein, 2007). Biological factors
cannot be ignored in light of the fact that male monkeys show the same rough-and-tumble physi-
cal style of play as U.S. human fathers, and infant male monkeys tend to respond more positively
to bids for rough-and-tumble play than females (Parke and Suomi, 1981): “Perhaps [both monkey
and human] males may be more susceptible to being aroused into states of positive excitement and
unpredictability than females” (Maccoby, 1988, p. 761)—speculation that is consistent with gender
differences in risk-taking and sensation seeking. In addition, human males, whether boys or men,
tend to behave more boisterously and show more positive emotional expression and reactions than
females (Maccoby, 1998). The fact that girls and their mothers engage in more symbolic pretend
play than fathers and boys suggests that mothers and fathers may enact complementary roles in their
children’s lives. Together, these threads of the puzzle suggest that predisposing biological differences
between males and females may influence the play patterns of mothers and fathers. At the same time,
the cross-cultural data underscore the ways in which cultural and environmental contexts shape play
patterns of parents and remind us of the high degree of plasticity of human social behaviors.
How mutable are these stylistic differences? The common wisdom concerning these parent gen-
der differences has been questioned. Instead, a profile has emerged of overlapping play styles between
and within mothers and fathers as well as adoption of a range of play styles by both mothers and
fathers has emerged. This revision does not diminish the contribution of either parent to children’s
development but opens up new questions about the processes through which parents contribute.
Moreover, we may need to reevaluate the distinctiveness of maternal and paternal contributions
to developmental outcomes but still recognize that both parents can play important roles. Despite
evidence about the unique styles of mothers and fathers, questions remain. The gender-of-parent
differences, on average, are relatively small, and there is a good deal of overlap between mothers
and fathers in both the style of play as well as in the absolute amount of time devoted to playful
75
interactions (Pleck, 2010; Yeung et al., 2001). And fathers do not own the physical play franchise;
mothers have a mixed play repertoire, too, and can and do bouncing and tickling as well as reading
and conversing with their children. In the same vein, fathers, like mothers, play with toys, read books,
and engage in pretend play in addition to their supposedly signature style of arousing and stimulating
physical play (Lamb and Lewis, 2010). Parents may do a variety of types of play not only in a single
play session but also across different days, weeks, or even times of day depending on their mood,
their energy level, the child’s momentary interest, and their child’s daily schedule. Both mothers and
fathers contribute to their children’s development in a myriad of playful ways (Roggman, Boyce,
Cook, Christiansen, and Jones, 2004; Tamis-LeMonda, 2004):
The stylistic differences in play between fathers and mothers became enshrined in our
views of mothers and fathers based on work conducted 20–30 years ago when traditional
conceptions of fathers’ role predominated, maternal employment was still relatively uncom-
mon and was viewed negatively, and fathers were much less involved in the day-to-day care
of their infants.
(Lamb and Lewis, 2010, p. 116)
As men in contemporary society have expanded their range of involvement to include more car-
egiving and managerial parenting activities, the predominance of play as the distinctive feature of
the father role has diminished in importance. Play has become merely one of a variety of ways that
fathers (and mothers) are involved with their children. Some leading father scholars have revised
their earlier views of the uniqueness of father play: “There is less and less justification for viewing the
identification of fatherhood with play and companionship as something with unique psychological
significance as was once thought” (Lamb and Lewis, 2010, p. 117).
Other Cultures, Other Interactive Styles, and Other Play Partners

Another challenge to the uniqueness of these play distinctions comes from scrutiny of other cultures,
which clearly demonstrates that both the quantity and quality of parental involvement vary across
cultures. This evidence has challenged the assumption of the universality of paternal physical play as
well as the widely shared view that physical play is the hallmark of fathers’ interactive style. In some
cultures that are similar to mainstream U.S. culture, such as England and Australia, there are compara-
ble differences between mothers and fathers in play. However, findings from several other cultures do
not find that physical play is a central feature of the father-infant relationship (Roopnarine and Hos-
sain, 2013; Shwalb et al., 2013). Neither in Sweden nor among Israeli Kibbutz families were fathers
more likely than mothers to play with their children or to engage in different types of physical play
(Hwang, 1987). Similarly, among Chinese Malaysian, Indian and Aka pygmy (Central Africa) par-
ents, parents, they rarely engage in physical play with their children (Hewlett and MacFarlan, 2010;
Roopnarine and Hossain, 2013). Instead, both parents display affection and engage in plenty of close
physical contact. Perhaps societies that value sharing and cooperation are less likely to encourage a
physical playful interactive style, whereas industrialized societies which are characterized by a high
degree of competition and value independence and assertiveness commonly support this interactive
style (Paquette, 2004). In fact, children in Western technologically advanced and highly individually
oriented societies have the highest levels of competition between partners in their play (Hughes,
1999). However, there is less competitive play among North American children reared in coopera-
tion-oriented communes (Plattner and Minturn, 1975) and perhaps less prevalence of physical play
between fathers and children, although the possible decrease in physical play has not been established.
Another challenge to the traditional view of mothers and fathers as play partners comes from
cross-cultural observations that parents are not always active play partners. Instead, in some cultures,
76
the play duties are assumed by other members of the community. In Italy, neither mothers nor fathers
but other women in the extended family or within the community are more likely to play physically
with infants (New and Benigini, 1987), and in Mexico, this physical play role often falls to siblings
(Zukow-Goldring, 2002). These findings suggest that the physical play role of the father is not
universal and that the play role may be assumed by other social agents in some cultures. Moreover,
these cross-national differences suggest that cultural context is one of the factors that may reduce
the differences—in this case, in terms of play style—between mother and father interaction patterns.
These observations argue for a reevaluation of the pathways through which fathers influence their
children and suggest that we reconsider the father’s physical play role as a major contributor to chil-
dren’s emotional regulation—at least in some cultures.
The findings from other cultures suggest that our focus on the gender of the parent may be too
narrow a conceptualization of the issue of necessary adult input for adequate child development.
Instead, it may be helpful to recast the issue by asking whether exposure to male and female parents
is the key, or whether it is exposure to the interactive style typically associated with either mothers
or fathers that matters. In an experimental examination of this issue, Ross and Taylor (1989) found
that boys prefer the physical play style, whether it is mothers or fathers who engage in it. Their
work suggests that boys may not necessarily prefer their fathers but rather their physical style of
play. Together, these studies suggest that gender of the agent of delivery of playful input may be less
important than the type of stimulation itself. Further evidence is consistent with this interchangeabil-
ity argument, which suggests that mothers and fathers can substitute for each other as we saw in the
case of caregiving. To illustrate gender of parent substitutability, consider a classic study of the effects
of having a secure or insecure attachment relationship with mother or father on an infant’s sociabil-
ity with a stranger, a friendly clown (Main and Weston, 1981). Infants who had secure attachment
ties to both mother and father were most responsive to the friendly stranger, whereas those with
insecure attachment relationships with both parents were the most wary and least responsive. Infants
who had a secure attachment with either their mother or their father and an insecure attachment to
the other parent exhibited a mid-level of social responsiveness. However, the gender of the parent
with whom the infant developed a secure attachment did not matter; the parents were substitutable
for one another. Studies of the effects of having supportive or unsupportive parents on toddlers’ and
5-year-olds’ cognitive development came to a similar conclusion (Martin, Ryan, and Brooks-Gunn,
2007; Ryan, Martin, and Brooks-Gunn, 2006). When both mothers and fathers were supportive, the
children’s cognitive development scores were highest, and when both parents were unsupportive, the
children scored lowest. The scores were between the two high and low extremes when one parent
was supportive and the other parent was unsupportive. However, the scores were similar regardless
of which parent was supportive or unsupportive. Clearly, it is better to have two supportive parents,
but if the child has only one supportive parent, sex of parent is irrelevant and mother and father are
equivalent.
Together, this evidence indicates that the style of parenting and the gender of the parent who
delivers it can be viewed as at least partially independent. These data help us address the uniqueness
of fathers’ and mothers’ roles in the family. Moreover, they help provide clarity on the important issue
of how essential fathers (Silverstein and Auerbach, 1999) and mothers (Parke, 2002, 2013) are for the
successful socialization of their children. Work on same-gender parents that shows that parenting
processes are more important than the family type (same gender versus heterosexual) for children’s
development is consistent with this view (Golombok, 2019; Miller, Kors, and Macfie, 2017; Patter-
son, 2016). Finally, the focus on parents themselves as the sole agents in the socialization matrix is
too narrow a framing as well, as we saw in the cross-national examples in Mexico and Italy. These
findings suggest that a variety of socialization agents beyond mothers and fathers, such as siblings,
extended family members, and nonkin figures in the community, play important roles in children’s
lives.
77
Beyond the “New Involved Father” in Intact Married Families

It is increasingly clear that the previous descriptions of the albeit slow emergence of fathers who are
more actively involved in the care of their children, and shared the responsibilities of both caregiver
and breadwinner with their partners, do not apply to all fathers (Doucet, 2013; Edin and Nelson, 2013).
There is increasing recognition that there is a two-tier family system based to a large extent on social
class (Furstenberg, 2014). The cultural trends involving new and involved fathers apply most clearly to
economically and educationally advantaged families, but they apply less readily to less economically
well off and less educated fathers and families. Especially as economic inequality has increased, it is
important to recognize that economic disparities have yielded more variability across social class in the
patterns of fathering than is usually recognized. Many fathers are either in cohabitation with a partner
rather than married; others may be divorced or never in residence with their partner but still involved
in the lives of their children. Reviews of fathering after divorce and stepfathering are beyond the scope
of this chapter (see Ganong, Coleman, and Sanner, 2019; Weinraub and Bowler, 2019). Instead, several
recent trends in fathering will be examined in this section including the father’s role in multiple partner
fertility families. In a subsequent section, work on patterns of “fathering at a distance” in which fathers
do not reside with their children on a regular basis for a variety of reasons, such as military deployment,
incarceration, or work in another country, will be examined.
Disadvantaged Families and Patterns of Father-Child Contact

Much of the recent work on fathers and families who have experienced disadvantage is based on
large national samples of fathers and children, such as the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth
(NLSY), the National Survey of Children’s Health (NSCH), the National Survey of Families and
Households (NSFH), and the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (Carlson and McLana-
han, 2010). These studies and recent qualitative studies (Edin and Nelson, 2013) provide important
insights into fathers’ roles in the lives of children as well as the effects of these fathers on children’s
development. According to the Fragile Families study, unmarried fathers are generally younger than
married fathers at the time of the birth of their first child (27 versus 32 years), of minority back-
ground (African American or Latin American), and less educated and less likely to be employed
(Carlson and McLanahan, 2010). A variety of other features characterizes these families, such as early
onset of parenthood and a decision not to marry. However, many parents are either cohabitating or
in a partner relationship at the time that the baby is born (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010). In spite
of stereotypes, these men often had a close relationship with their partners, with 82% being roman-
tically involved at the time of the birth, 50% were cohabiting, and another 32% were romantically
involved but not in residence. Clearly, the belief that most out-of-wedlock births are a product of
casual relationships is misleading (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010). Across time, however, just as is the
case of early-timed marriages, these relationships are unstable. Only about two fifths of unmarried
couples are still romantically involved 5 years after the birth of the child, compared with 77% of
married couples (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010).
Moreover, disadvantaged men may be involved with multiple partners across time and, in turn,
have children with subsequent partners. Almost 20% of fathers between the ages of 15 and 44 years
have children with more than one partner (Guzzo, 2014; Guzzo and Furstenberg, 2007). Age at first
sexual experience, age at birth of the first child, and relationship status of partners are correlates of
multi-partner fertility (Guzzo, 2014). Men whose first children are born outside of marriage are
three times as likely to experience multi-partner fertility than are men who are married to the
mother of their first child at the time of birth (Carlson and Furstenberg, 2006).
What about involvement with their children? Several studies converge in finding that con-
tact between unmarried fathers and their children decreases over time and, in contrast to the
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new contemporary fathers, have less contact with their offspring (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010).
However, contact is not absent, and there is a notable amount of variation in the amount of time
that unmarried fathers spend with their children as well as variations in their forms of support for
their child. Studies of unmarried fathers indicate a surprising amount of paternal involvement for
extended periods following the birth. Results from Fragile Families indicate that 87% of fathers
saw their child in the year after the birth and 63% saw the child more than once a month (Carlson
and McLanahan, 2010). There is considerable instability in levels of father involvement with their
children across time. In a sample of low-income African American, unwed fathers, nearly 40% either
increased or decreased their level of involvement between the child’s birth and 3 years (Coley and
Chase-Lansdale, 1999). Similarly in the Fragile Families study (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010), by
3 years, only 71% of fathers had seen their child in the prior 2-year period and less than half (47%)
had seen their child more than once in the past month. By 5 years, 63% of fathers had seen their child
since age 3, and 43% had seen their child more than once in the past month. These declines in father
participation continue across childhood and adolescence (Furstenberg and Harris, 1993).
A word of caution in needed because the pattern of instability over time in contact patterns of
nonresident fathers and their children may apply more to poor fathers than all nonresidential fathers.
To illustrate, using a nationally representative sample, Cheadle, Amato, and King (2010) found that
most nonresidential fathers have fairly stable patterns of contact over a 12-year period. A large group
(38%) maintained a high level of contact across the study, and another group (32%) were initially
uninvolved and continued to remain at a distance from their children across time. A third group (23%)
of men were initially involved with their offspring but became relatively uninvolved across time, as
a small group (7%) were low at the beginning but gradually increased their level of involvement.
There is great variety in forms of father involvement beyond financial or even emotional and
practical support for the mother. Fathers provide nurturance, play and leisure activities, safety, moral
guidance, and discipline as well as connections with the extended family and community (Carlson
and McLanahan, 2010; Palkovitz, 2002). In the Fragile Families study, formal child support was rare
but informal support in the form of money, toys or diapers for the baby, or transportation were
common around the birth of the baby (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010; Edin and Nelson, 2013).
A broadened definition of support has clearly corrected the myth of the “deadbeat dad” among poor
and unmarried fathers (Tamis-LeMonda and McFadden, 2010). And the stereotype that African
American fathers are uninvolved is not true, either. In the Fragile Families study, African American
men were more likely to maintain contact with their children than either European American or
Latin American men (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010). Similarly, others report that fewer African
American fathers (12%) have no contact with their offspring than European American (30%) and
Latin American (37%) fathers.
Finally, to fully appreciate the variability in contact between poor, often nonresidential, fathers
and their offspring, another feature of fathering among poor unwed men needs attention, namely,
that fathers do not maintain similar levels of contact across all biological children. Middle-class men
are more likely to marry, divorce, and remarry, a pattern that has been termed the “Marriage go
round” (Cherlin, 2009), but men in poverty are less likely to marry but more likely than middle-class
men to have multiple children with different partners. According to Edin and Nelson (2013), these
men are on “the ‘Family-go-round’ where good fatherhood is accomplished by moving from one
child to another” (2013, p. 189) as romantic relationships end and they move on to a new relationship
and often a new bout of fathering. Fathering efforts are not evenly distributed across all offspring
because few men are able to support or even maintain ties with several children. Instead, a pattern
of selective fathering is more normative among poor unmarried men whereby a father selectively
and serially invests his fathering capital in one or a few offspring. Instead of supporting the child’s
mother, many women are left to their own resources as many poor men are unable to play the tra-
ditional breadwinner role due to high unemployment or sporadic and low paying employment or
79
intermittent incarceration. Instead of a contemporary package deal in which a middle-class father is

expected to be both a breadwinner and a nurturer, guide, and support for their child, poor men may
elect to play only the nurturing role. This selective involvement choice represents a reversal of roles
between the sexes because it is the mother who is the financial provider and the father the playmate
to their child. Although selective involvement allows men to perhaps father at least one child well,
it leaves not only the women who have borne these other children to bear the major responsibil-
ity for the financial burden of rearing a child but also these “nonselected” children without support
from their biological father. As we elaborate ahead, this arrangement may have detrimental effects on
children. Clearly, the patterns of contact between fathers and their offspring, the modes of support
provided to either children or the biological mother, and the couple relationships among these poor
families in which fathers are often nonresidential are sufficiently unique from more typical married
families to raise caution about any single profile of fathers in the current era. Instead, there continue
to be multiple faces of fatherhood.
Paternal Incarceration and Father Contact

Another group of fathers who have begun to receive attention and who are disproportionately
drawn from poor, disadvantaged, and minority groups are incarcerated fathers. A recent estimate
suggests that more than 5,000,000 children, or 7% of all U.S. children, have experienced a coresi-
dent parent leaving to spend time in jail or prison (Murphey and Cooper, 2015; see Dalliare, 2019).
A recent report revealed that 1 in 28 children in the United States had an incarcerated parent in 2010,
up from 1 in 125 children in 1985 (The Pew Charitable Trusts, 2010). Estimates suggest that cumu-
latively, 1 in 25 European American children and 1 in 4 African American children born in 1990
had experienced parental imprisonment by their 14th birthday (Wildeman, 2009). There has been
increasing interest in both the modes and the frequency of contact between incarcerated parents and
their children (Poehlmann-Tynan, 2014). A variety of factors alters the contact patterns between
incarcerated parents and their children. First, proximity is a major factor, and the greater the distance
between the incarceration site and the family, the less the likelihood of visitation (Myers, Smarsh,
Amlund-Hagen, and Kennon, 1999). Therefore, those in more distant state or federal prisons, rather
than in local jails, are less likely to experience regular visitation (Dallaire, 2019).
Second, the appropriateness and friendliness of visiting arrangements affect both the likelihood
of visitation and the positive or negative effects of the visit on both parent and child (Loper, Carlson,
Levitt, and Scheffel, 2009). Noisy, inhospitable contact settings, such as plexiglass barriers that limit
direct contact between parent and child, may reduce the benefits of visitation. In light of these diffi-
culties surrounding live visitation, remote forms of contact such as phone calls or written correspond-
ence offer a viable alternative for reliable contact between incarcerated parents and their children
(Poehlmann et al., 2010). Letter writing is the most frequent vehicle for parent-child contact, with
an estimated 52% of parents in state prisons having at least monthly mail contact with at least one
of their children (Glaze and Maruschak, 2008). Moreover, Tuerk and Loper (2006) found that fre-
quency of letter writing, rather than the frequency of personal visits or phone calls, accounted for the
association between more child contact and less parenting stress. As Poehlmann et al. (2010) noted,
“Parents have control over the content of letters and can plan and anticipate what their children
may need to hear in ways that are not available to them in a noisy or unpredictable visitation envi-
ronment” (p. 586). Other forms of remote communication are increasingly feasible such as video
calls, instant messaging, and e-mail, but these forms of communication are not uniformly available
to incarcerated individuals or are limited to a few contacts and at a cost to the imprisoned person
(Poehlmann-Tynan, 2014). Boudin (1997) described a program by which incarcerated parents read
and recorded stories for their children. The effects of these forms of contact remain to be rigorously
evaluated.
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Third, according to a national survey of state and federal prisoners, imprisoned mothers more
frequently reported at least monthly phone calls (47% versus 38%) and mail correspondence with
children (65% versus 51%) than did imprisoned fathers (Glaze and Maruschak, 2008). Fathers are
less likely to receive visitation contact with their children than incarcerated mothers, and contact
is likely to vary with the earlier quality of the parent-child relationship (Poehlmann, Shlafer, Maes,
and Hanneman, 2008). Others found that imprisoned fathers (and mothers) perceiving stronger
coparenting alliances were more likely to experience child contact (letters in particular) than those
who disagreed about coparenting issues (Loper et al., 2009). Most children with incarcerated fathers
live with their mothers during the incarceration period, whereas children with incarcerated mothers
are more likely to live with their grandparents, other family members, or in foster care (Glaze and
Maruschak, 2008). Particularly in the case of young children, the non-incarcerated caregiver often
restricts contact with the incarcerated parent due to concerns about negative reactions to the visit
(Arditti, 2003). Additionally, because many young incarcerated fathers have limited direct experience
caring for children, interventions to pair parent education with one-on-one time with the child
appear to be having an impact on father-child time and relationships (Barr et al., 2011). Finally, prior
incarceration is related to less child contact in the post-incarceration period due to “the social stigma,
lower earning capability, and complicated relationships with mothers typically experienced after they
are released” (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010, p. 253). As we note ahead, incarceration has a clear
negative effect on children and families and although some forms of contact may be beneficial, the
effects of contact between incarcerated fathers and their children remain poorly understood.
Transnational Fathers and Patterns of Contact

Another understudied aspect of fathering at a distance involves transnational fathers who often leave
their country of origin and migrate to another country to improve their economic prospects but
who often leave either their partner or children or sometimes both behind in the process. Some esti-
mates suggest that 25% of children in U.S. immigrant families have at least one parent abroad (Maz-
zucato and Schans, 2011), and most often it is the father who is the emigrating parent. The decision
to divide childcare and provisioning responsibilities across international borders is best viewed as a
family strategy aimed at helping the family survive economically by finding better-paying jobs in
another country. At the same time, the consequences of these economic strategies for father-mother
relationships and father-child relationships are poorly understood. Little is known about the varia-
tions in the amount of time that fathers (or mothers) are separated from their children (or partners).
Thus, we need better information on the patterns of contact between transnational parents and their
children and or partners who remain in the country of origin.
Clearly, most parents make an effort to stay in contact with their children. Although visiting their
children is obviously important, and according to an internet survey (Cookston, Boyer, Vega, and
Parke, 2017), 64% of parents who were residing in the United States cited “visiting children living
there” as their primary reason for visiting their families in Mexico, visiting their home country is
often difficult in terms of logistics and cost. In spite of their motivation to see their children, 75%
of parents had not been back to visit their children in over a year. Alternatively and as a result of the
limited opportunities to have face-to face visits, most transnational parents use some form of “com-
munication at a distance” strategy to keep in contact with their children. In one study (Dreby, 2010),
most U.S.-based parents—mothers and fathers—reported calling home to Mexico once a week.
Similarly, 61% of children in this study reported talking to their parents once a week or more. The
frequency of contact needs to be better understood, and the modes of communication need to be
better specified. In the internet survey, Cookston et al. (2017) found that 83% of parents communi-
cated with their children via telephone, 85% via the internet, and 67% by video conference. Only
24% communicated by traditional postal mail.
81
Many questions remain to be addressed. What is the quality of internet contact? What topics are
most frequently discussed? And how are variations in contact patterns related to fathers’ (and moth-
ers’) perceptions of his role as father? What factors determine variations in separation periods? How
does the age of the child alter the patterns of separation? Do fathers return home more often when
children are younger (or older)? Perhaps, fathers return more frequently to visit infants to establish
attachment bonds. Are they less (or more) likely to leave at all when children are young? Or do
fathers visit more when children are adolescents? Fathers may view themselves as more critical in
curbing deviant behavior during the adolescent period.
Father Duty: Military Fathers During Deployment and Back Home

Another form of fathering at a distance involves military fathers who are deployed to foreign lands as
part of their military duties. Patterns of contact between these physically absent fathers and their chil-
dren is beginning to receive attention (MacDermid Wadsworth, 2013). The evidence suggests that
deployed fathers use a variety of communication strategies to maintain contact with their partners
and children, such as phone contact, video conference, and other forms of electronic communication.
Ahead, we examine the impact of this form of father-child separation on children’s development.
This form of fathering at a distance is an especially useful comparison because many of the con-
founding factors, such as stigma and poverty, associated with other forms of distant fathering, such as
incarceration, are avoided.
Fathers who are in the military and are deployed due to military service experience a unique set
of challenges. On the one hand, their physical separation makes direct contact a challenge; however,
access to modern telecommunications means fathers can interact with their children regularly while
deployed and their relationships with their children’s other parent means they are able to remain
involved in the lives of their children. However, as we would expect with long periods of absence,
when military deployed fathers are separated from their children for extended periods, children
appear to increase in their adjustment problems at both school (Chandra, Martin, Hawkins, and
Richardson, 2010) and home (Lester and Flake, 2013). For the most part, children who experience
deployment fare well, but a subset of children experience adversity as a result of the deployment
separation (Mustillo, Wadsworth, and Lester, 2015). Importantly, a DVD intervention that employed
Sesame Street characters that was designed to help families prepare for and cope with deployment
was linked to better functioning among caregivers and children (Flittner O’Grady et al., 2016).
For many military fathers who have seen active duty, a return to family life can prove challeng-
ing, and it is common for these fathers to experience difficulties in their marriages and parenting
(Mustillo, Wadsworth, and Lester, 2015). In one sample of men who had served in the National
Guard (Mustillo et al., 2015), combat exposure was linked to major depression and the experience
of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Further, the quality of the marital relationship was associ-
ated with father internalizing symptoms, and parenting difficulties were greatest when depressive
symptoms were greatest.
Cozza, Holmes, and van Ost (2013) drew attention to risks associated with childhood in a military
family and suggested that a deficit perspective has emerged for research on the risks of a life in the
military. In fact, when both risk and protective factors associated were measured, evidence emerged
that the protective factors within families increased when risk was present (MacDermid Wadsworth
et al., 2016). For these reasons, the experiences of military families offer an important perspective for
consideration of the role of fathers in the lives of their children. In a qualitative study of deployed
fathers, parent identity emerged as a salient determinant whether and how fathers remain involved in
the lives of their children (Willerton et al., 2011). Given that the military is a workplace with expec-
tations and rules that bind members, opportunities exist to promote education and opportunities
for men to fully engage in the lives of their children and partners. An evaluation of a mobile phone
82
application designed to help military fathers learn about child development, track milestones, and
communicate with their child’s other parent demonstrated that the content resonated with military
fathers and could be a useful tool to engage military fathers in the lives of their children despite
possibly being separated by a great distance (Lee and Walsh, 2015). Clearly as the previous sections
illustrate, both differences in fathering across cultures and the considerable variability in patterns of
father involvement across social and ethnic groups in our own culture need to be recognized.
Determinants of Father Involvement

The importance of examining the determinants of father involvement stems from the view that
the paternal role is less culturally scripted and determined than the maternal role and few clear role
models for defining fatherhood exist. It is assumed that a multifactor approach to father involvement
is necessary because a variety of factors determines the degree of father involvement with children.
It is useful to distinguish individual, familial, and societal levels of analysis in assessing the determi-
nants of father involvement with children. As outlined in Figure 3.1, it is useful to distinguish both
biological (hormonal and neurological) and social (individual, familial, and societal levels) determi-
nants of father involvement with children (Doherty, Kouneski, and Erikson, 1998; Li and Fleming,
2019; Parke and Buriel, 2006). It is important to recognize that these factors operate together in
determining fathering behavior even though most prior investigators have examined single or a few
predictors within an individual study. The advantages of an additive and interactive approach over a
model focusing on single components to understanding father-child interaction are illustrated in a
study by Holmes and Huston (2010), who found that a variety of factors including father parenting
beliefs, child language and social skills, maternal employment and mother-child interaction quality
together predicted father-child interaction patterns (see Parke and Buriel, 2006; Pleck, 2010; Pleck
and Masciadrelli, 2004 for reviews).
Biological Factors in Paternal Behavior
Hormonal Influences
It has long been recognized that females undergo a variety of hormonal changes during pregnancy
and childbirth that may facilitate maternal behavior. It was long assumed that hormones play an
unimportant role in paternal behavior because exposure to rat pups increases paternal activity with-
out any changes in hormone levels (Li and Fleming, 2019). More recent evidence has challenged the
assumption that hormonal levels are unimportant determinants of paternal behavior by examining
this issue in species other the rat, which is not a natural paternal species. In naturally paternal spe-
cies, such as canid species who constitute less than 10% of mammalian species (Storey and Walsh,
2013), researchers have found that in a variety of animal species, males experience hormonal changes
including increases in prolactin and decreases in testosterone prior to the onset of parental behavior
and during infant contact (Li and Fleming, 2019).
Human fathers, too, undergo hormonal changes during pregnancy and childbirth (Feldman, 2019;
Storey and Walsh, 2013). Males experience hormonal changes prior to the onset of parental behav-
ior and during infant contact. Storey, Walsh, Quinton, and Wynne-Edwards (2000) found that men
experienced significant pre-, peri-, and postnatal changes in each of these hormones—prolactin,
cortisol, and testosterone—a pattern of results that was similar to the women in their study. Specifi-
cally, prolactin levels were higher for both men and women in the late prenatal period than in the
early prenatal period, and cortisol levels increased just before birth and decreased in the postnatal
period for both men and women. Testosterone levels were lower in the early postnatal period, which
corresponds to the first opportunity for interaction with their infants. Hormonal levels and changes
83
were linked with a variety of social stimuli as well. Men with lower testosterone held test baby dolls
longer and were more responsive to infant cues (crying) than men with higher testosterone. Men
who reported a greater drop in testosterone also reported more pregnancy or couvade symptoms.
Together, these findings suggest that lower testosterone in the postnatal period may increase pater-
nal responsiveness, in part, by reducing competitive non-nurturing behavior (Storey et al., 2000).
Similarly, prolactin levels were higher in men showing greater responsiveness to infant cries and in
men reporting more couvade symptoms during pregnancy. Storey et al. (2000, p. 91) argued that the
“cortisol increases in late pregnancy and during labor may help new fathers focus on and become
attached to their newborns.” Men’s changes in hormonal levels are linked not only with baby cries
and the time in the pregnancy birth cycle but also to the hormonal levels of their partners. Women’s
hormonal levels were closely linked with the time remaining before delivery, and men’s levels were
linked with their partner’s hormone levels, not with time to birth. That father hormone levels are
linked with those of his partner suggests that contact with the pregnant partner may play a role in
paternal responsiveness, just as the quality of the marital relationship is linked with paternal involve-
ment in later infancy. Clearly, social variables need to be considered in understanding the operation
of biological effects. Perhaps intimate ties between partners during pregnancy stimulates hormonal
changes, which, in turn, are associated with more nurturance toward babies. This perspective rec-
ognizes the dynamic or transactional nature of the links between hormones and behavior in which
behavior changes can lead to hormonal shifts and vice versa.
Other evidence is consistent with a psychobiological view of paternal behavior. Fleming and
colleagues (2002) found that fathers with lower baseline levels of testosterone are more sympathetic
and show a greater need to respond when hearing infant cries than men with higher baseline tes-
tosterone levels. Moreover, fathers with higher baseline prolactin levels are more positive and alert
in response to infant cries. Just as in the case of mothers, contact with the baby is linked to the
level of the hormone oxytocin for new fathers too; paternal oxytocin correlated with the degree
of stimulatory parenting behaviors, including proprioceptive contact, tactile stimulation, and object
presentation (Feldman, Gordon, Schneiderman, Weisman, and Zagoory-Sharon, 2010). This stimula-
tory play style is the typical and unique way that many Western fathers interact with their infants.
But all of these studies were cross-sectional snapshots, and alternative interpretations are possible.
Perhaps men who show lower testosterone are more likely to partner and reproduce, whereas higher
testosterone men stay single and do not become parents. Longitudinal work suggests that becoming
a father does, indeed, lead to a drop in testosterone which, in turn, may better prepare them for the
nurturing aspect of parenting. Gettler and his colleagues (2011) followed a group of over 600 men
in the Philippines over a 5-year period from the time that they were single to the time some became
fathers. Men with high levels of testosterone were more likely to become partnered fathers over the
course of the study than men with lower levels of the hormone, possibly because men with higher
testosterone were more assertive in competing for women or appeared healthier and more attrac-
tive. However, the men who became partnered fathers showed a larger drop in testosterone than did
single non-fathers, whereas the drop for the men who became fathers was nearly twice as large as the
decline in testosterone shown by the single men. These findings show that relations between testos-
terone and men’s reproductive strategies are bidirectional. High testosterone is helpful in the mating
process but declines rapidly once men become fathers and begin the process of parenting where
lower levels of testosterone are better for maintaining a family. As anthropologist Peter Gray noted,
“A dad with lower testosterone is maybe a little more sensitive to cues from his child, and maybe he’s
a little less sensitive to cues from a woman he meets at a restaurant” (Simon, 2011).
Moreover, childcare experience also plays a role. Fathers who have more experience with babies
have lower testosterone and higher prolactin levels than first-time fathers (Fleming, Corter, Stall-
ings, and Steiner, 2002), even after controlling for paternal age. In the Gettler, McDade, Feranil,
and Kuzawa (2011) study, fathers with extensive involvement in childcare (3 hours a day or more
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playing, feeding, bathing, toileting, reading, or dressing them) showed larger decreases in testosterone
than fathers who were less involved with the routine care of their children. Similar links between
testosterone and involvement in childcare have been found in Tanzania (Muller, Marlowe, Bugumba,
and Ellison, 2009). In two neighboring cultural groups, fathers in the group in which paternal care
is the cultural norm had lower testosterone than among fathers in the group in which paternal care
is absent. In a study of a polygamous Senegalese society, fathers who were highly invested in their
children, as reported by the children’s mothers, had lower testosterone compared with fathers who
were less invested (Alvergne, Faurie, and Raymond, 2009).
This perspective recognizes the dynamic or transactional nature of the links between hormones
and behavior in which behavior changes can lead to hormonal shifts and vice versa. In contrast to
the myth of the biologically unfit father, this work suggests that men may be more prepared—even
biologically—for parenting than previously thought. Men, just like women, are biologically evolved
to be parents, and cooperation between parents is an adaptive strategy.
More work is needed to explore the implications of these hormonal changes for the long-term
relationship between fathers and their offspring. For example, are the ties between children and
fathers who do not experience hormone-related changes at birth weaker, or can experience com-
pensate for this lack of hormonal shift? Do childless men or women show hormonal changes as a
result of opportunities to engage infants and children as well? However, it is clear that hormonal, in
combination with social, factors are an important class of factors to recognize because the shifts in
paternal hormones may decrease differences in maternal versus paternal parenting behavior. It is not
just hormones that reflect fathers’ biological preparedness for parenting.
Insights From the Brain

Perhaps some of the most striking evidence that humans—mothers and fathers—are biologically
prepared for caregiving comes from studies of how our brains react when we are exposed to babies.
From the earliest days of life, fathers as well as mothers are neurologically primed to respond to
infants. Using brain imaging techniques such as fMRI, they show more neural activation when
shown pictures of babies than pictures of animate objects (Swain, Lorberbaum, Kose, and Strathearn,
2007). Brain imaging reveals that mothers and fathers compared with nonparents exhibited more
pronounced neural responses in the right amygdala (an area involved in emotional processing) in
response to infant crying than to infant laughter (Seifritz et al., 2003). Evidence for differences in
neural responses to the emotional responses of children suggests parents may experience a cry as an
emotionally important signal which requires their attention and demonstrates that the emotion areas
of the brain may be involved in fathers and mothers listening/responding to babies distress signals
(Seifritz et al., 2003). Fathers and mothers show higher levels of activity in emotional processing
areas of the brain when exposed to infant cries than nonparents (Swain, 2008; Swain et al., 2011).
Other brain imaging studies found that men respond neurologically more to the cries of their own
infants than to the distress signals of unrelated infants (Swain et al., 2007). Structural changes in the
brain of fathers over the first 4 months postpartum have been documented (Kim et al., 2014). Fathers
exhibited increase in gray matter (GM) volume in several neural regions involved in parental motiva-
tion, including the hypothalamus, amygdala, striatum, and lateral prefrontal cortex. Fathers exhibited
decreases in GM volume in the orbitofrontal cortex, posterior cingulate cortex, and insula. These
changes may support the development of close attachment relationships with their offspring during
early infancy. The findings provide evidence for neural plasticity in fathers’ brains that accompanies
interaction experience between fathers and their infants. How much and what type of social inter-
actional experience between fathers and infants is related to these brain changes remains unexplored.
Moreover, hormonal changes in vasopressin may be related to these brain changes (Kim et al., 2014), a
reminder that neurological and hormonal influences may act together in shaping paternal responding.
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In sum, our brains as well as our hormones prepare not just mothers but also fathers for the
challenges of caregiving. In contrast to the myth of the biologically unfit father, this work suggests
that men may be more prepared even biologically for parenting than previously thought. Finally, it
is critical to underscore that these hormonal possibly neurological changes are not necessary for the
elicitation of fathering behaviors in either animals or humans (Li and Fleming, 2019). In humans, for
example, studies of father-infant relationships in the cases of adoption clearly suggest that hormonal
shifts are unnecessary for the development of positive father-infant relationships (Grotevant and
McDermott, 2014; Pinderhughes and Brodinsky, 2019). Next, we turn to a discussion of the social
determinants of father involvement.
Individual Factors
Men’s own psychological and family background, attitudes toward the fathering role, motivation to
become involved, and childcare and childrearing knowledge and skills all play a role in determining
men’s level of involvement with their children.
Men’s Relationships With Their Family of Origin

The quality of relationship that fathers develop with their own mothers and fathers has been viewed
as a possible determinant of fathers’ involvement with their own children. However, evidence in sup-
port of this proposition is not clear-cut. Two views have guided this inquiry. First, from social learn-
ing theory (Bandura, 1989) comes a modeling hypothesis that suggests that men model themselves
after their fathers, and this modeling process will be enhanced if their fathers were nurturant and
accessible. Second, a compensatory or reworking hypothesis argues that fathers tend to compensate
or make up for deficiencies in their childhood relationships with their own fathers by becoming
better and more involved when they themselves assume this role (Roy and Smith, 2013). There is
support for both views. In support of the modeling hypothesis, a number of studies suggest that posi-
tive relationships with fathers in childhood are related to higher levels of later father involvement
(Cowan and Cowan, 1992; Sagi, 1982). Hofferth (1999) found that men whose fathers were active
participants in rearing them are more involved with their own offspring, take more responsibility, are
warmer, and monitor them more closely than men reared by less involved fathers. Subsequent results
from the 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth showed that men were more involved with
their children when their own fathers were more involved when they were children (Hofferth, Pleck,
and Vesely, 2012). Importantly, the link between more involved fathering as a child and involved
fathering as a parent was not better explained by mothering or adolescent adjustment. Moreover,
fathers parent more like their own fathers than their mothers (Losh-Hesselbart, 1997). There is also
intergenerational transmission of harshness. Scaramella and Conger (2003) found that children who
experienced hostile parenting were more likely to use similar tactics when they became parents.
Support for the second hypothesis is also evident. Men may reject their own experiences with
their fathers and opt for alternative compensatory parenting practices. Baruch and Barnett (1986)
found that men who viewed their own relationships with their fathers as negative tended to be
more involved with their 5- and 9-year-old children. Similarly, studies of men reared in father
absent homes suggest that many men became more involved when they themselves became fathers
(Roy, 2006). As Sagi (1982, p. 214) argued, these two hypotheses “are not mutually exclusive since
either process is possible depending on the circumstances.” Prior history often combines with cur-
rent circumstances as well as child temperament in determining cross-generational father involve-
ment. Low-income men who had poor childhood relationships with their fathers and poor current
circumstances (poor coparent relationship, limited education) were low on involvement with their
children, whereas men with negative histories with their fathers but a positive current situation were
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highly involved with their children (McFadden, Tamis-Lemonda, Howard, Shannon, and Cabrera,
2009). Moreover, cross-generational continuity of parental hostility is more likely if children were
temperamentally negative (high in negative reactivity), but less continuity was found when children
were temperamentally more positive (Scaramella and Conger, 2003). Another factor that can disrupt
the intergenerational transmission of hostility is the presence of a warm and supportive coparent
(Shannon, Tamis-LeMonda, and Cabrera, 2006). It is oversimplified to assume that family of origin
is the only major influence on fathering, and a broader set of cultural factors needs to be recognized.
Roy, Buckmiller, and McDowell (2008) found that only about half of the men reported that their
own fathers taught them how to be a father. In a qualitative study, Daly (1993) interviewed fathers
of young children about the sources of their role models for their own fatherhood identity. Some
fathers emulate their own fathers, others compensate, and still others report little influence of their
own fathers as mentors or models. However, most fathers interviewed by Daly either did not view
their fathers as a model or wanted to do better as fathers than their own fathers. Many fathers in
Daly’s study opted for a piecemeal approach to defining fathering. Instead of emulating one person,
many men tried to piece together an image of fathering from many different sources including
extended family members, cultural figures, and friends. This view is echoed by Roy and Smith
(2013), who suggested that “young men’s lessons about how to care emerge through the enactment
of relationships as sons to their parents, as siblings or as junior family members with aunts and uncles,
cousins or grandparents” (p. 324).
Men thus draw on models from their own generation of contemporary fathers as well as fathers
from earlier eras and generations. As men become fathers, they struggle to reconcile past and pre-
sent images and models of fathering behavior with the changed historical circumstances that face
modern fathers. Even if they chose to emulate their own fathers, the rapid changes in our society
make it difficult for current fathers to apply these lessons from the past in any simple way. It is clear
that the process of intergenerational transmission of parenting is an active one in which the father
himself plays a central role in sorting, retaining, and discarding images and guidelines from a variety
of sources. There is no simple or single route to developing a father identity; there are many different
paths just as there are many different kinds of fathers.
Socialization of Boys Into the Fathering Role

It is not only the specific nature of the relationship a child develops with his parents but the ways in
which girls and boys are differentially prepared for parenthood during childhood that determine the
ways in which girls and boys enact their parenting roles in adulthood. It is well known that girls and
boys are treated differently by parents during socialization but most of this work focuses on occu-
pational aspirations, activity, and object preferences and modes of relating to others. However, the
differential treatment of girls and boys may help shape a boy’s expectation about his future fathering
role. A variety of strands of evidence supports this view. First, children’s household chores are based
on gender, with girls engaging in more household duties such as cleaning, ironing, cooking, and
childcare, whereas boys take out the garbage and mow the lawn (Goodnow and Lawrence, 2001;
McHale, Crouter, and Whiteman, 2003). Cross-national studies of over 30 countries confirm these
findings, with girls engaging in more household work and boys engaging in non-household labor
such as farm- or business-related activities (Putnick and Bornstein, 2016). Of particular importance
are the differential opportunities afforded to girls and boys to learn childcare skills. Cross-cultural
evidence (Whiting, Edwards, Ember, and Erchak, 1988), as well as evidence from our own culture,
suggests that boys are given dolls less often than girls and are discouraged from playing with dolls
(Rheingold and Cook, 1975; Pomerleau, Bolduc, Malcuit, and Cossotte, 1990). In middle child-
hood, boys are less likely to be babysitters (Goodnow, 1999) and are less likely to be caregivers for
their siblings (East, 2010). This lack of opportunities for socialization into parenthood makes boys
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less prepared for fatherhood than girls are for motherhood and may lead to lower levels of parental
self-efficacy for men than women (Rose and Halverson, 1996). However, some qualitative evidence
suggests that in single-mother families or in economically disadvantaged households, boys as well as
girls are more likely to be recruited into household work, including sibling caregiving duties, in part
due to the more limited parental resources in these households (Roy and Smith, 2013). When boys
are obligated to care for younger siblings, some suggest that “these first steps toward learning to par-
ent may lead to a new sense of self confidence, empathy or leadership” (Roy and Smith, 2013, p. 325).
Although these qualitative studies suggest that these childhood experiences may enhance later father
involvement, further quantitative work is needed to firmly establish these links.
Men’s Attitudes, Motivation, and Skills

Paternal attitudes, motivation, and skills are important determinants of father involvement (Lamb
and Lewis, 2010). In early work on attitudes and father involvement, the focus was on the relation
between sex role attitudes and paternal involvement. However, weak or no links between sex role
attitudes and father involvement have led to a more specific focus on men’s attitudes concerning the
paternal role (Parke, 2002). When the focus is more specifically oriented toward beliefs about parental
roles, clearer links between beliefs and behavior are evident (Bornstein, Putnick, and Suwalsky, 2017).
This work has been guided, in part, by identity theory which recognizes that men play a variety of
roles as spouse, parent, and worker and that the relative importance men assign to these roles in their
formation of a self-identity is a useful predictor of father involvement (Rane and McBride, 2000).
Paternal attitudes about parenting relate to measures of father involvement with their 3-month-
old infants (Beitel and Parke, 1998). Specifically, fathers’ belief in the biological basis of sex differ-
ences, their perception of their caregiving skills, and the extent to which they valued the father’s role
were predictors of father’s involvement. Finally, a variety of types of involvement relates to paternal
attitudes including play, caregiving, and indirect care (e.g., packs diaper bag, changes crib linen).
Other studies have confirmed that paternal attitudes are important beyond infancy. Russell (1983)
found that Australian men who do not accept the notion of maternal instinct participate in childcare
more with their 3- to 6-year-old children. Consistent with this work, McBride and Rane (1997)
found that fathers’ attitudes about the importance of father for preschool age children’s development
were linked to several indices of father involvement (responsibility, interaction, and accessibility),
and their perceived investment in the worker role was inversely related to their workday accessibil-
ity and responsibility. Rane and McBride (2000) found that fathers who considered the nurturing
role highly central to their sense of self engaged in more interaction and assumed more responsibil-
ity behaviors with their children than fathers low on nurturing role centrality. Bonney, Kelley, and
Levant (1999) found that fathers with more liberal gender ideology and who view fathers as criti-
cal for child development and as capable of performing childcare as mothers have higher levels of
involvement in childcare than more traditional fathers. Similarly, fathers who have more traditional
childrearing attitudes (high in control and emotionally distant) have lower quality interactions with
their children than less traditional fathers (Holmes and Huston, 2010). Finally, Hofferth, Pleck, Gold-
scheider, Curtin, and Hrapczynski (2013) suggested that paternal attitudes (e.g., “fathers should be as
involved as mothers,” “fathers and mothers are equally good at meeting their children’s needs”) are
undergoing change but also predict father involvement across time. Compared with 1997, in 2003,
fathers’ attitudes concerning their paternal role became more positive. And positive attitudes were
linked with several indices of father involvement (i.e., engagement, warmth, control, discussion of
rules) across this period.
In spite of the fact that men are competent caregivers, there are wide individual differences among
men in either their perceived or actual level of skill in caregiving. In turn, these variations in skill may
be related to level of father involvement.
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Paternal Mental Health

A variety of studies supports the prediction that personal resources—including mental health—alter
parenting behaviors (Cummings, Merrilees, and Ward George, 2010). Although many studies have
found that maternal psychopathology, such as depression, will alter parenting behavior, evidence sug-
gests that paternal depression is an important determinant of fathering as well (Cummings, Keller,
and Davies, 2005). Fathers who report depression at 8 weeks postpartum have children with more
conduct problems 3 years later (Ramchandani, Stein, Evans, and O’Connor, 2005). Others find that
paternal depression is linked with poorer peer relationships and more behavior problems (Dave et al.,
2005). Labeled the “paternal mental health hypothesis” (Cummings et al., 2010), this perspective
focuses on the role of parental psychological functioning in accounting for the effects of marital
conflict either as a risk or protective factor. While recognizing that the mental health of both parents
is important, a strong version of this position suggests that father mental health may be particularly
influential in altering children’s adjustment. Papp, Cummings, and Schemerhorn (2004) found that
paternal (as well as maternal) depression was linked with poor child adjustment indirectly through a
poor marital relationship. Mothers’ depression was directly related to child problems, which suggests
that paternal and maternal depression may be linked to child outcomes through different pathways.
Other work suggests that the effects of paternal and maternal depression may affect different child
outcomes and vary by gender of child (Cummings et al., 2005; Shelton and Harold, 2008).
As we explore ahead, fathers’ parenting may be more vulnerable to problematic marital relation-
ships than mothers’ parenting. Some evidence suggests that paternal depression may have a greater
impact on their parenting and, in turn, their children’s adjustment than maternal depression (Low
and Stocker, 2005), a finding that would bolster the paternal mental health hypothesis. Cummings,
El-Sheikh, Kouros, and Keller (2007) found that children’s sympathetic nervous system reactivity in
response to marital conflict was linked to child adjustment more strongly for fathers’ than moth-
ers’ dysphoria, a result that supports the paternal mental health argument. Further support for this
hypothesis comes from evidence that suggests that problem drinking may negatively impact not only
the marital relationship but also parenting and, in turn, children’s adjustment; again, paternal drinking
is more consequential for child outcomes than maternal alcohol consumption (Keller, Cummings,
Davies, and Petersen, 2009).
Characteristics of the Child

In recognition that fathers and children mutually influence each other, it is important to note that
a variety of child characteristics merits consideration as well. Several individual child features have
been identified, including child gender, temperament, and children’s social skill and language com-
petence. Support for gender of child has been found in infancy, with fathers devoting more time
to boys than girls (Lamb and Lewis, 2010) but less support for a clear gender effect beyond infancy
(Pleck and Masciadrelli, 2004). Child sociability positively predicted a father’s time with his child,
his accessibility to his child, and his responsibility for the child’s care (McBride, Schoppe, and Rane,
2002) and to the quality of father-child interaction (Holmes and Huston, 2010). Moreover, children
with high receptive and expressive language skills engage in more positive father-child interactions
than children with low skills (Holmes and Huston, 2010). Children’s health appears to be important
as well. Greater neurobiological risk at birth and a longer hospitalization at birth are associated with
more distress at 6 months of age for fathers but not mothers (Gueron-Sela, Atzaba-Poria, Meiri, and
Marks, 2015). Further, although diagnoses of a developmental delay in children are resolved similarly
by mothers and fathers, mothers tend to employ methods of emotion coping, and fathers favor more
cognitive coping strategies (Barak-Levy and Atzaba-Poria, 2013). When children experience sleep
difficulties, fathers (more so than mothers) report their children as more difficult, but when fathers
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of children with sleep difficulties become more engaged, it serves to protect mothers from stress
(Millikovsky-Ayalon, Atzaba-Poria, and Meiri, 2015). Finally, child temperament has been linked to
father-child interaction quality. When children have difficult temperaments, fathers as well as moth-
ers are more likely to use coercive parenting strategies (Rothbart, 2011) or be less involved with
their children (Grych and Clark, 1999). And temperament may affect the quality of coparenting as
well (Wong, Mangelsdorf, Brown, Neff, and Schoppe-Sullivan, 2009). In sum, both father and child
characteristics play roles in determining the father-child relationship.
Family Factors
Individual factors are not the only determinants of father involvement. Family-level variables includ-
ing maternal attitudes concerning father involvement and the marital relationship are both family
level factors that require examination.
Maternal Attitudes: Mother as Gatekeeper

Consistent with a family systems view, maternal attitudes need to be considered as a determinant of
paternal participation in childcare (Schoppe-Sullivan and Altenburger, 2019). In spite of advances
in women’s participation in the workplace, many women still feel ambivalent about father involve-
ment in domestic issues (Doucet, 2006). Due, in part, to the “cult of maternalism” (Duffy, 1988),
which stresses the notion that mothers are indispensable, natural, and necessary, many women are
reluctant to actively and wholeheartedly involve fathers in the daily routines of caregiving. As Allen
and Hawkins (1999) suggest, their ambivalence “may be because increased paternal involvement
intrudes on a previously held monopoly over the attentive and intuitive responsibilities of family
work which if altered may compromise female power and privilege in the home” (p. 202). However,
contradictory attitudes about father involvement may reflect a more deeply held belief that predates
recent increases in father involvement. As a father of five in 1927 lamented, “There often seems to
be a conspiracy on the part of the female of the species to exclude father from any active part in
the care of the baby” (What Should a Child Demand of His Father, Parents’ Magazine, 1927; cited
by Milkie and Denny, 2014). These maternal attitudes may lead to behaviors which, in turn, limit
father involvement and constitute a form of gatekeeping. A major advance in the conceptualization
of gatekeeping was made by Allen and Hawkins (1999, p. 200), who defined the term as follows:
Maternal gatekeeping is a collection of beliefs and behaviors that ultimately inhibit a col-
laboration effort between men and women in families by limiting men’s opportunities for
learning and growing through caring for home and children.
These investigators identified three conceptual dimensions: Mothers’ reluctance to relinquish respon-
sibility over family matters by setting rigid standards, external validation of a mothering identity, and
differentiated conceptions of family roles. In a study of dual-earner families, Allen and Hawkins
(1999) found that 21% of the mothers were classified as gatekeepers who, in turn, did more hours
of family work per week and had less equal divisions of labor than women classified as collabora-
tors. Unfortunately, the scales used to measure gatekeeping included both housework and child-
care, although the authors noted that “separating housework and child care into unique measures
produced similar results” (1999, p. 210). Nor were the number and ages of the children specified in
analyses. Other studies of gatekeeping have focused specifically on father involvement in childcare.
Beitel and Parke (1998) examined the relation between maternal attitudes and father involve-
ment with 3- to 5-month-old infants. A variety of maternal attitudes concerning father involvement
including judgments about their husband’s motivation and interest in childcare activities, maternal
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perception of his childcare skills, and the value that she places on his involvement linked with father
involvement. Mothers’ belief in innate sex differences in female and male ability to nurture infants
and the extent to which mothers viewed themselves as critical of the quality of their husbands’
caregiving were negatively related to father involvement. As these results suggest, maternal attitudes
play a significant role in understanding father involvement, but the type of involvement needs to be
considered, because maternal attitudes may vary across different types of involvement (e.g., play, role
responsibility, indirect care).
But gatekeeping is not restricted to infancy. Fagan and Barnett (2003) found a direct link between
maternal gatekeeping and father involvement in a sample of fathers of children between 3 and
17 years of age Similarly, McBride and Rane (1997) found that maternal perceptions of their partners
investment in the parental as well as the spousal role were related to father involvement, whereas
their perceptions of their husbands’ investment in the worker role was negatively related to fathers’
involvement. In fact, mothers’ perceptions were the best predictors of total father involvement.
Other evidence suggests that fathers’ participation may be more self-determined than these earlier
studies suggest. Bonney, Kelley, and Levant (1999) found that mothers’ attitudes about the degree to
which fathers should be involved in childcare were unrelated to fathers’ participation in childcare.
Instead, they found that fathers’ participation appears to influence mother’s beliefs about the father’s
role. Or perhaps, as Bonney et al. (1999) argue, a transactional perspective best characterizes this
relation between maternal attitudes and father involvement in which fathers who are more involved
have female partners who develop more positive attitudes about their involvement which, in turn,
increases fathers’ level of participation. Longitudinal studies are needed to more definitively deter-
mine the direction of causality in this domain.
Finally, gatekeeping effects are not confined to intact families as studies of postdivorce efforts on
the part of the custodial parent demonstrate. Custodial parents, usually the mother, will often attempt
to restrict access to the noncustodial father after divorce, especially if there is a high level of couple
conflict and distrust (Fabricius et al., 2010; see Ganong et al., 2019). Moreover, in nonresidential
father families, mothers or, in some cases, maternal grandparents control paternal access to the child
and may facilitate or restrict his access (Edin and Nelson, 2013; Fagan and Barnett, 2003). Similarly,
visitation opportunities between incarcerated fathers and their children are regulated by their non-
incarcerated partner (Poehlmann et al., 2010), just as in the case on transnational fathers where
custodial mothers or other relatives may control the duration and frequency of phone contact with
their children (Dreby, 2010).
Two qualifications to our discussion of gatekeeping are needed. First, the term is gender neu-
tral and fathers as well as mothers engage in gatekeeping activities in other domains of family life
(Allen and Hawkins, 1999; Pruett, Williams, Insabella, and Little, 2003; Schoppe-Sullivan, Brown,
and Cannon, 2008; Trinder, 2008), and theoretical work suggests that there are likely to be bidi-
rectional influences across partners with respect to gatekeeping attitudes and behaviors (Adamsons,
2010). Second, gates can open as well as close, and the term needs to be broadened to recognize
that parents—mother and fathers—can facilitate as well as inhibit the type and level of domestic
involvement of each other. Work on “parental gatekeeping” needs to include gateopening as well as
gateclosing to underscore the dual nature of the inhibitory and faciliatory processes that are part of
the coparenting enterprise.
Couple Relationships and Father-Child Relationships

Models that limit examination of the effects of interaction patterns to only father-child and mother-
child dyads and the direct effects of one individual on another are inadequate for understanding the
impact of social interaction patterns in families (Belsky, 1984; Cummings et al., 2010; Parke, 2013).
From a family systems viewpoint, the couple relationship needs to be considered as well. The bulk of
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attention has been given to intact families, as noted earlier, but the quality of the couple relationship
in non-intact families suggests that the quality of the couple relationship is a major determinant of
the degree of father involvement.
Studies of nonresident unmarried fathers suggest that when the relationship between the paren-
tal partners is harmonious (romantic or not) and their quality of coparenting is satisfactory, father
involvement is higher (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010; Lerman and Sorensen, 2000), but if either
parent has moved on to a new partner, father participation may decrease or at least be more selective
in terms of which child is the recipient of father involvement (Edin and Nelson, 2013; Edin, Tach,
and Mincy, 2009).
Among intact families, the primary focus has been on the effects of the quality of the couple
relationship (conflictful versus cooperative/constructive) on their children. Two perspectives con-
cerning the link between couple conflict and children’s adaptation can be distinguished. Accord-
ing to a direct effects model, direct exposure to couple conflict influences children’s behavior; the
indirect model suggests that the impact of couple conflict on children is indirectly mediated by
changes in the parent-child relationship (Crockenberg and Langrock, 2001; Cummings and Davies,
2010; Grych and Fincham, 1993). Several decades of investigation suggest that dimensions of marital
functioning are related to aspects of children’s long-term overall adjustment and immediate coping
responses in the face of interparental conflict (Cummings and Davies, 2010). Couple discord and
conflict are linked to a variety of child outcomes, including antisocial behavior, internalizing and
externalizing behavior problems, and changes in cognition, emotions, and physiology in response
to exposure to marital conflict (Cummings et al., 2010). Although less empirical work has been
directed specifically toward examination of the “carryover” of exposure to couple conflict to the
quality of children’s relationships with significant others, such as peers and siblings, exposure to
couple discord is associated with poor social competence and problematic peer relationships (Katz
and Gottman, 1991; Kerig, 1996). Importantly, among divorcing families when conflict tends to be
high, fathering can compensate for the negative risk associated with exposure to conflict (Sandler,
Miles, Cookston, and Braver, 2008), and intervention with fathers after divorce appears to reduce
interparental conflict while increasing perceived coparenting by mothers (Cookston, Braver, Griffin,
deLusé, and Miles, 2007).
Couple discord can have an indirect influence on children’s adjustment through changes in the
quality of parenting (Cummings and Davies, 2010; Fauber and Long, 1991). Factors that include
affective changes in the quality of the parent-child relationship, lack of emotional availability, and
adoption of less optimal parenting styles each has been implicated as a potential mechanism through
which marital discord disrupts parenting processes. Marital conflict is linked with poor parenting,
which, in turn, is related to poor social adjustment on the children. Other work has focused on the
specific processes by which the marital relationship itself directly influences children’s immediate
functioning and long-term adjustment. Several aspects of parental conflict appear to be relatively
consistently associated with poor outcomes for children. More frequent interparental conflict and
more intense or violent forms of conflict have been found to be particularly disturbing to children
and likely to be associated with externalizing and internalizing difficulties (Cummings and Davies,
2010) and poor peer relationships (Parke et al., 2001). Conflict that was child-related in content was
more likely than conflict involving other content to be associated with behavior problems in chil-
dren (Cummings and Davies, 2010; Grych and Fincham, 1993). Finally, when parents resolve their
conflict, the negative effects on children are reduced.
Resolution of conflict reduces children’s negative reactions to exposure to inter-adult anger and
conflict. Exposure to unresolved conflict is associated with negative affect and poor coping responses
in children (Cummings and Davies, 2010). In addition, the manner in which conflict is resolved may
also influence children’s adjustment. Katz and Gottman (1993) found that couples who exhibited a
hostile style of resolving conflict had children who tended to be described by teachers as exhibiting
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antisocial characteristics. When husbands were angry and emotionally distant while resolving marital
conflict, children were described by teachers as anxious and socially withdrawn.
Conflict is inevitable in most parental relationships and is not detrimental to family relationships
and children’s functioning under all circumstances. In particular, disagreements that are extremely
intense and involve threat to the child are likely to be more disturbing to the child. In contrast, when
conflict is expressed constructively, is moderate in degree, is expressed in the context of a warm and
supportive family environment, and shows evidence of resolution, children may learn valuable lessons
regarding how to negotiate conflict and resolve disagreements (Cummings and Davies, 2010). How-
ever, although the evidence suggests that couple conflict may alter the parenting of both mothers
and fathers, evidence suggests that fathers are more likely to be affected by marital conflict than their
female partners. Several studies in the United States (Cummings and Davies, 2010), Great Britain
(Pike, Caldwell, and Dunn, 2005), and other cultures (e.g., Japan; Durrett, Otaki, and Richards, 1984)
support the conclusion that the quality of the mother-father relationship is related to the quality of
the father- and mother-child relationships, which, in turn, may alter the child’s adjustment. Several
major theoretical and empirical advances in this domain over the past several decades are noteworthy.
First, the vulnerability of the father to disruptions in quality of the couple relationship has continued
to receive attention. Often termed the father “vulnerability hypothesis” (Cummings et al., 2010), this
notion suggests that the father-child relationship is altered more than the mother-child relationship
by the quality of the couple relationship. This position continues to receive support but several mod-
erating process that govern its operation have been identified. Second, possible mediators between
the impact of couple quality on fathering and child outcomes have been discovered. Third, longi-
tudinal evidence in support of this hypothesis has begun to accumulate. Fourth, the positive effects
of a high-quality couple relationship on fathering (and mothering) have received more scrutiny as a
corrective to the usual focus of the effects of marital conflict.
The Father Vulnerability Hypothesis

This notion has a long history of support over the last 30 years. A meta-analysis of the relations
between interparental conflict and parenting provided strong evidence of this position including
stronger links between a variety of aspects of fathering behaviors such as parental control, accept-
ance, harsh discipline, and overall parenting quality than for mothering behaviors (Krishnakumar
and Buehler, 2000). However, this hypothesis needs to be qualified in several ways (Cummings et al.,
2010). First, contextual factors need consideration because fathers’ parenting is linked with poor
marital quality in both dyadic and triadic settings, but mothers exhibit the negative effects of marital
conflict on parenting only in triadic contexts (Clements, Lim, and Chaplin, 2002). Perhaps the pres-
ence of her conflictful partner in the triadic interactional context highlight their mutual estrange-
ment leading to a deterioration of mothering, whereas fathers may have more deeply internalized
the negativity associated with the marital conflict. Second, the child’s gender matters as well. Some
studies have found that fathering boys (Kitzmann, 2000) is more vulnerable to marital quality and
conflict than mothering of boys, but others found that fathering girls is more negatively affected than
fathering boys (Cowan and Cowan, 1992). Third, some child outcomes may be more strongly altered
by marital conflict than others. For example, fathers’ parenting declines in response to marital quality
were linked with increases in boys’ internalizing, whereas maternal parenting in high conflict marital
contexts is associated with higher externalizing problems among boys (Kaczynski et al., 2006). There
is overall support for the father vulnerability hypothesis, but a variety of factors may qualify its opera-
tion and probably more will be discovered.
Even stronger support for this hypothesis comes from longitudinal studies. For example, across
time, interparental hostility and withdrawal are both linked to parental emotional unavailability and,
in turn, to children’s adjustment (Sturge-Apple, Davies, and Cummings, 2006). Fathers’ emotional
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unavailability is more consistently related to a range of child outcomes (internalizing, externalizing,

and school-related problems), whereas maternal unavailability is related only to scholastic problems.
Other longitudinal evidence supports this hypothesis and suggests greater complexity across time.
A reverse pathway from parent-child to marital relationships was found for fathers, but not mothers,
which suggests that the father-child relationship may be more closely tied to broader family relation-
ships than the mother-child relationship (Schermerhorn, Cummings, and Davies, 2008). This bidi-
rectionality of influence between parenting and other aspects of family dynamics is not surprising
and is consistent with a general family systems view of fathering.
A number of factors aid in explaining the father vulnerability hypothesis. First, fathers’ level
of participation is, in part, determined by the extent to which the mother permits participation
(Allen and Hawkins, 1999; Beitel and Parke, 1998). Second, because the paternal role is less well
defined than the maternal role, spousal support may help crystallize the boundaries of appropriate
role behavior (Lamb and Lewis, 2010; Parke, 2013). Third, men have fewer opportunities to acquire
and practice caregiving skills during socialization and, therefore, may benefit more than mothers
from informational support (Parke and Brott, 1999).
Although the preponderance of evidence has focused on the negative effects of couple distress
on parent-child relationships and child adjustment, it is important to recognize that positive couple
relationships can have a protective effect on parenting and, in turn, child outcomes. In both cross-
sectional and longitudinal studies, support for this link has been found. Bonney et al. (1999), in a
cross-sectional study of couples with children ages 1–4, found that for fathers, higher marital satisfac-
tion was associated with more participation in common childcare activities. Lee and Doherty (2007)
followed couples from the second trimester of pregnancy to 6 and 12 months postpartum. Fathers’
marital satisfaction and involvement were positively related, and mothers’ employment status and
fathers’ attitudes toward father involvement were important moderators. Nor are the links evident in
only European American families. A study focused on the potential benefits of positive marital qual-
ity for children in working-class, first-generation Mexican American families (Leidy, Parke, Clavis,
Coltrane, and Duffy, 2009) examined the links between positive marital quality and child internaliz-
ing and externalizing behaviors 1 year later when the child was in sixth grade. Positive marital quality
was negatively correlated with child internalizing behaviors. Not all studies found couple satisfaction
negatively related to paternal involvement (Nangle, Kelley, Fals-Stewart, and Levant, 2003), so the
issue remains open. However, this body of work serves as an important corrective to the sole focus
on the negative aspects of couple relationships on fathering.
Changing Societal Conditions as Determinants

of Father-Child Relationships
A number of society-wide changes in the United States have produced a variety of shifts in the nature
of early family relationships. Fertility rates and family size have decreased, the percentage of women
in the workforce has increased, the timing of onset of parenthood has shifted, divorce rates have risen,
and the number of single-parent families has increased (for reviews, see Goldberg, 2014; Golombok,
2015; Parke, 2013). In this section, the effects of two of these changes—timing of parenthood and
recent shifts in family employment patterns—are explored to illustrate the impact of social change
on father-child and family relationships. Exploration of these shifts underscores an additional theme,
namely, the importance of considering the historical period or era in which social change occurs.
Timing of Parenthood and the Father’s Role

A number of factors need to be considered to understand the impact on parenting of childbearing
at different ages. First, the life course context, which is broadly defined as the point at which the
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individual has arrived in his or her social, educational, and occupational timetable, is an important
determinant. Second, the historical context, namely, the societal and economic conditions that pre-
vail at the time of the onset of parenting, interacts with the first factor in determining the effects
of variations in timing. Consider early and delayed childbirth in light of these issues. Patterns of
the timing of the onset of parenting are changing for both mothers and fathers. In comparison to
1986–1987, when women were on average 22.7 years old and fathers were 25.3 years when they
became parents, in 2013, both women and men were about 2 years older (24.6 and 27.8, respectively)
when they made this transition (Eickmeyer, 2016). However, there is considerable variability, and
the age of entry into this role varies with marital status, ethnicity, and education (Eickmeyer, 2016).
Married fathers were older (29.4 years) than cohabitating fathers (26.7 years), who, in turn, were
older than single men (21.5 years). European American men became fathers at later ages (28.3 years)
than either African American men (26.5 years) or either native born (27.5) or foreign born (26.2)
Latin American men. As educational attainment increases, men become fathers at later ages. Men
who completed at least an undergraduate college degree were the oldest (30.9), and those without a
high school diploma were the youngest (23.9) to become fathers. Those men who completed high
school or attained a GED and those with some college entered fatherhood around 27 years of age.
At the same time, it is important to recognize that, as the overall shift toward later childbearing has
occurred, there has been a decline in births to teenage mothers over the last several decades. There
were approximately 60 births per 1,000 to teen women in 1991, but by 2014, this number dropped
to 24.3 per 1,000, which is a decline of about one third. In spite of the fact that teenage parenthood
is still higher in the United States than in many Western countries, this is a decline in part due to
delays in initiation of sexual activity and increased use of birth control (Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention, 2016). Moreover, most fathers or young mothers are, in fact, older, usually in their
20s or later rather than teenagers themselves. The focus of attention has shifted from teen or adoles-
cent parenthood to early parenthood more broadly conceived as a challenge of young or emerging
adulthood (Arnett, 2011). Movement through the educational system and into a stable position in
the workforce is a longer, slower, and more challenging process than in prior eras. “Transitions of
today’s young adults are both delayed and elongated: delayed because young adults take more time
to complete their education and enter the job market and elongated because each subsequent transi-
tion (marriage and family formation) takes longer to complete. Typical transitions to adulthood can
stretch from the late teens to early thirties” (Clarke, 2009, p. 14, cited by Leadbeater, 2014). Therefore
the issue of early versus late-timed onset of fathering needs to be reframed as an issue of financial and
educational readiness for the fathering role and more generally how poverty alters father roles. Edu-
cational level is positively linked with later onset of fathering (and mothering), which, in turn, alters
job and financial prospects. In this section, we examine recent work on men who become fathers
at a time before they are fully prepared for this role, and in a later section, we explore the effects of
delayed entry into fatherhood.
The Challenges of Entry Into Fatherhood Before Preparation

Men who become fathers in young adulthood are often unprepared financially and emotionally to
undertake the responsibilities of parenthood (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010). As Lerman (1993,
p. 47) noted, “Young unwed fathers are generally less well educated, had lower academic abilities,
started sex at earlier ages and engaged in more crime than did other young men.” Low family income
and having lived in a welfare household increase the likelihood of entry into young unwed father-
hood. This profile is especially evident for European American unwed fathers. In spite of the fact
that African American males are four times as likely to be an unwed father as European American
males, African American unwed fatherhood is less likely to be linked with adverse circumstances
but is a more mainstream issue. Several factors reduce the likelihood of becoming a father earlier
95
than optimal including church attendance, military service, and higher reading scores. In view of the
low rates of marriage and high rates of separation and divorce for adolescents, early and less pre-
pared fathers, in contrast to “on-schedule” fathers, have less contact with their offspring. However,
contact is not absent; in fact, studies of unmarried adolescent fathers indicate a surprising amount
of paternal involvement for extended periods following the birth. Data (Lerman, 1993) based on
a national representative sample of over 600 young unwed fathers indicated that three-fourths of
young fathers who lived away from their children at birth never lived in the same household with
them. However, many unwed fathers remain in close contact with their children. According to Ler-
man’s (1993) analysis of the national survey data, nearly half visited their youngest child at least once
a week and nearly a quarter almost daily. Only 13% never visited, and 7% visited only yearly. There is
considerable instability in levels of father involvement with their children across time. In a sample of
low-income African American, unwed fathers, nearly 40% either increased or decreased their level
of involvement between the child’s birth and 3 years (Coley and Chase-Lansdale, 1999).
These declines in father participation continue across childhood and adolescence. Furstenberg
and Harris (1993) reported the pattern of contact between adolescent fathers and their offspring
from birth through late adolescence. Under half of the children lived at least some time with their
biological father at some time during their first 18 years, but only 9% lived with their father during
the entire period. During the preschool period, nearly half of the children were either living with
their father or saw him on a weekly basis. By late adolescence, 14% were living with him, and only
15% were seeing him as often as once a week; 46% had no contact, but 25% saw him occasionally
in the preceding year.
In contrast to early-timed childbearing, when childbearing is delayed, considerable progress in
occupational and educational spheres has potentially already taken place. Education is generally
completed and career development is well underway for both males and females. Delayed fathers
have described themselves to be in more stable work situations than early-timing fathers, to be more
experienced workers, and have their jobs and careers more firmly established than early-timing peers
(Daniels and Weingarten, 1982). The financial strains associated with early career status may be more
likely to create conflict between the work and family demands of early/normal-timing fathers than
delayed-timing fathers. Neville and Parke (1997) found some support for this proposition, but quali-
fied by the sex of the child. Specifically, younger fathers of girls and older fathers of boys reported
more interference by work in family life than older fathers of girls and younger fathers of boys.
What are the effects of late-timed parenthood for the father-child relationship? Retrospective
accounts by adults who were the firstborn children of older parents report having felt especially
appreciated by their parents (Yarrow, 1991). Daniels and Weingarten (1982) found late-timed fathers
are three times more likely to be involved in the daily care of a preschool child. Cooney, Pedersen,
Indelicato, and Palkovitz (1993) found that late-timed fathers were more likely to be classified as
being highly involved and experiencing positive affect associated with the paternal role than “on-
time” fathers. Finally, men who delayed parenthood until their late 20s contributed more to indirect
aspects of childcare, such as cooking, feeding, cleaning, and doing laundry than men who assumed
parenthood earlier (Coltrane and Ishii-Kuntz, 1991).
There are qualitative differences in styles of interaction for on-time versus late-timed fathers.
In a self-report study, MacDonald and Parke (1986) found that age of parent is negatively related
to the frequency of physical play, especially physical activities (i.e., bounce, tickle, chase, and pig-
gyback), that require more physical energy on the part of the play partner. Moreover, Neville and
Parke (1997) found older parents likely to engage in more cognitively advanced activities with
children and to report holding their children more than younger fathers. These and other studies
(Zaslow, Pedersen, Suwalsky, Rabinovich, and Cain, 1985) suggest that older fathers may be less tied
to stereotypic paternal behavior, adopting styles more similar to those that have been considered
traditionally maternal.
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Observational studies of father-child interaction confirm these early self-report investigations.

Volling and Belsky (1991), who studied fathers and their 3- and 9-month-olds, found that older
fathers were more responsive, stimulating, and affectionate. Neville and Parke (1997) found that early
fathers relied on physical arousal to engage their preschoolers, whereas delayed fathers relied on more
cognitive mechanisms to remain engaged. Waiting too long to become a parent has a downside not
only for women but also for men. As men age, they produce lower quality sperm that increases the
risk of birth defects (Wyrobek et al., 2006). Men as well as women have ticking biological clocks.
Timing effects are important not just for fathers, but also for grandfathers as well. In their study
of grandfathers interacting with their 7-month-old grandchildren, Tinsley and Parke (1987) divided
grandfathers into three categories: Younger (36–49 years), middle (50–56), and older (57–68).
Grandfathers in the middle age group were rated significantly higher on competence (e.g., confident,
accepting), affect (e.g., warm, attentive), and play style (e.g., playful, responsive, stimulatory). From
a life-span developmental perspective, the middle group of grandfathers could be viewed as being
optimally ready for grandparenthood, both physically and psychologically (Tinsley and Parke, 1984)
because they were less likely to be chronically tired or to have been ill or still be heavily involved in
their work activities. Moreover, the age of the middle group of grandfathers fits the normative or
age-appropriate time at which grandparenthood is most often achieved.
Women’s and Men’s Employment Patterns and Their Parental Roles

in the Family
Relations between employment patterns of both women and men and their family roles are increas-
ingly being recognized (Coltrane and Adams, 2008). In this section, a variety of issues concerning the
links between the worlds of work and family is considered to illustrate the impact of shifts in work
patterns on both men’s and women’s family roles. The impact of changes in the rate of maternal
employment on both quantitative and qualitative aspects of father participation is examined as well
as the influence of variations in family work schedules.
Since the mid-1960s, there has been a dramatic shift in the participation rate of women in the
labor force. Between 1960 and 2016, the employment rate for mothers of children under age 6
increased dramatically from about 20% to 65% and among mothers of children between 6 and 17, it
is even higher (75%) (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2017). In exploring these work trends, two issues are
relevant. First, does father involvement shift with increases in maternal employment? Second, how
does the quality of work alter maternal and paternal parenting behavior?
Maternal employment is a robust predictor of paternal involvement which, as noted earlier, has
increased considerably over the last half century (Pleck, 2010). However, we are clearly not at 50/50
yet. Working women decrease their time devoted to housework, but they still spend time on child-
care, especially in the case of children under 6 (Bianchi, 2009). Women who do not work outside
the home continue to do a significantly larger share of childcare than their husbands (Coltrane and
Adams, 2008).
In addition to documenting the quantitative shifts in father behavior as a consequence of maternal
employment, it is also necessary to examine the impact of this shift on the quality of the father-child
relationship. Pedersen, Anderson, and Cain (1980) assessed the impact of dual wage-earner families
on mother and father interaction patterns with their 5-month-old infants. Fathers in single wage-
earner families tended to play with their infants more than mothers did, but in the dual wage-earner
families, the mothers’ rate of social play was higher than the fathers’ rate of play. Perhaps mothers
used increased play as a way of reestablishing contact with the infant after being away from home
for the day: “It is possible that the working mother’s special need to interact with the infant inhib-
ited or crowded out the father in his specialty” (Pedersen et al., 1980, p. 10). However, as studies of
reversed role families suggest, the physical style of fathers play remains evident (Field, 1978). These
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data suggest that both mothers and fathers may exhibit distinctive play styles, even when family role
arrangements modify the quantity of their interaction. However, the father-infant relationship is
altered as a result of maternal employment. Specifically, insecure infant-father attachment is higher
in dual-career families, although only for sons and not daughters (Belsky, Rovine, and Fish, 1989).
Other evidence suggests that fathers in dual-earner families are less sensitive with their male infants,
and this pattern may explain the more insecure infant-father attachments (Braungart-Rieker, Court-
ney, and Garwood, 1999). Grych and Clark (1999) reported similar findings, namely, that in families
where mothers work full time (defined as 25 hours or more), fathers were more negative in interact-
ing with their infants at 4 months, although the relation was not evident at 12 months.
Father’s Work Quantity and Quality and Father Involvement

Although there has been an increase in the number of parents who are employed, many workers
experienced increases in work hours, a decrease in job stability, a rise in temporary jobs, and especially
among low-wage workers, a decrease in income (Williams, 2010). As a result of these changes, the
theoretical questions have shifted. Instead of examining whether one or both parents are employed,
researchers have begun to address the issue of the impact of the quality and nature of work on the
parenting of both mothers and fathers (see Cho and Ciancetta, 2016, for a review). Both how much
and when parents work matter for children. As studies of poor nonresidential fathers indicate, lack of
employment opportunities and, therefore, financial ability to support children is a major determinant
of lack of father involvement (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010). Men who provide either informal
or formal financial support are more likely to maintain contact with their children, whereas fathers
who rarely or never visit are less likely to pay child support (Lerman, 1993; Lerman and Sorensen,
2000) which, in turn, adds to mothers’ financial burden and may indirectly have negative effects on
the children. The direction of effects is still being debated; perhaps fathers who can provide financial
support are more likely to stay involved as a parent, or alternatively, those who stay involved are more
likely to seek employment to fulfill their role as provider (Carlson and McLanahan, 2010; Coley and
Chase-Lansdale, 1999).
Parental work schedules can be stressful and are associated with negative outcomes for children
and adults (Li et al., 2013; Williams, 2010). In the 24-hour economy, 40% of employed individuals
in the United States work part of their time outside normal working hours or what Europeans call
“unsocial hours.” In 51% of two-job families with children, at least one parent works nonstand-
ard hours, with the evening shift being the most common (Deutsch, 1999; Gornick and Meyers,
2003). As Williams (2010) observed, this trend toward nonstandard schedules takes its toll on family
relationships. People working “unsocial hours,” not surprisingly, tend to have strained relationships.
These schedules are associated with higher family-work conflict, lower marital quality, and reduced
time with children. They are also associated with a lower likelihood of eating meals together, provid-
ing homework supervision, and sharing leisure (Han and Fox, 2011; Williams, 2010). In a Canadian
study, children had more behavioral problems when parents worked nonstandard hours (Strazdins,
Korda, Lim, Broom, and D’Souza, 2004). Nor are marriages immune from the effects of work sched-
ules; nonoverlapping work hours for husbands and wives had negative effects on marital relationships
(Perry-Jenkins, Repetti, and Crouter, 2000) and may increase the chances of divorce (Presser, 2004).
And mothers’ household workload goes up more than fathers’ with nonstandard job schedules (Craig
and Powell, 2011). Although such work schedules are often undertaken out of economic necessity,
they still are a hardship for parents and children. Finally, job loss and underemployment have serious
effects on family life, including marital relationships, parent-child relationships, and child adjustment
(Conger et al., 2002; Parke et al., 2004; White and Rogers, 2000).
In terms of the quality issue, there are two types of linkage between father work and fathering.
One type of research focuses on work as an “emotional climate” which, in turn, may have short-term
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spillover effects to the enactment of roles in home settings. A second type of linkage focuses on the
type of skills, attitudes, and perspectives that adults acquire in their work-based socialization as adults
and how these variations in job experience alter their behavior in family contexts on a longer term
basis.
Work in the first tradition (Repetti, 1994, 2005) has shown that fathers in high-stress jobs (e.g.,
air traffic controller) were more withdrawn in marital interactions after high-stress shifts and behav-
iorally and emotionally withdrawn during father-child interactions. Distressing social experiences at
work were associated with higher expressions of anger and greater use of discipline during interac-
tion with the child later in the day. Similarly Crouter, Bumpus, Maguire, and McHale (1999) found
that mothers and fathers who felt more pressure on the job reported greater role overload, which,
in turn, was linked to heightened parent-adolescent conflict (see Repetti, 2005, for a review). Posi-
tive work experiences can enhance the quality of fathering. Grossman, Pollack, and Golding (1988)
found that high job satisfaction was associated with higher levels of support for 5-year-old children’s
autonomy and affiliation in spite of the fact that positive feelings about work were negatively related
to the quantity of time spent interacting with the child. This finding underscores the importance of
distinguishing quantity and quality of involvement. Finally, when parents have better work-family
balance, children’s mental health is better (Repetti, 2005). This line of research underscores the
importance of distinguishing between different types of work-related stress on subsequent father-
child interactions and of considering direct short-term carryover effects versus long-term effects of
work on fathering.
Research in the second tradition of family-work linkage, namely, the effects of the nature of
men’s occupational roles on their fathering behavior, dates back to Miller and Swanson (1958) and
Kohn and Schooler (1983). Men who experience a high degree of occupational autonomy value
independence in their children, consider children’s intentions in discipline, and use reasoning and
withdrawal of rewards instead of physical punishment. In contrast, men who are in highly supervised
jobs with little autonomy value conformity and obedience, focus on consequences rather than inten-
tions, and use more physical forms of discipline. In short, they repeat their job-based experiences in
their parenting roles.
In extensions of Kohn’s original focus on the implications of job characteristics for parenting,
scholars have explored the effects of these variations in parenting for children’s development. Fathers
with more complex jobs (i.e., characterized by mentoring others versus taking instruction or serving
others) spend more time alone with sons, more time developing their sons’ skills (e.g., academic, ath-
letic, mechanical, interpersonal), behave more warmly and responsively, and use less harsh and less lax
control, but this is not the case for daughters (Greenberger, O’Neil, and Nagel, 1994). In fact, fathers
spend more time in work and work-related activities if they have daughters, but report more firm
but flexible control with daughters. Fathers who have jobs characterized by a high level of challenge
(e.g., expected to solve problems, high level of decision-making) devote more time to developing
sons’ skills, give higher quality explanations to their sons, and use less harsh and more firm but flexible
control in their interactions with their boys. Finally, fathers with time-urgent jobs (e.g., fast pace, few
breaks) spend more time on work activities, less time interacting, and use less lax control if they have
daughters. When fathers have complex, stimulating, and challenging jobs, boys seem to benefit much
more than girls. Grimm-Thomas and Perry-Jenkins (1994) found that fathers with greater complex-
ity and autonomy at work reported higher self-esteem and less authoritarian parenting. In a sample of
European American, rural, dual-earner couples, Whitbeck et al. (1997) found that fathers with more
job autonomy had more flexible parenting styles, which were linked to a sense of mastery and control
in their adolescents. In another rural sample, poor job characteristics (e.g., low autonomy and flex-
ibility, high pressure and supervisor criticism) were linked with lower levels of father engagement and
less sensitive parenting (Goodman, Crouter, Lanza, and Cox, 2008) and lower quality of parent-infant
interaction (Goodman et al., 2011). Some evidence suggests that these job characteristics effects may
99
be more evident for fathers than mothers (Parcel and Menaghan, 1994; Whitbeck et al., 1997). Per-
haps mothers show fewer links due to the more heavily culturally- or evolutionarily-scripted nature
of maternal roles with the focus on caregiving. However, as women’s involvement in the workplace
continues, the effects of workplace characteristics on women may increase.
Although these myriad factors have been discussed individually, as our earlier theoretical model
suggests and as empirical evidence supports, the challenge for the future is to test the additive and
interactive effects of these individual factors in comprehensive models so that the complexity of
predictive patterns of determinants of father involvement can be better understood.
Consequences of Father-Child Relationships

Variations in father involvement have implications for men themselves, their families, and their
children.
Consequences of Fatherhood for Men Themselves

Becoming a father impacts on a man’s own psychological development and well-being. As Parke
(1981) noted, “The father-child relationship is a two-way process and children influence their fathers
just as fathers alter their children’s development”(p. 9). Several aspects of this issue have been exam-
ined, namely (1) mother-father relationships, (2) work and occupational issues, (3) self-identity, (4)
psychological adjustment, (5) physical health, and (6) social connectedness beyond the family.
Impact on Mother-Father Relationships

Perhaps most attention has been devoted to the impact of the transition to parenthood on marriage.
The general finding from a large number of studies is that there is a decline in marital satisfaction,
especially on the part of men, as a consequence of the birth of a child (see Mitnick, Heyman, and
Smith Slep, 2009, for a meta-analytic review). The psychological adjustments associated with the
transition to fatherhood are clearly evident in the Cowan and Cowan (1992) longitudinal study.
Their project followed families from pregnancy until the children were 5 years of age. Fathers’ mari-
tal satisfaction showed a modest decrease from pregnancy to 6 months, but a sharp decline between
6 and 18 months. In contrast, mothers show a linear decline beginning in the postpartum period
and continuing across the first 2 years. In this same period of 18 months, 12.5% of the couples sepa-
rated or divorced; by 5 years of age, this figure was up to 20%. Another study found lower marital
satisfaction at 1 year postpartum than at 3 months (Shapiro, Gottman, and Carrere, 2000), a finding
confirmed by a study of first-time fathers that found that marital satisfaction was lowest at 1 year
post-birth (Condon, Boyce, and Corkindale, 2004). A more recent longitudinal study (Doss et al.,
2009) compared couples who did and did not have children across 8 years of marriage. Both groups
showed a decline, but in the case of the couples with children, there was a sharp drop-off in marital
satisfaction after the onset of parenthood, whereas the decline was more gradual in childless couples.
Perhaps most persuasive is the recent meta-analysis of 37 studies that followed couples from before
to after birth (Mitnick et al., 2009). There were small-to-moderate effect sizes indicating a decline in
marital satisfaction from pregnancy through 11–14 months after birth for men and women.
In spite of the dip in marital satisfaction, two caveats should be noted. First, even though marital
satisfaction decreases for men (and women) after the onset of parenthood, marital stability (i.e., the
likelihood of staying in the marriage) increases relative to childless couples (Cowan and Cowan,
1992). Second, not all of the couples showed a decline in marital satisfaction; 18% of couples showed
increased satisfaction with their marital relationship. This figure rose to 38% for couples who partici-
pated in a supportive intervention program during the transition to parenthood (Cowan and Cowan,
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1992). During the transition to parenthood, marital quality declined in about 30% of the families,
improved in another 30%, and in nearly 40% of the families showed no change (Belsky, Rovine, and
Fish, 1989). Similar diversity in the pattern of change in marital satisfaction is evident in other studies
(McDermid, Huston, and McHale, 1990; Shapiro et al., 2000)
A variety of reasons has been suggested for this decline in men’s marital satisfaction, including
(1) physical strain of childcare, (2) increased financial responsibilities, (3) emotional demands of
new familial responsibilities, (4) the restrictions of parenthood, and (5) the redefinition of roles
and role arrangements (Goldberg, 2014; Mitnick et al., 2009). Several lines of evidence suggest that
discrepancies in expectations on the part of mothers and fathers concerning the relative roles that
each will play may be an important determinant of postpartum marital satisfaction. When there
was a larger discrepancy between the wives’ expectations of their husbands’ involvement in infant
care and husbands’ level of actual participation, there was a greater decline in marital satisfaction
(Cowan and Cowan, 1992). Similarly, McDermid et al. (1990) found greater negative impact of
the onset of parenthood when there was a discrepancy between spouses’ sex role attitudes and the
division of household and childcare labor, and McBride (1989) found that traditional fathers who
held conservative sex-role attitudes, but were nonetheless involved in childcare, reported lower
levels of dissatisfaction. On the positive side, when couple’s expectations and behaviors match,
some evidence suggests that marital satisfaction is correspondingly high (Cowan and Cowan,
1992). In summary, discrepancies in parental expectations about roles, rather than the level of
change per se, may be a key correlate of men’s marital satisfaction after the onset of fatherhood. It
is important to underscore that marital relationships are both determinants as well as consequences
of paternal involvement (Pleck, 2010).
Much of the literature is focused on infancy. Less is known about the impact of being a father on
marital satisfaction after infancy. An exception is the longitudinal study by Heath (1976; Heath and
Heath, 1991) that followed a cohort of college men into their 30s and mid-40s. Competent fathers were
in satisfying marriages. However, these two indices also related to psychological maturity, leaving open
the possibility that fathering activities lead to marital satisfaction and maturity or that maturity is the
common correlate of being both a competent father and husband. Snarey (1993) found support for the
relation between paternal involvement in childhood or adolescence on marital satisfaction. In a follow-up
longitudinal study, Snarey assessed the marital success of men at mid-life (age 47):
Fathers who provided high levels of social-emotional support for their offspring during
the childhood decade (0–10 years) and high levels of intellectual, academic and social
emotional support during the adolescent decade (11–21 years) were themselves as men at
mid-life, more likely to be happily married.
(Snarey, 1993, p. 111)
In summary, it is clear that there are hints of long-term positive effects of father involvement on
marriage, but these data must be interpreted cautiously for several reasons. First, there are negative
effects of increased father involvement as noted earlier in our discussions of maternal gatekeeping.
Some women may view increased father involvement as intrusive and unwelcome. Second, some of
the literature is based on cohorts studied several decades ago. In light of the changing work and fam-
ily lives of both men and women in the new millennium, conclusions based on earlier periods may
not be readily applicable (Pleck, 2010).
Fatherhood and Men’s Work Patterns

There are two perspectives on this issue. First, a short-term perspective suggests that as fathers increase
their involvement, they perceive higher levels of work-family conflict (Grzywacz and Carlson, 2007).
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This work-family stress is more likely to be reported by fathers in dual- rather than single-earner
families (Volling and Belsky, 1991). Many fathers wish they had more time for family and more
flexible job arrangements (Parke and Brott, 1999), and, although there are clear trends toward more
family-friendly policies, workplace barriers remain formidable A long term perspective suggests that
father involvement is positively linked with occupational mobility, wage levels, and asset accumula-
tion. Recent evidence suggests that
the links between fatherhood and men’s work behaviors are a complex function of many
factors including: human capital, marital status (non) resident status with children, age at
the transition to fatherhood, race-ethnicity, desires and abilities to embrace “new” father
ideals and selection effects.
(Eggebeen, Knoester, and McDaniel, 2013, p. 349)
Men who become fathers work longer hours, are more likely to be employed, receive higher wages
and have more assets than men who are childless (Eggebeen, Dew, and Knoester, 2010; Hodges and
Budig, 2010). However, married professional fathers, especially European American men, benefit
more than others in terms of earnings and asset accumulation in part due to institutionalized dis-
criminatory practices that penalize other groups of men such as African American fathers (Eggebeen
et al., 2010; Glauber, 2008). Moreover, married professional European American men may be mar-
ried to partners who assume a greater domestic burden, which allows men to specialize in outside
employment. Young fathers, although their wages and assets are lower, often increase their commit-
ment to work by increasing their employment hours in part due to the recognition that the onset
of fatherhood requires greater responsibility including a heightened commitment to work (Astone,
Dariotis, Sonensteon, Pleck, and Hynes, 2010; Settersten and Cancel-Tirado, 2010).
Finally, occupational mobility is also affected by father involvement. In his longitudinal study,
Snarey (1993) found that fathers’ childrearing involvement across the first two decades of the child’s
life moderately predicted fathers’ occupational mobility (at age 47) above and beyond other back-
ground variables (e.g., parents’ occupation, his IQ, current maternal employment). In general, father-
hood and work are linked, but the patterns clearly vary across age, level of professionalism, and
ethnicity. It is also evident that fathering practices and work involvement may mutually influence
one another.
Fatherhood and Men’s Self-Identity

Men’s sense of themselves shifts as a function of the transition to fatherhood. A variety of dimen-
sions has been explored in prior research, including their role definitions, their self-esteem, and their
sense of generativity. Roles change for both men and women after the onset of parenthood. Cowan
and Cowan (1992, 2010) assessed role shifts during the transition to fatherhood and found that men
who become fathers decreased the “partner/lover” aspect of their self and increased the “parent” per-
centage of their self-definition. In contrast, men who remained childless significantly increased the
“partner/lover” aspect of their relationship over a nearly 2-year assessment period. Grossman (1987)
found that first-time fathers who were both more affiliative (i.e., connected to others, empathetic
relationships) and more autonomous had significantly higher life adaptation scores. Fathers of first-
borns who were more affiliative at 1 year also reported being higher in emotional well-being than
less affiliative fathers. Thus, it appears that “separateness and individuation are not sufficient for men’s
well-being; they need connections as well” (Grossman, 1987, p. 107). Does fatherhood have a longer
term impact on men’s self-identity? In a longitudinal study of college men, Heath (1977) found that
fatherhood related to men’s ability to understand themselves, to understand others sympathetically,
and to integrate their own feelings.
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Fatherhood and Psychological Adjustment of Men

Becoming a father is linked with both positive and negative psychological consequences for men
themselves (Eggebeen et al., 2013). As Palkovitz (2002) reported in his qualitative examination
of fathers, men report joy, anticipation, and excitement about being a father while also reporting
increased stress, anxiety, frustration, depression and, as we noted earlier, marital conflict. Married
or cohabitating men are less likely than single men to experience depression on becoming a father
(Woo and Raley, 2005). Stepfathers may report more stress and lower levels of life satisfaction (Kohler,
Behrman, and Skytthe, 2005). With longer duration of the stepfamily relationship, the negative effects
increased stress, and altered perceptions of life satisfaction decrease (Umberson and Montez, 2010).
The early-timed entry into fatherhood has clear negative effects on men’s psychological adjust-
ment. A variety of disruptions in their lives associated with early fatherhood, such as interruptions
in education, increased financial and social responsibilities, and unstable partner relationships, all
contribute to lower levels of life satisfaction for young fathers (Hofferth and Goldscheider, 2010). In
contrast, on-time and late-timed fathers are generally better adjusted psychologically, although later
fatherhood may be complicated by divorce and remarriage (Setttersten and Cancel-Tirado, 2010).
Some ethnicity-related effects have been found as well, with African American fathers reporting
higher rates of depression than European American fathers (Gross et al., 2008). And fathers (and
mothers) are often negatively affected (i.e., increases in depression) when adult children encounter
stressful events such as job loss, financial problems, illness, or divorce (Pudrovska, 2009).
Fatherhood and Physical Health

As in the case of psychological adjustment, the onset of fatherhood can have both positive and nega-
tive effects on men’s physical well-being but depends on the life stage, residential and marital status,
and income level. Becoming a father may improve health by reducing risky behavior in part to pro-
vide a better model for children and to maintain their health to fulfill their parental role (Palkovitz,
2002). The majority of fathers attempt to curtail or quit smoking (Everett et al., 2005), and some
have found that alcohol consumption decreases (Garfield, Isacco, and Bartlo, 2010). Even in the case
of divorced fathers, who are likely to be stressed and potentially use excessive alcohol, those who
are involved extensively in their children’s lives decrease alcohol and marijuana use (DeGarmo,
2010). Rearing a difficult child or encountering other life stressors, such as financial challenges, may
increase alcohol consumption (Pelham and Lang, 1999). Or transitioning into fatherhood at a young
age may lead to a continuation of risky behavior or patterns of drug abuse (Little, Handley, Leuthe,
and Chassin, 2009), limited job opportunities, and more poverty, all of which may contribute to
poorer long-term health outcomes (Williams, 2003). Even lower mortality is linked with fatherhood,
especially in the context of marriage (Friedman and Martin, 2011) but decreases after the number of
children increases (Lawlor et al., 2003).
Fatherhood and Social Connections Beyond the Family

Becoming a father has consequences for the roles that men play beyond the family in the wider
community. This effect of fatherhood is reflected in increased generativity, a concept derived from
Erikson’s (1975) theoretical writings. Snarey (1993, pp. 18–19) provided a succinct summary:
The psychosocial task of middle adulthood, Stage 7 [in Erikson’s Stage theory] is the
attainment of a favorable balance of generativity over stagnation and self-absorption. Most
broadly, Erikson (1975) considers generativity to mean any caring activity that contributes
to the spirit of future generations, such as the generation of new or more mature persons,
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products, ideas, or works of art. Generativity’s psychosocial challenge to adults is to create,

care for, and promote the development of others from nurturing the growth of another
person to shepherding the development of a broader community.
Snarey (1993) described three types that apply to fathers, namely (1) biological generativity (indi-
cated by the birth of a child), (2) parental generativity (indicated by childrearing activities), and
(3) societal generativity (indicated by caring for other younger adults, such as serving as a mentor,
providing leadership, and contributing to generational continuity). The concept of generativity is a
useful marker for assessing the long-term relation between fathering behavior and other aspects of
mature men’s lives. It also serves as a theoretical corrective to earlier views of fathers as inadequate
and deficient (Hawkins and Dollahite, 1997; Palkovitz and Palm, 2009). The onset of fatherhood is
linked with a strengthening of intergenerational ties (Eggebeen et al., 2010) as illustrated by more
contact (letters, phone calls) with parents and relatives than nonfathers.
There are more instrumental exchanges, such as giving and receiving monetary, social and car-
egiving assistance, by fathers as well. A series of studies has examined relations between fatherhood
and community-based social generativity. Fathers compared with non-fathers are more involved in
community service and volunteer activities not only with child-related activities, such as team sports
or girl or boy scout groups, but also in a wide variety of community organizations (labor unions, pro-
fessional societies, or local/national political groups; Eggebeen et al., 2013; Knoester and Eggebeen,
2006). Snarey found that men who nurtured their children’s socioemotional development during
childhood (0–10 years) and who also contributed to both socioemotional and intellectual-academic
development during the second decade (11–21 years) were at mid-life more likely to become gen-
erative in areas outside their family. In summary, although the processes are not yet well understood,
it is clear that involved fathering relates in positive ways to other aspects of men’s lives. As Snarey
(1993, p. 119) noted, “Men who are parentally generative during early adulthood usually turn out
to be good spouses, workers and citizens at mid life.” Although further empirical work is necessary
to adequately evaluate the utility of this generativity perspective, it represents a promising direction
for fatherhood research.
Palkovitz (2002; Palkovitz and Palm, 1998) argued that engagement in fatherhood roles may
present a sensitive period for men in the development of religious faith and in religious practice.
In support of this expectation, men become more religious and attend religious institutions more
often after the onset of fatherhood (Knoester, Petts, and Eggebeen, 2007). This embrace of religion
is important because religiousness (faith and practice) is linked not only with paternal and maternal
warmth and parenting efficacy but also with increases in parental control. In turn, warmth and par-
enting efficacy are linked with higher social competence and school performance in children while
parental control is related to increases in internalizing and externalizing (Bornstein et al., 2017).
However, the conditions under which religiousness will yield positive or negative child outcomes
remains unclear. The effects are evident across nine countries and religions (Protestant, Catholic,
Buddhist, Muslim) and underscore the importance of religion as a determinant of fathering.
Implications of Father Involvement for Children’s Development

Three types of approaches to the issue of the impact of father involvement on children’s social,
emotional, and cognitive development can be distinguished. First, in a modern variant of the earlier
father-absence theme, sociologists, in particular, have examined the impact of nonresident fathers’
frequency and quality of contact on children’s development. In contrast to this paternal deprivation
approach, a second strategy examines the impact of paternal enhancement. This approach asks about
the lessons learned from focusing on unusually highly involved fathers, such as occurs in role sharing
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and reversed role families. The third or normative approach focuses on the consequences of the qual-
ity and quantity of father-child interaction on children’s development in intact families.
Beyond Intact Father Families: Effects on Children’s Development
Disadvantaged Fathers and Child Development

What are the effects of contact between disadvantaged fathers and children on children’s develop-
ment? It is noteworthy that unmarried fathers continue to see their children even though the ties
with their partner have deteriorated. Some have suggested that the package deal whereby close ties
between partners and involvement in child contact is a guiding principle may not apply to unmar-
ried fathers who see contact with children and a relationship with the child’s mother as separate
components (Edin and Nelson, 2013; Edin, Tach, and Mincy, 2009). However, the selective invest-
ment of many poor fathers in a subset of their biological children may leave the nonselected biologi-
cal children at a developmental disadvantage. Not only do these nonselected children receive less
contact with their biological fathers, but also they experience the added stress of multiple transitions
in their lives, as their mothers may form new partnerships and, in turn, have more children. As Edin
and Nelson (2013) noted,
Children may be exposed to the confusion of new parental figures who come and go, and
they will likely accumulate half siblings along the way. Kids are resilient but the rate of fam-
ily change among children of unwed fathers has become so rapid and now leads to such
complicated family structures that kids might have a hard time adjusting.
(p. 226)
Although child outcomes were not the focus of the Edin-Nelson project, other studies have found
that the higher the rate of family transitions in and out of coresidential unions or significant roman-
tic relationships, the more behavior problems exhibited by the children (Fomby and Cherlin, 2007;
Osborne and McLanahan, 2007) and more problems with peers (Cavanaugh and Huston, 2006).
However, as Furstenberg (2014) cautioned, “The research challenge is sorting out the selection of
couples with very different demographic and psychological attributes from the social process gen-
erated when couples encounter the challenges of supporting and raising children across different
households” (p. 22).
Moreover, quality, not presence/absence alone, is important in assessing the impact of nonresi-
dent fathers. In a follow-up study of 18- to 21-year-old children of African American adolescent
mothers, Furstenberg and Harris (1993) found little impact of contact alone on young adults’ out-
comes but clear beneficial effects if the quality of the relationship were taken into account. Those
who reported a strong bond or attachment with their father during adolescence had higher edu-
cational attainment, were less likely to be imprisoned, and were less depressed. These effects were
especially evident in the case of children living with the father and were only marginally evident for
nonresident biological fathers. The data suggest that both presence and quality matters, but quality
is especially important because fathers’ presence is unrelated to outcomes when quality (degree of
attachment to father) is controlled. Others report that paternal nurturing behaviors are related with
better cognitive and behavioral outcomes (Martin et al., 2007; Tamis-LeMonda et al., 2004), and
involvement by nonresidential fathers is related to lower rates of delinquency (Coley and Medeiros,
2007). Additionally, more father engagement in shared activities during adolescence is linked to more
healthy cortisol responses to stressful events (Ibrahim, Somers, Luecken, Fabricius, and Cookston,
2017). The Amato and Gilbreth (1999) meta-analysis is consistent with findings; a measure of the
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affective relationship between the father and child (feeling close) was positively associated with child
academic success, and negatively with child internalizing and externalizing problems. The effect
sizes were modest in magnitude. Second, fathers’ authoritative parenting was associated with higher
academic success and fewer internalizing and externalizing problems. Authoritative parenting was
a better predictor than either frequency of contact or the “feeling close” measure. In addition to
quality of involvement, one other variable, namely, the amount of father’s payment of child sup-
port, was a significant predictor of children’s outcomes, including academic success and children’s
externalizing behavior although not internalizing behavior. This finding is not surprising, because
“fathers’ financial contributions provide wholesome food, adequate shelter in safe neighborhoods,
commodities (such as books, computers, and private lessons) that facilitate children’s academic suc-
cess and support for college attendance” (Amato and Gilbreth, 1999, p. 559). These findings were
evident for both boys and girls and African American and European American families. Finally, in
the Fragile Families project, few links have been found between father contact and child outcomes,
but if the parents have an effective coparenting relationship, children have fewer behavior problems
(Carlson and McLanahan, 2010) This work reflects earlier and recurring themes in the parent-child
literature, namely, that quality of the father-child and couple relationship are the critical factors in
determining children’s development.
Incarcerated Fathers and Children’s Development

What are the effects of paternal incarceration on children? Murray, Farrington, and Sekol (2012)
examined evidence on the associations between parental incarceration and children’s later antisocial
behavior, mental health problems, drug use, and educational performance. In their meta-analysis,
the most rigorous studies that controlled for sociodemographic risk factors (e.g., ethnicity, educa-
tion, poverty), children’s antisocial behavior before parental incarceration, or parental criminality
(e.g., prior criminal convictions), they found that parental incarceration was associated with chil-
dren’s increased risk for antisocial behavior, but not for mental health problems, drug use, or poor
educational performance. Although previous studies have found multiple types of adverse effects of
parental incarceration on children’s outcomes, results suggest that when important co-occurring risk
factors are taken into account, only children’s antisocial behavior is uniquely affected by parental
incarceration: “Although incarceration is likely not the cause of these compromised outcomes, it
instead serves as one indicator of other co-occurring risks and vulnerabilities that make these fami-
lies particularly fragile” (Shlafer, Gerrity, Ruhland, Wheeler, and Michaels, 2013, p. 9). For exam-
ple, incarceration increases financial insecurity and housing instability, heightens stigmatization, and
increases the probability that a non-incarcerated mother will repartner (Sykes and Pettit, 2014).
Together, these shifts will have negative effects on children, including an increase in homelessness
(Wildeman, 2014) and elevated food insecurity (Cox and Wallace, 2013).
Most evidence suggests that the parent-child attachment relationship is more likely to be nega-
tively affected when the mother is incarcerated than when fathers are incarcerated because mothers
are more likely to be the primary caregiver than fathers prior to incarceration. Only a quarter of
fathers compared with three quarters of mothers reported providing primary care for their children
prior to arrest (Maruschak, Glaze, and Mumola, 2010). However, the conditions surrounding the
father’s incarceration are linked to the non-incarcerated caregiver-child relationship. Although no
studies have directly examined the effects of paternal incarceration on children’s attachment to their
fathers, paternal imprisonment is linked with poorer caregiver (mother)-child attachment, especially
if the child is exposed to either their father’s crime or the arrest of their father. However, if the
maternal caregiver was sensitive and provided a stimulating home environment, the levels of insecure
attachment between child and the non-incarcerated caregiver were reduced (Poehlmann-Tynan,
Burnson, Runyon, and Weymouth, 2017).
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An examination of how the contact patterns are managed during incarceration suggests a com-
plex picture. On the one hand, Shlafer and Poehlmann (2010) found that no parent-child contact
was associated with children’s feelings of alienation; on the other hand, visitation may not always be
associated with positive outcomes. For example, there are associations between visits with parents
(mothers) in corrections facilities and representations of insecure attachment relationships in chil-
dren (Poehlmann, 2005). Children who experienced more frequent no contact barrier visits with
their mothers in the jail setting exhibited more depression and anxiety symptoms, whereas the use
of alternative forms of contact (mail, phone) was associated with fewer symptoms of internalizing
behavior (Dallaire, Zeman, and Thrash, 2015). The child-unfriendly nature of visitation environ-
ments probably contributed to this link. As observations of children during visits with their jailed
fathers (and mothers) indicate, children exhibit more emotional dysregulation in jail settings than
at home (Poehlmann-Tynan et al., 2014). However, when the visitation setting is more child- and
parent-friendly (direct physical contact between parent and child), visitation is associated with more
positive outcomes for children (Snyder, Carlo, and Coats Mullins, 2001). In one small-scale interven-
tion (weekly parent-child visit in a child-friendly setting) for incarcerated fathers and their young
children, Landreth and Lobaugh (1998) found that children’s self-esteem increased across a 10-week
intervention. Moreover, a longer term view suggests that the post-incarceration period needs to
be examined. Some report more visitation and mail contact during incarceration was linked with
more father-child contact and better father-child relationships and child outcomes in the post-
incarceration period (LaVigne, Naser, Brooks, and Castro, 2005) as well as lower recidivism rates for
inmates (Bales and Mears, 2008). In summary, the context and type of contact are important modera-
tors of these links between contact and outcomes.
Transnational Fathers and Children’s Development

Some evidence suggests that the frequency of contact is an important factor in child outcomes for
transnational fathers. For example, Nobles (2011) found a positive association between the amount
of father-child contact and school performance for both sons and daughters. In an internet survey,
Cookston, Boyer, Vega, and Parke (2017) found a positive relation between frequency of telephone
contact between transnational Mexican parents and their children and the quality of parent-child
relationships. How is the quality of the father-child relationship modified by the frequency and by
the quality of these contacts? How are contact patterns related to children’s perceptions of their
father? Clearly, this topic needs more attention by father researchers, especially in view of the con-
tinuing increase in transnational parenting.
Deployed Fathers and Children’s Development

Assessments of the impact of being separated from their families and children due to military deploy-
ment is a further avenue for exploring the effects of fathering on children’s development. A variety
of negative outcomes on children of deployed parents (usually fathers) has been reported. In one
study (Chandra et al., 2010) after controlling for family and service-member characteristics, children
(11–17 years old) had more emotional difficulties compared with national samples. Older youth
and girls of all ages reported significantly more school-, family-, and peer-related difficulties with
parental deployment. Length of parental deployment and poorer non-deployed caregiver mental
health were associated with a greater number of challenges for children both during deployment
and deployed-parent reintegration. A study using deployment records and parent reports by primary
caregivers revealed that greater exposure to deployment was linked with impaired family function-
ing and marital instability (Lester et al., 2016). Parental depressive and post-traumatic stress symp-
toms were associated with impairments in socioemotional adjustment in young children, increased
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anxiety in early childhood, and adjustment problems in school-age children. Conversely, parental
sensitivity was associated with improved social and emotional outcomes across childhood. In another
study (Mansfield et al., 2011) of over 300,000 children between 5 and 17 years of age, those with
parental deployment had more mental health diagnoses during a 4-year period compared with chil-
dren whose parents did not deploy. After the children’s age, gender, and mental health history were
adjusted for, excess mental health diagnoses associated with parental deployment were greatest for
acute stress reaction/adjustment, depression, and pediatric behavioral disorders and increased with
total months of parental deployment. Boys and girls showed similar patterns within these same cat-
egories, with more diagnoses observed in older children within gender groups and in boys relative to
girls within age groups. However, caution is needed because a meta-analysis found a small association
between deployment and poorer adjustment. This association varied across several features of the
studies. Age moderation was such that associations are strongest in middle childhood and weakest
during adolescence (Card et al., 2011). However, more recent studies have found stronger effects
(McDermid-Wadsworth, 2013).
Together, these studies suggest that various forms of father-child separation and loss of contact
are linked with several forms of negative developmental outcomes for children. However, this long-
standing issue remains difficult to interpret because concurrent circumstances as a result of the
separation (e.g., quality of caregiving, economic hardships associated with separation) may, in part,
account for these negative outcomes. In spite of these problems, it is vital to better understand these
various forms of fathering at a distance because significant numbers of children are developing under
these family forms.
Impact of Normal Variations in Intact Families

on Children’s Development
A voluminous literature has emerged over the last three decades that clearly demonstrates relations
between quality of paternal involvement and children’s social, emotional, and cognitive development
(Parke, 1996; Pleck, 2010). At the same time, considerable evidence shows a good deal of redundancy
between fathers’ and mothers’ impact on children. However, accumulated evidence suggests that
fathers make a unique contribution to children’s development independent of maternal influences.
In a review of the effects of fathers on children, Marsiglio, Amato, Day, and Lamb (2000) found
moderate negative associations between authoritative fathering and child internalizing and external-
izing problems. The relation held for children and adolescents regardless of age. Aldous and Mulligan
(2002), using a national data set, found that positive paternal engagement is linked to lower frequency
of later behavior problems for boys and for “difficult to rear” children. Similarly, in a large sample
of British teenagers, positive paternal engagement predicted positive school attitudes (Flouri, 2004)
and lower rates of police contact (Flouri, 2004). Still other investigators have found that children of
involved fathers have higher academic achievement (McBride, Schoppe-Sullivan, and Ho, 2005) and
better language and cognitive competence (Cabrera, Shannon, and Tamis-LeMonda, 2007). A meta-
analytic review of 22 studies found positive effects of paternal involvement on children’s cogni-
tive and personality development, whereas negative effects of involvement were rare (McWayne,
Downer, Campos, and Harris, 2013). Moreover, Amato and Rivera (1999) found that the positive
influence on children’s behavior was similar for European American, African American, and Latin
American fathers. Similarly, others have found similar links between positive fathering and fewer
behavior problems in adolescents regardless of ethnicity (Latin American and European American)
(Leidy et al., 2011).
In spite of this consistent body of evidence that positive father involvement is advantageous to
child and adolescent development, Marsiglio et al. (2000) offered three important caveats to this con-
clusion. First, most studies rely on a single data source, which raises the problem of shared method
108
variance. Second, many researchers do not control for the quality of the mother-child relationship
when examining father effects. Because the behavior and attitudes of parents are often highly related,
this step is critical. However, Pleck and Masciadrelli (2004) concluded that in over 70% of studies
that were methodologically sound (control for maternal effects and independent data sources), there
is evidence of a positive correlation of paternal involvement with child outcomes. Although there
is overlap between the effects of mothers and fathers on their children’s academic, emotional, and
social development, evidence is emerging that fathers make a unique contribution to their children’s
development.
A third caveat concerns problems of inferring direction of causality because studies are correla-
tional and involve concurrent rather than longitudinal assessments. However, two strands of evidence
suggest that the direction of effects plausibly flow from paternal behavior to child outcomes. First,
longitudinal studies support the view that fathers influence their children (see Amato and Rivera,
1999; Cookston and Finlay, 2006; Parke and Buriel, 2006; Pleck, 2010; Pleck and Masciadrelli, 2004,
for reviews). Nor are the effects of fathering on developmental outcomes restricted to childhood.
Boys who were separated from their fathers before age 10 due to paternal incarceration had more
internalizing problems in adulthood (Murray and Farrington, 2008). In addition, father-adolescent
closeness at age 16 predicted lower levels of depression and higher marital satisfaction at age 33
(Flouri, 2004). In a follow-up of Sears, Maccoby, and Levin (1957), Koestner, Franz, and Weinberger
(1990) found that the most powerful predictor of empathy in adulthood (age 31) for both men and
women was paternal childrearing involvement at age 5 and it was a better predictor than several
maternal variables. Franz, McClelland, and Weinberger (1991), reported that men and women with
better social relationships (marriage quality; extrafamilial ties) at age 41 had experienced more pater-
nal warmth as children. Although these studies support a father effects perspective, it is likely that
reciprocal relationships will become evident, in which children and fathers mutually influence each
other across the life course (Parke, 2013).
Reverse Role Families

The other strand of evidence that supports the plausibility of a father-to-child direction of effects
model comes from reports of reverse role families and intervention studies. A small minority of
families has explored alternative family arrangements such as role sharing and reversing family roles.
In spite of their rarity, these alternative family arrangements can inform us about the possible ways
in which families can reorganize themselves to provide flexibility for mothers, fathers, and children
(see Parke, 2013, for a recent review) and to assess the impact of increased father involvement on
children’s development. Although this arrangement is a relatively recent phenomenon, it is on the
rise. In 2007, stay-at-home fathers in the United States made up approximately 2.7% of the nation’s
stay-at-home parents, triple the percentage from 1997 and has been consistently higher each year
since 2005 (Shaver, 2007; U.S. Census Bureau, 2010). According to a 2010 census report, there are
154,000 stay-at-home dads in the United States, up from 140,000 in 2008. These fathers cared for
287,000 children (U.S. Census Bureau, 2010). The news from Canada is even more dramatic. The
number of men self-identifying as stay-at-home dads has increased threefold over the past 30 years
(Statistics Canada, 2010), with the number of stay-at-home dads gradually rising, reaching 60,000 in
2011, up from 20,000 in 1976. Canadian men now account for 12% of stay-at-home parents, com-
pared with only 4% in 1986. To put these figures into perspective: One in every 100 stay-at-home
parents were fathers in the 1970s and in 2011, it is 1 in every 8 fathers.
There is a variety of reasons for the increase in this family arrangement but also challenges that
may account for the small number of families who choose this alternative and persist in it. For many
families, it is economic; perhaps the father is laid off, or the mother earns more money so it makes
more financial sense for the father to stay home and the mother to assume the financial provider role.
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In fact, between 2009 and 2010, during the recession the United States, the earnings of men with
college degrees dropped, but women’s earnings increased. In some cases, the wife’s job provides a
better set of health benefits than her spouse’s job. In fact, as unemployment rises, the number of men
who are thrust into primary care roles rises, in part, because the unemployment rates for men tend to
be higher than those for women (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2010). In some cases, women enjoy
their job and prefer to work outside the home, and men may dread their work and prefer to become
the primary caregiver. In other families, parents report that they simply believe that they should share
the care of their children.
There are distinct consequences for mothers, fathers, and children from parents’ role sharing.
According to Russell’s (1983, 1986) study of Australian families in which fathers took major or equal
responsibility for childcare, mothers reported increased stimulation as a result of outside employment,
greater independence, and increased self-esteem. Nearly half of the fathers reported difficulties asso-
ciated with the demands—the constancy and boredom—associated with their full-time caregiving
role. On the positive side, 70% of fathers reported that their relationship with their children and their
understanding of children improved, and they noted a greater awareness of mother-housewife roles,
and enjoyed the freedom from career pressures. In a 2-year follow-up (Russell, 1986), nearly two
thirds of both parents continued to view improved father-child relationships as the major advantage
of this sharing arrangement, but there was an increase in tension and conflict in the father-child
as well as the marital relationship. According to a study of 3,600 couples who participated in the
National Survey of Families and Households, Sayer et al. (2011) found that rates of divorce were
higher in role-reversal families.
Others argue that we still view breadwinning and masculinity as linked, and some men feel that
their sense of manhood is undermined by not being employed in an outside job and instead taking
on a traditional female role of caregiver (Doucet, 2006, 2013). To combat this feeling of threatened
loss of masculinity after giving up participation in the full-time labor force for a caregiving role,
many fathers replace employment with “self-provisioning” work that allows them to con-
tribute economically to the household economy as well as to display masculine practices,
both to themselves and their wider community. For example, fathers play a role in children’s
extracurricular activities such as sporting as well as in community work which emphasizes
leadership, sports, construction, and building while also easing community scrutiny of their
decision to give up work.
(Doucet, 2004, pp. 278–279)
In short, men who assume these primary caregiver roles adopt strategies to overcome some of the
still remaining social isolation and prejudice associated with this new family form and the prevailing
narrow definition of masculinity. To appreciate the potential impact of these changes in men’s roles
on children, we need to examine the ways in which fathers’ styles of interaction shift when mothers
and fathers reverse their customary roles as caregiver and outside-the-home worker. Evidence from
the United States, Australia, and Israel suggests that when fathers stay home, their style of interaction
becomes more like that of primary caregiving mothers with more imitative and vocal exchanges
(Field, 1978); more indoor activities such as talking, singing and drawing, and less exclusive focus on
roughhousing and outdoor games such as football (Russell, 1983); and more nurturance (Sagi, 1982).
However, these stay-at-home fathers still played as physically as traditional fathers, which suggests
that some aspects of paternal style may be resistant to change.
How do the children reared in reverse role families fare? There are no apparent major negative
effects, but there are some positive effects for children. Children were higher in problem-solving
skills and personal and social skills (Pruett, 1987) and higher verbal ability than children reared in tra-
ditional families (Radin, 1993) and higher in internal locus of control and in empathy than children
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of fathers with low involvement (Sagi, Koren, and Weinberg, 1987). Similarly, Pruett (2000) found
that adolescents of primary caregiver fathers showed greater emotional balance, stronger curiosity,
and a stronger sense of self-assurance than adolescents reared in homes with less involved fathers.
Although this role-reversal arrangement clearly violates the notion of an “ideal” family form, it is
clear that men as primary caregivers not only do an adequate job of rearing children but also their
increased involvement may benefit their children’s development as well. At the same time, our cul-
tural acceptance of men as primary caregivers is still slowly evolving. Finally, evidence suggesting that
children from these families fare better must be treated cautiously because stay at home fathers may
be different in other ways from parents who maintain more traditional roles. Perhaps they might have
treated their children differently from traditional parents, no matter which parent stayed home with
the children. At the same time, it is likely that parents who reverse roles are significantly affected by
their choice, and that, therefore, the nontraditional environment in which children develop is at least
partially responsible for the differences between children reared in role-reversal and traditional families.
Intervention Evidence of the Effects of Father Involvement

Intervention studies in which parenting skills are taught show that changes in paternal parenting
behavior are related to enhanced social and cognitive development in children and, in turn, suggest
that the direction of effects flow, in part, from father to child (see Holmes, Cowan, Cowan, and Hawk-
ins, 2013; Knox, Cowan, Cowan, and Bildner, 2011, for reviews). For example, intervention studies
of fathers and infants have found that fathers who receive parenting training not only increase their
involvement (Parke, Hymel, Power and Tinsley,1980), but also their infants show increased social
responsiveness and more play initiations (Dickie and Gerber, 1980). Studies of fathers with older
children, too, show positive changes in father involvement, which, in turn, improves the father-child
relationship (Levant, 1988). Unfortunately, relatively few of these studies systematically assess children’s
developmental outcomes. An exception is the work of the Cowans and their colleagues (Cowan,
Cowan, and Heming, 2005), who used a randomized design to assess the effects of parental interven-
tions on children’s outcomes. Prior to their children’s entry into elementary school parents of 5-year-
old first children were assigned randomly to one of three intervention conditions: (1) a couples group
in which facilitators focused more on parent-child issues (e.g., discipline), (2) a couples group in which
facilitators focused more on issues between the parents as a couple, and (3) a brief consultation condi-
tion, which served as a control group. In comparison with parents in the control condition, parents in
the group interventions displayed increases in positive parenting (e.g., greater warmth, engagement,
structuring behaviors). Parents in the marital focus groups showed more positive parenting, reduced
conflict in problem-solving as a couple, and positive changes in the overall quality of their relationship
as a couple. Furthermore, children of parents in the marital-focus group displayed a greater reduction
in externalizing behaviors between kindergarten and first grade and greater increases in achievement
(Cowan, Cowan, Ablow, Johnson, and Measelle, 2005). Revisiting the families 10 years later when the
children had made the transition to high school, they found that positive outcomes associated with
parents’ relationship satisfaction, couple communication, and the teens’ externalizing behaviors had
persisted for families in which parents had attended the groups with an emphasis on couple relation-
ship issues (Cowan, Cowan, and Barry, 2011). The results of this study suggest that there is added and
lasting value of including couple relationship content in parenting interventions.
Later work focusing on low-income fathers confirmed and extended these findings. The Sup-
porting Father Involvement program (SFI) was developed with the aim of enhancing fathers’ involve-
ment with their children in low-income families (Cowan, Cowan, Pruett, Pruett, and Wong, 2009)
as well as strengthening the relationship between the parents. A sample of low-income participants
(two thirds were Mexican American) with a child from birth to age 7 were assigned randomly either
to (1) a one-time, 3-hour informational meeting for a group of couples, (2) 16-week groups attended
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by fathers only (32 hours), or (3) 16-week groups attended by both mothers and fathers (32 hours).
Parents in the informational meeting showed significant declines in couple relationship satisfaction
and increases in their children’s problem behaviors. Participants in the fathers-only groups showed
increased involvement in the care of their children but declining relationship satisfaction, whereas
parents who attended the groups as couples reported increases in fathers’ involvement, declines in
parenting stress, and stable levels of both relationship satisfaction and child behaviors over 18 months.
In a replication with a more diverse high-risk sample, Cowan, Cowan, Pruett, Pruett, and Gillette
(2014) found that participation in a couples group intervention produced significant positive effects
on parents’ reports of their own well-being, their relationships with each other and their children,
and their children’s externalizing and internalizing behavior problems. The couple’s groups were
equally effective for participants of different ethnic groups, different economic levels, and different
levels of anxiety or depressive symptoms. From the perspective of policy, the SFI program demon-
strates the importance of (1) early intervention, (2) explicitly inviting fathers to participate (versus
recruiting fathers through mothers), and (3) focus on the coparenting and couple relationship as a
means to engage men (Pruett, Pruett, Cowan, and Cowan, 2017). Although these studies involved
both mother and fathers as the unit of intervention, these data suggest that experimental modifi-
cation of fathering behaviors can be an effective way of more clearly establishing the direction of
causality in fathering research.
Beyond Description: Processes Which Link Fathering and Child Outcomes

Work that has focused on fathers’ special style of interacting, namely play, reveals processes through
which fathers influence children’s development (see Leidy, Schofield, and Parke, 2013; Paquette,
2004, for reviews). As noted in Figure 3.1, three sets of mediating processes link father-child involve-
ment and child outcomes, namely, emotional, attentional regulatory, and cognitive representational
processes. Parke and his colleagues, for example, examined the relation between father-toddler play
and children’s adaptation to peers. In one study (MacDonald and Parke, 1984), fathers and their
3- and 4-year-old girls and boys were observed in 20 minutes of structured play in their homes.
Teachers ranked these sample children in terms of their popularity among their preschool classmates.
For both girls and boys, fathers who were rated as exhibiting high levels of physical play with their
children, and who elicited high levels of positive affect in their children during the play sessions, had
children who received the highest peer popularity ratings. For boys, however, this pattern was quali-
fied by the fathers’ level of directiveness. Boys whose fathers were both highly physical and low in
directiveness received the highest popularity ratings, and the boys whose fathers were highly directive
received lower popularity scores. Mize and Pettit (1997) found that preschool children whose play
with fathers is characterized by mutuality or balance in making play suggestions and following part-
ners’ suggestions were less aggressive, more competent, and better liked by peers. Similarly, Hart et al.
(1998, 2000) found that greater playfulness, patience, and understanding with children, especially on
the part of the father, are associated with less aggressive behavior with peers among both Western
and Russian children. Flanders and colleagues (2009, 2010) found that rough-and-tumble play was
associated with less aggression in preschoolers but only when the fathers control the flow of play and
keeps the play from exceeding the fathers’ acceptable level of excitability. It is not any kind or level
of physical play but modulated and regulated physical play that is positively linked to social outcomes
such as less aggression and better emotional regulation.
Emotional Processes
Possibly, children who interact with a physically playful father learn how to recognize and send emo-
tional signals during these play interactions. Several studies reveal a link between children’s emotional
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encoding and decoding abilities that are presumably acquired, in part, in these playful interchanges
and children’s social adaptation to peers (Parke et al., 1988, 1992). In addition, fathers’ affect displays,
especially anger, seem to be a potent correlate of children’s social acceptance. In studies in both the
laboratory (Carson and Parke, 1996) and the home (Boyum and Parke, 1995), fathers’ negative affect
is inversely related to preschool and kindergarten children’s sociometric status. By contrast, when
fathers help their children cope with negative emotions, such as sadness and anger, at age 5, their
children were more socially competent with their peers at age 8 (Gottman et al., 1997). Later work
isolated other emotional processes such as emotional regulation (McDowell, Kim, O’Neil, and Parke,
2002; Parke, McDowell, Kim, and Leidy, 2006) and knowledge and use of display rules (McDowell
and Parke, 2000) that, in turn, are influenced by paternal interaction patterns and are predictive of
children’s social acceptance. Other aspects of children’s development that may be influenced by
fathers’ arousing and unpredictable play style include risk-taking (Kromelow, Harding, and Touris,
1990; Le Camus, 1995), the capacity to manage unfamiliar situations (Grossmann et al., 2002), and
the skill to manage competition (Bourcois, 1997). However, these topics have received less attention
than the issue of social competence with peers.
Attention Regulation
Closely related to emotional regulatory processes are a distinct but important additional mediator
between fathering and child outcomes, namely, attention regulatory abilities. These processes include
the ability to attend to relevant cues, sustain attention to refocus attention through such processes as
cognitive distraction and cognitive restructuring and other efforts to purposely reduce the level of
emotional arousal in stressful situations. Attentional processes organize experience and play a central
role in cognitive and social development beginning in early infancy (Rothbart, 2011). It has been
proposed that attention regulatory processes serve as a “shuttle” linking emotional regulation and
social-cognitive processes because attentional processes organize both cognitions and emotions, and
thus influence relationship competence (Katz,Wilson and Gottman, 1999). Using a national longi-
tudinal study (NICHD Early Child Care Research Network, 2008), it was found that both mother
and father relationship quality at 54 months predicted children’s ability to sustain attention (using an
independent laboratory-based measure) as well as ratings of attentional problems in first grade and,
in turn, mediated the links between parenting and higher social skills ratings in first and third grade.
Maternal and paternal interactions accounted for unique variance in these outcomes. In summary,
the ability to regulate attention is a further important mediating factor through which paternal (and
maternal) behavior may influence children’s social competence.
Cognitive Processes
In addition to learning to manage emotions in social encounters, children also develop cognitive
representations or cognitive scripts that serve as guides to social exchanges with peers. Attachment
theorists offer cognitive working models, whereas social and cognitive psychologists have suggested
scripts or cognitive maps, as guides for social action. Research within the attachment tradition has
found support for Bowlby’s argument that representations vary as a function of child-parent attach-
ment history (working models Bowlby, 1969; Bretherton and Munholland, 2008; Sroufe et al., 2005).
For example, children who had been securely attached infants were more likely to represent their
family in their drawings in a coherent manner, with a balance between individuality and connection,
than children who had been insecurely attached. In turn, securely attached children have better peer
relationships (Sroufe et al.,2005)
Research in the social interactional tradition reveals links between parent and child cognitive
representations of social relationships and, in turn, their peer relationships (Burks and Parke, 1996;
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McDowell, Parke, and Spitzer, 2002). For example, children of fathers with confrontational strate-
gies and goals for dealing with interpersonal conflict dilemmas were lower in peer competence. In
contrast, children of fathers with relational goals were rated higher in social competence by peers
and teachers. Similarly, Rah and Parke (2008) found that children who had positive interactions
with their fathers in fourth grade had fewer negative goals and strategies for solving interpersonal
problems with either their fathers or their peers in fifth grade. In turn, they were more accepted by
their peers, which suggests that positive father-child interaction can lead to more constructive social
scripts for dealing with peers. Other work suggests that father-child interaction is related to children’s
“theory of mind” competence, a clear asset for achieving social skills (LaBounty et al., 2008).
More recently, another cognitive mediator between father behavior and children’s outcomes has
received attention, namely, father mattering. This aspect of the parent-child relationship is chil-
dren’s appraisal of how much they “matter” to their parents (Rosenberg and McCullough, 1979).
Beliefs that one is important to one’s parent may give children and adolescents a sense of security
in their relatedness and connectedness to others which, in turn, may have important implications
for their mental health (Elliot, 2009). In support of this expectation, parental mattering is related to
fewer internalizing and externalizing problems, more self-esteem, healthier self-concepts and sense
of efficacy, and reduced intrafamilial violence and suicidal ideation in adolescents (e.g., Elliott, Cun-
ningham, Colangelo, and Gelles, 2011; Marshall, 2001, 2004; Wu and Kim, 2009). Suh et al. (2016)
explored relations between parental mattering and adolescent mental health in the context of step-
father families (i.e., adolescents living with biological mothers and stepfathers but who also had a
nonresidential biological father). Mattering to residential stepfathers or to nonresidential biological
fathers was associated with adolescent mental health problems, over and above mattering to moth-
ers. Results showed that mattering to nonresidential biological fathers significantly predicted fewer
internalizing problems; mattering to residential stepfathers significantly predicted fewer internalizing
and externalizing problems. For teacher-reported externalizing problems specifically, mattering to
the two father types interacted such that mattering to either father predicted lower externalizing
problems; perceived mattering to the second father did not predict a further reduction in problems.
These data suggest that mattering to residential stepfathers and to nonresidential biological fathers
is important for adolescent mental health and—for teacher-observed externalizing problems—that
a sense of mattering to one father can buffer an adolescent against the potential negative effects of
feeling unimportant to the second father (see also Stevenson et al., 2014). Further, it appears that
children and adolescents make sense of their relationships with their fathers by forming attributions
to explain his behaviors (Finlay et al., 2014) and by engaging in guided cognitive reframing with
mothers, fathers, and others (Cookston et al., 2012; Cookston et al., 2015).
Although father involvement in infancy and childhood is quantitatively less than mother involve-
ment, the data suggest that both fathers and mothers have important and possibly unique impacts on
their offspring’s social-emotional development. Just as earlier research indicated that quality rather
than quantity of mother-child interaction was the important predictor of cognitive and social devel-
opment, a similar assumption appears to hold for fathers. At the same time, there is a long history
of documentation that maternal involvement is related to child outcomes independent of paternal
effects (Parke and Buriel, 2006). More interesting is evidence suggesting that mothers’ verbal style
of interaction may enhance children’s intellectual development including memory, problem-solving,
and language advancement (Bornstein, 2002; Cabrera, Shannon, West, and Brooks-Gunn, 2006)
as well as emotional understanding. For example, mothers’ emotional expressiveness is related to
children’s understanding of emotions (LaBounty et al., 2008). Perhaps children’s knowledge of inter-
nal emotional states—a consequence of maternal labeling of emotions and feeling states during
social and caregiving interactions—is learned through mother-child exchanges (Denham, Basset,
and Wyatt, 2014).
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Remaining Issues and Future Trends for Fathering Scholarship

A number of issues remain to be examined in future research if we are to describe fully the complex-
ities, specify the determinants and processes, and outline the consequences of father-child relation-
ships. These include the choice of the levels of analysis, unit of analysis, the effects of family variation,
types of developmental change, the role of secular trends, the need for interdisciplinary perspectives,
increased attention to context, and methodological issues.
Levels of Analysis: Beyond Individual Levels Toward Multilevel Models

In spite of calls for recognizing the multiple-levels of influence on fathering, most studies focus on
single or, at most, several levels of analysis. However, as this review underscores a wide range of factors
from biological to individual, couple, family, community, and culture operate together in determin-
ing father behavior. We need more studies that sample across levels of analysis and, in turn, analytic
models that begin to reveal the complex mediating and moderating role of factors at these many
levels of influence (see Feldman, 2016; Holmes and Huston, 2010).
Unit of Analysis
Current work clearly recognizes the importance of considering fathers from a family systems per-
spective. However, our conceptual analysis of dyadic and triadic units of analysis is still limited
(Barrett and Hinde, 1988; McHale and Lindahl, 2011; Parke, 1988). Considerable progress has been
made in describing the behavior of individual interactants (e.g., mother, father, child) within dyadic
and to a lesser extent triadic settings, but less progress has been achieved in developing a language
for describing interaction in dyadic and triadic terms. However, such terms as “reciprocity,” “syn-
chronicity,” and “co-regulation” are receiving empirical operationalization and evaluation in recent
work (e.g., Feldman, 2007). In addition, greater attention needs to be paid to the family as a unit of
analysis.
Fathers and Family Variation

An advance of the last decade is recognition of the importance of individual differences in children;
one of the next advances will be the recognition of individual differences among families and fathers.
Recognition of individual variability across families implies the necessity of expanding sampling pro-
cedures. In spite of our greater awareness of family diversity, the range of family types that are studied
is still relatively narrow. Although progress has been made in describing fathers and children in differ-
ent cultures (Shwalb et al., 2013; Roopnarine and Hossain, 2013) and in different ethnic groups and
social classes in the United States (Cabrera et al., 2013; Furstenberg, 2014) more detailed description
as well as process-oriented work is necessary if we are to achieve an understanding of how cultural
beliefs and practices influence fathering behaviors. Finally, recent work on gay and lesbian families
has raised provocative issues for fatherhood research. The evidence suggests that children in families
of same-gendered parents develop adequately in terms of socioemotional adjustment (Golombok,
2015; Patterson, 2016). As Parke (2013, p. 105) has argued:
Our focus on the gender of the parent may too narrow; instead, it could be helpful to
recast the issue and ask whether it is the extent to which exposure to males and/or females
is critical or whether it is exposure to the interactive style typically associated with either
mother or father that matters.
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Perhaps the style of parenting and gender of the parent who enacts the style can be viewed as par-
tially independent. More attention to the kinds of parenting styles evident in same-gendered parental
households will help us address the uniqueness of father and mother roles in the family and help
provide needed clarity on the important issue of how essential opposite-sex parental dyads are for
children’s development (Parke, 2013; Silverstein and Auerbach, 1999).
Types of Developmental Change

Moreover, we need to move beyond childhood and examine more closely father relationships with
their adult children—if we are to achieve a life-span view of fathering. Although development
traditionally has marked change in the individual child, this perspective is too limited, and fathers,
as well as children, continue to develop across time (Elder et al., 2015; Parke, 1988). Fathers’ man-
agement of a variety of life-course tasks, such as marriage, work, and personal identity, will clearly
determine how they will execute parental tasks; in turn, these differences may find expression in
measures of father-child interaction. Because developmental shifts in children’s perceptual, cogni-
tive, and social development, in turn, may alter parental attitudes and behaviors and/or the nature of
the adults’ own developmentally relevant choices, such as work and family commitment, we need
to recognize two developmental trajectories—a child developmental course and an adult devel-
opmental sequence. The description of the interplay between these two types of developmental
curves is necessary to capture adequately the nature of developmental changes in a father’s role in
the family.
Monitoring Secular Trends

There is a continuing need to monitor secular trends and to describe their impact on father-child
interaction patterns (Furstenberg, 2014). “Family is not a static institution but one that is constantly
being re-worked, reshaped, reimagined and reenacted in complex and dynamic ways” (Goldberg,
2010, p. 186). Clearly, a historical perspective on fathers and families is necessary, because changing
economic, social, political, and technological changes have real and measurable effects on family
organization, form, and functioning. As historical events such as the Great Depression, the Midwest
farm crisis of the 1980s, the tragedy of 9/11, and the recent Great Recession illustrate, families are
altered by these secular events, and we need to continually monitor their effects. While these events
are potential disruptive forces on families, these changes can be viewed as natural experiments that
can be useful in evaluating theoretical models of family functioning, coping, and resilience. Secu-
lar change is complex and clearly does not affect all individuals equally or all behavior patterns to
the same extent. In fact, it is a serious oversimplification to assume that general societal trends can
isomorphically be applied across all individual fathers and families. Moreover, better guidelines are
necessary to illuminate which aspects of processes within families are most likely to be altered by
historical events and which processes are less amenable to change (Parke and Elder, in press).
A variety of technological advances from the new reproductive technologies to new forms of
electronic communication continues to play a major role in shaping fathers’ roles. Just as the intro-
duction of television and phones altered family interaction patterns, new advances in communica-
tion technologies (i.e., internet, cellphones, instant messaging, video conferencing, social media) are
reshaping the ways that families interact. Our understanding of the impact of these new advances
on father relationships and processes is limited and lags behind the adoption of these new strategies
by families themselves. As families become increasingly geographically dispersed, communication
technologies offer new forms of “at-a-distance” contact that can benefit families. Advances such
as video conferencing allow “face-to-face” contact with extended family members, such as distant
grandparents or other relatives and for fathers who are separated from their children due to mobility,
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divorce, military deployment, incarceration, and fragmented immigration patterns. More systematic
examination of these issues is needed.
Even more profound is the potential impact of the new reproductive technologies on parenting
in general and fathering in particular (Parke, 2013). New reproductive technologies are expanding
the ways in which individuals become parents and opening up new possibilities for infertile as well
as same-sex couples (Golombok, 2015; Paulson and Sachs, 1999). The implication of these recent
advances including in vitro fertilization, sperm and egg donors, and surrogate mothers for our defini-
tions of parenthood, including fatherhood, are only beginning to be explored. Although knowledge
about the impact of these alternative pathways to fatherhood on children’s development is limited, to
date, the effects on children’s development are generally benign (Golombok, 2015). Increasingly, our
definition of fatherhood is becoming divorced from biology and instead is recognized as a socially
constructed category.
Methodological Issues
No single methodological strategy will suffice to understand the development of the father’s role in
the family. Instead, a wide range of designs and data collection and data analysis strategies is necessary.
To date, there is still a paucity of information concerning interrelations across molar and molecular
levels of analysis. However, it is becoming increasingly clear that a microanalytic strategy is not always
more profitable in terms of describing relationships among interactive partners; in fact, in some cases,
ratings may be a more useful approach. A set of guidelines concerning the appropriate level of analy-
sis for different questions would be helpful.
More attention to tasks used for the assessment of the effects of fathers on their children is needed
in light of the work of Grossman et al. (2002) and Paquette and colleagues (Flanders et al., 2009,
2010; Paquette, 2004), which suggests that challenging situations may be well suited to uncovering
the unique effects of father interaction on children. The continued utilization of similar tasks for
mothers and fathers may, in fact, undermine our efforts to better understand the distinctive ways that
fathers and mothers influence their children’s development.
To address the important issue of direction of effects in work on the impact of fathers on children
and families, experimental strategies are necessary. By experimentally modifying either the type of
paternal behavior or level of father involvement, firmer conclusions concerning the causative role
that fathers play in modifying their children’s and their wives’ development will be possible. Interven-
tion studies (e.g., Doherty, Erickson, and LaRossa, 2006; Holmes et al., 2013) aimed at modifying
fathering behavior provide models for this type of work, and studies (Pruett et al., 2017) that include
measures of child, mother, and father development are providing evidence of the impact of changes
in fathering behavior on developmental outcomes. Moreover, these experimentally based interven-
tions have clear policy implications by exploring the degree of plasticity of fathering behavior and
can serve as a vehicle for evaluation of alternative theoretical views of fatherhood.
An Interdisciplinary Perspective on Fatherhood

In many ways, a psychological approach to fathering has a unique identity, with its focus on intrafa-
milial processes, such as actor attitudes, cognitions, and beliefs and the dynamic interchanges between
and among family members. However, it is unlikely that we can fully understand fathers without rec-
ognizing the contributions of other disciplines. Sociologists inform us about issues of ethnicity, class,
inequality, and demographic shifts (Edin and Nelson, 2013), anthropologists alert us to cross-cultural
variations (Hewlett and Macfarlan, 2010), and economists document shifts in economic opportuni-
ties and struggles (Bishai, 2013). Medical professionals provide insights about family illness, disease,
and wellness-promoting strategies (Yogman and Garfield, 2016), and legal scholars offer glimpses
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into the ways in which families can be helped or hindered by laws and social policies that directly
affect families (Sugarman, 2008). Historians remind us that cross-time shifts in family forms, beliefs,
and practices are constantly under revision (Pleck, 2004). Beyond these traditional contributors to
the study of fathers, some disciplines have not received sufficient attention, namely, architecture and
urban design (Parke, 2013). The effects of living in multifamily households or in intergenerational
housing on father roles is poorly understood. Our challenge is to examine how innovations in hous-
ing arrangements alter various aspects of family life. Father scholars need to better understand how
these cross-disciplinary insights modify process-oriented explanations of father functioning. Clearly,
solutions to the problems facing contemporary families need scholars and practitioners from many
disciplines.
Contextual Issues
Greater attention needs to be paid to the role of context in determining father-child relationships.
How do father-child interaction patterns shift between home and laboratory settings and across dif-
ferent types of interaction contexts such as play, teaching, and caregiving? Moreover, it is important
to consider the social as well as the physical context. Recognition of the embeddedness of fathers in
family contexts is critical, and, in turn, conceptualizing families as embedded in a variety of extra-
familial social settings is important for understanding variation in father functioning (Parke, 2013).
The legal system is one of many institutions that affect father functioning as illustrated by the legal
issues surrounding custody, adoption, and the regulation of the new reproductive technologies. The
family links with educational institutions including schools as centers of academic learning and
schools as social service systems (i.e., childcare centers and after-school programs) need more atten-
tion. Medical settings and social service providers all play central roles in family life and need more
systematic scrutiny, especially in light of the need to make fathers more welcome in these settings.
Work contexts have historically received attention beginning with maternal employment issues, but
as work patterns have changed, new issues have emerged such as time management, work schedules
and stress, and family leave policies for fathers as well as mothers. As intergenerational perspectives
become more prevalent, family leave for both parents needs to accommodate not only infants and
ill children but also elderly relatives as well because it is likely as family roles shift fathers as well as
mothers will be called on to provide elder care. Another topic, fathers and religion, has not yet been
fully embraced by our field in spite of some exceptions (e.g., Bollinger and Palkovitz, 2003; Born-
stein et al., 2017; Vermeer, 2014). We still do not fully appreciate the myriad ways religious beliefs
and practices and religious institutions and leaders play in family life as both moral guides and social
supports. Nor are the attitudes, practices, and organization of family life across different religious
groups such as Buddhists, Hindus, and Muslims, who are becoming increasingly part of contempo-
rary Western culture, fully understood. Clearly, the links among fathers, families, and community
institutions continue to merit our attention.
Conclusion
In spite of a relatively brief recent history of serious research devoted to fatherhood, considerable
progress has been achieved in our understanding of the paternal role and the impact of fathers on
themselves and others. Several conclusions are warranted. First, some modest increases over the
past several decades have occurred in the level of father involvement with children. However, not
all types of involvement shown have been equally affected, and managerial aspects of family life
remain largely a maternal responsibility. Moreover, not all fathers have increased their involve-
ment and the variability in involvement across social class, education and ethnicity needs to con-
tinue to be explored. Second, fathers are clearly competent caregivers and playmates in spite of
118
their limited overall involvement in childcare. Third, stylistic differences in interaction with chil-
dren especially in play between mothers and fathers continue to be evident in spite of recent shifts
toward greater father involvement in children’s daily lives, although some cross-cultural evidence
suggests that the paternal physical play style may not be as universal as previously assumed. Fourth,
the father role appears less scripted than the mother role, which may account for the variability
that characterizes enactments of fathering. Fifth, evidence continues to suggest that fathers impact
children’s social, emotional, and cognitive development. However, quality of fathering remains an
important determinant of paternal influence on children’s development, and the independent con-
tribution of fathers relative to mothers remains only weakly documented. Sixth, recent evidence
suggests that fathering activities alter men’s marital relationships as well as men’s own sense of self
and their societal generativity.
The study of father-child relationships has matured in the last several decades and is now a
more fully contextualized issue. Fathers in the context of their social relationships both within and
beyond the family are increasingly the appropriate point of entry for understanding the issue of
both paternal roles and their impact on themselves and others. Because our conceptual paradigms
continue to outstrip our empirical understanding, reducing this gap is the challenge of the next
decades of research. Children, fathers, and families will benefit from this increased understanding.
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4
COPARENTING IN DIVERSE
FAMILY SYSTEMS
Introduction
In this chapter, we address a dynamic that lies inextricably at the core of most family systems around
the world—that of the coparenting collaboration operative between the important adults who shoul-
der responsibility for the socialization and upbringing of each individual child. The acknowledgment
by the Handbook of Parenting (2nd ed.) that across diverse families parenting of children is brokered
not just dyadically, but also within a system that involves, at minimum, three people, made a bold,
innovative, and transformative contribution to the landscape of the parenting field as it had taken
shape in 2002. McHale and colleagues noted that there had been a recent groundswell of scholarly
activity devoted to understanding coparenting, but “most of what we know about coparenting to
date is based on research with heterosexual, married, European American or European two-parent
families” (p. 76). This situation has gradually changed in the years since, with studies exploring,
weighing, and documenting the nature of coparenting dynamics as they are revealed in a variety of
different family collectives and structures around the globe in which adults parent children together.
Progression has been, in one sense, very modest and, in another, extraordinarily expansive. Our aims
in this chapter are to mark progress in the field and define vistas yet to be explored.
Historical Considerations in Coparenting

In many accounts, the Women’s Movement in the United States is seen as a major impetus for
modern-day perspectives on coparenting, challenging—and, in many ways, transforming—long-
held views of the appropriate roles of men and fathers in families. But well before this significant
reframing of the “shared work” of parenting, the writings of family clinicians as early as the 1950s
had drawn attention to mother-father-child family triangles and the effects of fractiousness between
parenting adults on the well-being of children (McHale and Sullivan, 2008). Some of the themes
identified by influential family therapists, such as contentiousness between wives and husbands in
their marriage and disinterest in the family by one of the parenting figures—usually, fathers—remain
pivotal in coparenting research. Other important concepts, including coparenting communication,
cooperation, and solidarity (McHale, 2007) and joint management of family functions (Feinberg,
2002) are also derivative of concepts first introduced by family theorists and therapists.
One important result of the Women’s Movement was to cast important light on the responsibili-
ties of men and fathers, but other provocations in the 1980s further shaped the nature of coparenting
137
studies to come. Even as a handful of pioneering studies were taking up comprehensive study of
mothers, fathers, and families as family units (Lewis, 1989), feminist commentators (Leupnitz, 1988;
McGoldrick, Anderson, and Walsh, 1989; Walters, Carter, Papp, and Silverstein, 1988), augmented
by the voices of other critics (Rich, 1976; Singh, 2004), challenged another decades-old gender bias
in psychology’s theorizing about children and families. Their arguments converged on and laid bare
implicit—and often explicit—views of mothers and mothering that had been formulaic, harm-
ful, and even pathological. In the views of the field’s most influential theories and theorists, these
writers noted, mothers were typically the ones held responsible for the ultimate adjustment—or
maladjustment—of children (Caplan and Caplan, 1994; Kindlon and Thompson, 2000).
This long-overdue reckoning with the myopic focus on mothers opened the doors not only for a
breaking field of scholarship on fathers and fathering (Parke and Cookston, 2019), but also for inten-
sive empirical work to come in the 1990s detailing coparenting coordination in two-parent families
as a shared and co-constructed phenomenon. In this view of parenting as a triangular family-level
phenomenon (Fivaz-Depeursinge and Corboz-Warnery, 1999; McHale, 1995; McHale and Cowan,
1996), movement was made to avoid casting prejudiced aspersions on the motives or competen-
cies of either women or men (Belsky, Crnic, and Gable, 1995; McHale, 1995; McHale and Cowan,
1996). It was not so much that the individual propensities or inclinations of men and women were
no longer of interest, but rather that coparenting and triangular dynamics themselves became the
phenomena of interest.
Contemporary studies of coparenting, if sometimes still unduly influenced by the constraining
and ethnocentric view of families as limited to mothers, fathers, and children, have increasingly come
to recognize and appreciate the variety of family systems and structures in which children are raised.
Exemplary of this shift was a volume published by the American Psychological Association that
examined the scholarship of coparenting across diverse families and structures (McHale and Lindahl,
2011). It seems safe to say that the field of coparenting has turned a corner and that studies of copar-
enting are now, appropriately, truly studies of all families.
Theory in Coparenting
Coparenting is an enterprise undertaken by two or more adults who together take on the socializa-
tion, care, and upbringing of children for whom they share responsibility (McHale, Lauretti, Tal-
bot, and Pouquette, 2002). Seen as a deep structure within families related to, but also separate
from, adult-child and adult-adult dyadic subsystems, coparenting is rooted within Minuchin’s (1974)
structural family theory, which stressed collaborative, supportive leadership provided by the family’s
parenting adults.
A central theme in Minuchin’s writings was that the most functional family systems are those
characterized by clear generational boundaries between adults and children, with adults embracing
and sharing their responsibilities and parental authority so that children will be protected and per-
mitted to be children without having to care for adults’ sensibilities (Minuchin, 1974). This theme
still resonates today. Surprisingly then, even although the writings of family theorists and therapists
were both insightful and prolific through the decades of the 1960s and 1970s, it was not until the late
1970s that a rapprochement with the field of child development finally began. The scientific study
of coparenting, calling on results from systematic empirical investigations of coparenting, initially
only began making its way into the child development literature via studies focused on postdivorce
cooperation and antagonism between parents (Ahrons, 1981; Hetherington, Cox, and Cox, 1982).
Studies of coparenting in families in which parents were still together and had not divorced came
only much later—with studies of coparenting in families where coparents numbered more than just
a married, coresidential or divorced mother and father finally beginning with concerted deliberation
and resolve only within the start of the twenty first century.
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Coparenting in Diverse Family Systems
How best to understand coparenting phenomena in diverse family systems? With Minuchin’s
flexible view of coparenting solidarity, hierarchy, and shared responsibility as a platform, the questions
come more clearly into focus. As McHale (2011) explains, an essential “read” of any given family’s
coparenting alliance cannot begin until the identities and involvement of all the important parenting
adults in the child’s life have been established. Coparents are sometimes limited to the child’s biologi-
cal mother and father, but as or more often, these two individuals are not the prime or sole coparents.
Regardless of who is ultimately identified as the child’s “people,” an understanding of the functional
coparenting alliance at work in the family necessitates developing an understanding of how that fam-
ily’s unique coparental alliance functions regarding (1) mutual involvement/engagement by major
coparents, (2) presence/extent of active solidarity and collaboration between these individuals, and
(3) presence/extent of unresolved coparenting dissonance between them (McHale, 2011). Coparent-
ing arrangements are many, and any can be functional when co-constructed by the involved adults
and attuned to the child’s needs and sensibilities. Moreover, episodic disputes about what is best for
children are expectable, normative, and growth promoting. Chronic, unresolved, or contentious dis-
putes are more concerning; unchecked, they can lead to destructive conflict, to emotional or actual
withdrawal by one or more important attachment figures in the child’s life, and, consequentially, to
threats to the child’s core sense of safety and security within the family system.
Central Issues in Coparenting

With greater cross-disciplinary infusion of scholarship on family adaptations throughout history and
around the world into the study of child development, research on children and families has pro-
ceeded from a more mindful and worldly view of family processes in the new millennia. Of course,
studies of coparenting can never be truly atheoretical. A few broad, core assumptions guide contem-
porary coparenting theory and research (McHale and Irace, 2011). First, honoring Minuchin’s form-
ative arguments, any coparenting system that serves the needs of children must maintain functional
hierarchies and appropriate boundaries. Life circumstances may dictate that children must sometimes
be recruited to assist with adult responsibilities at an early age (caring for younger siblings, aiding
with family work), but there is no confusion about reversal of roles in hierarchically organized sys-
tems. Such clarity allows both adults and children to tend appropriately to normative developmental
and relationship challenges they confront.
Second, proper understanding of coparental alliances dictates taking a triangular or family group
level of analysis, in which the relationship between the adults with respect to a particular child is
considered. In the 1980s, there was a burgeoning realm of scholarship that explored the effects
of relationships on relationships (Hinde and Stevenson-Hinde, 1988). This work exemplified the
intense focus paid at that time to parent-child relationships and to couple and marital functioning,
and carries on today. At the same time, views of the family as interlocking dyads do not embrace the
systems notion that the family whole is greater than, and transcends, the sum of the system’s distinct
and interlocking parts (Kerig, 2019; McHale and Irace, 2011). Moreover, although it is useful to
consider the coparents’ work with respect to rearing all children within their family collective—for
this is the day-to-day reality of coparents—each child experiences a somewhat different coparent
system. As McHale and Irace (2011) have outlined, the coparenting network that evolves for two
different children within the same family can be constituted of different individuals, and the nature
and dynamics of the same two people’s coparenting alliance may differ for different children within
the family (McHale, 2007a). Moreover, children themselves contribute to the distinctive relationship
dynamic that evolves between them and their coparents (Fivaz-Depeursinge, Frascarolo, Lopes, Dim-
itrova, and Favez, 2007).
A third core assumption, and the one that guides this chapter, is that coparenting remains a cen-
trally important dynamic not just in families headed by heterosexual or gay, married or common-law
139
couples, but also in all family systems. In 2011, McHale and Irace argued that the essence of copar-
enting is best understood from children’s perspectives, for
Children see their families as a collection of individuals who loves and cares for them. And
children are right; in the end, their welfare in the world will ultimately be protected and
assured, to the extent maximally possible, by the collection of individuals who step up to
take responsibility for their care and upbringing.
(p. 15)
This theme was exemplified by Crosbie-Burnett and Lewis (1999)’s treatise on the child-centered
focus characteristic of countless African American family systems. In such families, coparents are
all parental and family figures who contribute to the child’s well-being and become involved in
the child’s support and nurturance. Arrangements are based on the child’s needs, assuring endur-
ing responsibility for dependent children across changes in relationships among adults (McHale
et al., 2002). It is this conceptualization that ties together diverse scholarship and supports the view
that during their formative years, whether episodically or continuously, nearly all children will be
coparented.
The following sections update themes pursued in coparenting research in the years since the 2002
Handbook overview. At that time, evidence had begun to amass verifying the formative impact that
coparenting dynamics exert in Western two-parent families. That line of work has continued and is
summarized ahead. The remainder of the chapter turns its attention to new scholarship illuminating
coparenting in diverse family systems.
Classical and Modern Research in Coparenting
The First Wave: Initial Studies of Coparenting in Two-Parent

Heterosexual Coresidential Families
Married two-parent families have commanded extensive attention from child development and
family researchers. Perhaps not surprisingly, such families were the first (besides postdivorce fami-
lies) whose coparenting processes were explored in detail by coparenting researchers. Such studies
continue vibrantly today. Among the most widely replicated findings in the coparenting field has
been that marital quality is linked to the quality of coparenting (see Manglesdorf, Laxman, and Jes-
see, 2011, for a review). Prenatal relationship quality sets the tone for the developing coparenting
relationship (McHale, Kuersten-Hogan, and Rao, 2004), with better adjusted couples demonstrating
more positive and constructive coparenting relationships after birth (Bonds and Gondoli, 2007; Le,
McDaniel, Leavitt, and Feinberg, 2016; Morrill, Hines, Mahmood, and Cordova, 2010; Van Egeren,
2004). In this sense, pre-child dyadic marital quality shapes the nature of the emergent three-person
coparenting system, which, in turn, comes to influence later child outcomes (Baril, Crouter, and
McHale, 2007; Katz and Low, 2004; McHale and Rasmussen, 1998). These systems are not static;
Stroud, Meyers, Wilson, and Durbin (2015) showed that distressed marital functioning was related
to preschool children’s internalizing and externalizing problems through reductions in coparenting
warmth.
Direct and Indirect Effects

Beyond the elementary linkage between marital and coparenting quality, much attention has been
devoted to interrelations among marital functioning, parenting, and coparenting in families, with
questions raised about the direction of effects among these family processes and dynamics and their
140
ultimate impact on children. These are complex questions to entertain and answer; indeed, there was
a time when coparenting was conceptualized not as a distinctive family process in and of its own
right, but rather as a subcomponent of marital unions and relationships.
Among the early, formative findings often cited as an impetus for the development of the copar-
enting field is that child-related conflict (e.g., interparental disagreements on discipline, religious and
moral values, dependence-independence, peer relationships, safety, and others) is significantly more
disruptive for child well-being and more closely related to child outcomes than is marital conflict
(Bearss and Eyberg, 1998; Camara and Resnick, 1989; Jouriles et al., 1991). The recognition that
coparenting is a child-specific, triangular construct rather than a subsidiary of marital or conjugal
relationship functioning has not guided every study of within-family dynamics, however. Perhaps as
a result, reports studying their interrelations have sometimes provided contrary results or leads that
have gone off in blind directions.
One line of inquiry that gained traction is that coparenting appears to be a more proximal predic-
tor of child outcomes than is marital functioning (Bonds and Gondoli, 2007; Holland and McElwain,
2013; Morrill et al., 2010). Morrill and colleagues (2010) reported that coparenting exerts impact
on both marital relationships and parenting practices, although conceptually there is also reason to
suspect that the relation between marital and coparenting dynamics is bidirectional.
The tools and methods used to estimate coparenting are not inconsequential, and confusion
has sometimes arisen when studies’ methodologies and instruments fail to recognize the triangular
nature of coparenting as a co-constructed entity (McHale, 2015). One example of such confusion
occurs when studies have relied on concepts such as “maternal coparenting” or “paternal coparent-
ing.” Clearly, both maternal and paternal actions contribute to coparenting, and so, on the face of it,
the concepts themselves have intuitive merit. But parsing coparenting into “maternal” and “paternal”
elements also muddies the meaning of findings such as those reported by Holland and McElwain
(2013), who found that marital quality fosters more positive paternal coparenting, which, in turn,
has positive implications on father-child relationships during the toddler years. Holland and McEl-
wain (2013) also concluded that although marital quality influences maternal coparenting, maternal
coparenting is associated with better mother-son relationships but not mother-daughter relation-
ships. The confusing element here is not that marital quality might exert an impact on maternal or
paternal actions related to positive coparenting—that would not be controversial. Rather, it is the
reported finding that maternal and paternal coparenting affects the coparents’ own parenting behav-
ior and relationships—but not their partners’. One main benefit of supportive coparenting is that
the solidarity can lift, enhance, and strengthen the parenting of a less apt or distressed parent. It is
conceivable, therefore, that the finding that maternal and paternal coparenting affects coparents’ own
parenting behavior and relationships—but not their partners’—reflects a response or social desir-
ability bias on the part of the reporter rather than any true core family-level dynamic. Single-source
method variance was a major issue in early studies of family and child development.
Equally perplexing are studies that show that individual parenting patterns influence coparent-
ing (Carlson, McLanahan, and Brooks-Gunn, 2008; Cookston, Braver, Griffin, De Luse, and Miles,
2007; Jia and Schoppe-Sullivan, 2011). Certainly, there is evidence from early studies on transitions
to parenthood indicating that in many families with small infants, fathers take their lead from moth-
ers (Entwisle and Doering, 1981). Mothers often more quickly become “experts” on young infants’
signals simply by the greater amounts of time they have spent with them. In this instance, coparent-
ing solidarity and consistency might improve if fathers take stock of and emulate maternal routines
and soothing techniques. That is, mothering might be said to affect both fathering and coparenting.
But other, more complex longitudinal designs have given pause in trying to understand the interplay
between parenting and coparenting. For example, Jia and Schoppe-Sullivan (2011) reported that the
more frequently fathers engaged in play activities with children, the more supportive and less under-
mining coparenting behavior was observed to be a year later. In contrast, greater father involvement
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in caregiving was associated with a decline in supportive, and an increase in undermining, coparenting
behavior a year later.
What might this mean? On the face of it, this finding may seem contradictory to a common
complaint by mothers that is sometimes linked to maternal reports of marital dissatisfaction—that
fathers get to enjoy the benefits of play and positive engagement with young children while avoiding
the drudgery of caregiving and of limit setting, which disproportionately falls to mothers. However,
other evidence hints that paternal encroachment on mothers’ closeness with young children can
be experienced negatively by mothers, especially those who may have insecure states of mind with
respect to attachment (Talbot, Baker, and McHale, 2009), and so more intensive paternal caregiving
may counterintuitively dampen rather than enhance coparental solidarity. This finding is deserving
of greater scrutiny, for it may not have similar parallels in family systems where the coparent is not
the child’s biological father.
Less provocative have been studies whose primary purpose was to establish that coparenting can
have direct effects as well as indirect effects on child adjustment (Barnett, Scaramella, McGoron, and
Callahan, 2012; Karreman, van Tuijl, van Aken, and Dekovic, 2008; McHale and Rasmussen, 1998).
Typically, studies that have examined both parenting and coparenting as predictors of children’s
developmental outcomes found that the quality of coparenting explains additional variance in child
adjustment that is not captured by what each parent does individually. For example, Karreman and
colleagues (2008) reported that coparenting contributed to preschoolers’ effortful control beyond the
contributions of maternal and paternal parenting. Heightened hostile-competitive coparenting was
related to lower levels of effortful control in preschoolers. Of note, these results were confirmed both
via observations and self-reports.
Perhaps more important is the issue of whether coparenting solidarity augments the efforts of
individual parenting behavior among children who face some form of risk. This, after all, was a core
premise in S. Minuchin’s work with families—together, adults could mitigate their children’s risk
by working effectively as a coparenting team. There is some empirical evidence consistent with this
premise; Schoppe-Sullivan, Weldon, Claire Cook, Davis, and Buckley (2009) found that when par-
ents engage in supportive coparenting, children with less effortful control were less likely to develop
externalizing behaviors. In related work, Barnett et al. (2012) found that when children grow up
experiencing supportive coparenting, they tend to display more prosocial behaviors even when their
mothers use less inductive reasoning. In other words, supportive coparenting serves as a protec-
tive factor for children’s prosocial behavior (Scrimgeour, Blandon, Stifter, and Buss, 2013). Findings
such as these usefully augment those that examine simply whether mistuned coparenting influences
development of problem behaviors and indicate that coparenting can have a buffering effect depend-
ing on the nature and context of individual child adjustment or parenting behavior.
Development of Coparenting: Consistency and Change

As children develop and acquire new abilities, parents need to renegotiate their coparenting patterns.
It might be anticipated that coparents who establish coparenting solidarity when their children are
young will be in better position to maintain solidarity as children grow older. To test this premise,
several coparenting investigations charted the development of early coparenting from patterns of
adjustment that existed even prior to the child’s birth. Van Egeren (2003), for example, identified
parental age, education, occupation, concerns about childrearing, coparenting in the family of ori-
gin, differences in childrearing philosophies, and maternal ego development as important prenatal
predictors of coparenting. Among these many differences, McHale and Rotman (2007) found that
the degree of difference between the expectant parents in their parenting beliefs was predictive of
post-birth coparental adjustment even beyond the child’s first 2 years of life; couples reporting larger
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differences in their parenting beliefs prenatally were characterized by lower coparenting solidarity at
30 months postpartum.
With respect to individual parental adjustment, Talbot et al. (2009) linked prenatal attachment
security of the expectant parents to coparenting quality following the baby’s birth, and Altenburger,
Schoppe-Sullivan, Lang, Bower, and Kamp Dush (2014) argued that expectant parents demonstrate
coparenting tendencies even before their child’s birth that will remain relatively stable throughout
the child’s first year of life. Whether coparenting, a triangular construct, can be documented prior to
the baby’s birth remains an open question, but what has become clear is that there is at least moder-
ate stability of coparenting from the early postpartum months through the first year of the child’s life
(Laxman et al., 2013; Le et al., 2016; McHale, 2007a; Van Egeren, 2004).
Furthermore, some studies (Schoppe-Sullivan, Mangelsdorf, Frosch, and McHale, 2004) have
found evidence for moderate stability in coparenting behavior for even longer periods—in the
Schoppe-Sullivan study, spanning the developmental periods of infancy, toddlerhood, and preschool
years from 6 months to 3 years of age. Laxman and colleagues (2013) likewise reported that both sup-
portive and undermining coparenting remain stable over the first 3 years of children’s life, although
child factors also moderate. There is hence converging evidence that coherence in coparenting
adjustment is the rule rather than the exception in coresidential two-parent families (McHale, 2007).
In non-coresidential families, coparenting arrangements may be more strongly impacted by
external life circumstances. In analyzing data from the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being Study,
Waller (2002) showed that father involvement in coparenting children sometimes diminished over
times, sometimes remained relatively stable, and sometimes—prompted by life challenges destabiliz-
ing the child-mother household situation—reinvigorated over time as exigencies demanded. Such
thoughtful looks at family systems beyond the more typically studied “nuclear family” arrangement
add important nuance to scholarship on coparenting dynamics in families.
Coparenting at Different Stages of Child Development

Children of all ages benefit when the coparenting adults in their lives provide adequate protection
and safety, are mutually attuned to and in regular communication about the child’s needs and sen-
sibilities and respect the child’s need to maintain a close and loving bond with all members of their
coparenting system (McHale and Irace, 2011). When coparents support one another, and are inter-
changeable in this way, the child is far more likely to experience family-level security and stability.
The benefits derived by children from positive and coordinated coparenting may differ at dif-
ferent points in the family life cycle (McHale and Irace, 2011). Coparenting efforts invariably shift
in complexity as children develop. Most early studies of coparenting focused on coresidential, two-
parent families with infants, toddlers, and preschoolers (Lindsey, Caldera, and Colwell, 2005; McHale,
1995, 2007a; Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2004; Van Egeren, 2003). Investigations since have compared
non-coresidential and residential families of young children and examined coparenting processes and
child adjustment during elementary school years and adolescence. Studies of coparenting in families
with very young children are described in comprehensive detail in McHale and Lindahl (2011).
Here, we touch on a few major themes and findings.
In a secondary analysis of data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Lewin, Mitchell,
Beers, Feinberg, and Minkovitz (2012) established that coparenting conflict between teen mothers
and their children’s fathers affects child adjustment in both residential and non-coresidential fam-
ily systems. Both mothers and fathers perceived fathers to be more involved coparents when fathers
resided together with the children, but children’s mothers reported greater coparenting conflict when
coparenting with resident fathers, whereas resident fathers reported lower coparenting conflict with
children’s mothers than did non-coresidential fathers. Of interest, coparenting conflict was nonetheless
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related to child behavior problems in much the same way as it has been in most studies of coresiden-
tial parents, with the associations stronger for boys than for girls. Links between paternal reports of
coparenting and children’s social adjustment were moderated by child ethnicity and father education.
One of the first studies to examine links between coparenting and children’s adjustment during the
elementary school years was conducted by Stright and Neitzel (2003). They found that parents who
supported each other in parenting had children who were more likely to pay attention in class, work
actively and independently, and earn better grades in third grade. Furthermore, coparenting moder-
ated relations between individual parenting and children’s attention, activity, independence, and grades.
Specifically, if parents were critical of children’s efforts but engaged in supportive coparenting, children
showed better attentional capacities, were more independent learners, and earned better grades. In con-
trast, when parents were not supportive of children’s efforts and did not support each other’s parenting,
their children had poorer attention, were more passive and dependent in their learning, and earned
lower grades. Also, in the realm of problematic child behavior, Jones, Shaffer, Forehand, Brody, and
Armistead (2003) reported that 7- to 11-year-old African American children whose mothers reported
greater coparent conflict exhibited more externalizing and internalizing problems, both concurrently
and longitudinally. With respect to effects of coparenting on positive child functioning, Barnett and
colleagues (2012) documented an association between coparenting cooperation and 4- and 6-year-old
children’s social competence, closely replicating earlier findings linking cooperative coparenting and
social adaptation that had been reported by McHale, Johnson, and Sinclair (1999).
In one longitudinal investigation, Leary and Katz (2004) found that children who experienced
hostile-withdrawn coparenting during the preschool years continued to struggle in their peer rela-
tionships during middle school. Moreover, not only were they more likely to engage in conflict with
their peers and within this conflict, to evoke relationship damaging behaviors, such as name-calling
and negative teasing, but also these children were less likely to engage in fun and connecting interac-
tions with their peers. The authors suggested that children may have been emulating the negative
relationship dynamics they witnessed between their coparents, carrying these forward to their rela-
tionships with peers.
During adolescence, when children begin to test limits, coparenting conflict predicts adolescents’
antisocial and risky behavior. Riina and McHale (2014) reported that coparenting characterized
by less shared decision-making is associated with more risky behavior among adolescent boys. By
contrast, greater joint involvement in the adolescent children’s activities is associated with less risky
behavior and with fewer depressive symptoms among girls and boys. However, the coparenting-
depressive symptomatology link was less clear in reports by Baril, Crouter, and McHale (2007) and
by Feinberg, Kan, and Hetherington (2007). Curiously, Riina and McHale (2014) also found that
coparenting satisfaction among fathers tended to decrease during children’s early adolescent years but
remained relatively stable among mothers.
In a finding harkening the Lewin et al. (2012) report, Goodrum, Jones, Kincaid, and Cuellar
(2012) found that in a sample of African American youth who coresided only with their mothers,
coparenting was especially significant. Higher levels of conflict between mothers and children’s main
coparents (whether fathers or grandmothers) were associated with adolescent externalizing prob-
lems, just as is the case for adolescents in dual-parent residences. Links were bidirectional, providing
evidence that children’s behavior problems also undermine coparenting. Considering these findings,
it seems safe to conclude that coparenting materially influences children’s development and well-
being from early toddlerhood through late adolescence.
Coparenting and Child Adjustment

Specific dynamics of adults’ coparenting relationships may be most important for different child
outcomes; a meta-analysis of the relation between coparenting and child adjustment by Teubert and
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Pinquart (2010) concluded that coparenting conflict is a more relevant predictor of child externaliz-
ing problems, with triangulation and lack of cooperation more likely to culminate in child internal-
izing problems (Buehler and Welsh, 2009). The quality of coparenting relationship may be especially
important when considering children’s development of social skills (McHale, Kuersten, and Lauretti,
1996). First, competitive coparenting may be associated with incongruent infant-parent attachment,
with children developing a secure attachment with one parent and an insecure one with the other
(Caldera and Lindsey, 2006) and thereby having a compromised sense of family-level security. Sec-
ond, children learn and adopt social behaviors partly through observations of their parents. Parents
engaging in cooperative coparenting enhance children’s development of their own social skills (Man-
gelsdorf et al., 2011; McHale et al., 1999).
However, not all studies are not successful in uncovering links between supportive coparent-
ing and indices of positive child adjustment. For example, Kwon and Elicker (2012) reported that
negative coparenting was associated with toddlers’ noncompliance with mothers, but there was no
association between positive coparenting and toddler compliance. Other studies have likewise sug-
gested links between high coparenting conflict and child maladjustment but found less support
tying lower levels of positive coparenting to child maladjustment (Baril et al., 2007; McConnell and
Kerig, 2002). Cabrera, Scott, Fagan, Steward-Streng, and Chien (2012), studying longitudinal effects
of coparenting conflict, communication, and shared decision-making on children’s school readiness
in families led by married and coresidential couples, found that coparenting conflict when children
were toddlers predicted poorer child social and academic skills at age 48 months. Shared decision-
making was relevant, though directly related only to children’s social skills. This finding is in line with
prior summaries suggesting that positive features of coparenting—closeness, warmth, cooperation,
and solidarity—may be most closely connected with children’s social adjustment (Mangelsdorf et al.,
2011; McHale et al., 1999; McHale et al., 1996).
Coparenting and Its Relation to Attributes of Individual Parents and Children

The capacity to co-construct a collaborative and supportive coparental relationship, especially given
the inevitable and often deep-seated differences in beliefs that everyone has about what is best for
children, is never simply realized. Adults vary significantly in both their capacity and their propen-
sity to trust and collaborate with others, and hence it might be expected that coparental solidarity
would be harder-won for families in which one or both adults entered the coparenting enterprise
with some form of short- or longer term challenge. However, to the extent that that wholes truly
are greater than the sum of their parts, events such as the birth of a baby and sharing that experience
with the child’s other parent can create an emergent system that would never have been anticipated
based on an individual parent’s personality traits alone. This said, researchers have been interested
in determining whether coparenting adjustment can be tied to certain shorter term (e.g., parental
well-being, a fluid and adaptable state) or longer term (personality traits, more rigid and tougher to
influence) characteristics. Studies have been scattered, with no replicated consensus findings shining
an especially helpful light on this question, but what we have learned is of interest.
In 1980, Jeanne and Jack Block outlined two core concepts thought to be central personality
dimensions—ego control and ego resilience, or flexibility. Some of the early studies of coparenting
examined these and related constructs, with interesting but nonoverlapping findings. Van Egeren
(2003) found that maternal personalities were especially important—she reported that greater mater-
nal ego development predicted fathers’ perceptions of better quality of coparenting. Independently,
Talbot and McHale (2004) found that paternal personalities had special importance—paternal flex-
ibility and resilience predicted coparenting of 12-month-old infants. Specifically, when fathers were
more flexibly able to adjust their behavior to changing or unfamiliar interpersonal demands, their
coparenting relationships were more cooperative, child centered, and warm. Of interest, paternal
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resilience moderated the effect of marital distress on coparenting—problems in the marriage did not
have the anticipated adverse impact on coparenting in families where fathers were ego resilient—
capable of “taking a hit” without retaliating or withdrawing. Given the neglect of the relevance of
fathers in child development for so long, it was of great interest that Talbot et al.’s work identified a
paternal strength that was serving as a protective factor and buffer for coparenting children in families
where marriages were in disarray.
Unfortunately, neither of these findings sparked replication studies, although a second indication
of the importance of understanding fathers’ as well as mothers’ psychological adjustment came in
a report by Talbot et al. (2009). In this study, early coparenting cooperation was predictably high
in families where both fathers and mothers had secure states of mind with respect to attachment as
assessed on the Adult Attachment Interview, with cohesion lowest (i.e., disconnection highest) in
families where fathers had insecure states of minds with respect to attachment. What was especially
compelling was the situation in families where fathers were secure but mothers insecure—in such
families, coparenting conflict was highest of all families. Something about maternal insecurity in the
context of paternal security triggered a dynamic in which patterns of coparental conflict during
interactions with infants were most readily visible.
Similar results were reported by Sheftall, Schoppe-Sullivan, and Futris (2010), who found that
adolescent mothers with higher attachment avoidance had more conflictual coparenting relation-
ships and a weaker parenting alliance, compared with mothers with lower attachment avoidance.
There are several intriguing explanations for this pattern of results, but what is clear is that it is insuf-
ficient to simply ask what the role of maternal or paternal characteristics might be—understanding
the psychological adaptations of both parents within the same family provides the most compelling
leads.
In other studies, parents’ psychological well-being, arguably a more transitory and malleable state,
has been found to influence the emerging coparenting relationship. Lindsey and colleagues (2005)
reported that both mothers and fathers with higher self-esteem demonstrated less intrusive copar-
enting. Mothers with higher self-esteem were also more supportive in their coparenting. Other
investigations suggest that parents who report less well-being develop more negative coparenting
relationships. In one study, fathers reporting higher levels of depressive symptoms also tended to
report high-conflict and lower support in their coparenting relationship (Bronte-Tinkew, Scott,
Horowitz, and Lilja, 2009). Another line of work illustrates how situational stressors amplify individ-
ual parent characteristics to influence coparenting quality. Fathers’ negative emotionality, when cou-
pled with lower socioeconomic status, was associated with more undermining coparenting behavior
(Schoppe-Sullivan and Mangelsdorf, 2012).
The Role of Child Gender

Given indications in the parenting literature that there can be differential beliefs and practices of
mothers and fathers with sons and daughters (Russell and Saebel, 1997), it is perhaps not surpris-
ing that coparenting researchers would be drawn to ask whether differential patterns of coparenting
might characterize the nature of the triangular relationships coparents form with sons versus daugh-
ters. The short answer is that no singular distinctive set of relationship differences as a function of
child gender have ever been identified. Rather, there has been mixed, and occasionally intriguing,
evidence indicating some role for child gender in studies of distressed coparenting (Margolin, Gordis,
and John, 2001; McHale, 1995; Stright and Bales, 2003).
In one of the first studies to explore organizing effects of child gender, McHale (1995) docu-
mented a relation between marital distress and hostile-competitive coparenting that operated mainly
in families of boys (greater distress, greater likelihood of hostile-competitive coparenting). In fami-
lies of girls, there was also a link between marital distress and coparenting, but it took a different
146
form—greater marital distress was coincident with larger discrepancies in levels of parent engage-
ment with the child (one parent either leaning in the direction of over- or under-involvement—and
sometimes both), a dynamic not as present in maritally distressed families of boys. Echoes of this pat-
tern also appear in a study by Elliston, McHale, Talbot, Parmley, and Kuersten-Hogan (2008), who
found indications of conflictual dynamics in families with boys and disengaged patterns in families
with girls.
In a follow-up of the families in McHale’s (1995) study of families with infants, McHale and Ras-
mussen (1998) found differential cross-time predictions for patterns of hostile-competitive behavior
during infancy (predicting children’s externalizing behavior during preschool) and patterns of par-
enting discrepancies during infancy (predicting internalizing behavior), although in their relatively
small sample, the gendered effects of these findings fell short of statistical significance. However,
Umemura, Christopher, Mann, Jacobvitz, and Hazen (2015) found that competitive coparenting
during the toddler years could be linked to Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Opposi-
tional Defiant Disorder symptoms in boys, but not girls; competitive coparenting during the toddler
years was linked to later somatic complaints in girls, but not boys. McConnell and Kerig (2002)
likewise reported links between hostile-competitive coparenting and externalizing behavior prob-
lems among school-age boys, with coparenting that was characterized by discrepancies between
coparents in warmth and investment correlated with internalizing problems among girls. Kolak and
Vernon-Feagans (2008) also documented that lower warmth and less cooperation between parents
was associated with more internalizing problems among toddler girls.
Despite these intriguing leads, suggesting that in many families where there is fundamental mari-
tal distress, girls may be at comparatively greater risk for experiencing withdrawal by a coparent—
whereas boys may be at comparatively greater risk for exposure to coparenting conflict—there is not
a corpus of evidence fully bearing this possibility out. Other work examining effects of child gender
have been less consistent, with no clear theme emerging. For example, Davis, Schoppe-Sullivan,
Mangelsdorf, and Brown, (2009) reported that parents of 1-year-old girls exhibited more support-
ive coparenting compared with parents of 1-year-old boys, and Kolak and Vernon-Feagans (2008)
found that supportive coparenting benefited the social development of girls but not boys. However,
Brown, Schoppe-Sullivan, Mangelsdorf, and Neff (2010) found coparenting to be related to infant-
mother and infant-father attachment in families of boys but not girls. Still others find no significant
influence of gender on coparenting. For example, Kamp Dush, Kotila, and Schoppe-Sullivan (2011)
reported that child gender was not related to supportive coparenting following relationship dissolu-
tion of the parents.
At this point, it seems premature to draw specific conclusions about patterns or forms of copar-
enting organized by child gender. There may be value in contextualizing coparenting-child links as
they exist in confluence with other family risk factors.
The Influence of Child Temperament on Coparenting

Beyond child gender, studies of child effects have been interested in the interplay between child
temperament and coparenting. The relation is complex, and not surprisingly no consensus has been
reached on the role child temperament might play in organizing coparenting systems (Lindsey et al.,
2005; McHale et al., 2004; Schoppe-Sullivan, Mangelsdorf, Brown, and Sokolowski, 2007; Van
Egeren, 2004). For some families, the family accommodation may be that one parent assumes the
bulk of responsibility for the challenging child, but in other families, shared coparental responsibility
may be the adaptation. In either of these cases, there may be shared agreement between the coparent-
ing adults that the chosen division of responsibilities is the best form of supporting the child, but in
others, there may be discord and animosity regarding the co-constructed arrangement. What does
seem important is whether the coparenting adults succeed in helping the child.
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Davis et al. (2009) provided evidence for bidirectional links between infant temperament and
coparenting during children’s first year of life. Although early difficult temperament was associ-
ated with a decrease in supportive coparenting over time, so too was early supportive coparenting
associated with a decrease in infant difficulty. Consistent with other reports (Lindsey et al., 2005;
Van Egeren, 2004), difficult temperament challenged the coparenting system in an ongoing way,
with families of more temperamentally difficult children exhibiting less stability in their cross-time
coparenting patterns. One common first-year challenge sometimes related to, but also sometimes
unrelated to, temperament is infant night waking and sleep quality. McDaniel and Teti (2012) found
that infant night wakening predicted parent night wakening, which predicted parental sleep quality,
parent distress, and perceptions of poorer coparenting.
Burney and Leerkes (2010) found evidence that coparenting is most affected by difficult infant
temperament when other risk factors are also present. They found that mothers of highly reactive
infants reported more negative coparenting if their children were also difficult to soothe, or if they
were dissatisfied with the sharing of parenting tasks with children’s fathers, and more positive copar-
enting if their infants were perceived as easier to soothe. By comparison, fathers of highly reactive
babies reported more negative coparenting if prenatal marital functioning was low, and more positive
coparenting if it was high. This latter finding is consistent with previous research that prenatal rela-
tionship quality sets a tone for the developing coparenting relationship. Couples with high relation-
ship quality prenatally manage to work together in a more constructive and supportive manner in
developing a coparenting alliance after the baby is born (Bonds and Gondoli, 2007; McHale et al.,
2004; Morrill et al., 2010; Van Egeren, 2004).
Ongoing challenges with children’s temperament that do not resolve during the infant and tod-
dler years can wear on coparents over the longer run. Cook, Schoppe-Sullivan, Buckley, and Davis
(2009) reported that parents of more temperamentally difficult preschool children tended to under-
mine each other’s parenting more frequently and intensely, even when their marital quality was high.
Subsequently, Raffaele Mendez, Loker, Fefer, Wolgemuth, and Mann (2015) interviewed couples
who were coparenting young children with challenging behaviors and learned of an “initial period
of shock” that parents described as they’d become aware of and began adjusting to their child’s chal-
lenges. Parents also detailed how they subsequently then either moved together—or drew apart—as a
parenting team. For children, staying the course matters; Altenburger, Lang, Schoppe-Sullivan, Kamp
Dush, and Johnson (2015) found that children with more difficult temperaments who had experi-
enced highly supportive coparenting environments exhibited low dysregulation, whereas children
with difficult temperaments who had experienced lower levels of supportive coparenting exhibited
higher dysregulation. The effect of child temperament on externalizing behavior was moderated by
supportive coparenting, as has been found in other studies of toddlers and preschool children (Brad-
ley and Corwyn, 2008; Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2009).
Besides the import of the enduring effects of coparenting for difficult children, coparenting soli-
darity also is of important developmental impact during times of family disequilibrium, such as the
addition of a new sibling. Examining associations between firstborn children’s temperaments and
behavior problems during the transition to siblinghood, Kolak and Volling (2013) reported that chil-
dren with difficult temperaments were more sensitive to parents’ undermining coparenting behavior
as evidenced by higher rates of internalizing and externalizing behavior problems. Coparenting
patterns are also affected by the new sibling’s temperament. When examining stability and change
of coparenting and its relation to children’s temperament in families going through the transition
of having a second child, Szabo, Dubas, and van Aken (2012) found that coparenting of the older
children tended to change when the younger sibling had a difficult temperament but remained stable
when the younger child had an easier temperament. Szabo and colleagues also found that coparent-
ing of older children predicted coparenting of younger children only when the younger siblings had
easy temperaments, but not when they had difficult temperaments.
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Song and Volling (2015) found that coparenting quality moderated the association between
children’s temperament and children’s cooperative behavior in response to maternal requests to assist
in the care of a 1-month-old infant sibling. Low temperamental soothability predicted low levels of
children’s cooperative responding in families where there was high undermining and low coopera-
tive coparenting, indicating that child temperament and coparenting quality conjointly predicted
individual differences in the firstborn children’s adaptation. Similar patterns were found by Leary
and Katz (2004), who reported that difficulties with self-regulation under stressful circumstances by
children in families with high levels of hostile-withdrawn coparenting were associated with greater
peer conflict. It appears likely that there are cascading effects of temperamental difficulties across time
for children whose parents are not able to find ways to work effectively together as coparents, with
conflictual coparenting exacerbating child difficulties.
Interventions to Improve Coparenting

Given the interplay between coparenting and child adjustment, it is not surprising that increasing
attention has been paid to interventions that specifically address coparenting solidarity in families.
The empirical study of coparenting interventions owes an intellectual debt to Philip and Caro-
lyn Cowan’s (1992, 1995) Becoming a Family (BAF) Project. The Cowans tested whether a couple
relationship-focused prevention program delivered at the transition to parenthood could reduce
parenting frustrations and distress and increase postnatal marital satisfaction for couples. Community
couples not presenting with any self-identified form of clinical distress were invited to meet for
24 weeks in semi-structured groups where they discussed topics in five different domains: (1) their
couple relationship, (2) parenting, (3) family of origin influences, (4) outside-the-family stresses, and
(5) social support. Participants in these groups improved their marital and their parenting quality,
reported fewer negative changes in sexual relationships and role satisfaction, and showed less precipi-
tous declines in marital satisfaction as compared with couples in a control condition (Schulz, Cowan,
and Cowan, 2006).
Subsequently, the Cowans’ Supporting Father Involvement (SFI) Study (Cowan, Cowan, Pruett, Pru-
ett, and Wong, 2009) expanded on the BAF work and tested whether a couples group (CG) format
was as or more effective than a father-only program or a control condition in enhancing father
involvement and family relationships. Both father-only and CG interventions met 16 times, again
guided by the five domain themes. Afterward, parental stress showed a greater decline among the CG
participants, whereas relationship quality of CG mothers remained stable compared with that of con-
trol group mothers, who declined. Relevant to coparenting, both CG and father-only participants
showed increases in fathers’ engagement with children and involvement in daily childcare tasks com-
pared with the control group. However, although CG mothers reported greater increases in fathers’
share of parenting than did control group mothers, CG mothers also reported greater increases in
conflicts with the father about child discipline than did mothers in the control group. A far-reaching
impact on the family appears attainable if both parents take part in interventions. Although SFI was
not explicitly focused on the triangular coparenting relationship, the study provided evidence that
family outcomes beyond just couple relationship quality can be influenced through a curriculum
addressing couple communication and relationship quality, if the curriculum explicitly focuses on
those other family outcomes (as SFI did on father engagement).
Feinberg’s Family Foundations (FF) provides an example of a program developed specifically to
affect coparenting relationships rather than romantic relationships or parenting qualities. Designed as
a universal program, FF involves four prenatal and four postnatal groups of 6–10 couples addressing
conflict management, problem-solving, communication, mutual support strategies, emotional self-
management and parenting. Feinberg and Sakuma (2011) reported that in his initial FF randomized
controlled trial, FF parents had lower levels of coparental competition and triangulation behaviors
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than control parents at child age 1 year, with FF children reportedly better at self-soothing than
control children. When children were 3 years old, FF participants had greater coparenting qual-
ity, and mothers reported fewer child externalizing and internalizing problems (Feinberg, Jones,
Kan, and Goslin, 2010). At a 5–7 year follow-up, FF children had fewer problems reported by their
teachers (Feinberg, Jones, Roettger, Solmeyer, and Hostetler, 2014). FF is a promising coparenting
intervention. Doss, Cicila, Hsueh, Morrison, and Carhart (2014) likewise demonstrated that brief
interventions over the transition to parenthood cam be effective in improving both coparenting and
relationship functioning, with gains sustained for up to 2 years.
While these coparenting-specific interventions for couples have shown desired benefits, Fein-
berg and Sakuma (2011) thoughtfully pointed out that universal interventions often do not reach
higher risk and/or unmarried, uncommitted parents (see also McHale, Waller, and Pearson, 2012).
As such, Florsheim’s pioneering work with adolescent mothers- and fathers-to-be (Florsheim,
McArthur, Hudak, Heavin and Burrow-Sanchez, 2011; Florsheim et al., 2012) is noteworthy. Test-
ing a 10-week intervention focused on the interpersonal skills needed to engage in supportive
coparenting (the Young Parents Program, or YPP), Florsheim and colleagues documented positive
effects on paternal engagement and on fathers’ reports of relationship quality with their partners
after the baby’s birth. Mothers also reported improved relationship competence scores, although
fathers did not. YPP couples were also significantly less likely than control group couples to report
intimate partner violence (IPV) at a 3-month postpartum follow-up, although the strength of the
IPV finding diminished over time.
It is of note that Florsheim’s program, unlike the ones summarized earlier, did not inevitably
exclude parents if IPV or substance abuse was initially reported at the point of recruitment and
intake. While a couples-based program is contraindicated any time there is grave danger from IPV
(see Bograd and Mederos, 1999; Stith, Rosen, and McCollum, 2003), Florsheim et al. (2012) argued
that among moderate-risk couples, YPP-type interventions can be beneficial in curtailing situ-
ational aggressive acts like pushing or slapping. In this regard, YPP was particularly groundbreaking
in enrolling and working together on coparenting issues with moderate-risk mothers and fathers.
Most of the other coparenting-related interventions with at-risk samples have elected to tackle
obstacles to successful coparenting by intervening with just mothers or with just fathers, but seldom
with both together. For example, Fagan (2008) engaged fathers without mothers in a five-session
coparenting intervention prior to their child’s birth. Stover (2015) individually engaged substance-
abusing fathers who had perpetrated situational IPV, and only later involved those mothers who
expressed willingness to take part in a few coparenting-focused sessions. Garneau and Adler-Baeder
(2015) developed a coparenting-focused group education program for coparenting step-couples,
although in most cases (58%), only one coparenting partner attended the groups. Fagan, Cherson,
Brown, and Vecere (2015) worked with groups of unmarried mothers to address issues around their
excluding their children’s fathers from coparenting. An innovative Coparenting Court initiative was
designed to shift parents’ attitudes and behaviors so that both parents could take part in the child’s
life, mandating (four 3-hour) coparent education sessions—but holding the sessions separately for
mothers and fathers (Marczak, Becher, Hardman, Galos, and Ruhland, 2015).
An exception to this propensity to deliver interventions separately to each parent in higher risk
families was a seven-session dyadic mother-father coparenting intervention, based on principles out-
lined in McHale and Irace’s (2011) Focused Coparenting Consultation (McHale, Gaskin-Butler,
McKay, and Gallardo, 2013).“Figuring It Out for the Child” (FIOC) was delivered by paraprofessional
male-female Mentor teams (supervised by a licensed clinician) to unmarried, lower socioeconomic
and largely non-coresidential African American parents expecting a first child together. Mother-
female interventionist and father-male interventionist rapport-building sessions were held prior to
commencing the seven dyadic sessions. In the first field test of the program, McHale, Salman-Engin,
and Coovert (2015) found that FIOC completers demonstrated statistically and clinically significant
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gains in coparental communication as observed during videotaped problem-solving discussions, and

that all were coparenting together at 3 months postpartum, regardless of whether they lived together.
Observed triangular interactions among father, mother, and baby in the Lausanne Trilogue Play
(Fivaz-Depeursinge and Corboz-Warnery, 1999) also captured clear evidence of rapport and com-
radery (McHale and Coates, 2014), and the observed family dynamic in over half the families was
decidedly cohesive in nature.
Because unmarried parents not in committed relationships are seldom ready to plunge whole-
heartedly into coparenting work, interventions offered to just one coparent at a time can allow
that person to reflect on their views concerning the importance of fathers, and on the costs versus
benefits of staying connected and communicating regularly about the child as members of an allied
coparenting team. Such single-parent only interventions may, in fact, be necessary, although single-
parent only interventions seem unlikely to ever be sufficient in affecting coparenting change (see
McHale and Negrini, 2018, for a more detailed discussion). To date, interventions that have worked
with parents together have offered the most compelling evidence that brief interventions for coparents
who are not yet married can affect the coparenting alliance itself (Epstein, Pruett, Cowan, Cowan,
Pradhan, Mah, and Pruett, 2015; Florsheim et al., 2012; McHale et al., 2015). These coparenting
interventions, designed to extend traditional parenting or marriage and relationship enhancement
efforts by focusing more specifically on strengthening coparenting alliances, have charted an impor-
tant new direction for future work with more diverse families.
The Breaking Wave: Research on Coparenting in Diverse Family Systems

This section reviews research illustrating how, across diverse families and family circumstances, chil-
dren’s development comes to be affected by the coparenting efforts of the adults who guide their
upbringing (McHale, 2007b, 2009; P. Minuchin, 1985).
Postdivorce Coparenting
Historically, studies of divorce were among the first to document empirically that children exposed to
ongoing high levels of coparental conflict are at higher risk for various behavioral and emotional prob-
lems (Emery, 1999) and more problematic parent-child relationships (Buchanan, Maccoby, and Dorn-
bush, 1991). Parents’ ability to effectively cooperate as coparents was found to affect children’s sense
of well-being in divorced families, especially when the children were young (Adamsons and Pasley,
2006; Pruett, Arthur, and Ebling, 2007). After divorce, coparental communication and c oparent-child
boundaries became confusing, as communication often passed through children. Family members
became uncertain about who was in and out of the family (Caroll, Olson, and Buchmiller, 2007), and
concerns about exclusion jarred both parents’ and children’s sense of family-level security.
Without the security of a shared family domicile and the perceived sense of “wholeness” fam-
ily members had historically experienced, even during times of strife, the children’s needs often
take a back seat as the parents battle for authority, respect, autonomy, and decision-making power.
This struggle for power typically militates against cooperative coparenting, as shared investment and
“teamness” are impossible when competition and animosity take over the coparenting relationship.
The recognition that coparental cooperation and collaboration are vital to enhancing children’s
longer term postdivorce adjustment led to a search for means of fostering positive postdivorce copar-
enting. Although efforts continue 40 years on after the initial studies of effects of divorce on children,
constructive models of shared coparenting and interventions to achieve this end have made progress.
Empirical evidence has provided support for the usefulness of intervening to reduce parental
conflict and promote civil coparental relationships (Pruett and Donsky, 2011). Different kinds of
postdivorce interventions (parenting groups, mediation, parenting coordination) may be most ideally
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suited for different kinds of families and children at varying developmental stages. Among alterna-
tive dispute resolution (ADR) interventions for divorcing families, mediation has the longest history.
Some mediators incorporate therapeutic elements into the process, whereas others focus principally
on settlement (Folberg, Milne, and Salem, 2004). Both mothers and fathers find mediation accept-
able, and outcome studies with control groups have reported increased father involvement, reduced
coparental conflict, increased cooperative decision-making, and successful parenting plans develop-
ment (Emery, Laumann-Billings, Waldron, Sbarra, and Dillon, 2001; Pruett, Insabella, and Gustafson,
2005). Pruett and Donsky (2011) cautioned that data are not uniformly positive, however, and more
work is needed (Beck, Sales, and Emery, 2004).
Parenting coordination is a newer ADR that has proven effective in preventing relitigation and
return court visits by high-conflict couples (Henry, Fieldstone, and Bohac, 2009) that may hold as-
yet untapped promise as a means for promoting postdivorce coparenting. It is a child-focused alterna-
tive dispute resolution process in which a mental health or legal professional with mediation training
and experience (the Parenting Coordinator, or PC) works with parents to create or implement a
parenting plan, resolve disputes, make recommendations and, with the prior approval of the parents
and the court, even make limited decisions within the scope of the court’s order of referral (Florida
Statute 61.125). To date, research on the intervention is scant, and there has been no research yet to
ascertain whether parenting coordination reduces coparenting conflict or triangulation or improves
child-related communication. Such efforts are just beginning and promise to further enhance the
theory and practice of Parenting Coordination.
Coparenting in Cohabiting and Stepfamilies

As many as half of U.S. children spend time in a cohabiting (biological or step-) parent family
(Bumpass and Lu, 2000; Kennedy and Bumpass, 2008). Coparenting relationships in stepfamilies
are very complex; when stepparents attempt to assume the same position of parental authority with
stepchildren as they would with their own children, this creates conflict not just with the stepchild
but also with their partner, the child’s biological parent. It is usually stepfathers who attempt to adopt
this “birth parent” role, although about a quarter of stepmothers likewise do so (Ahrons and Wallisch,
1987). Child age also matters; younger children are far more likely than older children to ultimately
consent to the stepparent as legitimate coparenting figure (Visher and Visher, 1990).
Stepparents are often unclear as to their spouse’s expectations of them as coparents, and birth
parents sometimes view their new parenting partner as a threat to the exclusive bond they share with
their birth children (Erera-Weatherly, 1996). If birth parents exclude the stepparent from executive
decisions in the reconstituted family, the stepparent never becomes fully integrated as either parent
or coparenting partner. Because gatekeeping by the birth parent (especially, the child’s mother) is the
rule and not the exception in stepfamilies, the family processes that follow are necessarily different
from those of nuclear families (Bronstein, Clauson, Stoll, and Abrams, 1993). Ganong, Coleman, Jam-
ison, and Feistman (2015) reported that mothers see themselves as “captains of the coparenting team,”
deciding who should play what roles in parenting their children. They see their children’s fathers as
important coparenting partners, but also use a variety of strategies to draw boundaries around the
coparental subsystem when they or their ex-husbands repartner. In Ganong et al.’s analysis, if mothers
felt secure as primary parent, were able to cooperatively coparent with and saw children’s biological
fathers as good and responsible parents, and perceived new partners as adequate caregivers, they were
likely to expand the coparental subsystem to include new partners. If any of these conditions were
not met, however, mothers resisted including stepparents as part of the childrearing team.
African American children are especially likely to be coparented in families where unmarried
cohabiting partners are raising children from prior relationship(s) together; Kennedy and Bumpass
(2008) estimated that almost half of African American children born to (non-cohabiting) single or
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married mothers experience maternal cohabitation by age 12. The cohabiting stepfamily formation
process for low-income African American mothers and their partners is gradual and deliberative;
child well-being is central to a “vetting and letting” process (Reid and Golub, 2015).
Less is known about coparenting as viewed from the perspectives of new partners of children’s
biological fathers. Burton and Hardaway (2012) examined how often and when women in nonmari-
tal multi-partner fertility (MFP) unions with men coparent partners’ children from other relation-
ships; most women in MPF unions othermothered children of friends and relatives, but 89% did not
coparent their partners’ children from any MPF relationship. The small proportion who did, did so
either because the partners were the children’s custodial parents and the children’s mothers were
not able to provide care for them, or because they wanted their own children to know their half-
siblings. Reasons why women did not coparent included the tenuous nature of pass-through MPF
relationships, gendered scripts around second families (the authors invoked the term “casa chicas”),
and mothers’ desires for their romantic partners to child-swap (Burton and Hardaway, 2012). Clearly,
models of coparenting differ in the “normative family processes” of stepfamilies. Further research in
this area will help expand the coparenting literature relevant to this increasingly large and important
subset of modern families.
Coparenting in Unmarried Families

The study of coparenting by unmarried fathers and mothers is a relatively new enterprise, with
emerging research shaped by different forces. One set of forces has been an extension and emana-
tion from fatherhood programs, launched in the early 1990s in the wake of welfare reform to help
men to take on greater responsibility and roles in the lives of their children. Fatherhood programs
historically targeted nonresident fathers in the child support system, or low-income fathers who
might ultimately be participants. They sought to enable fathers to pay child support by improving
employment and earnings through employment services, and to strengthen paternal relationships
with children through peer support and parenting education. Certain programs also offered access
and visitation services such as mediation efforts, and evaluations of initiatives supported by the Office
of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE), summarized by McHale, Waller, and Pearson (2012), sug-
gested that brief interventions can result in parenting plans that encourage more parent-child contact
and better child support payment.
Although some limited data suggest AV programs can affect perceptions of cooperative parent-
ing, the bigger picture is that potentially worthwhile programs aiming to help support coparenting
between non-coresidential parents are met with resistance by parents they are designed to serve
(McHale et al., 2012). A considerable percentage of parents offered services never participate (Davis,
Pearson, and Thoennes, 2010). Fathers participating in federally funded fatherhood initiatives report
ongoing frustration and conflict in their relationship with their child’s mother, with coordination
complicated greatly if one or both parents have children with more than one partner. Curiously,
despite voicing need for more help with coparenting relationships than they can get from programs,
utilization of existing mediation services by non-coresidential parents—and even more so, by custo-
dial parents—has remained poor (Martinson and Nightingale, 2008).
Trust is one major reason fatherhood programs struggle to solicit coparental buy-in and partici-
pation; both mothers and fathers fear that programs may worsen rather than improve their fragile
coparental relationship. Perhaps even more poignantly, the core model underlying these programs
is flawed, as it is based on a “2 + 1” rather than a “3-together” model. McHale and Phares (2015)
and Gaskin-Butler et al. (2015) describe common practice models in which fathers are implicitly
conceptualized primarily as supports for mothers as “2 + 1”—father is helpful, not indispensable.
By contrast, in 3-together conceptualizations, father is avowed, relentlessly, by all who engage and
interact with the family as indispensable to child health and development—a coparent in his own
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right. In 3-together models, coparents are understood as needing to work collaboratively, enduringly,
to chart the healthiest, most positive course for their shared child.
A triadic approach is the essence of the triangular model we have emphasized in this chapter—but
it is not the one that guides most fatherhood programming. It has been unusual for fatherhood pro-
grams to also actively engage mothers or to provide significant support for developing cooperative
coparenting skills. The creation of a “Fatherhood Research and Practice Network” (FRPN) in 2014
drawing together fatherhood researchers and practitioners from many different walks was intended
to begin piecing together what had been learned from historical efforts with families, and to try to
deal with the disconnect between mothers and fathers engendered by work to date.
Creating a strong and enduring coparenting alliance can be challenging, and the obstacles for-
midable. The overwhelming majority of unmarried fathers’ desire to be involved in rearing their
child, and most provide support to the mother early on (McLanahan, 2009). Yet within 3 years,
about 53% are living apart from their children, and 45% of nonresident fathers have not had recent
contact with their children. But patterns vary greatly; for example, Waller (2012) illustrated how
many fathers “disengaged” by customary measures nonetheless remained involved in their children’s
lives unless they had developed a conflicted coparenting relationship with the mother. Roy, Buck-
miller, and McDowell (2008) described a pair-bonding paradigm for unresolved relationships not
readily defined as marriage or cohabitation, with children at the core of the unmarried parents’
commitment to one another. Relationships often get “suspended,” but persevere through episodic
emotional support women provide men, histories of relationships stretching back as far as childhood
and adolescence, and mutual coparental involvement with children (Roy et al., 2008). Through a
delinking of partnering from parenting, unmarried African American mothers and fathers create a
basis for prolonged interaction and in many instances successful collaboration to rear their shared
child, even when living separately and outside of conjugal relationships (Carlson, McLanahan, and
Brooks-Gunn, 2008; Edin et al., 2009).
Research on children’s experiences of the coparenting dynamics between their mothers and
fathers (and others) in families where mother and father never cohabitate or develop conjugal rela-
tionships is still sparse. Although such families are distinctively different from divorced families in
nearly every regard, they have sometimes been lumped together for programming and policy pur-
poses. A research agendum that traces various kinds of coparenting relationship profiles that evolve
in unmarried families, guided by a triangular and not 2 + 1 frame, will advance our understanding
of families, and of outcomes for children, in the years ahead.
Coparenting in Military Families

The dynamics of coparenting in military families are unique again still, with known cycles of separa-
tion and parenting apart, and reunification and parenting together. The strains on coparents in such
families have long been recognized but only recently studied empirically (DeVoe, Paris, and Acker,
2016). During deployment, the deployed father or mother must relinquish parenting and coparent-
ing responsibilities and become highly dependent on at-home caregivers for parenting support and
assistance. Recent web technology has provided encouraging means for sustained coparental relation-
ships and continual emotional connection with children and partners through real-time communi-
cation with family members from overseas, but the deployed parent’s situation is still extraordinarily
taxing. Deployed fathers describe competing demands of ensuring the safety of their own troops and
themselves, caring for child nationals, and attending to their own children’s needs. Reintegration is a
prolonged process that involves reexamining and recommitting to family and coparenting roles and
expectations while adjusting to changes that have occurred individually and within the family during
deployment. Upon reunification, the coparental relationship must be renegotiated as the returning
service member and family seek to reconnect.
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Common reintegration responses that affect coparenting include the at-home parent being reluc-
tant to let the returning service member parent take on responsibilities, the service member parent
jumping back in too quickly without reassessing the current “lay of the land,” the service member
parent unthinkingly using “military communication” in discipline and/or to reestablish norms, and
the service member allowing the children too much free reign because he or she feels guilty or wor-
ried about the children’s reaction to limit setting. Renegotiating the authority and shared parenting
role can tax even the most prepared military families, and as a result, prevention and intervention
programs, such as Strong Families Strong Forces (DeVoe, Paris, and Acker, 2016), offer promise as a
conceptually grounded and military culturally informed approach to buffering children’s adjustment
throughout the various stages of the deployment cycle.
Coparenting in Families Led by Same-Sex Partners

Families led by same-sex parents are very diverse, and hence no one set of guiding principles helps to
explain coparenting by LGBTQ parents. Although most of what is known about same-sex coparent-
hood has been gleaned from studies of division of labor in European American, middle-class, highly
educated North American samples (Patterson and Farr, 2011), recent studies of same-sex European
coparents have begun appearing in the literature (Carone, Baiocco, Ioverno, Chirumbolo, and Lingi-
ardi, 2017; Smetana, Jennings, Herbrand, and Golombok, 2014). The sampling bias is significant; Cao,
Mills-Koonce, Wood, and Fine (2016) point out ways in which the family adaptations of same-sex
coparents are multifaceted and characterized by disparate crossings of individual characteristics, cou-
ple relational dynamics, LGBTQ community culture, and heterosexual socio-structural norms—all
affected by social contextual factors such as social class, ethnicity, family structure, and social environ-
ment associated with geographic location.
Pathways through which same-sex couples become coparents include prior heterosexual relation-
ships, adoption, donor insemination, surrogacy, and foster care (Goldberg and Gartrell, 2014; McHale,
Khazan et al., 2002). Each produces unique biological and related legal and social statuses (in regard
to parental rights) between coparenting partners (Almack, 2005; Moore, 2008; Shelley-Sireci and
Ciano-Boyce, 2002), and may also evoke of different varieties of coparenting dynamics and challenges
(e.g., protectiveness, competition, conflicts). In families where partners adopt together, the coparents
are often on more equal footing both as the child’s legal parents and as authority figures. While
conventional provider-nurturer roles are sometimes adopted by the parents, perhaps in response to
internalized heterosexual cultural norms, such partnerships are typically characterized by a more egali-
tarian division of labor than in most heterosexual couples (Patterson and Farr, 2011). Moreover, many
partners break set and invent “new” family roles, expanding the definitions of conventional caregiving
by integrating both masculine and feminine nurturing behaviors into parenting practices (Biblarz and
Stacey, 2010; Doucet and Lee, 2014; Goldberg, Smith, and Perry-Jenkins, 2012; Wells, 2011).
When a child is born within the partnership via natural childbirth with an outside donor, the
birth mother is frequently the one more involved in childcare, although there is again greater egali-
tarianism in the division of labor than in heterosexual couples (Goldberg, 2013). One theme exam-
ined in the literature has been expansion of coparenting systems by lesbian mothers at the transition
to parenthood to involve brothers, fathers, biological fathers, and sometimes male friends (Goldberg
and Allen, 2007). This said, there is pronounced variability in the extent to which male adults
become intimately involved in children’s lives, from never, to expectable visitations, to relating as a
true coparent by sharing responsibility for childcare. Most common appear to be male adults who see
the child intermittently but otherwise provide minimal ongoing parenting support (Gartrell, Rodas,
Deck, Peyser, and Banks, 2006; Goldberg and Allen, 2013; Touroni and Coyle, 2002).
Very little research is currently available on female involvement in same-sex male households,
but some suggestive evidence hints that same-sex cofathers may feel even greater pressure to have a
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female parental figure involved in their child’s or children’s life than do same-sex comothers (Doucet
and Lee, 2014; Goldberg, 2012). With respect to intra-family dynamics, less is known about imbal-
ances in parenting or the extent to which “gatekeeping” processes (Schoppe-Sullivan, 2019) of the
sort described earlier occur in same-sex partnerships. Some reports indicate that birth mothers who
bring a child to a new lesbian partnership from a prior heterosexual relationship may play a gatekeep-
ing role with “their” children, similar to that seen in other stepfamilies; indeed, Erera and Fredrikson
(1999) argue that lesbian stepfamilies confront many of the challenges of heterosexual stepfami-
lies. Yet evidence also indicates that most same-sex coparents effectively navigate their transitions
to coparenthood, and employ specific strategies (e.g., parallel address terms, hyphenated surnames,
second-parent adoption prior to the nationwide legalization of same-sex marriage in the United
States) to minimize potential negative effects of biological inequity to children (Bergen, Suter, and
Daas, 2006; Goldberg, Downing, and Sauck, 2008; Pelka, 2009).
In the years to come, far more scholarship is needed to better understand the diversity of same-sex
couples with respect to intra-family coparenting adaptations (e.g., working-class, same-sex parents
with lower income may have greater difficulty establishing an equal sharing of labor) and dynam-
ics. Same-sex coparents live in both urban and rural communities and in socially progressive and
conservative states (Gates, 2013), and the research base on contextual effects on coparenting would
benefit from beginning to reflect this diversity. Finally, with a few noteworthy exceptions, research on
transgender fathers’ and mothers’ transitions to parenthood and coparenthood has been absent from
the research literature, but promises to provide important new insights into understanding mother-
ing, fathering, and family dynamics (Biblarz and Savci, 2010; Doucet and Lee, 2014).
Coparenting in Extended Kinship Networks

Coparenting in extended kinship networks may be the norm rather than the exception in most places
around the world, and in the United States, coparenting with kin caregivers is a staple in many com-
munities of color (Chase-Lansdale, Brooks-Gunn and Zamsky, 1994; Piontak, 2016). Latino and Afri-
can American grandparents are more likely to coparent with the child’s parent, and family members
expect intergenerational assistance in childrearing and other household tasks (Hayslip and Kaminski,
2005). Yet as is true of coparents in virtually all family systems discussed earlier, kin caregivers have
the potential to serve a stabilizing or disrupting effect as coparenting figures (McHale, Salman, Stro-
zier, and Cecil, 2013). It is not just the presence of additional caregivers but the quality of coparental
support provided by these individuals that determines both parenting success and child outcome
(Greenfield, 2011; Pittman and Boswell, 2008). In one seminal study, Apfel and Seitz (1991, 1999)
found the most negative long-term consequences in families of young adolescent African American
mothers when maternal grandmothers provided either too much aid (commandeering primary con-
trol as the grandchild’s main parenting figure) or too little aid (abandoning the daughter and leaving
her with no caregiving support). Adolescent mothers in these situations were less often the primary
parent for the first child at child age 12, and more often had another child in rapid succession.
It is important that family researchers attune to what Demo and Cox (2000) termed the family’s
parenting map before seeking to measure family process. Essential caregiving functions and impor-
tant enrichment activities can be shared in an infinite number of permutations among two or more
coparenting figures (McHale, Khazan et al., 2002). The division of roles and responsibilities is organ-
ized by cultural mores, but even so, there are nuances to be negotiated and worked out by individual
families (McHale, Salman, Strozier, and Cecil, 2013). Regardless of who does what, socialization and
acculturation of young children proceeds most efficiently when there is functional agreement and
coordination among parenting figures, whoever these figures may be (McHale and Irace, 2011).
In some families where coparenting is shared across multiple generations, an elder exerts greater
authority in decision-making about the child; in some, the child’s parent does, and in others still,
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there is equal and shared power between the coparents. What seems to matter most, whichever cir-
cumstance characterizes any given family, is whether each coparent is content and comfortable with
the arrangement. That is, greater leadership by one coparent or another may sit well with the other,
or there may be discontent by one or both parties about how their dynamic has evolved (McHale,
Salman, Strozier, and Cecil, 2013). When the latter is the case, there is opportunity for growth and
change, but also greater likelihood of friction and dissonance that will affect the child. Children in
multigenerational family systems, as in other family systems, fare less well when they are receiving
dissonant messages from different parenting figures or being drawn into age-inappropriate alliances
with adult family members, one against another.
Attention to functional coparenting arrangements in multigenerational and extended families,
to individual differences in both the process and outcomes of such arrangements, and to distinc-
tive coparenting dynamics unique to extended families are much needed in coparenting theory
and research. Better understanding of multigenerational coparenting structures for sexual minority
people of color is a particularly important area of future investigation; such individuals often take on
significant coparenting responsibilities for grandchildren, younger siblings, nieces and nephews, and
other children (Cahill, Battle, and Meyer, 2003; Orel and Fruhauf, 2013). Such research promises to
expand the still relatively narrow characterization of “same-sex coparenting.”
Coparenting Between Biological and Foster Family Systems

Perhaps no more important coparenting triangle for child health and well-being is the foster family-
biological family-child triangle in circumstances where a child is removed from the home and
placed in foster care, with hopes of reunification (Nesmith, Patton, Christophersen, and Smart, 2017).
During the child’s time away, family visits (scheduled in-person contacts between child and parent
or parents) are crucial to maintaining the parent-child relationship (Hess, 1988) and a critical com-
ponent to family preservation and reunification efforts. More frequent visits predict reunification
(Perkins and Ansay, 1998), sustain or restore parent-child attachment, and mitigate child anxiety
while in foster care (McWey and Mullis, 2004). More frequent parent-child contact is facilitated by
a positive biological-foster family coparenting relationship (Oyserman and Benbenishty, 1992), but
there is unfortunately often a lack of communication or poor communication between the foster
and biological families (Morrison, Mishna, Cook, and Aitken, 2011; Nesmith, 2013). As in all other
family systems, tension and conflict between coparents in biological and foster families are noticed
by, and have a negative impact on, even very young children (Leathers, 2006; Linares et al., 2010).
Operating from a coparenting framework lessens unremitting grief children experience when
removed from their natal home, if biological and foster families are helped to develop a functional
coparenting alliance (McHale, 2016). Such alliances are most likely to evolve if the two sets of fami-
lies are brought together from the very start, with either pre-removal conferences or, if not possible,
facilitated “icebreaker” meetings (Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2012) as soon as possible after removal.
A communication plan that sets parameters for regular and ongoing communications between par-
ents and child (phone calls, FaceTime, Skype) that are facilitated by the biological family; regular
child-related communications about the child between the foster and biological parents, respect for
the biological families’ greater knowledge about the child’s sensibilities, and supervised visitations
with foster parents serving as allies and resources before, during, and after visits are all components of
an optimally established and functional alliance.
When authentic relationships develop between the two sets of parents during the child’s time
away, the likelihood of the foster family remaining in the child’s life post-reunification as “godpar-
ents” of sorts, and as a resource to the child’s parents, is far more likely to be welcomed by parents,
thereby preventing another traumatic final goodbye for the child. Often-entrenched child welfare
systems view the coparenting frame with skepticism, and their views are echoed by foster parents
157
themselves. Some foster carers may be willing to participate in restoration work, but far fewer believe
that supporting birth parents is part of their role (Thorpe, Klease, and Westerhuis, 2005). However,
as more and more sites experiment with the tenets of a coparenting framework, there is hope that a
greater number of children will benefit from the connections made between the two sets of fami-
lies in their best interests (McHale, 2016). Toward this end, pioneering efforts have sought to bring
biological and foster parents together via a structured intervention group format in an effort to
encourage a coparenting alliance between the two families (Linares, Montalto, Li, and Oza, 2006).
A two-component intervention consisting of a 2-hour parenting course and a 1-hour coparenting
program offered to biological and foster parent pairs for 12 consecutive weeks yielded evidence for
gains in positive parenting and coparenting among both the biological and foster parents as well as a
reduction in reported externalizing problems of the children involved (Linares et al., 2006).
Summary
This cursory review has only skimmed the surface of how coparenting evolves to serve children
in family systems of every kind. Understanding coparenting demands a careful look at each fam-
ily system, not just families headed by married or coresidential gay or straight fathers and mothers.
The coparenting system in millions of families throughout the world involves someone besides just
biological mother and father. When a mother and/or father is entirely absent (with other impor-
tant adults shouldering responsibility for sharing in the child’s care and upbringing), the triangular
relationships among these coparenting adults with reference to the child are every bit as salient and
formative for child development. Coparenting is decidedly not a dynamic limited just to married or
divorced heterosexual mother-father family systems; indeed, the most generative and fresh approach
to this field would do well to proceed from the premise that between birth and young adulthood,
all children will be coparented (McHale, 2009; McHale and Irace, 2011; McHale, Khazan et al., 2002;
McHale and Phares, 2015).
Conclusion
Exponential growth in the elucidation and understanding of coparenting in diverse family systems
has done a great deal to foster the well-being of children around the world. At the same time, most
research efforts examining adaptive coparenting to date have engaged relatively select groups of fami-
lies (McHale, 2015, 2011; McHale, Khazan et al., 2002; Pleck, 2010). As a result, there are undoubt-
edly functional coparenting arrangements yet to be identified and understood. It is not just the case
that cross-national studies of coparenting, carried out by culturally centered informants, remain few
and far between—although this is certainly so. Even within the United States, P. Minuchin, Colap-
into, and S. Minuchin (2007) have been critical of the practice by which uninformed child welfare
professionals enter troubled family systems, ostensibly to be of aid to children, but instead end up
pulling asunder the “invisible family structures” that the family had relied on to coparent and buoy
their children through times of challenge and distress. Much needed is fresh scholarship, rivaling the
inventive efforts of Burton in elucidating “othermothering” (Burton and Hardaway, 2012) and fami-
lies’ kinscription work (Burton and Stack, 1993; Roy and Burton, 2007), to reveal the full range of
coparenting adaptations families call on to promote children’s health, development, and well-being.
These are growing points for a field of scholarship that has already contributed immeasurably to
the field of parenting. Future endeavors must now take seriously the key core principles of triangles
rather than dyads, of child-centric views of coparenting, and of emic approaches toward illuminating
the full range of coparenting adaptations in cultural context. Such principles will further enhance
the scope and reach of currently available coparenting knowledge to advance the best interests of all
children.
158
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5
PARENTAL GATEKEEPING
Introduction
From the powerful patriarch and moral teacher roles that defined the earliest generation of fathers
residing in the United States to the breadwinning and economic support functions that emerged
during industrialization, fathers’ involvement in family life has undergone numerous transforma-
tions (Lamb, 2010). Today’s fathers spend more time with their children than fathers of previous
generations and fulfill multiple, diverse roles in families (Sayer, Bianchi, and Robinson, 2004). When
fathers are regularly engaged in childrearing and show high-quality parenting behaviors, includ-
ing warmth, sensitivity, and emotional engagement, children are better adjusted, exhibiting reduced
behavioral problems, enhanced cognitive development, and better social and relational functioning
(Carlson, 2006; Coley and Medeiros, 2007; Sarkadi, Kristiansson, Oberklaid, and Bremberg, 2008).
Fathers’ increased involvement in childrearing, and the corresponding benefits of sustained, high-
quality involvement for children’s adjustment, has brought attention to contextual factors that might
enhance or hinder the quality and quantity of fathers’ parenting behaviors—especially in the early
months following childbirth when patterns of parenting are established.
Theoretical models of parenting have highlighted the role of relationships with other family
members in fathers’ parenting (Bornstein, 2016; Cummings, Merrilees, and George, 2010). For
example, family systems theory describes the family as an interdependent network of individual
family members and relationships among family members—or subsystems—that collectively form
a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts (Minuchin, 1985). As the “executive subsystem” of
the family (Cox and Paley, 1997; Kerig, 2019), the coparenting relationship captures the extent to
which parents take a team-oriented, collaborative approach in rearing their child (Feinberg, 2003).
The quality of interactions between coparenting partners can spill over and affect the quality of other
relationships within the family system and the functioning of individual family members, especially
children. In particular, when parents support the parenting strategies of their partner and exhibit low
levels of competition and undermining behaviors, children show fewer externalizing behaviors and
better social and emotional adjustment (Teubert and Pinquart, 2010). Furthermore, research has gen-
erally supported the notion that fathers’ parenting is more susceptible to environmental factors than
is mothers’ parenting (Marsiglio, Roy, and Fox, 2005). This theory of fathers’ increased susceptibility,
termed the fathering vulnerability hypothesis (Cummings et al., 2010), has been supported in a num-
ber of studies showing a stronger association between the quality of family interactions (i.e., copar-
enting and romantic relationship quality) and fathers’ parenting behavior compared with mothers’
167
parenting behavior (Brown, Schoppe-Sullivan, Mangelsdorf, and Neff, 2010; Davies, Sturge-Apple,
Woitach, and Cummings, 2009).
An aspect of the coparenting relationship that might be particularly consequential for parenting
behavior is parental gatekeeping, or beliefs and behaviors held and directed by one parent that regu-
late the other parent’s relationship with the child. Although all coparenting partners are theoretically
able to engage in gatekeeping behaviors, current understanding of gatekeeping is centered primarily
on maternal gatekeeping, or the ways in which mothers encourage (i.e., gateopen), discourage (i.e.,
gateclose), or control fathers’ parenting, in families in which the child’s key parental figures are a
mother and a father. In its earliest form, research on maternal gatekeeping focused on the ways in
which mothers’ beliefs about the importance of fathers in childrearing were associated with fathers’
parenting (De Luccie, 1995). Fathers were more likely to engage in higher quality parenting behav-
iors when mothers held beliefs that fathers were important for child development (Simons, Whit-
beck, Conger, and Melby, 1990).
Maternal gatekeeping research and theory have since evolved to incorporate observations and
reports of maternal gatekeeping behavior (Cannon, Schoppe-Sullivan, Mangelsdorf, Brown, and
Sokolowski, 2008; Schoppe-Sullivan, Altenburger, Lee, Bower, and Kamp Dush, 2015; Schoppe-
Sullivan, Brown, Cannon, Mangelsdorf, and Sokolowski, 2008). In their seminal work, Allen and
Hawkins (1999) introduced the first maternal gatekeeping conceptual model, which included mul-
tiple gatekeeping subdimensions focused largely on maternal gatekeeping of housework. Today,
several conceptualizations of maternal gatekeeping have been advanced in the literature to provide
a framework for better understanding the gatekeeping dynamic that might emerge between parents
regarding parenting roles and responsibilities in the early months following childbirth (Puhlman
and Pasley, 2013). However, these conceptual models of gatekeeping are limited in their exclusive
focus on behaviors that mothers direct toward fathers as an attempt to regulate father involvement
in childrearing. The purpose of this chapter is to describe theoretical rationale for the prior empiri-
cal focus on maternal (as opposed to paternal) gatekeeping, review previous maternal gatekeeping
research, synthesize gatekeeping theory in a new model of maternal gatekeeping that can also apply
to gatekeeping by other coparents, and identify future directions for gatekeeping research.
The Focus on Maternal Gatekeeping

Even though parental gatekeeping can be engaged in by fathers as well as by mothers, the literature
has focused almost entirely on maternal gatekeeping. There are a number of important practical
reasons why this has been the case. First, in many societies around the world, despite movement
toward more egalitarian views of men’s and women’s roles, today’s youth are not yet fully support-
ive of equality between men and women (Dotti Sani and Quaranta, 2016). In the United States,
the egalitarian shift in attitudes about gender in families has appeared to stall or even reverse since
the 1990s. In an analysis of young people’s attitudes about whether the male breadwinner-female
homemaker family is the best household arrangement, Pepin and Cotter (2018) showed that in
the mid-1990s, nearly 60% of young people disagreed with the notion that the male breadwinner-
female homemaker arrangement is best, but by 2014 the level of disagreement had fallen to 42%.
These results suggest that views of mothers as primary, essential parents and fathers as secondary
caregivers are persistent. These attitudes reflect (and likely affect) persistent gender differences in
parental involvement. U.S. fathers nearly tripled their childcare time from 2.5 hours per week in
1965 to 7 hours per week in 2011; however, fathers continue to spend significantly less time with
their children than do mothers (Bianchi, Robinson, and Milkie, 2006; England, 2010; Pleck and
Masciadrelli, 2004).
The largest differences in mothers’ and fathers’ parenting time are in routine childcare (Craig and
Mullan, 2011; Kotila, Schoppe-Sullivan, and Kamp Dush, 2013), especially when children are young
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Parental Gatekeeping
(Craig, 2006; Drago, 2009). Indeed, even as sharing housework between married men and women
has approached equality prior to parenthood (Bianchi, Sayer, Milkie, and Robinson, 2012), becoming
parents is strongly associated with a shift toward an unequal distribution of labor, as mothers become
more heavily involved in childcare than fathers. New mothers allocate twice as much of their avail-
able time to routine childcare activities than fathers (Yavorsky, Kamp Dush, and Schoppe-Sullivan,
2015). Although these differences in parental involvement are most pronounced in the domain of
routine childcare, they are present in other domains as well, including positive engagement (Lang
et al., 2014), didactic play (Schoppe-Sullivan, Kotila, Jia, Lang, and Bower, 2013), and responsibility
for the organizational and managerial aspects of parenting (McBride and Mills, 1993).
These views of mothers and fathers and discrepancies in parental involvement are reflected in
the legal system in the United States and many other countries. Since the mid-to-late nineteenth
century, in the U.S. legal system, postdivorce custody was awarded to one parent who had both
decision-making authority for the child as well as physical custody (Pruett and DiFonzo, 2014). In
accordance with the “tender years” doctrine, postdivorce custody of children was typically awarded
to mothers. As gender roles changed during the second half of the twentieth century, the influence
of the tender years doctrine weakened, the best interests of the child in individual cases became a
primary consideration, and support for joint decision-making, joint custody, and shared parent-
ing increased. Shared parenting, however, remains controversial in family law (Pruett and DiFonzo,
2014). Moreover, primary caregivers—most typically, children’s mothers—tend to be given priority
in custody arrangements. Thus, mothers are still most commonly the resident parent in the United
States and around the world (DiFonzo and Herbie, 2015), and mothers are afforded a great deal of
power in determining how much the father can remain involved with the child. It continues to be
the case that fathers are more likely to withdraw from children or spend less time with them after a
divorce or dissolution (Amato and Dorius, 2010).
There are also two sets of theoretical perspectives that support the focus on gatekeeping by moth-
ers, in particular, and its potential to influence father involvement in childrearing: “Gender perspec-
tives” and “evolutionary perspectives.”
Gender Perspectives
The set of theoretical perspectives that has been most consistently used as the foundation for study-
ing maternal gatekeeping is gender perspectives. This set of perspectives emphasizes the social con-
struction of gender; in particular, the significance of prescribed gender roles for men and women,
especially with respect to parenting, and the extent to which parents’ identities are tied closely with
societal expectations regarding gender. Gender perspectives have been most emphasized in studies of
the division of household and childcare labor conducted by sociologists, gender studies scholars, and
family scientists (Kan, Sullivan, and Gershuny, 2011; Kroska, 2004).
Being and becoming a parent is often conceived of as adopting a gendered role (e.g., mother
role, father role). Parsons and Bales (1955) outlined the complementary gendered roles of men and
women in parenting, suggesting that men typically adopt an instrumental role focused on financial
providing, protection, and discipline, whereas women adopt an expressive role focused on caregiving
and companionship. Finley and Schwartz (2006) demonstrated that children’s perceptions of fathers
as serving more instrumental than expressive functions remain dominant. However, there are clearly
wide individual differences between families in the extent to which mothers and fathers endorse and
adopt gendered parent roles. A gender ideology perspective suggests that individuals’ attitudes about
gender should explain these differences (Kroska, 2004). Yet the evidence linking parents’ gender
ideologies to the division of domestic labor and maternal gatekeeping is not especially consistent
or compelling (Bianchi, Milkie, Sayer, and Robinson, 2000; Fagan and Barnett, 2003; Sanchez and
Thomson, 1997; Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2008).
169
Kroska (2000) proposed that one reason stronger links are not found between gender ideology
and the division of domestic labor is that the way attitudes about gender are typically measured does
not assess the extent to which these attitudes are personalized or internalized. Kroska’s (2000) notion
of gender-ideological identity introduced a way of conceptualizing and measuring gender ideology
as it is applied to the self. Because gender-ideological identity focuses on the application of gender
ideology to the self, and not just in the abstract, it should be a better predictor of gendered behavior
in the home. Indeed, Kroska (2004) showed that women’s gender-ideological identity predicted
the share of feminine household tasks (e.g., cleaning, washing clothes) that they engaged in relative
to their husbands. Although Kroska did not apply gender-ideological identity directly to the phe-
nomenon of maternal gatekeeping, the implications for gatekeeping are obvious—that the extent
to which an individual applies socially constructed expectations for women and men to the self will
affect individuals’ gendered behavior in the realm of parenting.
Gender perspectives on gatekeeping also draw from the related but more dynamic notion of
“doing gender” (West and Zimmerman, 1987). According to this notion, gender is not a static char-
acteristic of the individual, but rather an emergent property of an individual’s social behaviors and
interactions with other people. “Doing gender” does not require or imply purposeful or dramatic
displays of one’s femininity or masculinity; rather, gender is something that people recreate over
and over again through seemingly routine and mundane actions. As such, West and Zimmerman
described gender as a “routine, methodical, and recurring accomplishment” (1987, p. 126). According
to this perspective, “doing gender” cannot be avoided, as women and men are accountable to society
and their competence as members of society is dependent upon the production and reproduction
of gender. For instance, mothers are accountable as women to society, and part of being feminine is
being a nurturing mother. Thus, when a mother is the one who packs her child’s lunch every day
and leaves work early to attend school events, she is doing gender appropriately. Similarly, fathers are
accountable as men to society, and part of being masculine is being a provider for your family. Thus,
a father who “doesn’t do diapers” and who often works late and misses dinner with the family is also
doing gender appropriately. The focus of “doing gender” on routine, day-to-day interactions fits well
with the research that has placed greater emphasis on maternal gatekeeping behavior in the context
of family processes than on gatekeeping attitudes (Cannon et al., 2008).
Evidence consistent with the gender perspectives comes primarily from the sociological litera-
ture on the division of household labor within families. Often, even after other differences between
men and women are taken into account (e.g., economic contributions to the family and economic
dependency, time availability), gender remains the most reliable determinant of the time women and
men contribute to family labor (Craig and Mullan, 2011; Kroska, 2004). In comparing the division of
labor of heterosexual couples in Sweden and the United States, Evertsson and Nermo (2004) found
that gender was a significant factor in the division of labor for couples in both countries, but particu-
larly in the United States. Specifically, U.S. couples in which the husband was economically depend-
ent on the wife appeared to engage in a sort of compensatory behavior such that wives in these
couples actually did more housework than couples in which breadwinning was more equally shared.
Bittman, England, Sayer, Folbre, and Matheson (2003), using Australian time use data, reported that
women’s greater earnings decreased their weekly housework hours, but only up to the point at
which husbands and wives contributed equally to family income. Beyond that point, as women’s
earnings increased relative to those of their husbands, women’s weekly housework hours actually
increased. Such intriguing reversals are known as “gender deviance neutralization” (Greenstein, 2000).
These types of effects, although small, controversial, and context dependent, are interpreted as sup-
port for gender perspectives on the division of domestic work (Sullivan, 2011).
Until recently, research on the role of gender in domestic labor had typically treated domestic
work as a unitary phenomenon and paid little attention to distinguishing between housework and
childcare (Sullivan, 2013). However, childcare differs from housework in several key ways. Whereas
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housework can be left undone—at least for a period of time—young children must be minded 24/7
(Bianchi et al., 2012). Childcare is enjoyable and rewarding; parents’ subjective perceptions of time
spent with children are much more positive than perceptions of time spent doing routine housework
(Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, Schwarz, and Stone, 2004). Thus, women may be less likely to bar-
gain out of childcare than out of housework (Raley, Bianchi, and Wang, 2012). Chesley and Flood
(2017) compared breadwinner and stay-at-home mothers and fathers on time spent in childcare and
found that mothers did more childcare when compared with their analogous breadwinner or stay-
at-home father counterparts. Thus, even as discrepancies between men’s and women’s contributions
to housework have waned over time (Bianchi et al., 2012), discrepancies between men’s and women’s
contributions to childcare have persisted (Kan et al., 2011).
Indeed, parenthood involves heightened enactment of gendered behavior by men and women,
as demonstrated by the wealth of empirical work indicating that the division of household labor
becomes more traditional after the birth of a child, particularly with respect to the additional burden
of childcare (Baxter, Hewitt, and Haynes, 2008; Yavorsky et al., 2015). Moreover, the transition to
parenthood also appears to invoke a shift toward more traditional gender-role attitudes (Endendijk,
Derks, and Mesman, 2018; Katz-Wise, Priess, and Hyde, 2010). A culture of “intensive mother-
ing” (Hays, 1996), which dictates that mothering must be time-, resource-, and emotion-intensive,
particularly among higher socioeconomic status mothers in the United States (Lareau, 2003), may
contribute to the maintenance of inequalities in involvement in childcare.
Evolutionary Perspectives
Evolutionary theory has been all but ignored as a foundation for the study of maternal gatekeep-
ing. However, its tenets also provide an important, albeit provocative, backdrop for understanding
this phenomenon. Evolutionary psychologists explain current human behavior in terms of psycho-
logical mechanisms that evolved to maximize survival and reproductive success (Buss, 1995a). These
mechanisms are purported to have emerged during the environment of evolutionary adaptedness
(EEA)—the Pleistocene era—when human beings lived in hunter-gatherer societies. According to
the evolutionary psychology perspective, psychological gender differences, including those between
mothers and fathers with respect to parenting children, emerged because of different environmental
pressures on men and women that led them to adopt different strategies for survival and reproduction.
A major influence on the thinking of evolutionary psychologists with respect to gender dif-
ferences is the theory of sexual selection (Trivers, 1972). According to this theory, male reproduc-
tive behavior prioritizes short-term mating and focuses on competition for mates, whereas females’
behavior prioritizes long-term mating and hinges on careful mate choice. These evolved preferences
are rooted in biological differences between men and women: Women can produce fewer children
than men in a lifetime, and the bearing and rearing of children necessitate significant physical and
psychological investment for women. Reproduction requires much less investment on the part of
men. Thus, “choosiness” in women was selected for because women who chose mates who could
provide resources for the family (e.g., food, money, protection, power) were more likely to experi-
ence reproductive success (Buss, 1995b).
More broadly construed, the evolutionary perspective suggests that mothers evolved psycho-
logical mechanisms focused on protecting their significant investment in children. When applied to
maternal gatekeeping, the evolutionary perspective suggests that beyond picking long-term mates
with money, ambition, and connections, women may have a strong interest in directing the father’s
parental investment and controlling his involvement with children. In today’s world, parental invest-
ment is understood as going beyond material resources to include social capital and the cognitive
and socioemotional benefits of high-quality parent-child relationships. Contemporary perspectives
on the evolution of fathering (Gray and Crittenden, 2014) recognize greater diversity in terms of
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paternal provisioning, by positing that various aspects of paternal care evolved at different times, and
that the patterns of human fathers’ investments in children vary significantly due to contextual fac-
tors (Hrdy, 2008). However, human paternal care must be understood in the context of the triad:
Father, mother, and offspring (Gray and Crittenden, 2014). Thus, from an evolutionary perspective,
mothers’ roles in paternal involvement are critical.
An evolutionary perspective on maternal gatekeeping suggests that mothers may evaluate the
father’s motivation and fitness for parenting, and encourage his involvement if he is judged to be a
committed and skilled father, but discourage his involvement if he is judged unmotivated, has unde-
sirable characteristics, or engages in risky behaviors. There is some empirical evidence to support this
notion. Schoppe-Sullivan et al. (2015) found that mothers were more likely to engage in gateclosing
behavior toward fathers when fathers had lower parenting self-efficacy. Claessens (2007) reported
that a common reason mothers gave for closing the gate to nonresidential fathers’ involvement was
that fathers were engaged in illegal or dangerous activities involving drugs or violence. In the con-
text of intimate partner violence, mothers who refrain from encouraging fathers’ involvement with
children may protect children from fathers’ harsh-intrusive parenting (Zvara, Mills-Koonce, and
Cox, 2016). In keeping with an evolved preference for long-term mating, mothers may seek early
signs from fathers of their commitment to the couple relationship and to the child and engage in
gateclosing or opening accordingly. Schoppe-Sullivan et al. (2015) reported that expectant mothers
who perceived their romantic relationships with children’s fathers as less stable were more likely to
engage in gateclosing behavior after the child’s birth. Moreover, mothers who are no longer roman-
tically involved with their children’s fathers may make fathers’ access to children contingent on the
provision of financial or material resources (Edin and Lein, 1997; Marsiglio and Cohan, 2000), using
provision as an indicator of the father’s motivation and fitness to parent.
The criticisms of the evolutionary psychology perspective are many. Even if evolved psychological
mechanisms exist, they may influence—but do not determine—behavior (Eagly and Wood, 1999).
However, evolutionary psychology has given much less weight to the contextual factors that shape
behavior than to presumed inherited preferences. Regarding maternal gatekeeping, gender perspec-
tives and evolutionary perspectives need not be at odds with each other, and many pieces of empirical
evidence can support both views. For instance, evidence in support of the critical role of moth-
ers in father-child relationships—that is, that fathers are more involved in childrearing when moth-
ers endorse the importance of fathers’ roles in children’s lives (Fagan and Barnett, 2003; Rane and
McBride, 2000)—is consistent with both the gender and evolutionary perspectives. Combined, these
perspectives converge to explain why the study of gatekeeping has focused predominantly on mothers.
Maternal Gatekeeping: Literature Review

Maternal gatekeeping—as it was originally introduced in the research literature—focused exclusively
on the role of mothers’ attitudes about gendered family roles as a precursor to fathers’ involvement
in domestic work in general, including housework (Allen and Hawkins, 1999). Since its introduc-
tion, however, the construct of maternal gatekeeping has evolved to include a variety of beliefs and
behaviors mothers might direct toward fathers in an effort to regulate fathers’ parenting. Today, several
multidimensional models of maternal gatekeeping exist in the literature (Adamsons, 2010; Allen and
Hawkins, 1999; Austin, Pruett, Kirkpatrick, Flens, and Gould, 2013; Fagan and Cherson, 2017; Puhl-
man and Pasley, 2013; Saini, Drozd, and Olesen, 2017). Researchers have distinguished maternal gate-
keeping attitudes (Allen and Hawkins, 1999) from maternal gatekeeping behaviors (Fagan and Barnett,
2003). Further distinctions have been drawn between discouraging, gateclosing attitudes or behaviors
and encouraging, gateopening attitudes or behaviors (Cannon et al., 2008; Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2008;
Trinder, 2008) as well as between adaptive gatekeeping and maladaptive gatekeeping behaviors (Saini
et al., 2017). To reflect the current state of the literature on maternal gatekeeping, we trace maternal
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gatekeeping research from its historical underpinnings to foundational theory and research to more
recent advancements and applications. It is important to note that although a parental gatekeeping
dynamic can occur in any coparenting relationship, the majority of previous research has centered on
maternal gatekeeping in families headed by different-sex couples in which fathers reside with mothers.
Historical Underpinnings
Scholars of child development and family science have long been interested in how different parent-
ing practices support or hinder child adjustment (Karreman, van Tuijl, van Aken, and Deković, 2008;
Maccoby and Martin, 1983; Rollins and Thomas, 1979). With the advancement of theoretical con-
ceptualizations highlighting the interdependence of family relationships (Bronfenbrenner and Ceci,
1994; Cox and Paley, 1997), however, this focus expanded to also include an examination of factors
that might be linked to parenting quality and, in turn, child adjustment. This approach has recog-
nized that parents have direct influences on their children, and they have indirect influences through
their relationships with other adults present in children’s microsystems (i.e., other coparenting part-
ners; Feinberg, 2003). As theoretical models of parenting and child adjustment were progressing to
account for direct and indirect influences, demographic trends in the early 1990s indicated that—
even as fathers’ involvement in childrearing was on the rise—mothers still reported higher levels of
involvement than fathers (Sayer et al., 2004). In an effort to explain these differences in parenting,
researchers speculated that mothers might serve as “gatekeepers” to fathers’ involvement in childrear-
ing by overtly or covertly limiting fathers’ interactions with their children (De Luccie, 1995; Pleck,
1983). Citing evidence that only 42% of working mothers want more help with childcare from their
husbands, scholars hypothesized that mothers might actively limit fathers’ interactions with children
because they believe men are not competent in performing child-related tasks (Pleck, 1983).
Early work seeking to validate this claim reported associations between mothers’ beliefs that fathers’
parenting had a significant impact on child development and fathers’ observed constructive parent-
ing, defined as warmth, authoritative parenting, child monitoring, and communication (Simons et al.,
1990). This association held even when fathers’ own beliefs about the importance of their roles were
taken into account. Similar work found mothers’ satisfaction with fathers’ involvement, judgments
about fathers’ motivations to participate in childcare activities, and evaluations of fathers’ competence
predicted fathers’ quantity of involvement in childrearing (Beitel and Parke, 1998; De Luccie, 1995).
Mothers’ beliefs about the importance of fathers also played a mediating role between variables such as
social support, marital satisfaction, and age of the child and the amount of father involvement (De Luc-
cie, 1995). Although these studies provided a first step toward better understanding the roles of mothers
in father involvement, they were limited in their focus on maternal gatekeeping beliefs rather than actual
gatekeeping behaviors directed toward fathers. Furthermore, data on maternal beliefs and measures
of fathers’ parenting were collected at the same time point. Thus, it is equally possible that mothers’
beliefs about the importance of fathers might be shaped by fathers’ concurrent level of involvement in
childrearing. In other words, if fathers are relatively uninvolved, mothers might come to believe they
have limited importance for child development. Finally, in some cases (i.e., Beitel and Parke, 1998; De
Luccie, 1995), mothers’ beliefs about the importance of fathers and reports of father involvement in
childrearing were both reported by mothers, and thus subject to common reporter bias.
Maternal Gatekeeping Foundations
Maternal Gatekeeping to Limit Father Involvement

Unsatisfied with the predominant theoretical explanations for the unequal distribution of childcare
and family labor, and guided by the notion that gender is socially constructed, Allen and Hawkins
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(1999) were the first to develop a conceptual model and corresponding survey measure of maternal
gatekeeping to explore how mothers might limit fathers’ involvement in domestic work. Originally
defined as “a collection of beliefs and behaviors that ultimately inhibit a collaborative effort between
men and women in family work by limiting men’s opportunities for learning and growing through
caring for home and children” (Allen and Hawkins, 1999, p. 200), maternal gatekeeping emerged as
a potential explanation for men’s reduced levels of involvement in domestic labor and also as a factor
that might, ultimately, hinder a mutually satisfactory arrangement for sharing family responsibilities
and childcare duties. They proposed three dimensions of maternal gatekeeping, all predicated on the
internalization of cultural expectations for mothering and fathering: Standards and responsibilities
(mother’s resistance to relinquishing ultimate responsibility for the successful conduct of housework
and childcare), maternal identity confirmation (desire for external validation of the mothering role),
and differentiated family roles (gendered attitudes regarding the family roles of men and women).
In their empirical assessment of maternal gatekeeping, Allen and Hawkins (1999) identified 21%
of mothers who scored high on the standards and responsibilities, maternal identity confirmation,
and differentiated family roles dimensions as “gatekeepers,” and 37% of mothers who scored low
on these three dimensions as “collaborators.” Gatekeepers reported doing significantly more family
work (about 5 hours more) than other participating mothers scoring lower on the Allen and Hawk-
ins (1999) dimensions. Subsequent research indicated an association between mothers who held
stronger maternal gatekeeping attitudes—as assessed using Allen and Hawkins’ (1999) measure—and
lower father involvement in childcare following the transition to parenthood in a sample of dual-
earner, working-class families (Meteyer and Perry-Jenkins, 2010). This research provided a glimpse
into the different aspects of maternal gatekeeping and the role of maternal gatekeeping attitudes in
fathers’ involvement. However, it is important to note that Allen and Hawkins’s (1999) conceptual
model focused mainly on maternal gatekeeping attitudes in the domains of housework and childcare,
rather than maternal gatekeeping behaviors in other domains more directly relevant to fathers’ parent-
ing, such as father-child interactions.
Following Allen and Hawkins’s (1999) work, Fagan and Barnett (2003) developed a measure of
maternal gatekeeping of fathers’ involvement in childcare tasks and sought to examine associations
between mothers’ gatekeeping behaviors, maternal attitudes about the father role, father competence,
and father involvement in childrearing. The positive association between fathers’ competence and
involvement was partially mediated by maternal gatekeeping behavior, such that mothers inhibited
father involvement in childrearing when they perceived fathers to be incompetent, which, in turn,
was associated with lower levels of father involvement. Notably, maternal gatekeeping behavior was
not correlated with maternal attitudes about the importance of the father role and did not medi-
ate the association between maternal attitudes and fathers’ involvement, as originally hypothesized.
Although De Luccie (1995) and others included both maternal attitudes and reports of gatekeeping
behavior as a single variable to represent “maternal gatekeeping,” the findings from Fagan and Bar-
nett (2003) suggested maternal gatekeeping attitudes and behaviors should be considered separately,
as they might have different implications for fathers’ parenting. However, it is important to note that
although Fagan and Barnett (2003) refer to their measure as an assessment of maternal gatekeep-
ing behavior, the items focus more generally on preferences for which parent should be the one to
perform child-related responsibilities (i.e., “If a decision has to be made about who my child(ren)
will play with (or spend time with), I think that I am the one to make that decision, not their father
(father figure)”).
Although Fagan and Barnett’s (2003) work highlighted the role of maternal gatekeeping prefer-
ences in predicting fathers’ parenting, it raised questions about the implications of maternal gate-
keeping attitudes for fathers’ parenting. Namely, Fagan and Barnett (2003) did not find evidence that
maternal beliefs about fathers’ importance for child development predicted fathers’ parenting. This
finding stood in contrast to other earlier research, which had reported such associations (De Luccie,
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1995; Simons et al., 1990). To understand better the role of maternal gatekeeping beliefs, McBride
and colleagues (2005) examined the complex relations between mothers’ and fathers’ beliefs about
the parental role and father involvement in childrearing. Fathers’ perceptions of themselves as highly
committed to parenthood were associated with higher father accessibility to their children—but
only when mothers believed that fathers had an important role in childrearing. Fathers’ own beliefs
about their importance did not play a role in this association, thus providing compelling evidence
that maternal beliefs, more so than fathers’ own beliefs, were consequential for fathers’ involve-
ment. However, McBride and colleagues (2005) did not examine the role of maternal gatekeeping
behavior. Thus, the extent to which maternal gatekeeping attitudes and behaviors were related and
whether the claim that “maternal attitudes lead to behavior that in turn limits father involvement and
constitutes a form of gatekeeping” (Parke, 2002, p. 40) was accurate remained an empirical question.
Although links between parenting cognitions and behaviors have been demonstrated (Bornstein,
Putnick, and Suwalsky, 2017), such connections are complex and not observed consistently.
Maternal Gatekeeping Backlash

In the early 2000s, accumulating empirical evidence highlighted the role of mothers’ beliefs and
behaviors in hindering fathers’ involvement in childrearing. As this body of research continued
to grow, critics challenged the Allen and Hawkins (1999) model of maternal gatekeeping, arguing
that the gatekeeping construct placed unwarranted blame on mothers for fathers’ lack of involve-
ment in childrearing and did not adequately account for the father’s own motivation for parent-
ing. Researchers argued that the proposition that women are ambivalent about father involvement
or act as gatekeepers does mothers a “disservice,” as—rather than working to gateclose or limit
fathers’ involvement—some mothers might facilitate father involvement in childrearing (Walker and
McGraw, 2000). Consistent with this perspective, Sano, Richards, and Zvonkovic (2008) reported
that in low-income families with a nonresident father, mothers want to increase father involvement.
Other critics argued that father involvement is more dependent on fathers’ own characteristics
than on mothers’ beliefs and behaviors (Bonney, Kelley, and Levant, 1999; Nangle, Kelley, Fals-
Stewart, and Levant, 2003). For example, heightened contextual barriers to father involvement are
associated with fathers’ lower involvement. However, fathers’ role beliefs and efficacy functioned as
mediators of this association (Freeman, Newland, and Coyl, 2008). Thus, when fathers’ efficacy and
role beliefs were accounted for, contextual barriers, including mothers’ desires to limit father involve-
ment, were no longer associated with actual father involvement.
An Expanded View of Maternal Gatekeeping

In response to criticisms that the Allen and Hawkins (1999) conceptual model of maternal gatekeep-
ing was too narrow to capture the full range of maternal gatekeeping behaviors, researchers developed
an expanded definition of maternal gatekeeping that acknowledged mothers’ capacity to exhibit
both encouraging, gateopening and discouraging, gateclosing beliefs and behaviors (Cannon et al.,
2008; Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2008). Early work examining this expanded conceptualization found
higher levels of maternal gateopening were associated with greater father involvement in childcare,
even when controlling for both mothers’ and fathers’ beliefs about the importance of fathers’ par-
enting for child development (Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2008). Additionally, maternal gateopening
moderated the positive association between coparenting support and fathers’ observed involvement
in family interaction, such that when maternal gateopening was low, associations between coparent-
ing support and father involvement were no longer statistically significant. Greater levels of maternal
gateopening have also been linked to fathers’ perceptions of having more influence in making major
decisions in areas such as healthcare for their child (Zvara, Schoppe-Sullivan, and Kamp Dush, 2013).
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At about the same time, Adamsons (2010) introduced a conceptualization of gatekeeping empha-
sizing the role of parental identity, similar to Allen and Hawkins (1999), and in particular the intersec-
tion of societally prescribed roles for parents (e.g., primary caregiver, financial provider) with the role
expectations dictated by gender (i.e., mothers are primary caregivers, fathers are financial providers).
However, unlike Allen and Hawkins’s model, Adamsons’s conceptualization allowed for gateopening
as well as gateclosing behavior. According to Adamsons, because gender is a “master status” (Stryker,
1987), it influences the expectations that women and men have for their own and each other’s roles
as parents, and thus the identity standards individuals hold for themselves and their partners. Parents
seek verification from their partners about the extent to which they are appropriately enacting their
parental identities, and thus mutually influence each other’s identity and behavior.
Within this framework, maternal gatekeeping attitudes are those about proper performance or
enactment of roles or identities. These gatekeeping attitudes influence mothers’ behaviors, which
provide feedback to fathers about their enactment of their fathering identities. If there is a mismatch
between what mothers expect of fathers and what fathers are actually doing, fathers may respond
with changes in their behavior or adjustments to their identity. The emphasis on maternal influences
on fathers stems from the proposition that the parent with greater power in the coparenting relation-
ship is likely to have greater influence on the other parent’s behavior and identity (i.e., power moder-
ates the extent to which one parent influences the other). In light of the greater social value placed
on mothering than fathering, such that mothers are judged harshly for not fulfilling their maternal
responsibilities, whereas variability in fathers’ performance of their roles is more socially acceptable,
mothers are assumed to have greater power in the coparenting relationship.
In yet another conceptualization of maternal gatekeeping, in contrast to models that assumed
encouraging and discouraging gatekeeping behaviors represented opposite ends of a single con-
tinuum (see Fagan and Barnett, 2003; McBride et al., 2005), Puhlman and Pasley (2013) separated
encouragement from discouragement in their conceptualization of gatekeeping. Arguing that posi-
tive and negative family processes can occur simultaneously in families (Fincham and Beach, 2010),
Puhlman and Pasley (2013) proposed a framework for researchers to examine the individual, unique
contributions of each dimension in a maternal gatekeeping process. In this new model of maternal
gatekeeping, a third “control” dimension, which captures mothers’ attempts to manage or regulate
information, resources, or people (Puhlman and Pasley, 2013), was also introduced.
At the intersection of control, encouragement, and discouragement, Puhlman and Pasley iden-
tified two broad types of gatekeepers: (1) polarized mothers, who clearly indicate their preference
for father involvement and behave in ways consistent with this position—whether encouraging,
discouraging, or controlling, and (2) ambivalent mothers, who engage in relatively equal levels of dis-
couragement and encouragement, leaving families confused about mothers’ overall desire for father
involvement. Within each type of gatekeeping, there are four specific subtypes of maternal gate-
keepers that vary in degree of control, encouragement, and discouragement. Within the polarized
type, the four subtypes of gatekeepers are (1) “traditional gate blockers,” who exhibit high control,
low encouragement, and high discouragement (i.e., speak negatively about the father to children or
actively dictate terms of father involvement); (2) “passive gate snubbers,” who exhibit low control
and low encouragement, but high discouragement (i.e., passively discourage the father’s involvement
by accidentally missing father-child time or redoing parenting tasks after he’s completed them); (3)
“facilitative gateopeners,” who exhibit high control and high encouragement, but low discourage-
ment (i.e., schedule father-child time and direct fathers’ interactions with children); and (4) “pas-
sive gate welcomers,” who exhibit low control, high encouragement, and low discouragement (i.e.,
share coparenting equally or are disengaged from family interactions). Within the ambivalent type,
the four subtypes of gatekeepers are (1) “confused gate managers,” who exhibit high degrees of
control, encouragement, and discouragement (i.e., manage family interactions and boundaries but
show strong and inconsistent behaviors toward fathers); (2) “apathetic gate managers,” who exhibit
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high control, low encouragement, and low discouragement (i.e., assume leadership in the family but
take a neutral stance toward father’s involvement); (3) “opinionated gate watchers,” who are low on
control but high on both encouragement and discouragement (i.e., engage in passive behaviors that
criticize and compliment fathers and send mixed signals); and (4) “invisible gate ignorers” who are
low on all three dimensions (i.e., share in coparenting or follow the father’s lead). Although Puhlman
and Pasley (2013) provide a conceptual model that gives researchers more precision in measuring
complex maternal gatekeeping behaviors, additional work is needed to evaluate the extent to which
mothers can be classified into different gatekeeping subtypes and whether maternal gatekeeping can
be conceptualized more parsimoniously.
As did Puhlman and Pasley in their conceptual model, empirical work has also highlighted the
complexity of maternal gateopening. For example, Fagan and Cherson (2017) differentiated maternal
gateopening into two components: (1) encouragement, which is a construct they claimed is concep-
tually identical to coparenting support, or the extent to which parents take a cooperative, team-
oriented approach in rearing their children, and (2) facilitation, or “mothers’ attempts to increase
fathers’ involvement with their children, which she may do for reasons other than supporting the
fathers’ own parenting goals” (p. 5). According to Fagan and Cherson (2017), mothers are more likely
to facilitate father involvement in childrearing if fathers are relatively uninvolved and mothers have
egalitarian views about the parental role. Notably, using the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being
data set, Fagan and Cherson (2017) found that greater levels of mother-reported facilitation at one
time were associated with decreased father and mother perceived father engagement 2 years later.
Maternal encouragement, however, was associated with increased subsequent father engagement.
These associations between maternal gatekeeping and father involvement held across families with a
resident or a nonresident father. Although Fagan and Cherson (2017) concluded that maternal facili-
tation might be harmful for father involvement, their findings should be confirmed in a different
sample using a richer measure of maternal gatekeeping that can better account for facilitation and
encouragement elements of gateopening.
Predictors of Maternal Gatekeeping

As evidence indicating associations between maternal gateopening, maternal gateclosing, and fathers’
involvement in childrearing continued to mount, researchers sought to understand better individual
differences between mothers in their gatekeeping attitudes and behaviors. Theoretical conceptual-
izations of maternal gatekeeping proposed that maternal gatekeeping, especially gateclosing, is more
likely to occur when women fear losing responsibility for family work, seek to conform to traditional
gender roles, or want to validate their maternal identity (Allen and Hawkins, 1999; Gaunt, 2008).
Using the Allen and Hawkins (1999) maternal gatekeeping model as a guide, researchers found
Israeli mothers with low self-esteem, a strong feminine gender orientation, and a prominent maternal
identity were more likely to hold maternal gatekeeping attitudes (Gaunt, 2008; Kulik and Tsoref,
2010). Furthermore, the stronger mothers’ religious views, fewer her work hours, less importance
she attached to her work, and lower her income and education level, the more she resisted fathers’
participation in family work (Gaunt, 2008). Gaunt and Pinho (2017) reported that British moth-
ers with more hostile sexist attitudes toward men and women had stronger gateclosing tendencies,
which were, in turn, associated with a greater total and relative investment in childcare compared
with fathers.
Other research has examined the role of women’s employment characteristics as a predictor of
maternal gatekeeping. Specifically, Pederson and Kilzer (2014) examined mothers’ work-to-family
conflict as a predictor of maternal gateclosing, as measured using Allen and Hawkins’s (1999) survey
measure. These researchers developed competing hypotheses to test whether mothers would gateclose
less or more when experiencing high levels of work-to-family conflict. Role theory, which suggests
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that mothers experiencing work-to-family conflict would seek to preserve personal resources and
maintain father involvement in childrearing (Barnett and Gareis, 2006; Goode, 1960), would predict
less gateclosing. Alternatively, identity theory suggests that mothers would gateclose even when
experiencing high levels of work-to-family conflict, as an attempt to protect their maternal identity
(see Adamsons, 2010). Results supported the identity theory hypothesis. Namely, researchers found
a positive association between women’s work-to-family conflict and maternal gateclosing. Moth-
ers also engaged in higher levels of gateclosing when fathers experienced greater work-to-family
conflict. These findings highlight the centrality of the maternal identity, even in families headed by
dual-earner couples in which parents face increased pressures to balance work and family (Pedersen
and Kilzer, 2014).
Researchers have also examined determinants of maternal gatekeeping in samples of couples
making the transition to parenthood, which is a critical period in the development of father-child
relationships, as patterns of parenting that are established in the early months following childbirth
generally persist over time (see Doherty, Erickson, and LaRossa, 2006; Shannon, Tamis-LeMonda,
and Cabrera, 2006). For example, Cannon and colleagues (2008) examined predictors of observed
maternal gatekeeping behavior when infants were 3.5 months of age. Although parent characteristics
(i.e., idealization of own parents, beliefs about the role of fathers, and parental personality) did not
predict maternal gatekeeping behavior, parents’ beliefs about fathers’ roles moderated the association
between parents’ negative emotionality and maternal gateclosing behavior. Specifically, high nega-
tive emotionality in one parent was associated with higher levels of maternal gateclosing when the
other parent held less progressive beliefs about fathers’ roles. Following this work, Schoppe-Sullivan
and colleagues (2015) examined predictors of both parents’ perceptions of maternal gateopening and
gateclosing as well as predictors of maternal gatekeeping attitudes. Results indicated that maternal
gatekeeping is more strongly tied to maternal expectations and psychological well-being than it is
to traditional gender attitudes, in conflict with prior maternal gatekeeping theory (see Allen and
Hawkins, 1999). For example, mothers with poorer psychological functioning demonstrated greater
levels of maternal gateclosing, whereas mothers’ traditional gender attitudes were not associated with
maternal gateclosing behavior, gateopening behavior, or gateclosing attitudes. Furthermore, mothers’
personal characteristics were more predictive of maternal gatekeeping than fathers’ characteristics,
as greater levels of maternal parenting self-efficacy, partner-oriented parenting perfectionism (i.e.,
unreasonably high standards for fathers’ parenting), and perceptions of relationship instability were
associated with greater maternal gateclosing. Maternal gateclosing was also higher when mothers
perceived low levels of fathers’ parenting self-efficacy. This body of evidence generally supports the
theoretical notion that mothers might evaluate fathers’ motivation and fitness for parenting and gate-
keep as an attempt to protect their investment in their offspring (see Geary, 2000).
To date, the total body of research on predictors of maternal gatekeeping suggests that maternal
gatekeeping is multiply determined. Notably, the majority of research in this area has included only
parents’ reports of maternal gatekeeping. Future research should examine predictors of maternal
gatekeeping in more naturalistic settings, such as in family interactions with both parents and child
present. Disentangling the predictors of maternal gatekeeping continues to be important work that
might increase the effectiveness of intervention efforts targeted at increasing father involvement or
promoting positive coparenting relationships.
Maternal Gatekeeping Advancements and Applications

To advance theory and research, maternal gatekeeping cannot be considered in isolation. Rather,
researchers and practitioners must examine the larger context of the relationship between parents,
fathers’ position within the family and desire for involvement, and children’s own characteristics (i.e.,
disability status, age, temperament; see Walker and McGraw, 2000). Furthermore, as the number
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of families headed by same-sex couples and by single mothers—who often coparent with another
adult such as the child’s grandmother—is on the rise, the gatekeeping framework must continue
to evolve to encompass these diverse family forms. Although much of the foundational maternal
gatekeeping research has focused on mothers’ gatekeeping of fathers’ involvement in childcare or
housework tasks in middle-class, two-parent families headed by a different-sex couple (Allen and
Hawkins, 1999; Cannon et al., 2008; McBride et al., 2005; Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2008), researchers
have expanded their view of maternal gatekeeping and considered maternal gatekeeping in families
with a nonresident father (Austin et al., 2013; Trinder, 2008), in families with an adolescent child
(Holmes, Dunn, Harper, Dyer, and Day, 2013; Stevenson et al., 2014), in families with a child with
special needs (Kaufman and Pickar, 2017), and in families headed by same-sex couples (Sweeney,
Goldberg, and Garcia, 2017). Moreover, the concept of “parental gatekeeping” is gaining momentum
in the divorce literature, as practitioners and researchers have acknowledged that gatekeeping is not
limited by the biological sex of the parent and can be a bidirectional process of parents regulating
each other’s involvement in childrearing (see Adamsons, 2010). According to Austin, Pruett, and
colleagues (2013), “parental gatekeeping encompasses attitudes and behaviors by either parent that
affect the quality of the other parent-child relationship and/or level of involvement with the child”
(p. 486), and can occur in any dual-parenting relationship where both parents are invested in their
child’s development and must coparent.
Parental Gatekeeping in Families With a Nonresident Father

Following foundational maternal gatekeeping work, researchers have turned to examine maternal
gatekeeping in families with a nonresident father (Austin, Pruett, et al., 2013; Fagan and Barnett,
2003; Saini et al., 2017; Trinder, 2008). Maternal gatekeeping processes in these families likely serve
a different function compared with families in which both parents are living together. On the whole,
nonresident fathers have less involvement in their children’s lives (Carlson and Berger, 2013; Carl-
son, VanOrman, and Turner, 2017). Mothers might restrict fathers’ access to children for a variety
of reasons, such as feelings of resentment, high levels of interparental conflict, or fathers’ insufficient
financial contributions. In one study examining maternal gateclosing in families with resident and
nonresident fathers, mothers reported higher levels of gateclosing in families with a nonresident
father (Fagan and Barnett, 2003). Mothers also reported that nonresident fathers were less competent;
thus, it is possible some mothers reported higher levels of gateclosing of nonresident fathers in an
effort to protect the child from a less competent parent.
Parental gatekeeping theory and research on families with a nonresident father have largely taken
place in the context of separation and divorce. Concern about the implications of gatekeeping
becomes prominent in the field of family law when the influence of one parent prevents the other
parent from maintaining a relationship with the child and the best interests of the child are ultimately
at stake (Pruett, Williams, Insabella, and Little, 2003; see Austin, Pruett, et al., 2013). Following sepa-
ration and divorce, parents must appropriately negotiate parenting responsibilities and redefine their
relationship and roles in the family. Gatekeeping, especially gateclosing, might be most overt during
this transitional period, as there is likely greater potential for the child’s primary caregiver to limit
the nonresident parent’s involvement with their child. Notwithstanding the challenges of redefining
family roles in the context of the dissolution of a romantic relationship, it is important for parents to
carefully navigate this period and maintain a positive coparenting relationship, as children show bet-
ter adjustment following parental divorce when parents coparent effectively (Amato and Sobolewski,
2004; Sobolewski and King, 2005; Whiteside and Becker, 2000) and when children maintain a posi-
tive relationship with both parents (Flouri, 2005).
Researchers and practitioners interested in child custody and gatekeeping processes in the context
of divorce have suggested multiple conceptualizations of parental gatekeeping. For example, Austin
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and colleagues described a gatekeeping continuum ranging from facilitative to extremely restrictive
(Austin, Fieldstone, and Pruett, 2013). On this continuum, facilitative gatekeeping reflects proactive and
constructive beliefs and behaviors that ultimately support the other parent’s relationship with the
child. Facilitative gatekeepers typically prioritize a cooperative coparenting arrangement and agree
on a plan for parenting without litigation (Austin, Fieldstone, et al., 2013; Austin, Pruett, et al., 2013).
At the opposite end of the spectrum, restrictive gatekeeping includes beliefs and behaviors that prevent
the other parent’s involvement in childrearing. Restrictive gatekeeping might include behaviors
such as ignoring phone calls, withholding information, or informing the other parent about child
activities at the last minute. In more extreme instances, restrictive gatekeepers might even abduct the
child to keep him or her separated from the other parent (Austin, Pruett, et al., 2013). Restrictive
gatekeeping has been further differentiated into unjustified and justified forms. Unjustified restrictive
gatekeeping occurs when the behaviors or attitudes of one parent interfere with the other parent’s
relationship with the child without basis for these behaviors (i.e., the other parent is competent and
interacts appropriately with the child). Justified restrictive gatekeeping occurs when the behaviors or
attitudes of one parent occur because the other parent poses a risk to the child (i.e., the gatekeeper
believes the other parent might harm the child) and the gatekeeper seeks to protect the child from
danger. Pruett, Arthur, and Ebling (2007) found evidence of both facilitative and restrictive forms of
gatekeeping in parents experiencing a divorce.
Similarly, other scholars of divorce have suggested that parental gatekeeping attitudes and behav-
iors should be conceptualized in relation to their ultimate impact on the child. Saini and colleagues
suggested that
gatekeeping should be assessed based on the nexus between the gatekeeping behaviors
(facilitative or restrictive) and the consequences (either positive or negative) on the impact
of children’s sense of safety and well-being and the quality of time they spend with each
parent.
(2017, p. 265)
This model of maternal gatekeeping prioritizes assessing the role of gatekeeping in affecting the
child’s safety and well-being when determining whether a particular gatekeeping behavior is adap-
tive or maladaptive. Adaptive gatekeeping is related to the previously defined facilitative gatekeeping
or justified restrictive gatekeeping, as the best interests of the child are given premier considera-
tion. Maladaptive gatekeeping, in contrast, does not consider the best interests of the child and can be
facilitative-apathetic if the other parent knowingly poses a threat to the child but the primary car-
egiver does not adequately protect the child from the other parent. Alternatively, maladaptive gate-
keeping could take the form of unjustified restrictive gatekeeping if the primary caregiver interferes
with the child’s relationship with the other parent without warrant (Saini et al., 2017). Researchers
also proposed “inconsistent gatekeeping” when no organized pattern of gatekeeping can be identi-
fied. This type of gatekeeping might occur when the primary caregiver is uncertain about the other
parent’s intentions or struggles to see the value in coparenting (Saini et al., 2017).
Qualitative work examining maternal gatekeeping in postdivorce families with a nonresident
father has revealed the complexity of family interactions during the postdivorce transition, includ-
ing the range of gatekeeping behaviors that might emerge. For example, Trinder (2008) explored
the roles of maternal gateclosing and gateopening in nonresident fathers’ involvement in childrear-
ing and identified five types of maternal gatekeeping: Proactive and contingent gateopening, pas-
sive gatekeeping, and justifiable and proactive gateclosing. Proactive gateopening occurs when resident
mothers work to monitor and troubleshoot nonresident fathers’ involvement in childrearing, as an
attempt to ensure that father involvement in childrearing continues and is positive for children.
Proactive gateopeners try to build positive images of fathers and engage in behaviors to make sure
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fathers’ involvement continues (i.e., maintaining a flexible schedule, sharing travel arrangements, and
providing a way for contact to continue). In contrast, contingent gateopeners support father involvement
in childrearing, but have concerns that the father poses a risk to the child. Thus, these mothers use
similar strategies as proactive gateopeners but take extra steps to ensure the child is protected. Both
proactive and contingent gateopening could be categorized as forms of adaptive gatekeeping because
they prioritize the best interests of the child (see Saini et al., 2017). Passive gatekeepers do not attempt
to increase or decrease father involvement in childrearing. Rather, these mothers place the responsi-
bility on fathers and children to maintain a relationship. Justifiable gateclosers report attempts to reduce
or end fathers’ contact with their child because fathers display poor, insensitive, or abusive parent-
ing. This form of gatekeeping behavior is similar to other types of maternal gatekeeping defined by
family scholars: Protective gatekeeping (Austin and Drozd, 2013), justified restrictive gatekeeping
(Austin, Fieldstone, et al., 2013), and adaptive gatekeeping (Saini et al., 2017). Justifiable gateclosing
behaviors have been reported in similar samples. For example, Sano et al. (2008) found that 20% of
divorced mothers did not trust children’s fathers and controlled their access to children because they
were concerned about children’s safety. It is important to note that nonresident fathers might not
agree with the reason for maternal gatekeeping. For example, when mothers reported engaging in
justifiable gatekeeping, none of the fathers perceived the behavior to be justifiable (Trinder, 2008).
Rather, fathers interpreted mothers’ behavior to be more reflective of proactive gateclosing, or attempts
to monopolize parenting for other reasons such as vindictiveness (Trinder, 2008)—conceptually
similar to unjustified restrictive gatekeeping (Austin, Fieldstone, et al., 2013). Thus, it is important to
recognize the complex and dynamic process of gatekeeping behavior to better understand its ulti-
mate role in promoting or hindering nonresident parents’ parenting and, in turn, child adjustment.
Maternal gatekeeping behaviors, in the context of divorce and separation, occur for numerous
reasons. For instance, Trinder (2008) found that mothers adjusted their gatekeeping strategies in
response to perceived father competence, child welfare, and relationship quality. Furthermore, Pruett
et al. (2007) reported that mothers’ gatekeeping might vary in relation to their perceptions of pre-
divorce marital quality, with custodial mothers who had more positive marriages more likely to facil-
itate father involvement after divorce. In some cases, maternal gatekeeping might serve as mothers’
attempt to exercise power and authority postdivorce. To understand better the reciprocal, systemic
nature of maternal gatekeeping, Moore evaluated how both parents exercise power and authority
when interacting with their ex-spouse, and specifically explored the ways in which fathers try to
gain power over their ex-spouse post-separation. Moore (2012) found evidence that some fathers
engaged in “paternal banking” strategies designed to limit or enhance mothers’ financial provisions
in response to maternal gatekeeping—especially during the prelegal settlement period. The maternal
gatekeeping-paternal banking dynamic emerged when parents had “segregated conjugal roles,” or a
strong, gendered division of labor during marriage. According to qualitative interviews, in the face
of proactive gateclosing, some fathers reported restricting or refusing to pay bills to make their wives
feel more economically vulnerable and regain control.
The growing body of research on maternal gatekeeping in postdivorce families has indicated that
gatekeeping is context specific and depends—in part—on the reason for divorce (i.e., violence, infi-
delity, conflict), the quality of parents’ relationship prior to divorce, time passed since separation, the
child’s age, and the child’s disability status (Kaufman and Pickar, 2017; Saini et al., 2017). Following a
divorce, it is important for custody evaluators to assess gatekeeping, as the involvement of nonresident
parents, oftentimes fathers, has long-standing implications for positive child development (Sarkadi
et al., 2008), and children of divorced parents are better adjusted when they have high-quality rela-
tionships with both parents (Amato and Sobolweski, 2004). As outlined by Austin (2011), custody
evaluators should consider a number of important factors when evaluating gatekeeping, including—
to name a few—parents’ patterns of involvement, the type of gatekeeping, whether restrictive gate-
keeping is justifiable, and taking care to distinguish protective gatekeeping behaviors from unjustified
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gateclosing behaviors. Even when mothers hold restrictive gatekeeping attitudes, sustained father
involvement has been linked to positive child adjustment (Pruett et al., 2003). Thus, it is important
for practitioners to facilitate strong coparenting relationships following divorce.
Measuring Maternal Gatekeeping

Although theoretical models of maternal gatekeeping have proliferated, maternal gatekeeping meas-
urement has lagged behind. A review of the literature revealed five survey measures (Allen and
Hawkins, 1999; Fagan and Barnett, 2003; Pruett et al., 2007; Puhlman and Pasley, 2017; Van Egeren
and Hawkins, 2004), one bench book (designed to provide a guide for practitioners and legal pro-
fessionals to identify gatekeeping in the context of divorce and separation; Austin, Fieldstone, et al.
2013), and one observational measure (see Cannon et al., 2008) of maternal gatekeeping that have
been used in published empirical research. However, there is no consensus among researchers on
which measures best capture maternal gatekeeping. The earliest measures of maternal gatekeep-
ing focused on mothers’ beliefs about the importance of fathers as well as the general division of
household and childcare responsibilities. For example, Allen and Hawkins’s (1999) 11-item survey
assesses three dimensions of maternal gatekeeping, including the extent to which mothers maintain
high standards and feel responsible for housework and childcare (i.e., “I frequently redo some household
tasks that my husband has not done well.”), maternal identity confirmation (i.e., “I care about what my
neighbors, extended family, and friends think about the way I perform my household tasks.”), and
belief that family work is primarily for women (i.e., “Most women enjoy caring for their homes and men
just don’t like that stuff.”). Fagan and Barnett’s (2003) 9-item survey assesses mothers’ preferences
for completing child-related tasks (i.e., “If an adult needs to talk to my child about his/her behavior,
I think that I am the one to do the talking, and not the father/father figure.”).
In addition to these early measures of maternal gatekeeping attitudes, researchers also developed
surveys to assess gatekeeping in the context of parental separation and divorce. For example, Pruett
and Pruett (see Pruett et al., 2007) developed a gatekeeping questionnaire, which assesses the cogni-
tive components of gatekeeping, specifically the extent to which mothers value fathers and believe
it is important to support father involvement in their child’s life (i.e., “It is part of my job as a parent
to positively influence my child’s relationship with his/her other parent.”). Researchers also created
two items designed to assess mothers’ perceptions about past parenting support within the marriage
(i.e., “During my marriage, it was my job to help my spouse be the best parent she/he could be.”;
Pruett et al., 2007). Similarly, Austin et al.,(2013) developed a Bench Book to aid judges, family law
professionals, and mental health professionals in assessing facilitative (i.e., “having photographs of the
other parent in view of or easily accessible to the child”) or restrictive (i.e., “denigrating or with-
holding gifts or cards from other parent; not allowing other parent to attend child’s birthday party”)
parental gatekeeping. In a legal context, because the primary concern is the best interests of the child,
custody evaluators should document specific gatekeeping behaviors and consider if the behavior cre-
ated conflict or separation between the child and the other parent.
In addition to surveys designed to measure maternal gatekeeping attitudes, division of household
tasks and childcare, or beliefs concerning the parental role, researchers have also developed meas-
urement tools to capture the frequency of maternal gatekeeping behaviors. For example, Schoppe-
Sullivan and colleagues (Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2015; Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2008) used a subset of
items taken from the Parental Regulation Inventory (PRI; Van Egeren, 2000) to measure maternal
gateopening (i.e., “How often do you do the following things to encourage your baby’s father to be
involved in childcare and with your baby, including feeding, play, and emotional support . . . tell your
baby’s father how happy he makes your baby?”) and gateclosing behaviors (i.e., “When your baby’s
father does something that you don’t approve of regarding childcare or with your baby, how often
do you . . . take over and do it your own way?”). Grounded in a new conceptualization of maternal
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gatekeeping, Puhlman and Pasley (2017) used items from the PRI, as well as items adapted from
other measures and some they created themselves, to construct a measure of maternal gatekeep-
ing that asked mothers to report how often they behaved in ways that were controlling (i.e., “make
him do what you want him to do with the child”), encouraging (i.e., “say positive things about how
he talks/interacts with the child”), and discouraging (i.e., “attempt to undermine his parenting deci-
sions”) toward fathers’ involvement in childrearing. An initial test of the psychometric properties of
this measure using data from a sample of mothers and fathers of preschool-age children confirmed
the three-factor structure. However, some items retained differed for mothers and fathers, and the
correlations between the control and discouragement factors exceeded .80 for mothers and fathers.
Scholars have also used observational techniques to assess maternal gatekeeping behavior. For
example, Cannon and colleagues (2008) coded observations of parents interacting with their child
using a coding scheme, originally developed by Bayer (1992), for maternal negative control (i.e., “ver-
bal and nonverbal attempts to limit the father’s interactions with the infant; for example, mother
criticizes father’s care or monopolizes the interaction”) and facilitation (i.e., “positive support for the
father’s interactions with the infant; for example, mother may refer to father during play or turn the
baby towards dad”; see Cannon et al., 2008, p. 507).
Although several measures of parental gatekeeping exist, consensus among researchers on which
measures best capture gatekeeping is lacking. Key to the advancement of parental gatekeeping theory
and research is the need to clarify and improve maternal gatekeeping measurement. Furthermore,
researchers should be careful to distinguish between maternal gatekeeping attitudes and behaviors, as
the two constructs are not always correlated and might have different implications for fathers’ parent-
ing. Scholars have also pointed out that the “lack of measures of gatekeeping behaviors is a concern,”
and the advancement of gatekeeping research would be supported by a consensus in the field among
family researchers of operational definitions of gatekeeping and corresponding measures to evaluate
gatekeeping levels (Ganong, Coleman, and McCaulley, 2012, p. 391). It is also important to consider
the role of parental gatekeeping in combination with other aspects of the family system, such as
coparenting support, undermining, and interparental conflict, to better clarify the role of parental
gatekeeping as it is situated in the larger family system.
A New Conceptualization of Maternal Gatekeeping

Despite the proliferation of theoretical models of parental gatekeeping and empirical studies, there is
no consensus regarding how to conceptualize gatekeeping nor how to measure this construct. Thus,
a new conceptual model of maternal gatekeeping behavior is proposed that both synthesizes and
builds on previous models of maternal gatekeeping, with the goal of providing an integrated frame-
work that can guide the development and testing of measures of gatekeeping and future research in
this area. Hypothetically, this model can be applied to gatekeeping behavior by mothers or by fathers
or other coparents; however, in keeping with much of the literature and for the reasons outlined
earlier, the focus of the description of the model is on maternal gatekeeping behavior. Furthermore,
specific hypotheses regarding concurrent and longitudinal associations between types of maternal
gatekeeping behavior and important facets of father involvement in childrearing are advanced.
Conceptual Model
This new conceptual model of maternal gatekeeping is grounded in a family systems perspective,
which embraces the notion that interactions between family members are bidirectional (Minuchin,
1985). Thus, this conceptualization of gatekeeping and its consequences recognizes that maternal
gatekeeping is as much a response to as a regulator of fathers’ behavior (Cannon et al., 2008). Mater-
nal gatekeeping is conceptualized as a component of the coparenting relationship, or the aspect of the
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interparental relationship focused on parenting children (Feinberg, 2003). In this model, gatekeep-
ing behavior can be captured by two dimensions reflecting (1) whether the behavior is enacted in
anticipation of or in response to the other parent’s beliefs or behaviors (proactive versus reactive) and
(2) whether the behavior is encouraging or discouraging of the other parent’s involvement in chil-
drearing (see Figure 5.1). To some extent, proactive behaviors are clearly more intentional, whereas
reactive behaviors may, in some cases, be unintended or subconscious.
This conceptual model is general enough to apply to gatekeeping engaged in by any coparent—
whether resident or nonresident, including divorced or separated coparents. Although this model
focuses on mothers’ behaviors, inherent to this model is also the notion that mothers’ gatekeeping
behaviors are influenced by their gatekeeping attitudes—in particular, their preferences for con-
trol over parental decision-making, attitudes regarding the father’s parenting competence, endorse-
ment of especially high standards for childcare, and need to confirm their maternal identity (Allen
and Hawkins, 1999; Fagan and Barnett, 2003). Mothers’ gatekeeping attitudes, and the associations
between mothers’ attitudes and their behaviors, are likely influenced by fathers’ characteristics and
prior parenting behaviors (Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2015).
This model has some important similarities and differences with other conceptualizations of
parental gatekeeping. Like more recent models of gatekeeping, the new model distinguishes between
gateopening and gateclosing behavior (Austin, Fieldstone, et al., 2013; Puhlman and Pasley, 2013;
Trinder, 2008). Consistent with Austin, Fieldstone, et al. (2013), the new model conceptualizes posi-
tive and negative gatekeeping behavior on a continuum. However, this model diverges from that of
Puhlman and Pasley (2013) in that we do not propose a distinct “control” dimension. This is because
the object of all gatekeeping behaviors—whether positive or negative—involves some degree of
Figure 5.1 Conceptual model of two dimensions of gatekeeping behavior (encouragement versus discourage-
ment, proactive versus reactive) forming four types of gatekeeping behavior
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control or attempt to control the other parent’s involvement in childrearing. In contrast to Saini et al.
(2017)’s concepts of adaptive and maladaptive gatekeeping, the new conceptualization is neutral with
respect to effects of gatekeeping on child outcomes. The new model is instead focused on predicting
the effects of parental gatekeeping behavior on the quantity and quality of the other parent’s involve-
ment in childrearing, which would, in turn, ultimately affect the child’s development.
Considering the high and low ends of the proposed encouragement versus discouragement and
proactive versus reactive dimensions together results in four types or “styles” of parental gatekeeping.
The first style, characterized by proactive encouragement, can also be described as the “pushing”
style of gatekeeping, and is similar to the “facilitation” identified by Fagan and Cherson (2017) and
the proactive gateopening defined by Trinder (2008). Mothers whose behavior can be predomi-
nantly described as simultaneously highly proactive and highly encouraging actively facilitate father
involvement in childrearing. They may invite fathers to engage with their children by arranging
activities for fathers and children to do together (e.g., “We have two tickets, why don’t you take
Tommy to the game this weekend?”), or support fathers’ engagement by providing advice or infor-
mation to fathers about children (e.g., “Jayden likes to have her Barbies in the tub with her when
taking a bath.”). In mother-father-child interactions, these mothers may draw the child’s attention
to the father (“Look at Daddy!”) or suggest activities for fathers and children to engage in together
(“Why doesn’t Daddy read the next page?”). For nonresident fathers, highly proactive, gateopening
mothers may provide a place where father-child contact can occur or transport children to see their
fathers (Trinder, 2008). This style is likely when mothers are concerned about fathers’ low or fragile
levels of involvement and is driven by mothers’ own reasons for wanting fathers to become more
involved (Fagan and Cherson, 2017). Such reasons may include the belief that father involvement is
beneficial to the child, a desire for equally shared parenting, or the need for relief from overwhelming
family responsibilities.
The second style, described as reactive encouragement or “praising,” captures those mothers who
are also highly encouraging of fathers, but whose behavior tends to be more reactive, or responsive
to fathers’ behaviors, rather than proactive. These mothers use positive reinforcement to maintain or
increase father involvement in childrearing. In mother-father-child interactions, these mothers are
cooperative, compliment fathers’ parenting, and show warmth and enjoyment when watching the
father interact with their child. Outside of direct interactions, mothers may compliment fathers’ par-
enting to others (“He’s such a great dad!”) or say positive things to the child about the father when
the father is not present. This style is likely when mothers believe father involvement is beneficial to
the child or desirable for the family and the father has demonstrated his motivation and competence
in parenting, either meeting or exceeding mothers’ expectations for his involvement. As pointed out
by Fagan and Cherson (2017), this type of maternal encouragement is very similar to the concept of
supportive coparenting (Feinberg, 2003).
The other two styles involve high discouragement of fathers’ involvement in childrearing. The
third style, proactive discouragement or “hindering,” likely captures the mothers who are most typi-
cally thought of as “gatekeepers” in the way Allen and Hawkins (1999) originally conceptualized
maternal gatekeeping. Mothers who hinder fathers actively discourage father involvement with chil-
dren. These mothers may monopolize childrearing such that fathers have little or no opportunity for
direct involvement with their children. They may make important childrearing decisions without
consulting fathers. These types of behaviors may be especially marked in families with nonresident
fathers; mothers may withhold important information about the child from the father or inform the
father about child-related activities at the last minute so that fathers are unable to participate (Aus-
tin, Pruett, et al., 2013). Hindering mothers may not think that father involvement in childrearing
is important or desirable. This could be for several different kinds of reasons, including traditional
beliefs about parent or gender roles (e.g., Allen and Hawkins’s differentiated family roles), a strong
need for confirmation of maternal identity, or a ( justified or not) lack of confidence in the father’s
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parenting capabilities. Mothers who hinder fathers’ involvement to protect children from harm are
Austin, Fieldstone, et al.’s (2013) “justified gatekeepers,” although fathers may not agree that this type
of gatekeeping is, in fact, justified (Trinder, 2008).
The fourth type of gatekeeper is the mother who is discouraging of fathers’ efforts to become
engaged in childrearing but who mainly expresses her negative view of the father’s parenting through
reactions or responses to fathers’ involvement (reactive discouragement) rather than through a priori
efforts to hinder his involvement. These “criticizing” mothers use punishment (negative reactions
to father’s involvement) as a means to remain in control of what the father does with the child. For
instance, these mothers may criticize or “make fun” of the father’s parenting in front of other people
(e.g., “Can you believe he didn’t brush her hair before sending her to school?!”). In interactions with
fathers and children, these mothers may directly criticize fathers’ efforts to engage with the child or
when they perceive that the father’s efforts are faltering, and simply take over and do it their own
way. In families with nonresident fathers, mothers who are high in reactive discouraging behavior
may criticize the father directly during interparental conflict or indirectly to the child (“Your father
was always a terrible cook.”). Importantly, for mothers to engage in reactive criticism, fathers must
demonstrate some degree of motivation and involvement. These mothers may be ambivalent about
the importance of fathers’ involvement in childrearing or their desire for the father to be involved,
or they may observe fathers engaging in developmentally inappropriate or even harmful behaviors
with their children. They may have a strong need for confirmation of their maternal identity and
may harbor beliefs that mothers are better parents. These mothers are likely to hold unrealistically
high standards for childcare. Fairly or unfairly, these mothers do not have full confidence in their
partner’s parenting. Because of their ambivalence, criticizing mothers may also at times use nega-
tive reinforcement to get fathers involved when they want or need them to be (e.g., refuse to do a
childcare task herself ).
Although the new model posits that most mothers fit into a type of gatekeeper that provides the
best description of their typical behavior, this model also allows mothers to show multiple types and
levels of gatekeeping behavior, including little or no gatekeeping behavior. The next step toward vali-
dating this model of gatekeeping will be to develop survey and observational assessments that capture
the degree to which a mother exhibits the four types of gatekeeping behavior. The creation of such
measures would allow person-centered examination of profiles of gatekeeping behavior as well as
the testing of interactions between different types of gatekeeping behavior. In fact, as described in
the next section, it may be combinations of particular types of gatekeeping behavior that are most
influential with respect to father involvement in childrearing.
Associations of Maternal Gatekeeping With Father Involvement

Figure 5.2 shows the proposed model of associations between types of maternal gatekeeping and
father involvement in childrearing. This model shows a number of important moderators of these
associations, including maternal (i.e., other types of gatekeeping behaviors also present, gatekeeper
power), paternal (i.e., perceptions of maternal behavior, motivation), and child (e.g., age, gender, tem-
perament) moderators. The proposed interactions between different types of gatekeeping behaviors
are described in detail ahead, as is the critical importance of fathers’ perceptions of mothers’ behav-
iors (Adamsons, 2010). With regard to the other proposed moderators, gatekeeper power encom-
passes the extent to which mothers can actually exert control over fathers’ behaviors. For instance,
a mother with primary custody of children postdivorce may have a high level of gatekeeper power,
whereas a married mother who shares parenting relatively equally with her child’s father may have
much less power as a gatekeeper. Fathers’ motivation may also moderate relations between maternal
gatekeeping and father involvement; fathers with more traditional beliefs about gender roles are more
susceptible to maternal gateclosing behavior (Zvara et al., 2013), whereas the parenting behavior of
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Other Maternal
Gatekeeping Gatekeeper
Behaviors Power
Type of
Maternal Father
Gatekeeping Involvement
Behavior
Fathers’ Child
Perceptions of Characteristics
Fathers’
Maternal
Motivation for
Behavior
Involvement
Figure 5.2 Model depicting moderators of associations between a particular type of maternal gatekeeping
behavior and father involvement in childrearing
highly motivated fathers or fathers with high parenting self-efficacy may be unaffected by maternal
gatekeeping.
Children’s characteristics may also moderate relations between maternal gatekeeping and father
involvement in childrearing. For example, if fathers believe their active engagement in parenting is
more important for the development of sons than daughters, maternal gatekeeping may be more
weakly associated with father involvement with boys than with girls. Regarding child age, moth-
ers’ gatekeeping behavior may be more effective in infancy, because of mothers’ more pronounced
primary caregiver status, supported by breastfeeding practices and greater parental leave allotments,
whereas as children’s agency increases with their development, they may play a greater role in regu-
lating their own interactions with their fathers. Children’s temperament and gender may also affect
the extent to which they actively work to sustain close relationships with their fathers in the context
of maternal gatekeeping behavior.
When considering the associations of types of maternal gatekeeping with father involvement in
childrearing, Pleck’s (2010, 2012) revised conceptualization of father/parental involvement served
as a guide. He emphasized that conceptualizations of parental involvement must account for both
the quantity and quality of parental involvement. The different aspects of parental involvement that
Pleck identified can be placed on a continuum of intensity. Less intense forms of involvement con-
sist of positive engagement or play with the other parent present or material indirect care activities
(i.e., purchasing goods and services for the child). Moderately intense forms of involvement include
solo positive engagement with the child and social indirect care activities (e.g., managing the child’s
friendships, helping the child build social capital). More intense forms of involvement include caring
for the child solo for extended periods of time or high levels of process responsibility (ensuring that
the child has all the elements she or he needs, including making sure that family financial resources
are used to promote the child’s development).
Mothers who are high in proactive encouragement or “pushing” behavior actively facilitate father
involvement to raise it to a level they perceive as acceptable. Importantly, fathers may or may not
perceive mothers’ “pushing” as “encouragement.” Those fathers who are motivated to be involved
with their children but lack confidence, are very busy with work responsibilities, or experience other
barriers to involvement may appreciate the mother’s efforts to get them more involved. However,
fathers who are less motivated may feel goaded into involvement, which may backfire (Fagan and
Cherson, 2017); those who are highly confident in their parenting may feel patronized by mothers’
efforts to educate them about appropriate fathering roles and father-child activities.
187
Because mothers’ proactive encouragement may be interpreted positively or negatively by fathers,

the effects on father involvement of maternal pushing will likely depend on fathers’ perceptions of
these behaviors—whether fathers view this behavior as encouragement or as patronizing or “bully-
ing” them into greater involvement. However, even when fathers are the recipients of a lot of pro-
active encouragement from mothers, and perceive it positively, they are unlikely to reach the point
of sharing childrearing equally with mothers. These fathers are most likely to remain in a “helper”
role in relation to mothers, and particularly unlikely to engage in more moderate or intense forms
of paternal involvement.
Similar to proactive encouragement, reactive encouragement or “praising” gatekeeping behavior
is also used by mothers to maintain or increase levels of father involvement. Compared with pro-
active encouragement, however, which may be viewed positively or negatively by fathers, reactive
encouragement is likely to be viewed as more universally supportive by fathers, and thus should have
its desired effect. Fathers who receive a lot of reactive encouragement are already motivated and
competent and may move along the continuum toward more intense forms of parental involvement
in response to mothers’ proactive encouragement.
Mothers who are high on “praising” may also be high on “pushing,” and this combination of gate-
keeping types is anticipated to be especially effective in increasing father involvement for fathers who
have initially lower skills and self-confidence because fathers are encouraged to become engaged and
then praised for their efforts. Mothers who couple proactive encouragement with reactive encour-
agement may boost fathers’ self-efficacy in parenting via positive feedback (Bandura, 1989), which
may, in turn, lead to increases in father involvement. However, the extent to which this combination
of gatekeeping behaviors supports more intense and sustained forms of father involvement likely
depends on a number of factors, including fathers’ perceptions of maternal behavior, fathers’ motiva-
tion for involvement, and the extent to which mothers shift their behavior to become more reactive
than proactive as fathers become more involved.
When mothers are high in proactive discouragement or “hindering,” fathers are expected to be
relatively low in direct involvement in childrearing. However, this low level of father involvement
may accompany or result from the “hindering” behaviors of mothers. For example, hindering moth-
ers may be those married or stably coupled women who have devoted themselves primarily or
entirely to childrearing, or divorced women who have primary custody of their children and ( justifi-
ably or not) successfully limit fathers’ involvement with children. Some fathers may be complicit in
mothers’ monopolization of childrearing and are comfortable with their lower levels of involvement
(as they are likely more involved in other spheres of family life such as financial providing). As such,
mothers’ “hindering” behavior may be accepted as a normal part of family life, and thus may not
have an impact on change in father involvement over time. However, in situations in which moth-
ers have primary custody of children postdivorce, mothers’ “hindering” may precipitate a decline in
nonresident father involvement over time. Mothers high in “hindering” may also exhibit “pushing”
behavior at times, particularly for less intense and gendered or more traditional fathering activities,
such as positive engagement in the form of play with children (e.g., “Honey, can you please play
with the kids for a little bit while I make dinner?”). This combination of hindering and pushing may
characterize harmonious but more “traditional” families in which fathers are engaged with children
but in less intense and highly gendered ways.
In contrast, families in which mothers predominantly engage in reactive discouragement of father
involvement are not expected to be harmonious. Because fathers who receive criticism from mothers
are at least somewhat motivated and involved, they are likely to experience maternal criticism as aver-
sive. Mothers’ critical behaviors may not be directly associated with father involvement (Schoppe-
Sullivan et al., 2008). Fathers who are relatively less motivated to be actively involved in childrearing
may be the most susceptible to the negative impact of maternal criticizing on their involvement
(Zvara et al., 2013). In contrast, fathers who are relatively more involved in childrearing may invite
188
criticism from these ambivalent mothers when they perceive the intensity of father involvement as
too strong. When fathers receive criticism from mothers—similar to effects of undermining copar-
enting behavior (Schoppe-Sullivan, Mangelsdorf, Frosch, and McHale, 2004)—father involvement
may or may not decrease, but the coparental and couple relationships may suffer. When maternal
reactive and proactive discouragement combine (i.e., “criticizing” and “hindering”), this combina-
tion would be anticipated to lead to decreases in father involvement over time as the father would be
expected to disengage from the child and possibly also the family. Mothers may be especially likely
to combine hindering and criticizing when a couple is in the midst of relationship distress or after
the dissolution of the relationship.
Although there are certainly many potential combinations of gatekeeping behaviors, the last
believed to be common and hypothesized to have a significant impact on father involvement is
proactive encouragement combined with reactive discouragement, or “pushing” and “criticizing.” At
first, this may seem like an awkward combination: Why would mothers simultaneously attempt to
foster father involvement while at the same time thwarting their own efforts through undermining
of fathers’ parenting? This combination of gatekeeping types may characterize the most ambivalent
mothers—those who believe in the importance of father involvement for children’s development
and desire greater father involvement, but who also struggle with ceding any parenting authority to
fathers because of a need to confirm maternal identity, especially high standards for childcare, or a
lack of confidence in the father’s parenting capabilities. This combination of gatekeeping behaviors
is likely to be particularly frustrating for fathers and will likely lead to declines in father involvement
over time, and disengagement from the child, couple relationship, and family.
Conclusions
Although theoretical conceptualizations and empirical studies of gatekeeping have proliferated, key
to the advancement of the knowledge base regarding parental gatekeeping will be the refinement of
conceptual models and the use of theory and conceptual models to inform testing hypotheses and
development of measures. Refinement of the construct of parental gatekeeping will be critical. More
nuanced investigations are necessary to first clearly distinguish between gatekeeping of childcare/
parenting and gatekeeping of housework, as childcare and housework differ in many ways (Sullivan,
2013). Unfortunately, the most widely used assessment of maternal gatekeeping to date (i.e., Allen
and Hawkins, 1999) does not make this important distinction. Moreover, expanding the parenting
domains in which gatekeeping might occur beyond caregiving for infants and young children to
include parental involvement in youth sports or children’s schooling, for example, may bring greater
attention to the potential for paternal gatekeeping and help broaden the focus beyond maternal
gatekeeping. Refinement of the gatekeeping construct will also necessitate showing how it is similar
to and different from related constructs, such as coparenting, parental alliance, interparental conflict,
parental alienation, and justified estrangement (Saini et al., 2017).
The advancement of knowledge on parental gatekeeping would also benefit from testing com-
peting hypotheses, which would facilitate greater clarity regarding which theories and models are
supported and which may need to be discarded. A good example of an effort of this type is Pedersen
and Kilzer’s (2014) study in which the hypotheses generated by role theory and identity theory
were pitted against each other, with the study’s findings supporting identity theory when consid-
ering mothers’ work-to-family conflict. Other interesting comparisons could involve hypotheses
drawn from gender versus evolutionary perspectives. For instance, gender perspectives would suggest
that mothers with larger families have more traditional gender-role attitudes, and should, therefore,
engage in greater gateclosing behavior. In contrast, evolutionary perspectives would suggest that
mothers with fewer children should be more protective of their investment and, therefore, would
engage in greater gateclosing behavior. Moreover, the conceptual model in this chapter generates a
189
number of hypotheses regarding associations between different types of maternal gatekeeping and
father involvement that should be tested in future work, and this conceptual model should be directly
compared with other models, such as Puhlman and Pasley’s (2013), to determine the number of
dimensions needed to capture the gatekeeping construct.
Additionally, greater effort should be made to improve gatekeeping measurement, which has
lagged behind theory development. In fact, researchers have typically referred to one gatekeeping
construct, though it has been measured in a variety of ways—with some measures more focused on
identity and beliefs (Allen and Hawkins, 1999), some on who mothers prefer to do child-related tasks
and responsibilities (Fagan and Barnett, 2003), and still others on mothers’ gateclosing and opening
behaviors toward fathers (Puhlman and Pasley, 2017; Van Egeren, 2000). Although researchers have
proposed many different types of gatekeeping, including justifiable gateclosing, proactive gateopen-
ing, and maladaptive gatekeeping (Austin and Drozd, 2013; Saini et al., 2017; Trinder, 2008), current
measures of gatekeeping do not adequately assess and distinguish between these different types and
dimensions. Measures should be revised and developed to align more closely with maternal gate-
keeping theory.
In addition to developing measures of parental gatekeeping that are better aligned with theory,
it is of the utmost importance to establish carefully the psychometric properties of these tools.
Measures of parenting are often assumed to show measurement equivalence across groups or time,
implying that the meaning of the construct being measured is consistent and constant (Putnick
and Bornstein, 2016). However, it is less common that measures of parenting are subjected to tests
of measurement invariance, and when they are, they often do not demonstrate invariance (Adam-
sons and Buehler, 2007; Puhlman and Pasley, 2017). Thus, measures of parental gatekeeping should
be subjected to tests of measurement invariance across reporters (e.g., mothers versus fathers) and
periods of child and family development to ensure that the same construct is being measured (Lee,
Schoppe-Sullivan, Feng, Gerhardt, and Kamp Dush, in press). In addition, analytic techniques such as
Rasch analysis could be used to examine the psychometric properties of gatekeeping measures and
determine how well measures of parental gatekeeping characterize individuals who exhibit low to
high levels of gatekeeping (Altenburger, Gugiu, Schoppe-Sullivan, and Kamp Dush, under review).
As higher quality survey measures are developed, it also remains critical to examine the cor-
respondence between reports and observations of parental gatekeeping (Lee et al., in press), as the
validity of survey measures of parental gatekeeping rests, in part, in their ability to capture behaviors,
and observed behavior is often considered the “gold standard” in studies of parenting. Informa-
tion regarding which items and surveys most closely correspond to observations of gatekeeping
will be useful for the refinement of parental gatekeeping surveys. Moreover, such studies will help
researchers develop reliable and valid versions of gatekeeping measures to include in future large-
scale population-based and panel studies. For instance, although researchers have used survey items
administered in the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being study to assess gatekeeping (Fagan and
Cherson, 2017), the questions used are very limited in scope (i.e., “Have you asked the father to
spend more time with your child?”). Often, prior research on the psychometric properties of meas-
ures included in studies like these has not been conducted.
As theoretical models of parenting have indicated, father involvement is determined in multiple
ways (Bornstein, 2016). Maternal gatekeeping is only one of many potential influences on father
involvement in childrearing. Future research should continue to explore the relative importance of
maternal gatekeeping in the context of other barriers and supports for father involvement in chil-
drearing in different types of families (e.g., divorced families, dual-earner families). Moreover, many
of the existing studies of associations between maternal gatekeeping and father involvement have
been cross-sectional (Fagan and Barnett, 2003; Zvara et al., 2013), and more longitudinal studies are
needed to disentangle the time order of these associations. In addition to studies that follow fami-
lies over months and years, more detailed observational studies that examine mother-father-child
190
interactions at a micro level may also make important contributions to understanding the moment-
to-moment process of maternal gatekeeping. Experimental designs would be useful to establish
causal associations between maternal gatekeeping and father involvement (i.e., tests of interventions
targeting maternal gatekeeping, possibly as an addition to an existing coparenting or transition to
parenthood program) as well as causal associations between predictors of maternal gatekeeping and
gatekeeping behavior (e.g., manipulations of maternal attitudes followed by observations of behavior).
As parental gatekeeping theory and research advance, there is a need for more research targeted
at better understanding the broad applicability of gatekeeping to diverse parents and families. This
research, in turn, will inform current theory and measurement. Like most of the research literature
on parenting (Bornstein, 2016), scientific investigations of parental gatekeeping have focused primar-
ily on families in Western, educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic societies (Henrich, Heine,
and Norenzayan, 2010), including the United States, Israel, and Great Britain. However, given that
gender ideologies and roles show both similarities and differences across cultures and countries
(Brandt, 2011; Wood and Eagly, 2002), and in light of the fact that beliefs and practices of parenting
vary across cultural contexts (Bornstein, 2016), it is likely that parental gatekeeping is influenced by
culture as well. In more egalitarian cultures in which men and women share more equally in chil-
drearing, parental gatekeeping may be less prevalent. Moreover, in societies where children have a lot
of unsupervised time starting in early childhood, and spend more time with siblings or peers than
with parents, parental gatekeeping may not be as frequent. On the other hand, in contexts in which
childrearing is more gendered, and in which young children are afforded less autonomy, parents may
engage in stronger gatekeeping to protect children from real or perceived dangers.
Limited research on coparenting has considered the role of culture. In their study of divisions of
family labor in Mexican origin and Anglo families, Pinto and Coltrane (2009) reported that Mexican
immigrant mothers endorsed more traditional gender-role attitudes, higher familism, and stronger
gateclosing attitudes than Mexican American or Anglo mothers. This is consistent with the atten-
tion Lindsey and Caldera (2015) have drawn to consideration of cultural values such as familismo,
machismo, respeto, and simpatío and the roles these values may play in coparenting dynamics among
Mexican origin families in the United States. Other cross-cultural studies on coparenting support
the importance of considering culture. For instance, Feldman, Masalha, and Nadam (2001) reported
that dual-earner Israeli-Jewish families demonstrated higher levels of cohesiveness during family
interactions than dual-earner Arab families at the transition to parenthood. In addition, in their study
of the coparental decision-making of mainland Chinese and Chinese Canadian immigrant mothers
and fathers of infants, Chuang and Su (2009) found that mothers had greater control over decision-
making overall, but that this “maternal advantage” was more pronounced in families in mainland
China than those who were immigrants to Canada. In addition to cross-cultural studies of parental
gatekeeping, in-depth emic and within-culture studies of coparenting and parental gatekeeping in
non-Western contexts will be critical to deepening our understanding of these phenomena (McHale,
Kuersten-Hogan, and Rao, 2004).
Most recently, gatekeeping has been examined in families headed by same-sex couples. Examin-
ing parental gatekeeping in same-sex families provides an opportunity to evaluate how gatekeeping
processes change or remain the same in diverse family arrangements. Prior research has suggested
that families headed by same-sex couples share childcare and housework more equally than families
headed by different-sex couples (Goldberg, Smith, and Perry-Jenkins, 2012). Perhaps a more equi-
table division of labor reduces the likelihood that gatekeeping processes will occur. Consistent with
this perspective, research has revealed that women in heterosexual relationships report higher levels
of gatekeeping than both fathers and mothers in same-sex relationships. Of note, fathers in same-
sex relationships report higher levels of gatekeeping in household tasks than mothers in same-sex
relationships (Sweeney et al., 2017). Furthermore, higher levels of gatekeeping in families headed by
same-sex mothers and same-sex fathers occur when participants report lower job autonomy, feelings
191
of ambivalence about continuing the relationship, greater perceived parenting skill, and lower per-
ceived partner parenting skill (Sweeney et al., 2017). Some of these predictors are similar to those
identified in research on gatekeeping in different-sex couples (Schoppe-Sullivan et al., 2015).
In better understanding how gatekeeping processes occur in diverse family structures, additional
research is needed to examine fathers’ gatekeeping. Exploring fathers’ gatekeeping in families with
primary caregiving fathers might provide a unique opportunity for researchers to differentiate
between gender perspectives and other perspectives on gatekeeping, such as identity theory. Finally,
although some researchers have examined the role of gatekeeping in parent-adolescent relationships
(Holmes et al., 2013; Stevenson et al., 2014), additional longitudinal research is needed to identify
the implications of gatekeeping for younger children’s socioemotional adjustment. It is possible, for
instance, that the other parent’s diminished parenting quality could mediate an association between
gatekeeping and child socioemotional adjustment.
In sum, important advances in the study of parental gatekeeping have been made, primarily
regarding mothers’ roles as gatekeepers of fathers’ involvement in childrearing. Further attention to
the integration of theory development, hypothesis testing, and measurement will ensure that forward
progress continues and will allow the expansion of gatekeeping research beyond mothers as gate-
keepers. Together, these efforts will contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of coparent-
ing dynamics in diverse families.
Acknowledgments
Sarah Schoppe-Sullivan’s work on this chapter was supported by Ohio State University’s Faculty
Professional Leave program, and Lauren Altenburger’s work on this chapter was supported by an
Ohio State University Presidential Fellowship. We thank Jason M. Sullivan for his helpful feedback
on our conceptual model of gatekeeping.
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6
ADOLESCENT PARENTING
M. Ann Easterbrooks, Rachel C. Katz, and Meera Menon
Introduction
Most individuals across the globe become parents at some point in their lives (86% of women, 84%
of men), primarily after their adolescent years (Bornstein, 2015). In this chapter, we consider the
timing of parenthood, and the phenomenon of adolescent parenthood for adolescent parents and
their children. The chapter reflects a bioecological approach (Bronfenbrenner and Morris, 2007) to
understanding adolescent parenting, in which we consider the multiple layers of context (individual,
relational, sociocultural, policy) that inform adolescent parenting, including its origins, meanings,
and consequences. We first examine the prevalence and correlates of adolescent parenthood globally
(both developing and developed countries) to address the sociocultural context of adolescent parent-
hood and parenting. Adolescent birth rates are declining worldwide, yet there are intra- and interna-
tional disparities in birth rates that may be related to circumstances such as economic and educational
opportunities for young women and variability in ethnicity that are relevant to understanding the
transition to parenthood during the adolescent years.
Adolescent parenting, particularly the negative consequences of early childbearing, has been well
documented in the developmental science literature. Although there is an abundance of literature
focusing on adolescent mothers and their children, the literature on adolescent fathers is sparse.
There are likely several reasons for this disparity, including the fact that adolescent fathers are less
likely to have stable patterns of involvement with their children than do adolescent mothers, in part
because relationships between adolescent parents and their partners are often unstable and children
are more likely to reside with their mothers (Goldberg, 2014). Accordingly, our focus is on parent-
hood and parenting among adolescent mothers.
One theme that we raise and return to several times in this chapter is that of heterogeneity. Just
as there is variability in how parenting looks (the goals, styles, and determinants of parenting) among
older adults, so too is there heterogeneity among adolescent parents and their children. Considering
adolescent parents and their children as a homogeneous group does not recognize the inherent vari-
ability (both genetic and experiential) within a population (Rose, 2016). Although we review the
literature that focuses primarily on the negative developmental consequences of making the transi-
tion to parenthood as an adolescent, we also include a discussion of protective and promotive aspects
of resilience among adolescent parents and their children; this inclusion recognizes the heterogeneity
of adolescent parenting and its consequences.
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M. Ann Easterbrooks et al.
We set the stage for this review with some thoughts about what it means to be a parent. This
is relevant because our discussion of the transition to parenthood highlights “meaning making”
(Walsh, 2012) and the meanings that adolescent parents and their contexts (families, communities,
society) attribute to adolescent parenthood that, in turn, may contribute to the heterogeneity among
adolescent mothers and their children. What are the roles and responsibilities of parents? Parents
are charged with the care and rearing of children to be healthy and productive citizens within
their particular families, communities, and societies. This involves several domains of personal and
contextual resources, including physical/material (housing, nutrition), psychological (emotional sup-
port, encouragement), and economic, occurring at multiple levels (individual, family, social policy).
According to Bornstein (2015) optimal parenting also requires “planning, organizing, and executing”
(p. 56). Although some portion of parenting is “intuitive,” even biologically “hardwired” (Barrett and
Fleming, 2011; Bornstein, 2016), parents also learn their roles and behaviors through observation
and information gained from other individuals as well as from formal resources (print material and
other media) and their own experiences of being parented. Reflecting this notion that parenting is
supported by informal and formal learning, we end our chapter with a discussion of several aspects of
policies and programs that aim to promote resilience among adolescent mothers and their children.
Global Trends of the Prevalence of Adolescent Births

To begin, we examine contemporary adolescent birth rates from a global perspective, discussing the
rates within both developed and developing countries. To consider adolescent births, we employ
the commonly used indicator of adolescent birth rate, which refers to the average number of live
births among 1,000 women ages 15–19 years old in a specific population at any given time (Loaiza
and Liang, 2013).
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) 2014 report, around 16 million girls
between the ages of 15 and 19 give birth each year (WHO, 2014a). This statistic does not include
girls under the age of 15, of which the WHO estimates about 1 million give birth yearly (WHO,
2014a). Despite these seemingly large estimates of adolescent births, over the past two decades,
adolescent birth rates have declined demonstrably. Yet there still exists wide variation in birth rate
among developed and developing countries and urban and rural populations as well as among vari-
ous ethnic groups within countries (Guttmacher Institute, 2015; Loaiza and Liang, 2013; Sedgh,
Finer, Bankole, Eilers, and Singh, 2015).
Adolescent Birth Rates in Developing Countries

Global estimates from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) suggest that the overall global
estimate for adolescent birth rates is 50 among 1,000 girls, but the estimate among developing coun-
tries is 85 (Loaiza and Liang, 2013). Even more, the WHO approximates that low-to-middle income
countries (LMIC) with greater poor, rural, and less educated populations comprise 95% of all global
adolescent births (WHO, 2014b). Developing societies, by in large, follow the declining trends in
adolescent birth rates (Blum, 2015; United Nations, 2013). For instance, in developing countries,
between the years of 1950 and 1955, there was an average adolescent birth rate of 170, whereas esti-
mates from 2010 show an average birth rate of 106 (Blum, 2015; United Nations, 2013).
Despite the trend of overall decline in adolescent births in the developing world, there remain
region-specific inequities in the rates of decline. Adolescent birth rates are highest in sub-Saharan
Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean (Blum, 2015). Even within regions, disparities in birth
rates are evident. For example, in sub-Saharan Africa, Burundi’s adolescent birth rate is 65 per 1,000
adolescent girls, whereas Niger’s is 210 per 1,000 girls (Blum, 2015). Region-specific variation is
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Adolescent Parenting
likely attributed to limited prospects for women in terms of education and careers, along with early
marriage and limited access to contraception (Blum, 2015).
Adolescent Birth Rates in Developed Countries

Among developed countries, estimates using complete country-wide data from the United Nations
(UN) Statistics Division’s Demographic Yearbook show that the highest adolescent birth rates are
in the United States, with England, Wales, and New Zealand following close behind (Sedgh et al.,
2015). In contrast, the lowest adolescent birth rates among developing countries can be found in
Switzerland, Netherlands, Singapore, and Slovenia (Sedgh et al., 2015). Still, the rates of adolescent
births within developed countries follow the overall downward global trend (Sedgh et al., 2015). In
explaining the higher birth rates in the United States compared with other similarly sized develop-
ing countries, researchers note that this is due not to greater sexual activity among United States
adolescents, but rather to a lack of access to reliable contraception (Mollborn, 2017; Santelli and
Melnikas, 2010).
In the United States, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) suggest
that in 2015, the adolescent birth rate was 22.3 births per 1,000 adolescent girls (Hamilton, Rosen,
and Bramm, 2016). Overall, adolescent births in the United States have declined 57% between 1991
and 2013; for instance, the adolescent birth rate estimate for 2015 was less than a quarter of the high-
est historical rate from 1957, which was 96.3 births per 1,000 adolescent girls (Ventura, Hamilton,
and Mathews, 2014). Even when probing the trends among the various sociodemographic groups
in the United States, the overall downward trend in teen birth rates is still visible. Data from 2007
to 2012 depict rates of births among adolescent girls of Hispanic ethnic background decreased the
greatest amount, by around 39%, whereas all other ethnic groups decreased at rates between 25% and
34% (Ventura et al., 2014).
Despite the overall decreases in adolescent birth rates for all sociodemographic groups within
the United States, there still are marked disparities between different ethnic groups. For instance, the
birth rate for non-Hispanic European American girls (approximately 20) was less than half of the
rate for non-Hispanic African American girls, (approximately 47) or Latin American girls (approxi-
mately 50). Further, there exist geographic disparities in U.S. adolescent birth rates. Estimates from
2007 to 2015 depict that whereas large urban counties in the United States have an adolescent birth
rate of 18.9, the rate for rural U.S. counties is almost double at around 30.9 (Hamilton et al., 2016).
Moreover, the population-wide patterns in birth rates among adolescent girls of different ethnic
backgrounds is replicated within urban and rural settings in the United States; nonetheless, the birth
rates for adolescent girls of any ethnic background were still higher in rural settings compared with
the average rate for the same ethnic groups in urban settings (Hamilton et al., 2016).
Factors Associated With Adolescent Parenthood

We adopt a bioecological framework (Bronfenbrenner and Morris, 2007). Considering the interplay
between more distal influences on adolescent parenting, such as the contemporary sociocultural and
political ethos, with proximal factors, such as the availability of economic and educational resources.
Together, distal and proximal influences are seen as contributing to adolescent pregnancies, births,
and parenting. In this section, we examine circumstances associated with adolescent parenthood. We
separate our discussion on the basis of the unique factors and contexts present in developing and
developed countries. However, we also draw attention to the commonalities across settings, namely,
lower access to educational opportunities and economic disadvantage as precipitating circumstances
related to adolescent parenthood.
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Developing Countries
The lack of educational and economic opportunities available to many girls from developing coun-
tries may partly explain the high rates of adolescent births in the developing world. Due to the com-
bination of the sparsity of school and career options for girls, there are limited prospects for upward
mobility; in many instances, marriage serves as the only option (Blum, 2015). Evidence supports this
claim, for within developing societies, adolescent girls, compared with adolescent boys, are more
likely to be married (16% compared with 3%) (Loaiza and Liang, 2013).
Marriage, then, is the greatest contributor to adolescent birth rates in this context; an estimated
9 out of 10 births to adolescent girls in developing countries occur within the confines of marriage
(Blum, 2015). Cultural norms may endorse a pregnancy within the first few years of marriage as a
sign of fertility, which increases adolescent girls’ social status (Pradhan, Wynter, and Fisher, 2015).
Furthermore, among married adolescent girls there is also either insufficient access to, or lack of
usage of, contraception, leading to more intended pregnancies (Blum, 2015; Pradhan et al., 2015).
For example, in sub-Saharan Africa, which has one of the highest rates of adolescent pregnancy in
the world, 65% of pregnancies were intended compared with 13% in the United States (Biddlecom,
Hessburg, Singh, Bankole, and Darabi, 2007; Finer and Zolna, 2013).
Developed Countries
The majority of research examining factors associated with adolescent parenthood has examined
Western societies; therefore, the literature on the precipitators of adolescent birth primarily focuses
on Western contexts. As is the case in developing countries, the lack of educational and economic
opportunities is consistently linked with a higher likelihood of adolescent birth. However, the expe-
rience and meanings associated with the abovementioned factors differ between adolescents living
in developed societies and those living in developing ones.
When considering the “social determinants” of adolescent pregnancy within Western contexts,
Romero and colleagues (2016) highlighted key drivers as lower educational attainment by parents
along with insufficient educational and economic opportunities for adolescents. Writing about ado-
lescent births in the European Union, Imamura and colleagues (2007) touched on several issues
that are often conflated with economic disadvantage and limited educational prospects, such as peer
attitudes around education and employment and disrupted family structures. Specifically in regard
to family structure, having a single mother or being the child of teen parents are associated with
a higher likelihood of adolescent pregnancy and childbirth (Penman-Aguilar, Carter, Snead, and
Kourtis, 2013).
The abovementioned factors tend to be more prevalent within certain economically under-
resourced and minority communities, which may explain the disparities in adolescent birth rates
in developed societies such as the United States (Romero et al., 2016). A bioecological perspective
might explain the ethnic disparities in adolescent birth rates as influenced by community-level fac-
tors (lack of education and economic opportunities) that can moderate other factors present in an
adolescent’s immediate context, triggering events that may lead to pregnancy and childbirth (Wilson,
1996). For instance, Sucoff and Upchurch (1998) used a combination of longitudinal individual
and census-tract data to explain the timing of teen pregnancy among African American girls in the
United States. Results indicated that residence in a highly segregated neighborhood, irrespective of
overall economic affluence, led to a shorter time to pregnancy than among girls living in ethnically
mixed neighborhoods. The effects of ethnic segregation on shortening time to birth were above and
beyond family level characteristics also associated with adolescent birth (Sucoff and Upchurch, 1998).
Research of South and Baumer (2000) also helps to explain ethnic disparities in teen birth rates
by using a community-level lens. They noted that poor African American adolescents tend to live in
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more economically disadvantaged neighborhoods than do poor European American adolescents. In

addition, these disadvantaged neighborhoods may be rife with elements that are associated with risky
sexual behavior, such as the more positive attitudes and behaviors of peers around adolescent sexual
activity, lower parental monitoring and supervision, adolescents’ low motivation for and commitment
to career and educational prospects, lack of parents’ involvement in their children’s social networks,
and high frequency of residential mobility (South and Baumer, 2000).
Through this lens, the disparities seen in adolescent birth rates within developed countries may
not be due to adolescents’ ethnic backgrounds but are instead associated with confounding commu-
nity-level factors. For example, income inequality, above and beyond ethnic composition, is associ-
ated with teen births (Gold, Kawachi, Kennedy, Lynch, and Connell, 2001). Using census-tract data
from the United States, Kirby, Coyle, and Gould (2001) found that a higher percentage of individuals
living below the federal poverty line and a lower percentage of adults with college degrees were both
linked with teen births. Notably, Kirby and colleagues (2001) still found racial/ethnic differences
among the trends associated with adolescent births. They noted that Latin American communities
that had a higher percentage of employed males had higher birth rates; conversely, a lower percentage
of employed males was associated with higher birth rates in European American communities. As we
discuss ahead, Kirby and colleagues’ (2001) work addresses the importance of understanding fami-
lies’ sociocultural contexts that may explain higher rates of adolescent births within Latin American
communities in the United States.
The rates of adolescent births among Latin American communities are among the highest when
compared with rates for other ethnic groups (Hamilton et al., 2016; Ventura et al., 2014). On hetero-
geneity, it is critical to understanding that Latin American communities are composed of individuals
from nearly 20 different Spanish-speaking countries in Central America, South America, and the
Caribbean and include both native born and foreign born individuals (Bornstein, 2017; Pew His-
panic Center, 2009). Despite the heterogeneity among different ethnic groups composing the Latin
American population, there are still many important shared cultural beliefs and norms regarding
motherhood, family, and religion (Aparicio, Pecukonis, and Zhou, 2014). Nonetheless, acculturation
status is one element that may be related to the disparities in teen pregnancies within Latin American
populations. For instance, adolescent pregnancy is looked upon less favorably by native born Latin
American youth and more favorably by foreign born Latin American youth (Pew Hispanic Center,
2009). Taken together, it remains challenging to understand the disparities in adolescent birth rates
among certain disadvantaged and minority populations in developed countries. Social and economic
disadvantage, however, appears to be a common element across both developed and developing
countries.
Conceptualizing Adolescent Parenthood—Models and Frameworks

In the previous section, we discussed the landscape of adolescent childbirth and parenthood within
contexts of developing and developed countries and factors that may lead to a higher likelihood
of adolescent parenting. Following sections of this chapter focus on the experience, meaning, and
attributes of adolescent parenting. To frame our discussion of the trajectories of adolescent parents
and their children, we first consider broader theoretical frameworks and theories that inform our
explication of the experience of adolescent parenting. Although age is simply a proxy for develop-
mental maturity (Lerner and Spanier, 1978), the phenomenon of adolescent parenthood raises con-
cerns for many, particularly in Western societies. As Mollborn (2017) noted, “Teenage motherhood
continues to capture attention as a social problem in the United States” (p. 63).
Adolescents who become parents are simultaneously negotiating two often-challenging devel-
opmental phases—adolescence that is often associated with negotiation of newfound independence
from family, and parenthood, a new role where the care and well-being of another person is primary
203
(Osofsky, Osofsky, and Diamond, 1988). Life course theories presume that positive adaptation to
the developmental concerns inherent in the transition to parenthood is predicated on successful
resolution of the developmental tasks of prior phases (Erikson, 1963). During adolescence, at least
in developed countries, identity formation is a prominent developmental task to be resolved (Erik-
son, 1968; Kroger, 2007; Marcia, 1993), and the “crisis” of adult identity formation is often seen as
the hallmark of adolescence. Parenthood is typically seen as an indicator of maturity, equivalent
with adulthood. When adolescence and adulthood share the same “developmental space,” especially
when the typical tasks of adulthood occur early, there may be an assumption of poor developmental
adaptation and failure in mastering of the key tasks of the phase. The transition to parenthood is
a developmental phase that requires a transformation of identity, the acquisition of new roles, and
shifting of priorities and behaviors, with less spontaneity and greater responsibility (Abidin, 1992;
Belsky, 1984; Steinberg, 2000).
Navigating the Transition to Parenthood

Most conceptualizations of adolescent parenthood represent this transition as difficult, fraught with
risks for both the parent and the child (Taylor, 2008). “Adolescent childbearing is usually inconsist-
ent with mainstream societal demands for attaining adulthood through education, work experience,
and financial stability” (Klein, 2005, p. 282). This portrayal of adolescent parenting is due, in part,
to an adolescent parent simultaneously navigating developmental phases that may be in opposition,
or at least appearing to have characteristics that are difficult to mesh (focus on peers, spontaneity,
independence in adolescence versus need for stability, caregiving focus on another, and dependence
in the transition to parenthood). Although typical conceptualizations of adolescent parenthood and
parenting depict the parents as lacking in knowledge (at best) and as insensitive, neglectful, or abusive
(at worst), this characterization of the average adolescent parent represents only a portion of the
population. Rose (2016) argued that distinct styles and patterns of learning and development are the
rule, not the exception, and that that heterogeneity is the norm in a population.
For some individuals, the transition to parenthood as an adolescent serves as a “turning point”
and catalyst for a different (often positive) life path (Masten, 2014), with new goals and behaviors.
For others, adolescent childbearing and parenting is one more challenge to be faced, among other
significant stressors and risks during this young person’s lifetime. For all, it is a transition and a pro-
cess rather than an event. The literature on the risks accompanying adolescent parenting (discussed
ahead) portrays the negative impacts of an early transition to parenthood, both for mothers and for
their children. Despite these challenges, adolescent parenthood cannot always be interpreted as an
adverse event (Cherrington and Breheny, 2005), nor does it guarantee adverse outcomes for parents
or children (Borkowski, Whitman, and Farris, 2007; Easterbrooks, Chaudhuri, Bartlett, and Cope-
man, 2011).
Life transitions and crises confront a person with a critical juncture or turning point. Per-
sonal growth and an expanded repertoire of coping skills often follow the successful reso-
lution of a crisis. But failure to manage a situation effectively may foreshadow impaired
adjustment and problems in handling future transitions and crises.
(Moos and Schaefer, 2013, p. 23)
Organizing Frameworks and Conceptual Models

Our organizing framework is a broad bioecological perspective (Bronfenbrenner and Morris, 2007)
that considers process, person, context, and time. Considering each of these dimensions, as well
as transactions between the dimensions, will lead to a more robust understanding of adolescent
204
parenting. “Transactions are omnipresent. . . . Everything in the universe is affecting something else
or is being affected by something else. Everything is in a relationship, from the most complex society
to the most elementary particle” (Sameroff, 2009, p. 3). In this view, individuals are not considered to
be separate from the multiple contexts that they navigate. A bioecological framework suggests that
an individual’s environment is composed of several fused levels (both proximal and distal) and that
understanding the integration and interrelations between these levels contributes to our understand-
ing of the broader ecology of human development (Bronfenbrenner, 1979; Sameroff, 2009). Moos
and Schaefer’s (1986) conceptualization of influences on individuals’ navigation of life crises (see
Figure 6.1) reflects an ecological orientation. Characteristics of the person’s background, the event,
and the wider environment all are directly influential, and these influences also are mediated by an
individual’s attributions and skills.
Pertinent to parenting, Belsky’s (1984) model of the determinants of parenting reflects this eco-
logical model by including characteristics of an individual’s history, personality, and social and struc-
tural relationships as fundamental to parenting. Expanding this model to include the sociocultural
context, Vondra, Sysko, and Belsky (2005) proposed that parental personality characteristics and
psychological functioning mediate sociocultural influences on parenting. They also noted the rela-
tion between psychological maturity (something that may be challenging for adolescent parents) and
parenting such that as psychological maturity increases so does the quality of parenting (McGroder,
2000; van Bakel and Riksen-Walraven, 2002). We represent a biological framework of the transac-
tions between individuals and their context that influence parenting in Figure 6.2.
Other mechanisms linking personality and parenting include a parent’s emotions and attribu-
tions about their infants. Teenage parents are known to have unrealistic expectations of their infants
(Herrenkohl, Herrenkohl, Egolf, and Russo, 1998; Whitman, Borkowski, Keogh, and Weed, 2001)
that affect both their own behavior and their attributions regarding their infants’ behavior, including
their intentionality in ways that may not be beneficial. In addition, adolescent mothers report greater
psychological distress than do either childless adolescents or non-adolescent mothers (Mollborn
and Morningstar, 2009). These challenges in emotion regulation affect parent-child interactions and
relationships. In Bowlby’s (1969/1982) seminal work on ethological attachment theory, attributions
and emotions were central facets of “Internal Working Models” (IWM) that shape parenting goals
and behavior. These Internal Working Models, or cognitive scripts, may be one process by which
BACKGROUND AND
PERSONAL FACTORS
COGNITIVE OUTCOME
APPRAISAL OF
EVENT-RELATED ADAPTIVE COPING
FACTORS TRANSITION
(PERCEIVED TASKS SKILLS OR
MEANING
CRISIS
OF EVENT)
PHYSICAL AND SOCIAL

ENVIRONMENTAL
FACTORS
Figure 6.1 Life transitions and crises

Source: In Moos and Schaefer (1986), Coping with life crises: A conceptual overview (pp. 3–28). New York: Springer
science+business media. Part of the springer series on stress and coping. Reprinted with permission of springer nature.
205
Individual attributes of the Individual attributes of the child

parent (personality) (personality)
Broader Ecology of Human Development
Past Experiences and

Developmental History Parenting beliefs,
attitudes, and practices Child Development
Employment/School Social Network
Structural relationships
(romantic relations)
Time
Figure 6.2 A bioecological framework of parenting: transactions between individual and contextual factors that
influence parenting beliefs, attitudes, and practices
Note: In this model, all levels of the developmental system impact one another and mutually influence (and are influenced
by) the broader ecology of human development. All arrows not shown for simplicity.
adolescent parents’ developmental history and experiences (adverse and otherwise) affect their own
parenting.
Although much of the literature on adolescent parenting focuses on negative attributes and conse-
quences, positive adaptation and resilience also are observed. Resilience is “the capacity of a dynamic
system to adapt successfully to disturbances that threaten system function, viability, or development”
(Masten, 2014, p. 10). Using Bowlby’s frame of IWM, resilience in adolescent parenting may occur
when a parent’s Internal Working Models guide appropriate attributions and sensitive parenting.
Adolescent parents may have healthy role models (current and/or historical) for parenthood, or sup-
portive relationships that provide emotional, informational, or tangible help in navigating the chal-
lenges of parenting. Supports for positive parenting may be informal (partners, kin, friends) or formal
(support programs, housing or childcare vouchers). A robust literature confirms the links between
social support and parenting self-efficacy, positive parenting behavior, and reduced parenting stress
(Leahy-Warren, McCarthy, and Corcoran, 2012; McConnell, Breitkreuz, and Savage, 2011; Taylor,
Conger, Robins, and Widaman, 2015). Social support may be especially important for adolescent
mothers if there are multiple challenges of developmental maturity, social discrimination, and adverse
developmental histories (Eshbaugh, Lempers, and Luze, 2006).
Some life course developmental theories (Erikson, 1950) propose that each phase of the life span
brings its own developmental challenges to be resolved. Erikson’s developmental phase of generativ-
ity, which takes place during adulthood, is the typical timing phase in which individuals make the
transition to parenthood. Failure to successfully resolve previous developmental challenges before
entering parenthood may compromise current functioning. For example, breakdown in the central
issue of adolescence, “identity versus confusion,” may prevent successful navigation of parenthood,
as well as Erikson’s next phase of development, “intimacy versus isolation.” Drawing on the con-
cept of heterogeneity of adaptation to adolescent parenthood, a successful transition to parenthood
may depend, in part, on the meanings of parenthood and adolescent parenthood within the larger
206
social and psychological context. As Mirowsky (2002, p. 340) noted, becoming a parent “defines a
core transition in the life course that may catalyze and interlock sets of social and biological con-
sequences.” Parenthood for adolescents may (but does not necessarily) prevent the resolution of
normative aspects of the transition from adolescence to adulthood, instead bringing life changes
that confer a “competitive disadvantage for the future attainment of material resources, power, and
prestige” (Goldberg, 2014, p. 24). Taking a life course perspective suggests that individuals who make
the transition to parenthood “off-time” may encounter challenges “due to social comparison pro-
cesses, self-assessment processes, and reduced opportunities for emotional and instrumental support”
(Goldberg, 2014, p. 23).
Heterogeneity in Adolescent Parenting

Countering the notion of a uniform model of parenting, however, Shapiro and Mangelsdorf (1994)
suggested that the models of parenting that have been developed for “on-time” parenthood may
not apply to “off-time” parenting. These authors noted that the amount of support from the fam-
ily of origin and from the father of the baby were related to adolescent mothers’ parenting com-
petence distinctly from what would be predicted among older mothers. Citing the developmental
issues associated with establishing autonomy from family as a normative step in adolescence, Shapiro
and Mangelsdorf noted that family support did not enhance adolescent mothers’ parenting efficacy.
Contreras (2004) reported that the effect of grandmother and partner support/relationships might
depend on whether the young mother is residing with them. Indeed, others have reported associa-
tions between the residence of adolescent mothers with their own mothers and negative parent-
ing practices (Chase-Lansdale Brooks-Gunn, and Zamsky, 1994; East and Felice, 2014). According
to Shapiro and Mangelsdorf (1994), high amounts of support may “interfere with the adolescent’s
maternal role identification and sense of maternal efficacy” (p. 636). In their study, support from the
father of the baby was negatively associated with mothers’ parenting competence. One interpreta-
tion of these data might be that father involvement overshadows a young mother’s parenting efficacy;
another interpretation might be that fathers (or grandmothers or other kin) step into a void when
they are aware that the adolescent mother lacks parenting skills, interest, or engagement. In summary,
unitary models of parenting, and of the determinants of parenting quality, are not representative of
the processes of multifinality (Cicchetti and Rogosch, 1996; von Bertalanffy, 1968) in the parenting
pathways of adolescents.
Although there is evidence to support the idea that early off-time parenthood has considerable
negative consequences for the life course of both mothers and children (see ahead), we want to
focus on two points that sometimes are overlooked. First, attributions of challenging life trajectories
resulting from adolescent parenthood to the early childbearing itself may be misplaced. As a group,
adolescents who become parents “off-time” already are at risk for challenging economic, educa-
tional, and psychosocial trajectories, even before becoming parents. Second, although adolescent
mothers and fathers are often referred to as a homogeneous group, there is considerable heteroge-
neity and individual variability, both within the group and within various domains of functioning
(Mistry et al., 2016; Raskin et al., under review). SmithBattle (2007b) concluded that “the power-
ful legacy of social class and racial divisions on teen mothers’ long-term outcomes challenges the
view that teen mothering leads to a downward spiral with negative repercussions for mothers and
children” (p. 409).
Individual and Social Context and Processes

The Phenomenological Variant of Ecological Systems Theory (PVEST; Spencer, Dupree, and Hart-
man, 1997; Spencer et al., 2006) adds to the ecological model to include an individual’s perceived
207
experience of events and objects. Thus, a mother’s understanding of events and processes of parent-
ing, and how she gives meaning to them, are important moderators of parenting; positive attributions
regarding motherhood and of her child may foster resilient functioning in parenting and within
other dimensions of an adolescent mother’s life. In her model of family resilience, Walsh (2012)
articulated that “meaning making” emphasizing individual and family strengths can promote positive
functioning in the presence of struggles. Indeed, optimism is strongly related to resilience (Masten,
2014; Walsh, 2012).
Lest we portray adolescent parenting as solely the result of individual or dyadic characteristics
and processes, we also want to recognize the critical importance of the assets and resources of com-
munities and the manner in which they are made available and are accessed by individual citizens,
neighborhoods, and systems. Later, we discuss issues of policies and programs available to adolescent
parents and their families that promote and support thriving and resilience among parents and chil-
dren. Here, we address the conceptual foundations of the notion of resilience as it is influenced by
the broader social context. Cherrington and Breheny (2005) advocated for considering the political
and social context of adolescent parents and their children, as well as the individual and social mean-
ings of adolescent pregnancy and parenting, to convey more diverse and rich pictures of the social,
political, and psychological circumstances of adolescent parenting and of resilience in the context
of challenging circumstances. Ungar’s (2008) definition of resilience embeds the social and politi-
cal landscape within the definition itself, calling resilience the “capacity of individuals to navigate
their way to the psychological, social, cultural, and physical resources that sustain their well-being,
and their capacity individually and collectively to negotiate for these resources to be provided and
experienced in culturally meaningful ways” (p. 225).
Adolescent Parenthood: Impacts of Early Childbearing

on Mothers and Children
Although this chapter emphasizes the capacity of individuals, relationships, and systems to dem-
onstrate resilient functioning, much of the extant literature on adolescent childbearing documents
the challenges and struggles of young parents and their children. A large number of studies suggest
that adolescent parenting is associated with a variety of risk factors and nonoptimal functioning
among both adolescent parents and their children (Mollborn and Dennis, 2012). More specifically,
extant research demonstrates relations between adolescent parenthood and individual-level risk fac-
tors such as poor psychological health and lower educational attainment (Hofferth, Reid, and Mott,
2001; Whitman, Borkowski, Keogh, and Weed, 2001) as well as environmental risks such as lack
of resources and economic instability (Assini-Meytin and Green, 2015; Corcoran and Kunz, 1997).
These circumstances often lead to challenging life trajectories for young mothers and their children
(Leadbeater, Bishop, and Raver, 1996; Mollborn and Morningstar, 2009).
Despite these risk factors, the life trajectories of adolescent mothers are not homogeneous and
resilience promoting factors on both the individual and contextual level may foster positive function-
ing in the midst of difficult circumstances (Howard, Lefever, Borkowski, and Whitman, 2006; Lounds,
Borkowski, and Whitman, 2006; Masten, 2014; Weed, Keogh, and Borkowski, 2006). Moreover, the
indicators of nonoptimal functioning documented in the literature may reflect socioeconomic fac-
tors that often precede early pregnancy and childbirth. As alluded to in our discussion of risk factors
precipitating adolescent parenthood, it is difficult to separate the influences of social, family, and
background factors that are commonly associated with early parenthood and determine the causal
role of adolescent parenthood in the development of parents, children, and families. In the following
sections, we consider these issues and examine research pertaining to adolescent parenting in relation
to maternal and child functioning.
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The Association Between Adolescent Parenting and Mental Health

As previously mentioned, adolescent mothers must negotiate developmental changes associated with
adolescence while simultaneously balancing the demands and stresses of parenting (Osofsky, Osofsky,
and Diamond, 1988; Sadler and Cowlin, 2003). Adolescent mothers often engage in these competing
tasks amid economic, social, and contextual adversities, leading to a range of mental health problems
that impact maternal and child well-being (Borkowski et al., 2007; Mollborn, 2007). The transition
to parenthood for adolescent mothers may differ substantially from that of adult mothers because
there are unique emotional challenges that accompany adolescent parenting, including depression,
stress, and negative emotions (Hans and Thullen, 2009).
Adolescent mothers are significantly more likely to experience depressive symptoms both before
and after giving birth compared with adolescents who are not pregnant as well as compared with
older mothers (Whitman, Borkowski, Keogh, and Weed, 2001). Depression is prevalent among ado-
lescent mothers, with as many as 57% of young mothers reporting moderate to severe depressive
symptoms postpartum; some studies show rates of depression that are twice as high as those for
adult mothers (Barnet, Joffe, Duggan, Wilson, and Repke, 1996; Birkeland, Thompson, and Phares,
2005; Logsdon, Birkimer, Simpson, and Looney, 2005; Mollborn and Morningstar, 2009; Schmidt,
Wiemann, Rickert, and Smith, 2006). In comparison, rates of depression in non-childbearing female
adolescents and older mothers are lower (Whitman et al., 2001). Twelve-month prevalence data
from the 2015 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) showed that 19.5% of female
adolescents ages 12–17 had at least one major depressive episode in the past year, and 15–25% of
older mothers experienced elevated levels of depressive symptomatology in the 2 years following
childbirth (Evans, Heron, Francomb, Oke, and Golding, 2001). Reid and Meadows-Oliver (2007)
reported that more family conflict, fewer social supports, and low self-esteem were some of the fac-
tors associated with increased rates of depressive symptoms in adolescent mothers during the first
postpartum year.
Adolescent mothers have also been found to experience higher rates of stress compared with
older mothers and are at greater risk for developing symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder
(PTSD; Emery, Paquette, and Bigras, 2008). For example, LePlatte and colleagues (2012) reported
that young mothers in their intervention study had experienced an average of five traumatic events
including extreme economic hardship, death, incarceration, interpersonal violence, neglect, and
abuse. Furthermore, over half of the sample met the criteria for PTSD (LePlatte, Rosenblum, Stan-
ton, Miller, and Muzik, 2012). Some of this traumatic exposure precedes parenthood. In a sample
of adolescent mothers enrolled in a randomized controlled-trial evaluation of a voluntary statewide
home visiting family support program for first-time young parents, 84% had exposure to traumatic
events, averaging three traumatic events prior to childbirth; 45% met criteria for partial or full PTSD
(Easterbrooks, Crossman, Caruso, Raskin, and Miranda-Julian, 2017). Larson (2004) also reported
high levels of stress in adolescent mothers over a period of 2.5 years. Over 30% of mothers in the
sample reported clinically high levels of stress, which stemmed primarily from criticism they received
about parenting and from intimate partner violence (young women ages 18–24 are particularly at
risk for intimate partner violence) (Black et al., 2011; Halpern, Spriggs, Martin, and Kupper, 2009;
Larson, 2004).
In many cases, depression and stress co-occur among adolescent mothers. Young mothers who
experience parental stress are more likely to develop postpartum depression (Venkatesh, Phipps,
Triche, and Zlotnick, 2014). Several studies have shown that higher parenting stress and lower
perceived social support are associated more depressive symptoms following childbirth (Huang,
Costeines, Ayala, and Kaufman, 2014; Spencer, Kalil, Larson, Spieker, and Gilchrist, 2002). Similarly,
Whitson and colleagues found that depressed adolescent mothers report higher levels of parenting
209
stress (Whitson, Martinez, Ayala, and Kaufman, 2011). These adverse mental health circumstances
can negatively impact maternal and child functioning, making them key factors to consider in rela-
tion to the development of adolescent mothers and their offspring.
A myriad of studies has linked maternal stress and depression with a variety of negative devel-
opmental outcomes for both adolescent mothers and their children. Parenting stress and depressive
symptoms in adolescent mothers are associated with repeat pregnancies, lower educational attain-
ment, and negative parenting practices (Cox et al., 2008; Holub et al., 2007; Lanzi, Bert, and Jacobs,
2009; Mollborn and Morningstar, 2009). For example, in a sample of minority and low-income
young mothers, Barnet, Liu, and DeVoe (2008) found a 44% increase in the risk of subsequent preg-
nancy among adolescent mothers who displayed depressive symptoms. Moreover, Fletcher (2008)
found that female adolescents with depressive symptoms were less likely to finish high school and
enroll in college. Rates of depression are even higher in adolescent mothers, so it is likely that
the association between depression and lower education attainment observed in adolescents would
extend to adolescent mothers.
Concerning parenting behaviors, higher levels of depression in adolescent mothers are related
to lower maternal warmth, sensitivity, contingent responsiveness, and verbal communication with
children (Lanzi et al., 2009). Moreover, adolescent mothers with depressive symptoms have more
negative interactions with their infants including less positive feeding interactions (Field et al., 2000;
Lesser and Koniak-Griffin, 2000; Panzarine, Slater, and Sharps, 1995). In addition, Holub and col-
leagues (2007) found that adolescent mothers who experienced high levels of stress had fewer posi-
tive feelings about parenting, spent less time caring for children, and had low perceived parenting
competence.
Depression and maternal stress in adolescent mothers have also been connected to negative child
outcomes including physical health, behavior problems, and attachment relationships (Lanzi et al.,
2009; Smith, 2004). For example, Field and colleagues (2000) reported that 6-month-old infants
of depressed adolescent mothers had lower weight, difficult sleeping behaviors, and more pediatric
complications (shorter length, smaller head circumference). Infants born to adolescent mothers who
exhibit depressive symptoms with suicidal ideation have also been reported to weigh less than infants
born to mothers without depressive symptoms or to mothers who displayed depressive symptoms
without suicidal ideation (Hodgkinson, Colantuoni, Roberts, Berg-Cross, and Belcher, 2010). In
addition, Emery et al. (2008) reported that parenting stress predicted security of attachment among
infants of adolescent mothers.
The impact of adolescent childbirth on offspring is not limited to the infancy period. Negative
outcomes stemming from maternal stress and depression have also been observed in offspring dur-
ing the childhood and adolescent years. A study by Leadbeater et al. (1996) indicated that children
of adolescent mothers who experienced depressive symptoms in the first year after giving birth
exhibited problem behaviors during the preschool years. Furthermore, Bureau, Easterbrooks, and
Lyons-Ruth (2009) found that maternal depression during infancy exerted a unique impact on
offspring depression during childhood and adolescence among children of older mothers. Research
with adolescent mothers and their children suggests a similar pattern of intergenerational transmis-
sion. In one study, rates of adolescent depression and teen pregnancy were higher in children born to
adolescent mothers who had a history of depression (Horwitz, Klerman, Kuo, and Jekel, 1991). Thus,
maternal depression in adolescent mothers may be a risk factor for intergenerational transmission of
mental health problems as well as teen pregnancy in the next generation.
When interpreting the association between early childbearing and mental health problems, it
is important to consider issues of causality. Adolescent parents are already at risk for mental health
problems given the adversities frequently faced by this population such as economic hardship, child
abuse, relationship issues, chaotic home environments, and low social support (Hoffman and Maynard,
2008; Woodward, Fergusson, and Horwood, 2001). In other words, many of the factors associated
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with mental health outcomes in adolescent mothers often overlap with the risk factors for teenage
pregnancy. Thus, the relation between early childbearing and mental health problems is complex
for it is often unclear whether adolescent parenthood leads to mental health issues or whether the
mental health problems observed in adolescent mothers are a consequence of the challenging cir-
cumstances that are commonly associated with becoming an adolescent parent.
When sociodemographic factors are considered, the association between early childbearing
and mothers’ negative mental health outcomes is much weaker. For example, Boden, Fergus-
son, and Horwood (2008) reported that after controlling for socioeconomic background, family
functioning, and childhood behavior and cognitive ability, the relation between adolescent parent-
hood and mental health problems was no longer statistically significant. Similarly, Patel and Sen
(2012) found that adolescents experienced negative mental health outcomes regardless of whether
a teenage pregnancy resulted in a live birth. The researchers posited that although it is possible
that teen pregnancy in general is related to mental health problems, it is also possible that factors
leading to teen pregnancy may account for the negative mental health outcomes observed in ado-
lescent childbearers rather than the experience of teen motherhood itself. Overall, prior research
demonstrates associations among early childbearing, depression, and stress-related issues. However,
additional research exploring issues of causality in the relation between adolescent parenting and
mental health should be conducted to better understand the associations between teen mother-
hood and mental health outcomes.
Adolescent Parenting in Relation to Education, Employment,

and Economic Outcomes
A multitude of studies has focused on the extent to which early pregnancy and childbirth might
impact educational attainment, employment, and economic-related outcomes for adolescent moth-
ers. High school graduation and college enrollment rates among adolescent mothers are substantially
lower in comparison to those for older mothers (Hofferth et al., 2001; Hoffman, 1998; Levine and
Painter, 2003). Perper, Peterson, and Manlove (2010) found that adolescent mothers are less likely
than nonparenting adolescents to finish high school by the age of 22. When measured at this age,
89% of nonparenting adolescent females received a high school diploma relative to 51% of adolescent
mothers. More specifically, Klepinger and colleagues (1995) reported that early childbearing reduced
the educational attainment of adolescent mothers by 1–3 years. Similarly, Hofferth et al. (2001) found
that women who had children in their teenage years completed 1.9–2.2 fewer years of schooling
compared with women who had not given birth by the age of 30. Research also shows that women
who gave birth at or after age 30 were 10–12% more likely to complete high school and 12–29%
more likely to complete postsecondary education. Hoffman and Maynard (2008) reported that only
about 10% of teen mothers completed a 2- or 4-year college program.
Although many teenage mothers value education, numerous obstacles prevent young parents from
achieving their educational goals (SmithBattle, 2007b). Due to challenges such as childcare availabil-
ity, transportation, and the task of simultaneously managing multiple responsibilities such as school,
work, and parenting, adolescent mothers often find difficulty in pursuing educational opportunities
(SmithBattle, 2006). Therefore, the time young mothers must devote to childrearing responsibilities
may supersede competing activities such as school-related obligations. Mollborn (2007) argued that
lack of material resources is a primary factor related to lower educational attainment among adoles-
cent parents and that adolescent parents with substantial housing, economic resources, and childcare
support would be better able to participate in school-related activities. Using longitudinal data from a
nationally representative survey, Mollborn (2007) reported that lack of material resources accounted
for adolescent fathers’ educational disadvantage and that lack of childcare resources in particular led
to poorer educational outcomes for teenage mothers.
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In turn, lower educational attainment among adolescent mothers has an impact on employment
opportunities and economic stability (Bissell, 2000; Hoffman and Maynard, 2008; Smith and Wil-
son, 2014; SmithBattle, 2007b). Moreover, independent of schooling, research suggests an associa-
tion between early childbearing, employment, and economic hardship. Fletcher and Wolfe (2009)
found that although early childbearing only modestly reduced the likelihood of mothers graduating
high school, teen motherhood was associated with negative economic consequences, specifically
reductions in annual income. Comparably, Assini-Meytin and Green (2015) showed that adolescent
mothers were less likely to complete college and more likely to be unemployed, live in poverty, and
receive government assistance compared with older mothers. These educational and income-related
differences continued to be observed through the age of 42. Corcoran and Kunz (1997) found that
mothers who had children during their adolescent years had 43% lower income-to-needs ratios,
were 2.8 times more likely to be poor, and were 1.4 times more likely to receive public assistance
compared with mothers who did not give birth in adolescence. Findings from a study conducted by
Jaffee (2002) additionally revealed that young childbearers reported higher unemployment rates, low
socioeconomic status, and more financial problems compared to older mothers. Adolescent moth-
ers are also more likely than older mothers to depend on public assistance including cash assistance
(Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF; or TAFDC in some states) and food stamps
(Hoffman, 2006).
Although teenage childbearing presents numerous challenges in relation to education and job
attainment, many adolescent mothers are at risk for negative educational and employment related
outcomes even before becoming pregnant (Levine and Painter, 2003). Up to 60% of adolescents who
become pregnant drop out of school before pregnancy, suggesting that factors beyond early child-
bearing may contribute to lower educational attainment among adolescent parents (Pillow, 2004).
Moreover, adolescent mothers face economic hardships and often end up in poverty, and they are
more likely to reside in impoverished neighborhoods and have grown up in low-income families
(Mollborn and Dennis, 2012). Thus, the magnitude of the impact of adolescent parenthood itself on
mothers’ schooling and employment status may not be as strong as previously believed.
Educational disadvantage may result from selection processes associated with teenage pregnancy
risk and not directly from early childbearing age. For example, researchers have found few differences
in economic outcomes between adolescent mothers and their sisters who were not early childbearers
(Holmlund, 2005). Although research indicates that adolescent mothers in general are more likely to
have lower incomes, live in poverty, and receive public assistance, when economic-related outcomes
of teenage mothers are compared with those of their sisters who had not given birth as adolescents,
the association between teen parenting and poverty, and teen parenting and welfare receipt, are no
longer evident (Holmlund, 2005). Thus, family and background characteristics, rather than young
maternal age, may account for the negative employment and economic outcomes observed among
adolescent mothers (though early childbearing may exacerbate the effects of these sociodemographic
factors).
Although it may be the case that adolescent parenthood interrupts schooling, leads to lower
employment attainment, and is related to economic hardship, it is also plausible that preexisting dis-
advantages that place adolescents at risk for young motherhood in the first place play a role in educa-
tional underachievement and lower income status. This may be especially likely given that adolescent
mothers are a more disadvantaged group compared with older mothers (Hofferth et al., 2001).
Overall, extant research indicates that adolescent parenthood is associated with lower levels of school
completion, educational attainment, employment, and income. However, these associations may not
reflect direct and causal relations. Social, economic, cognitive, family, and other background factors
should be considered when considering the impact of early childbearing on adolescent mothers’
economic outcomes, educational attainment, and employment.
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The Association Between Early Childbearing and Children’s Functioning

Thus far, we have discussed correlates and consequences of adolescent childbearing for the adoles-
cent mothers. We now turn our attention to considering their children. As a group, children born
to adolescent mothers demonstrate poorer functioning in several domains including health, language
competencies, cognitive development, and educational and social functioning (Chen et al., 2007;
Hoffman and Maynard, 2008; Keown, Woodward, and Field, 2001). Chen and colleagues (2007)
reported that adolescent pregnancy increased the risk of negative birth outcomes including preterm
deliveries, low birth weights, small gestational age, and low Apgar scores. These risks were higher
in younger adolescent mothers and the highest in individuals who gave birth under the age of 15.
Moreover, these results remained significant even after controlling for various demographic and
background variables (ethnicity, educational level, marital status, prenatal care utilization, tobacco,
and alcohol use). Similarly, Fraser, Brockert, and Ward (1995) found that early childbearing age was
associated with low birth weight, premature births, and small-for-gestational-age after adjusting for
marital status, level of education, and adequacy of prenatal care. The negative birth outcomes were
still observed when the sample was restricted to married mothers who received adequate prenatal
care and had age-appropriate educational levels. These findings imply that young childbearing age
and other circumstances associated with it may be key factors associated with negative infant health
outcomes above and beyond a variety of potentially confounding sociodemographic factors.
Adolescent parenting is also related to lower language comprehension and expressive language
abilities among children of young mothers (Keown et al., 2001; Oxford and Spieker, 2006). Keown
et al. (2001) indicated that preschool-age children born to adolescent mothers had poorer language
skills relative to a comparison group of children of older mothers, even when children’s behavior,
health, and family background were considered. Researchers reported that language delays were
primarily mediated by parenting behaviors and the quality of mother-child interactions. Specifically,
teenage mothers were more intrusive, less verbally responsive, sensitive, and affectionate toward their
children compared with older mothers, which impacted their children’s language capabilities. Fur-
thermore, Oxford and Spieker (2006) found that children of adolescent mothers performed below
average on linguistic assessments at 54 months of age when maternal language abilities were low,
and the quality of the home linguistic environment was low. In fact, results indicated that mothers’
lower language skills moderated the effect of the home environment, such that children’s language
scores were below average only when the quality of language learning in the home environment and
mothers’ verbal skills were both low. Thus, lower verbal skills in adolescent mothers increased the risk
of having a lower quality home language environment, which, in turn, was associated with children’s
lower language performance. This study provides evidence of heterogeneity within the population of
adolescent mothers and their children because not all children of adolescent mothers demonstrated
worrisome language development. Even so, most studies adopt a comparative design, examining
differences between groups (adolescent mothers versus older mothers) instead of a within-groups
design.
For example, children of adolescent mothers display lower cognitive abilities and academic
achievement relative to children born to older mothers. Findings from the Early Childhood Lon-
gitudinal Study, Kindergarten Cohort (ECLS-K), a nationally representative sample of young chil-
dren, suggest that children of teenage mothers score lower on cognitive assessments and measures
of academic achievement compared with children of older mothers. Lower performance on tests
of reading, math, and general knowledge persist even after controlling for maternal and child back-
ground characteristics (Hoffman and Maynard, 2008). Teenage parenting is associated with negative
cognitive development at age 4 after controlling for background variables in a sample of low-income
children (Briceno, De Feyter, and Winsler, 2013).
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In addition, data from the National Collaborative Perinatal Project (NCPP), the National Lon-
gitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY), and a study of adolescent mothers in Baltimore yielded results
showing that in infancy, children of adolescent mothers demonstrated average abilities on cogni-
tive and academic readiness assessments (Borkowski et al., 2007). However, developmental delays in
cognitive and academic development were observed by preschool age. For example, findings from
the NCPP, a sample primarily composed of disadvantaged mothers and children from minority
backgrounds, revealed that by age 4, children of adolescent mothers scored significantly lower on
standard tests of intelligence than did children born to older mothers. By the age of 7, children of
teenage mothers demonstrated delays in mathematics, and African American children in particular
exhibited delays on reading and spelling assessments (Broman, 1981; Lefever, Nicholson, and Noria,
2007). Lower levels of academic achievement in children of young mothers have continued to be
observed during the later childhood years and throughout adolescence. For example, Dahinten,
Shapka, and Willms (2007) reported that at age 10 children of adolescent mothers demonstrate lower
math achievement compared with a reference group of children of older mothers. By ninth grade,
children of adolescent mothers have significantly lower grade point averages and are less than half
as likely to graduate within 6 years of entering high school compared with children born to older
mothers ( Jutte et al., 2010).
Children born to adolescent mothers remain at risk for adverse outcomes into young adult-
hood (Pogarsky, Thornberry, and Lizotte, 2006), including in the domains of educational attainment,
unemployment, teenage parenting, and violent behavior ( Jaffee, Caspi, Moffitt, Belsky, and Silva,
2001). For example, findings from the Rochester Youth Development Study indicated that boys
born to adolescent mothers were at risk for negative outcomes in adolescence including school
dropout and externalizing behavior problems. Furthermore, both girls and boys born to adolescent
mothers had a higher risk of early childbearing (Pogarsky et al., 2006). Lipman and colleagues (2011)
also reported that young adults born to adolescent mothers demonstrated negative outcomes in
relation to educational attainment, life satisfaction, and income level. Jaffee and colleagues (2001)
additionally found a range of adverse early adult outcomes in the offspring of adolescent mothers,
including school dropout, unemployment, early childbearing, and violent behaviors. However, once
maternal and family factors were considered, only the association between teen parenthood and
violent offending remained significant ( Jaffee et al., 2001).
In fact, although studies show that adolescent parenthood is associated with negative outcomes for
the offspring of adolescent mothers after controlling for background factors, many studies indicate
that these associations decrease or disappear after potentially confounding variables are considered.
Levine, Emery, and Pollack (2007) argued that individual and family background characteristics
accounted for findings related to lower academic achievement in children of adolescent mothers.
Specifically, early childbearing age did not play a causal role in children’s performance on stand-
ardized academic tests. Moreover, the effects of teen childbearing on offspring’s marijuana use and
fighting were no longer observed when background factors were considered. Similarly, Levine, Pol-
lack, and Comfort (2001) found that children’s lower performance on cognitive tests as well as grade
repetition was attributed to individual and family background factors, and Mollborn and Dennis
(2012) reported that social disadvantage and parenting practices explained the association between
teen childbearing and children’s developmental outcomes and health status. For instance, household
income and maternal education accounted for children’s poorer reading and math performance over
and above teenage mother status.
Studies that have explored the relation between early childbearing and children’s behavior out-
comes (behavior problems, delinquency) in particular suggest that the association between adolescent
parenting and children’s behavior problems is no longer significant after maternal and child char-
acteristics are taken into account. For example, findings with data from the ECLS-K indicate that
the relation between early childbearing and children’s behavior problems is small. After accounting
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for maternal and child background factors, behavioral disparities among children born to adoles-
cent mothers 17 years of age or younger and older mothers are no longer observable. Likewise,
results from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY97) suggest that the relation between
negative behavioral outcomes and teen motherhood in adolescent offspring (higher delinquency)
disappear or are reduced when background characteristics are included in the analyses (Manlove,
Terry-Humen, Mincieli, and Moore, 2008).
Similar to associations between maternal outcomes and early childbearing, research investigating
outcomes in children born to adolescent mothers suggests that many associations found between
early childbearing age and short- and long-term development in children reflect preexisting dis-
advantages and sociodemographic characteristics that serve as risk factors for teenage pregnancy.
It is, therefore, difficult to confirm a direct cause-and-effect association between maternal age and
children’s functioning given that both teenage pregnancy and child adaptation may result from social
disadvantage, lack of resources, parenting practices, environmental adversities, and a variety of indi-
vidual background factors and personal processes.
Resilience Promoting Factors and Adolescent Parenthood

As suggested earlier, there is no single trajectory or developmental course among adolescent mothers.
In spite of the documented risks and adverse circumstances, some adolescent parents and their chil-
dren demonstrate resilient functioning and thriving. In this section, we discuss a variety of individual
and contextual factors that buffer or protect against the adverse outcomes associated with adolescent
parenthood for both mothers and children. These factors promote positive functioning in the midst
of difficult circumstances, either serving as buffers against the risks associated early childbearing or
promoting adaptation and recovery amid adverse experiences (Luthar, Cicchetti, and Becker, 2000;
Masten, 2014). Individual-level attributes (intelligence, self-esteem), family related factors (maternal
sensitivity, father involvement), and characteristics of the social environment (neighborhood charac-
teristics, social support) represent internal and external factors that contribute to resilient functioning
despite challenging or adverse circumstances (Masten and Garmezy, 1985). This triarchic framework
has been widely used in research related to resilience in at-risk populations (Luthar et al., 2000;
Masten and Garmezy, 1985). Considering protective factors in these three domains can further con-
tribute to our understanding of resilience in adolescent mothers and their children.
A variety of individual-level attributes serves as protective factors for adolescent mothers and their
families, buffering the influence of risks and adversities related to teen childbearing (Solivan, Wallace,
Kaplan, and Harville, 2015; Weed et al., 2006). In a qualitative study by Solivan et al. (2015), inter-
views with adolescent mothers were conducted to explore assets and resources present in the lives of
young mothers that may act as resilience promoting factors leading to healthy pregnancy and birth
experiences. Mothers’ positive outlook, self-efficacy, motivation toward educational and career goals,
and resisting stigma around teenage motherhood may have contributed to positive health outcomes
among these young mothers. In addition, Weed et al. (2006) found that among children of ado-
lescent mothers, intelligence at age 5 was associated with children’s resilient functioning measured
3 years later. Researchers posited that positive early intellectual development might enable children
to demonstrate competence in a variety of contexts despite the presence of adversities. Moreover,
positive changes in self-esteem among adolescent mothers are associated with continued resilient
functioning in children (Weed et al., 2006). These results show that individual-level attributes (self-
esteem, self-efficacy, motivation, intelligence) in both mothers and children can promote resilience
despite the negative risk factors associated with adolescent parenting.
Although some of the previously mentioned studies demonstrate associations between high levels
of familial support and negative parenting practices, in addition to individual attributes, family support
has also been found to be associated with more positive outcomes for both adolescent mothers and
215
their offspring. For example, Hess, Papas, and Black (2002) reported that supportive adolescent mother-
grandmother relationships predicted nurturing behaviors and positive parenting practices among ado-
lescent mothers and their children. Furthermore, father involvement has been found to promote positive
development in children born to teenage mothers. Howard, Lefever, Borkowski, and Whitman (2006)
found that father involvement was associated with children’s success in school including lower levels of
defiance and higher levels of cooperation with teachers. Moreover, more consistent father involvement
over the first 8 years of life was associated with lower levels of behavior problems in school settings and
higher academic achievement (reading skills). Research, therefore, suggests that positive relationships
with family members such as grandmothers and fathers can promote positive maternal behaviors and
functioning and contribute to the success of children born to adolescent parents.
The social environment in which young mothers and their children are embedded can also
serve as a protective factor for adolescent mothers and their offspring. In particular, social support
has been found to promote positive functioning and successful adaptation of young mothers and
their children. For instance, social support may foster positive development in regard to children’s
socioemotional and behavioral outcomes in the presence of negative life events and stressful condi-
tions. Carothers, Borkowski, and Whitman (2006) indicated that children’s attachment to parents,
religiosity/spirituality, support networks, and social groups/sports activities served as sources of pro-
tection against negative life events (parental divorce, residential instability, deaths) and promoted
positive socioemotional and behavioral functioning. Sieger and Renk (2007) also found that social
support moderated the relation between internalizing behavior problems and self-esteem as well as
externalizing behavior problems and self-esteem. Thus, social support serves as a protective factor for
adolescent mothers’ self-esteem despite negative behavioral functioning. In addition, supportive adult
figures beyond parents (extended family, neighbors, family members’ friends) promote resilience in
African American adolescent mothers by acting as a buffer against depression, anxiety, and negative
outcomes related to stress (Hurd and Zimmerman, 2010). Taken together, these studies suggest that
social support can contribute to resilience processes in adolescent mothers and their children, pro-
moting positive adaptation in the presence of risks.
Policies and Programs for Adolescent Parents

In this section of the chapter, we consider policies and programs addressing adolescent parenting.
Rather than conducting a comprehensive review of programs and policies, we instead discuss ideas
and issues in the development and implementation of policies and programs for adolescent parents;
we close with comments on a few illustrative programs. Earlier, we noted that for most adolescent
parents, early childbearing accompanies, rather than initiates, a developmental history of significant
risks and stressors. Thus, adolescent parenthood should not necessarily be seen as a causal factor
in the challenging life trajectories of young parents and their children. In part, this determination
may rest on whether early parenting is in conflict with the dominant sociocultural norms in the
community. In a large cohort study in Britain, Robson and Berthoud (2006) showed that delay in
parenthood was associated with economic advantage for some teens, including women of European
heritage and members of some ethnic minority groups (African, Caribbean), but not among others
where early parenthood was an expected norm (Pakistan, Bangladesh).
Policies and programs addressing the issue of adolescent parenthood derive from particular social
and theoretical assumptions. If adolescent parenthood is perceived as an “off-time” event, then poli-
cies and programs may seek to delay parenthood until it is more “timely.” Stakeholders’ assumptions
may be reflected in the genesis and implementation of programs and policies that are deficit based
versus strengths based or that are located at different points along the intervention/prevention/pro-
motion dimension. For example, policies and programs may be designed differently if guided by a
resilience, as opposed to deficit, framework.
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Resilience Perspective on Policies and Programs

Employing a resilience framework not only compels examination of what can support individual
and relationship competence, but also focuses on what communities (writ small or large, formal or
informal in nature) need and what they offer in support, as resilience processes operate within and
through community and cultural contexts. Policy makers must weigh the requisites and desires of
citizens and service providers as well as how programs are used by constituents. In addition, it is
important to consider whether use of services is considered normative or stigmatizing in a particular
community (Landau, 2007; Ungar, 2011). Writing about communities as adaptive processes, Ungar
(2011) noted the importance of taking into consideration the social and ecological processes that
will mitigate exposure to adversity, including both formal and informal supports and services. Using
an ecological framework, policies and programs might view adolescent parents and parenting from
several lenses, including organismic, interpersonal, and contextual, therefore focusing on either/both
concerns and potential in different layers of the system (micro-, meso-, macro-, and so forth; Bron-
fenbrenner and Morris, 2007). As such, we would expect considerable variation among programs
serving adolescent parents, including different service targets and modalities. Because a life course
perspective (Elder, Johnson, and Crosnoe, 2003) on adolescent parenting embraces a multifaceted
view of development across time, various policies and programs may set their sights on different
aspects of life functioning (maternal educational trajectory, employment, interpersonal relationships,
child maltreatment, secure and affordable housing) and different life phases (pregnancy, early child-
hood). Even a cursory glance at the plethora of programs available to adolescent parents confirms
that there is heterogeneity in program design, implementation, and goals.
The Policy Narrative in the United States and Beyond

Reviewing the research on adolescent parenting in the United Kingdom, Duncan (2007) used a
strengths-based lens and concluded that age of childbearing makes no difference in adaptation of
parents or their children. In explaining this controversial view, Duncan highlighted teen parenting
as a transformative catalyst for establishing positive life trajectories. Acknowledging that parenthood
may be a “window of opportunity” for some young parents, SmithBattle (1995, 2007a) suggested
that, on the basis of her 8-year longitudinal study in the United States, variations in teen mothers’
life trajectories are related to social, economic, and ethnic issues that sometimes precede motherhood.
As we noted earlier in this chapter, there is heterogeneity among adolescent mothers and their path-
ways. “Mothers with childhood advantage fared better over time than impoverished mothers, and a
legacy of advantage contributed to a cushion of safety and opportunity” (2007b, p. 409). By contrast,
Ermisch (2003) analyzed the large British Cohort Study and concluded that adolescent parenthood
affected a young mother’s life course such that at ages 30–51 she is less likely to have a residential
partner, own a home, and is more likely to be living in poverty, potentially due to partners who are
more likely to be unemployed and low wage earning. Similar to the status of adolescent parenting in
the United States, teen parents in the United Kingdom have been portrayed negatively, as a “social
threat as well as social victim” (Duncan, 2007, p. 310), in part because of the associations with single
parenting, decline of marriage, and early sexual debut. However, Duncan also described a different
view in parts of Western Europe, where adolescent pregnancy and parenting are seen as social prob-
lems that are “amenable to policy solution” (p. 312).
Representing adolescent parenting as part of a suite of circumstances consequent to considerable
social disadvantage, as opposed to resulting from a lack of knowledge about sexual health or about
the realities of parenting, yields different types of policies and resultant programs. As we noted earlier,
policies and programs derive from current beliefs and narrative about an issue. If parenthood were
viewed as an opportunity for responsibility and sense of efficacy, and a motivator for positive growth
217
and success (Barn and Mantovani, 2007; Mollborn, 2017; SmithBattle, 2007a), then policies and pro-
grams that presuppose the potential for parenthood to be transformative and generative in a positive
light would result. Utilizing the resilience framework discussed earlier, policies and programs should
provide avenues for young parents to secure access to, and attainment of, education, employment,
positive parenting, and healthy futures for themselves and their children. Some may argue that if early
childbearing is a conscious choice with the potential to redirect a life course in a positive direction,
then programs and policies aimed at prevention of such are misguided, and efforts should instead be
directed to family support or changing the landscape associated with early childbearing. Of course,
the particulars of political, economic, social, and cultural landscapes must be taken into account when
evaluating programs and policies relevant to adolescent parenting.
Taking a public health perspective, SmithBattle (2013) noted that stigma associated with teen
parenting can hamper intervention and support efforts. She cautioned that the narrative that teen
parents are “unmotivated, irresponsible, and incompetent” (p. 235) negatively impacts the delivery of
clinical care. Examining the assumptions that service providers hold about young parents may be one
step toward enhancing service delivery and parents’ engagement and retention in support programs.
Furthermore, Cherrington and Breheny (2005) argued that the tradition of locating teenage preg-
nancy and parenting within a disease model classifies early childbearing as a problem of the parent.
As a result, solutions developed to address the problem also are likely to be individual in scope, aimed
at parent-directed discrete changes (attitudes and behaviors), as opposed to changes that are systemic,
aimed at relationships or social antecedents (social, educational, and economic resources).
Both federal and state policy choices impact low-income parents (a group that encompasses most
adolescent parents) and their children. Public assistance programs that are essential safety nets for
low-income families include TANF and additional income-related policies (tax relief, tax credits
for dependent care and earned income). Some states, for example, offer a refundable dependent care
tax credit, or keep copayments for childcare subsidies low and based on family income among low-
income families. Few policies, with the exception of the TANF requirement that unmarried minor
custodial parents must live with a parent, adult relative, or legal guardian, are specific to low-income
teenage parents.
Adolescent mothers receive welfare benefits disproportionate to their numbers in the population;
this is the case both before, and subsequent to, the major welfare reform of the 1990s. If early child-
bearing sets in motion, or continues, a cycle of family poverty, lack of economic resources as a teen
parent presents risk for more than the teenage years. Acs and Koball (2003) examined the 1996 wel-
fare reform (the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act; PRWORA)
that specifically required minor teen mothers to live with an adult guardian (typically their own
parents) and to be enrolled in school or job training (per the 1988 Family Support Act) to receive
TANF cash benefits. They concluded that although mothers were less likely to receive cash benefits
post welfare reform, the decline was not accompanied by the intended effect of reducing teen child-
bearing, increasing educational attainment, or reducing life risks. For example, reductions in maternal
depression or exposure to intimate partner violence were not seen (Kalil and Danziger, 2000), and
although Acs and Kobal (2003) reported that teen mothers who lived with their parents were less
likely to smoke marijuana, living with parents did not result in reductions in alcohol or tobacco use.
Mollborn (2017) provided an analysis of the federal U.S. policy landscape as it applies to young
parents. Accompanying the declining rates of early childbearing, there has been a decline in the
provision of federal benefits, such as TANF, compared with previous benefits available under AFDC
(Aid to Families with Dependent Children). In 2002, approximately 50% fewer teen mothers
received TANF benefits than was the case in 1993 (Mollborn, 2017). Mollborn also noted the
confluence of this lower dispersion of benefits with decreased rates of marriage and lower income
and economic growth; together, these circumstances present greater economic pressure for young
families that is likely not short-term. Declining marriage rates also suggest that adolescent mothers
218
and their children may be involved with multiple relationship partners over time, who may or may
not engage in fathering roles. Because young women ages 18–24 are in the highest risk category for
intimate partner violence (Black et al., 2011; Halpern, 2009), this relationship instability is concern-
ing. Moreover, changes in the 2016 national and state political landscape mean threats to access to
reproductive care for young women; whether this will result in a rise in rates of adolescent pregnancy
and childbearing and sexually transmitted diseases remains to be seen.
Childcare as an Opportunity to Foster Positive Development

in Two Generations
Childcare, particularly high-quality care (Burchinal et al., 2000; Dearing, McCartney, and Taylor,
2009), can act as an asset for children at risk for challenging developmental adaptation due to eco-
nomic and social threats (Loeb, Fuller, Kagan, and Carrol, 2004). To achieve the goals of foster-
ing educational attainment and economic independence among young parents, access to affordable
quality childcare and housing may be fundamental. Although rates of high school graduation have
increased, one third of adolescent mothers do not obtain a high school diploma or GED (Shuger,
2012). Access to affordable childcare provides mothers time to devote to educational and vocational
training that can increase economic independence and, in turn, benefit their young children. On
average, adolescent mothers may struggle with providing optimal care for their children in regard to
appropriate stimulation and sensitive interactions. Given this, high-quality childcare may serve as an
asset, fostering optimal child development across socioemotional, cognitive, behavioral, and academic
domains.
There is evidence to support this assertion. Using a nationally representative longitudinal data set,
the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort (ECLS-B), Mollborn and Blalock (2012)
found that both adolescent mothers and their children reaped benefits from nonparental childcare.
Specifically, mothers whose children received nonparental care evidenced educational attainment
and household income gains that were not present when children were cared for only by their
parents. Similarly, children who had histories of nonparental care scored higher on measures of read-
ing, math, and positive behavior prior to kindergarten. Furthermore, the authors concluded that
the advantages associated with access to nonparental care were disproportionately seen among teen
parent families when compared with those who had delayed childbearing beyond their teenage
years. The benefits of nonparental care were evident even though quality of childcare (most often
associated with positive developmental trajectories) was unknown, and presumably variable. One
study of adolescent mothers and their children depicted similar results regarding the potential for
nonmaternal care experiences to promote positive development across generations. Mothers’ college
attendance was linked to greater childcare hours, and formal care (center based) was associated with
more positive child language and socioemotional competence in toddlerhood. These positive rela-
tions between childcare and positive functioning in both generations held even in the absence of
knowledge of quality of care (Katz, 2014; Tufts Interdisciplinary Evaluation Research, 2015).
Providing access to school-based childcare centers is one strategy that has been used to decrease
dropout rates and increase the high school graduation rates of teenage parents. Unfortunately, the
monetary costs associated with these childcare programs, and the decline in the prevalence of adoles-
cent parenthood, have led to closure of many such programs by school districts, counties, and towns
that have historically offered them. Even when rates of adolescent parenthood were much higher
than current incidence, only a very small portion of states provided funds for school-based childcare
for adolescent parents (Children’s Defense Fund, 1987). In some such school-based programs, the
school district pays a portion of the cost while federal Early Head Start or Head Start funds pro-
vide the remaining expenses. Some programs charge parents a minimal weekly fee for the service
that is operated by a nonprofit within school walls (Gartner, 2012). Although there are substantial
219
costs incurred when providing high-quality center-based childcare, such an investment can have
long-term returns. It has been reported that investments in high-quality early education generate
economic returns of over eight dollars for every one dollar spent (President’s Council of Economic
Advisers, 2015).
In 2008, teen childbearing cost taxpayers at least $10.9 billion, according to the National
Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. But many of these costs—pricier
health care, foster care, incarceration and lost tax revenue—are canceled out when teens
obtain an education and support their families.
(Gartner, 2012)
Supporting Parenting of Adolescent Parents

Many programs, operated under various auspices by government and nongovernmental agencies, aim
to support adolescent parents in achieving optimal developmental functioning for those individuals
and their children. It is beyond the scope of this chapter to review this plethora of program types,
auspices, and impacts. Instead, we describe a handful of programs to reflect on some of the issues
in program design, implementation, and efficacy. Taking an ecological view, when investigating the
efficacy of prevention and intervention programs, it is important to consider aspects of the contexts
of both the individual parents and the programs, including personality, cognitions and attributions,
relationships, employment and mental health resources, and political and sociocultural concerns.
Even when intervention programs are available and accessible, these characteristics influence pro-
gram outcomes.
Variations in participants’ developmental histories and the features of the program and how it is
offered, structured, implemented, and perceived by the individual and the community will influ-
ence participant engagement in program activities, affecting program fidelity and impact. Parental
depression, for example, is known to influence engagement and participation and to attenuate pro-
gram effects (Ammerman, Putnam, Bosse, Teeters, and Van Ginkel, 2010; Easterbrooks et al., 2013).
Vondra and colleagues (2005) argued that positive intervention effects may result, in part, from the
fact that individuals who are motivated, responsive, and able to participate in services may be dif-
ferent from those who are invited to participate, but who do not engage, or individuals who drop
out before program completion (i.e., complete only 3 out of 10 planned sessions, or who participate
in only a portion of a curriculum). These issues may not be apparent when examining the results
of randomized controlled trial (RCT) experiments in which the analyses conducted maintain the
integrity of the research design (e.g., treatment and control groups) even when participants assigned
to the treatment group receive partial treatment or, in some cases, no treatment. Although programs
typically desire that a participant receive the entire “treatment dosage” (full number of curriculum
lessons, home visits, and so forth) that is consistent with program design, it may be that those who
“drop out” prior to the intended end date have gained just what they needed or desired. Some indi-
viduals who do not complete the program may be the “success stories” for whom services served
as a catalyst for positive further development. Ending services early does not necessarily indicate
treatment failure.
Parenting Programs for Adolescent Mothers

A thorough consideration of programs for adolescent parents is beyond the scope of this chapter—it
would constitute a chapter in its own right. For illustrative purposes, we briefly discuss a handful
of programs that show promise in promoting thriving among adolescent parents and their children.
Most parenting intervention programs begin during pregnancy and extend throughout the first
220
few (2–3) years of a child’s life, theorizing that, as we noted earlier in this chapter, the transition to
parenthood is an opportunity for reorganization and a catalyst for a positive life trajectory. Accord-
ingly, program models should respond to the joint trajectories of adolescent development and the
transition to parenthood given that adolescence and parenthood are two unique components. For
example, models of adolescent development highlight a central role for peers in healthy functioning
(Steinberg and Morris, 2001). However, an explicit focus on peer relationships (with the exception of
the relationship with the father of the child) is conspicuously absent from many programs and poli-
cies addressing adolescent parenting, which instead concentrate on the dyadic relationship between
parent and child.
Home Visiting and Adolescent Mothers

Adolescent mothers may incur benefits from home visitation that supports positive parenting (Daro
and Harding, 1999; DuMont et al., 2008; Olds et al., 2002). One home visiting program that is well
known to us is Healthy Families Massachusetts (HFM), a “home-based family support and coaching
program that supports young, first-time parents” (Children’s Trust Massachusetts, 2017) that aims to
(1) prevent child maltreatment by supporting positive, effective parenting; (2) achieve optimal child
health and development; (3) promote positive maternal life course trajectory by supporting educa-
tional attainment and economic independence; (4) prevent repeat pregnancy during the teen years;
and (5) promote parental health and well-being. Since the outset of the HFM program in 1997, the
Tufts Interdisciplinary Evaluation Research (TIER) center has been involved in independent evalu-
ations of HFM, most recently utilizing a RCT design (Tufts Interdisciplinary Evaluation Research,
2015, 2017).
The HFM program is designed specifically for adolescent parents. All first-time young parents
under the age of 21 are eligible to receive program services from pregnancy until their child’s third
birthday. Although other communities and states have adopted the Healthy Families America (HFA)
model (evaluated by the Department of Health and Human Services as an evidence-based program),
HFM is the only HFA model that is universally available to, and specifically targeted toward, adoles-
cent parents. Parents and home visitors learn together about caring for infants and young children,
how to promote stable, nurturing home environments, and practice effective parenting skills in
approaches that are culturally and contextually sensitive. In addition to these parenting goals, home
visitors work with parents on goals that are developmentally appropriate for adolescents, including
educational, vocational, and occupational attainment, and healthy relationship skills.
Using Jacobs’ five-tiered approach to evaluation (1988), these studies have employed program
process, ethnographic, and impact/outcome designs to understand aspects of program implementa-
tion and fidelity, and program impact and outcome. The approach is to ask the question of what
works, for whom, and in what contexts? Rather than assuming that adolescent mothers and their
children are a monolithic group, with singular characteristics, concerns, pathways, and projected
adaptation, we have presupposed that adolescents come to parenthood with varying circumstances,
goals, preferences, and contexts (family, community) that influence whether and how they engage
and interact with a program, and the effects of program services.
This research confirms the heterogeneity among adolescent parents and program effects (East-
erbrooks, Chaudhuri, Bartlett, and Copeman, 2011; Easterbrooks, Kotake, Raskin, and Bumgarner,
2016; Mistry et al., 2016). The attenuation and promotion of program impacts relate to variations in
participant characteristics and circumstances (Easterbrooks et al., 2013; Raskin, Fosse, Fauth, Bum-
garner, and Easterbrooks, 2016), such as psychological vulnerability (maternal depression, history of
childhood maltreatment, PTSD, and low social connections) and ethnicity. Regarding program goal
attainment (parenting, health and well-being, educational attainment, prevention of repeat adolescent
pregnancy and childbirth), in some cases the HFM program was particularly effective in domains
221
of especial relevance to adolescent parents (risky behaviors, college attendance, intimate partner
violence, parenting stress). Results of longitudinal follow-up when children were of preschool and
kindergarten age demonstrated continued impact of the HFM services in several domains (TIER,
2017). Mothers in the program services group reported fewer symptoms of depression and were
less likely to engage in substance use. They also reported less parenting stress, and less use of corpo-
ral punishment, particularly among psychologically vulnerable mothers (depression). Furthermore,
families in the program services group were less likely to become homeless, and mothers who were
not depressed at enrollment in services were more likely to graduate from college. Children of moth-
ers in the program services group demonstrated better working memory (a component of executive
function). The data suggest that focusing on salient issues that address the dual developmental paths
of adolescence and parenthood can be impactful.
Other Programs for Adolescent Parents

We were unable to find a single compendium of evidence-based programs available to adolescent
parents. By contrast, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) has created a
website that reviews and evaluates the home visiting literature, Home Visiting Evidence of Effec-
tiveness (HomVEE; https://homvee.acf.hhs.gov/). Though not specifically addressing programs for
adolescent parents, HomVEE reviews many parenting programs and assesses the quality of research
evidence documenting program effectiveness as well as information regarding program model ten-
ets and program implementation. For example, cited by HomVEE as an evidence-based program,
Parents as Teachers (PAT; www.parentsasteachers.org) uses home visits to support the development
of positive parenting. Although PAT is not an adolescent parent-specific program, several Wiscon-
sin counties have focused their PAT program for teen parents, offering four service components:
home visits that provide parenting and child development information, group connections, and child
screening; parenting and child development information; developmental screenings; and a resource
network that links families to additional services.
A further example of a parenting program that serves primarily teenage mothers is Family
Spirit (Mullany et al., 2012). A parenting intervention program specifically designed for Native
American communities, Family Spirit uses tribal teachings that are conceptualized to operate as
protective factors. The Family Spirit model incorporates 52 home visits from pregnancy through
age 2, encompassing curricula across six domains of prenatal, infant and toddler care, maternal
life skills, and healthy living. Results of several RCTs of the Family Spirit program applied to
teen mothers demonstrated the efficacy of Family Spirit in increasing parenting knowledge and
positive parenting behavior, reducing parenting stress and maternal depressive symptoms, and
reducing maternal substance use and maternal and child behavior problems (Barlow et al., 2015;
Walkup et al., 2009). Despite differences in the program model, curricula, and implementation,
the results of the Family Spirit and the HFM programs designed for teenage mothers provide
relatively consistent support for the efficacy of these home visiting programs offered to young
parents.
A different model of support for teenage parents, the online resource Teenwise Minnesota (www.
moappp.org), specifically addresses concerns relevant to adolescent parents such as information
about sexual health and parenting. This resource includes a directory of adolescent parent programs
throughout the state of Minnesota and information on federal and state policies and policies related
to access to public benefits for adolescent parents as well as resources available to teen parents (hous-
ing, parent-child attachment, health, education, childcare, legal concerns). A link to “programs that
work” connects the viewer to the Promising Practices Network (www.promisingpractices.net) that
provides information on individual programs and details of their program evaluations; unfortunately,
the data on that site are no longer updated due to funding constraints.
222
Conclusion
Although rates of adolescent pregnancy and parenting have declined, there remains concern about
the prevalence and consequences of making the transition to parenthood as an adolescent. As a
group, adolescent parents and their children are more likely to evidence lower educational and eco-
nomic attainment, to be exposed to serious or chronic stressors, and to show disparities in health
and well-being compared with older parents and their children. In this chapter, we adopted a bio-
ecological approach to examining adolescent parenting, considering not only individual parents and
their children, but also their wider contexts of development. Viewing adolescent parenting from
this lens illuminates the circumstances and meanings that surround adolescent parenting; this stance
underlies and informs empirical investigations, policies, and programs regarding adolescent parenting.
In addition, this chapter underscores the importance of recognizing the heterogeneity of adolescent
parenting. Adolescent parents and their children are not a monolithic group; there is variation in
their parenting practices and adaptation similar to that of older parents. Furthermore, we highlighted
that what may be considered the “consequences” of adolescent childbearing may actually result
from other circumstances that precede, as well as accompany, adolescent parenting. We closed the
chapter with a discussion of policies and programs for adolescent parents. Focusing on community
and policy assets and resources that can promote positive functioning among adolescent parents and
their children highlights the bioecological and resilience perspectives that are essential to consider in
relation to adolescent parenting.
Acknowledgments
We are very grateful for the support of our many colleagues at the Tufts Interdisciplinary Research
Center (TIER) and to the adolescent mothers and their children who participated in our research
by opening their homes and sharing their lives with us.
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7
GRANDPARENTING
Introduction
Grandparenting is an important part of the life cycle. Leopold and Skopek (2015a) analyzed four
large surveys covering the United States and 24 European countries, using data from 2001 to 2008.
The typical life-course pattern for females was to become a mother in her mid-20s, and to cease
active parenting in the mid-40s. This usually preceded becoming a grandmother, which was typically
in the mid-to-late 40s to mid-50s. Grandmothering again preceded retirement/economic inactivity
in the late 50s and 60s. Life expectancy at age 60 was typically in the 80s, with some 25–30 years
spent as a grandmother. Men tend to be slightly older at marriage and to live slightly less long than
women, so the typical life-course pattern was to become a father in the mid-to-late 20s, and to cease
active parenting in the mid-to-late 40s. This usually preceded becoming a grandfather, which was
typically between 50 and 60. Grandfathering again preceded retirement/inactivity in the 60s. Life
expectancy at age 60 was typically late 70s to 80s, with some 20–25 years spent as a grandfather.
Leopold and Skopek pointed out that there are substantial country variations on this general-
ized pattern. In fact, cross-national differences in the median age of becoming a grandparent were
more substantial than differences in age of parenthood, age of retirement, or life expectancy. In the
countries they surveyed, becoming a grandparent was later in the Western European countries; it
was latest in Switzerland for women (57 years) and Spain for men (60 years). In the United States,
the figures were 49 years and 52 years, respectively. Some Eastern European countries showed an
even earlier pattern; the median age was lowest in Ukraine, at 46 years for women and 48 for men
(Leopold and Skopek (2015a, Figures 7.1 and 7.2).
These figures, especially for Western Europe, exemplify the effects of the first and second demo-
graphic transitions (Lesthaeghe, 2014). The first demographic transition, through the nineteenth
and twentieth centuries in Western countries, although still in process in developing countries,
saw declines in both mortality and fertility. The second demographic transition is seeing rising
age of first marriage, a delay in childbearing, rising divorce rates, lower levels of fertility, and an
increase in autonomy and multiple lifestyles. These are thought to arise from lower infant mortal-
ity and increased educational and work opportunities especially for women. Where this second
demographic transition started early (as in Western Europe), then it applies to both the grandparent
and parent generations, resulting in the so-called beanpole families with a stretched life course and
relatively small family size at each generation (Bengtson, 2001). The picture is still different in many
developing countries, although reliable survey data are harder to come by. In South Asian countries,
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Grandparenting
for example, Babu, Hossain, Morales, and Vij (2018) suggested marriage at around 18–22 years and
becoming a grandparent in one’s early 40s.
The previous discussion indicates the importance of historical context as well as country varia-
tion. Both developed and developing countries are shifting in their demographic patterns. In detailed
analysis of data from East and West Germany, Leopold and Skopek (2015b) compared three birth
cohorts: 1929–1938, 1939–1948, and 1949–1958. In East Germany, the median age of becoming a
grandmother was 47, 49, and 53 years, respectively, which is an increase of about 3 months/year. In
West Germany, the figures were later, 55, 57, and 60 years, respectively, which is an increase of 2.5
months/year. Findings for grandfathers were similar but about 3 years later.
Margolis (2016) provided a detailed demographic analysis of grandparenting in Canada at two
time points, 1985 and 2011. During this interval (as through the twentieth century) life expectancy
increased, reaching nearly 84 years for women and 80 for men by 2011. The mean age of having
a first child also increased, from 23.5 years in 1965 to 28.5 years in 2011; this, in turn, substantially
increased the age of becoming a grandparent, although eventual rates of grandparenthood were
stable. These two trends had opposite effects on the length of time spent as a grandparent. For
grandmothers, the two effects more or less canceled each other out; the average length of time being
a grandmother decreased slightly, from 24.7 to 24.3 years, over this period. Due to considerable
increases in life expectancy for men, the average length of time being a grandfather increased from
17.0 to 18.9 years.
The historical context is clearly important in considering the nature of grandparenthood—not
just the timing, but also aspects such as the nature and frequency of contacts, and the benefits and
costs involved. For example, Meyer and Abdul-Malak (2016) pointed out how in the United States
(and no doubt other Western countries) the Great Recession of 2007–2009 hit many working fami-
lies hard, leading to an increase in turning to grandparents for help.
Research on grandparenting has developed considerably. This means that many detailed find-
ings from the 1980s and even 1990s are less applicable in the contemporary context. We, therefore,
focus on research in this century. For a fuller account of research in the 1950s to 1990s, two earlier
chapters can be consulted (Smith, 1995; Smith and Drew, 2002). We provide a brief summary of
historical issues and classical research next. Following a review of theories bearing on the study of
grandparenthood, the central issues covered by research are outlined in some detail. Two particular
issues—grandparents as surrogate parents and the intergenerational transmission of attitudes and
behaviors—each has its own major section. Some practical issues of grandparenting are then consid-
ered, and finally future directions for research are indicated.
Historical Issues and Classical Studies in Studying Grandparenting

In studying grandparenthood, Bengtson (1987) distinguished period effects (historical period),
cohort effects (when you were born while living in an historical period), and lineage effects (dif-
ferent generations within a family structure). Bengtson’s emphasis on lineage rather than age is
appropriate for this chapter, where we are primarily looking at the generational relationship of
grandparenthood. Grandparents can, of course, vary in age a great deal, whereas lineage remains
constant. Age then becomes one mediating factor (among many others) to be considered as affect-
ing grandparental relationships.
Terms such as “grandparent,” “parent,” “child,” and “grandchild” are relative; someone may be
both a parent and a child, for example. Many researchers use generational labels such as “G1,” “G2,”
and “G3” to avoid this ambiguity. However, this device has its own difficulties, as, if G1 refers to
a grandparental generation, then there is no appropriate label for any great-grandparents. In this
chapter, we take grandchildren as the reference point, and refer to their parents, grandparents, and
great-grandparents.
233
Most of our evidence on grandparenthood still comes from modern urban, industrial societies,
particularly the United States and Europe, although this situation is changing. Generational relation-
ships in agrarian societies have traditionally been embedded in a system with strong kinship ties and
strong expectations of reciprocity. Parents tended to have many children, mortality was relatively high,
and parents expected children to support them in old age. The urban-industrial revolution reduces
the salience of kinship and parentage, and the concept of childrearing changes from one of lifelong
reciprocity to one of launching children into an autonomous maturity in which their future relation-
ship with parents is optional (LeVine and White, 1987). With the demographic transitions to lower
birth and death rates and longer life-span expectancy come mass public schooling and greater public
interest and concern in children, although with some reduction in parental control over matters such
as marriage and career. The latter decades of the twentieth century saw an increase in divorce rates
and in numbers of reconstituted families and step-kin (Bugental and Corpuz, 2019). This century has
seen the rise of the internet, reducing the impact of proximity on grandparent-grandchild contacts
(Ivan and Fernández-Ardèvol, 2017). These factors need to be borne in mind when considering the
nature and role of grandparenthood, but some changes may have also influenced the extent to which
grandparenting has been an object of social scientific and psychological research.
The first few articles about grandparents appeared in the 1930s and 1940s (Smith, 1991a). Usu-
ally written by psychiatrists or clinicians, they gave a rather negative view of grandparental influence.
Articles by Vollmer (1937) entitled “The Grandmother: A Problem in Child Rearing” and by Strauss
(1943) entitled “Grandma Made Johnny Delinquent” each berated the adverse influence of grand-
mothers who interfere with the mother’s childrearing in old-fashioned and didactic ways. Staples
(1952) presented a more balanced view, concluding that
the well-liked grandmother . . . keeps up with the times . . . can easily make the transition
from a position of responsibility in the family to one of rendering interested, helpful ser-
vices. The disliked grandmother is unable to adjust to change and is unpleasantly aggressive
in her contacts with her family.
(p. 340)
From the 1960s, grandparents started to be presented much more favorably. Smith (1991a) suggested
that this development reflected some actual changes in grandparental attitudes and roles; although the
early studies are probably unrepresentative in terms of sampling, there is some evidence that more
grandparents were coresident, and had a more authoritative attitude, earlier in the twentieth century.
But by the 1960s, many grandparents accepted a “formal” or “fun-seeking” role, clearly demarcating
grandparental and parental roles. In Neugarten and Weinstein’s (1964) study, only a very small pro-
portion of grandparents saw themselves as “reservoirs of family wisdom.” This decrease in formality
and authority probably allowed more indulgent and warm relationships between grandparents and
other family members.
Studies by Kahana and Kahana (1970) and Robertson (1977) of the perception of grandparent-
hood continued this more positive picture and set a trend for much subsequent research. Kornhaber
and Woodward (1981) described the “vital connection” of grandparents and grandchildren, although
worried by now that some grandparents were becoming remote and detached. Tinsley and Parke
(1984) reviewed the importance of grandparents as support and socialization agents. Bengtson and
Robertson (1985) provided a compilation of the more positive research and views of grandpar-
enthood that had accumulated over the previous decade. Cherlin and Furstenberg (1986) gave a
thorough account of “The new American grandparent.” Mangen, Bengtson, and Landry (1988) pro-
vided a comprehensive review of methodological issues in studying intergenerational relationships.
Smith (1991b) gave a selection of studies of grandparenthood from different industrialized countries,
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Grandparenting
helping to balance the great bulk of research from the United States. In a Handbook of Grandparent-
hood, Szinovacz (1998) provided an important multidisciplinary resource.
Tinsley and Parke (1984) suggested four reasons for the increase of research in these later decades
of the twentieth century. The first was the demographic change resulting in substantial increases in
life expectancy, with more people becoming grandparents. Second was the move to look beyond the
nuclear family to wider social networks. Third, consideration of grandparent-grandchild relation-
ships forced investigators to think in a life-span framework and to consider processes of intergenera-
tional influence, but the life-span perspective in developmental science became influential only in
the 1980s; prior to that, developmental psychology and child development were often seen as virtu-
ally synonymous. Fourth, the availability of theoretical and statistical models needed to cope with the
triadic or polyadic relations and patterns of direct and indirect influence likely to be encountered in
analyzing grandparent-grandchild influence and interaction increased.
In the twenty first century, research has continued, with the last decade seeing important collections
of studies, including edited volumes by Arber and Timonen (2012) on Contemporary Grandparenting:
Changing Family Relationships in Global Contexts, emphasizing historical and sociological perspectives;
Mehta and Thang (2012) on Experiencing Grandparenthood: An Asian Perspective; Buchanan and Rot-
kirch (2016a) providing considerable global coverage in Grandfathers: Global Perspectives; and Meyer
and Abdul-Malak (2016) covering Grandparenting in the United States. Hayslip and Smith (2013) on
Resilient Grandparent Caregivers: A Strength-Based Perspective is the most recent of several books and
edited collections on grandparents as caregivers. Moore and Rosenthal (2017) in Grandparenting:
Contemporary Perspectives provide a thorough overview of recent research; and the edited volume by
Shwalb and Hossain (2018), Grandparents in Cultural Context, includes reviews from across the globe,
including Central America, Brazil, South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.
Theoretical Perspectives Applicable to Grandparenthood

Several theoretical perspectives can be used to structure research and interpret data on grandpar-
enting. These include evolutionary theory, attachment theory, family sociology and family systems
theory, and life-span and life-course perspectives.
Evolutionary Theory
Evolutionary theory has contributed to the understanding of grandparenthood in two main ways.
One important contribution has been the explanation of the longer life span and extended meno-
pause in humans, leading to the “grandmother hypothesis” that grandmothers especially played an
important helping role in human evolution. The second contribution takes ideas from kin selection
theory and related concepts to explain why grandparent help might vary by factors such as gender
of grandparent and of grandchild. The key concept underlying the approach is that of inclusive fitness.
Genetic evolution acts to favor behavior that increases genetic representation in succeeding genera-
tions; this is obviously through having offspring of one’s own, but can also be through helping rela-
tives who are genetically related to you.
Human females typically live for an extended period, measured in decades, after the midlife
menopause; this was also true in hunter-gatherer societies, and probably emerged in the Early Upper
Paleolithic period (about 40,000 years ago; Caspari and Lee, 2004). This phenomenon is unique
to humans in extent; in most species, the possibility of reproduction continues until death. Only in
a very few species (including great apes and toothed whales) is there a menopause, and then only
for a relatively short period. Why should human females live for a long period without being able
to reproduce? An influential theory here has been the so-called grandmother hypothesis (Hawkes,
235
O’Connell, and Blurton Jones, 1997; Hawkes, O’Connell, Blurton Jones, Alvarez, and Charnov,
1998). The grandmother hypothesis supposes that as mothers age, the costs of having more children
of their own increases, and they would benefit more (in terms of inclusive fitness) from helping
their existing children. This could especially include helping their own children when they them-
selves become parents—that is, being a helpful grandmother. On this line of reasoning, it is perhaps
no accident that the age of menopause is not greatly different from the likely age of becoming a
grandparent.
In terms of explaining the menopause, the grandmother hypothesis has had critics (Kachel and
Premo, 2012); it is possible that a longer human life span evolved for other reasons, and that the
menopause is a by-product of this. However, it is clear that the menopause opens a window of
opportunity for older females to help their older children and their grandchildren, without competi-
tion from still bearing offspring themselves.
Hawkes et al. (1997) worked with the Hadza, a hunter-gatherer people living in Tanzania. They
found that grandmothers were an important source of extra food provisioning for grandchildren,
especially when the mother had a new baby. Besides food provisioning, this and similar studies in pre-
transition (nonurban) societies have found that grandmothers can pass on accumulated knowledge
such as advice on recognizing illnesses, and both grandmothers and grandfathers may contribute
with heavy domestic tasks and agricultural labor (Sear and Coall, 2011).
Sear and Coall (2011) reviewed 37 studies of cooperative breeding in humans generally (i.e., the
effects of relatives on infant survival). For pre-transition societies, they used anthropological studies
and also historical records in early European and North American societies. They found that one of
the most reliable helpers was the maternal grandmother; her presence helped child survival rates in
over two thirds of cases. Paternal grandmothers were helpful in just over half of cases. The presence
of grandfathers was found to make little difference for child survival, and a few studies actually found
negative effects of paternal grandfathers. They also examined 19 studies of grandparental effects in
post-transition societies. The majority indicated a positive impact of grandparents, with more evi-
dence here of the positive influence of grandfathers as well as grandmothers. Sear and Coall caution
that these are correlational studies, so direct causal effects are not established.
Evolutionary theory also makes predictions about which grandparents should help which grand-
children. In fact, a range of such predictions can be made (Tanskanen, Rotkirch, and Danielsbacka,
2011). One is that step-grandparents, because they are not genetically related to step-grandchildren,
would not be so likely to provide help; the greater risk of step-grandchildren for abuse (Margolin,
1992) would also be predicted. Another relates to paternity certainty; mothers can be sure of mater-
nity, but fathers cannot be so certain of paternity (unless a DNA test is made). Suppose paternity
certainty has a value p (less than 1; perhaps around 0.90; Geary, 2005); this means that whereas the
relatedness of maternal grandmother to her grandchild is definitely one-quarter or 0.25 (of genes
shared by common descent), for maternal grandfather and paternal grandmother (where there is one
potentially uncertain link), it is 0.25p, and for paternal grandfather, it is reduced to 0.25p2. This would
predict differences in grandparental involvement and investment of MGM > MGF = PGM > PGF;
a pattern found in many studies (Danielsbacka, Tanskanen, Jokela, and Rotkirch, 2011).
For this paternity certainty argument, the sex of grandchild is irrelevant. However, other theories
suggest sex of grandchild may be important. One relates to X-chromosome relatedness (Fox et al.,
2010); females are XX and males are XY, with the X-chromosome carrying about 8% of human
genes, and the much shorter Y-chromosome carrying only a very small 0.4% amount. Calculating
from the 8% figure and the inheritance of the X-chromosome, Fox et al. argued that MGM related-
ness to granddaughters and grandsons remains at 0.25, but that it can rise to 0.27 for PGM to grand-
daughters, and fall to 0.23 for PGM to grandsons. This imbalance then predicts that PGMs should
favor granddaughters over grandsons. Fox et al. reported evidence for this in 6 out of 7 relevant
studies that they examined.
236
Grandparenting
Some other approaches include the possibility of selfish mutations on the X-chromosome (Rice,
Gavrilets, and Friberg, 2010), which predicts not only differential PGM investment by sex of grand-
child, but also the possibility of PGMs having a negative effect on grandsons, found in some studies
(Fox et al., 2010; Sear and Coall, 2011). Tanskanen et al. (2011) tested the predictions from these
theories, using a nationally representative sample of 11- to 16-year-old grandchildren in England and
Wales, covering over 4,000 grandparents. Looking at various measures of investment in grandchil-
dren, they failed to find convincing evidence of any sex discrimination by the paternal grandmother
against grandsons, and if anything the opposite (less investment in granddaughters). Their findings
were in line with predictions from paternity certainty theory, but not for theories based on X-chro-
mosome effects. However, in a meta-analysis of 17 studies, Strassmann and Gerrard (2011) found that
grandparents most likely to live with a grandchild (paternal grandparents in patrilineal societies) were
less beneficial than those who do not do so, which they explain in terms of a local resource com-
petition hypothesis—competition among family members who belong to the same economic unit.
Evolutionary theories have a role to play in our understanding of grandparenthood, and can and
should be integrated with more proximal and cultural explanations of relevant data, rather than be
seen as antithetical to them. For example, Archer (1999) suggested that explanations of greater grief
in maternal grandmothers at the death of a grandchild, although having evolutionary theory as a
distal factor, require strength of attachment as a proximate causative variable. Other theories and
evidence concerning distribution of grandparental investment come from economics and from soci-
ology. Coall and Hertwig (2010, 2011) pointed out that these different traditions rarely interact with
each other and call for more cross-disciplinary research. In an extensive review (2010), they pointed
to the considerable evidence that grandparents can provide support for children and grandchildren
in adverse circumstances (see later sections in this chapter).
Attachment Theory
Attachment theory (Bowlby, 1974, 1988) emphasizes the powerful influence on development of
children’s early relationships with their caregivers—and particularly their mother-figure. This per-
spective utilizes the concept of internal working models (IWMs) of relationships. Main, Kaplan, and
Cassidy (1985) described IWMs as internalized representations acquired in infancy and childhood,
which reflect aspects such as trust or ambivalence learned in primary relationships. IWMs are assessed
in infancy in the Strange Situation (SS), yielding classifications of secure, avoidant, ambivalent, and
disorganized attachment with mother or caregiver.
Children are likely to form secure attachments to mothers who are attentive, sensitive, and
responsive, whereas insensitive, neglectful, or rejecting parenting is associated with insecure attach-
ment relationships. Over time, children gradually internalize these patterns of attachment to form
working models of the self and others, which, in turn, affect their expectations of, and behavior in,
close relationships. In this way, the early infant-caregiver attachment relationship gradually becomes
part of the child’s personality, and can have lasting effects on development.
One way in which grandparents can influence children’s development is through the intergenera-
tional transmission of attachment security. From this perspective, a mother’s attachment to her own
mother (as internalized in working models of relationships) is likely to influence the way in which
she treats her own child, leading to the repetition of attachment patterns in the next generation
(see ahead). Most research conducted within the framework of attachment theory has focused on
this indirect, intergenerational transmission of attachment. However, attachment theory also implies
that grandparents who are regularly involved in childcare could have direct effects on child behav-
ior through the quality of their relationship with the child. Bowlby (1974) recognized that most
infants become attached to more than one person, and that these attachment figures often include
grandparents (Myers, Jarvis, and Creasey, 1987). One limitation of attachment theory in its current
237
formulation is that it does not explain how the multiple attachment relationships that children have
with different caregivers are integrated over the course of development to influence their internal
working models and resulting social and personality growth (Thompson and Raikes, 2003).
Intergenerational Transmission of Attachment

In adult life, the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI; Main et al., 1985) provides a means of assess-
ing an adult’s model of his or her relationships with his or her parents; it yields four categories: (1)
autonomous (recalling earlier attachment-related experiences objectively and openly, even if these
were not favorable); (2) dismissive (earlier attachment-related experiences seen as of little concern,
value, or influence); (3) preoccupied (still dependent on parents and actively struggling to please
them); and (4) unresolved (a trauma involving, or early death of, an attachment figure, which has not
been worked through).
The results of a meta-analysis conducted two decades ago suggested that the relation between
children’s attachment categorization in the SS and their parent’s AAI classification was quite strong.
The overall correspondence was 75% between secure/insecure on the SS and autonomous/nonau-
tonomous on the AAI (Van Ijzendoorn, 1995). A more recent series of meta-analyses (Verhage et al.,
2016) confirmed the existence of a robust association between children’s attachment to their parents
and parents’ attachment representations. However, effect sizes were smaller than in the initial studies.
Maternal sensitivity to infant signals appears to be one of many processes through which intergen-
erational transmission occurs.
Benoit and Parker (1994) demonstrated links in attachment security across three generations;
mothers’ AAI scores during pregnancy and when infants were 11 months old were compared with
infant’s SS classification at 12 months, and the maternal grandmother’s AAI status measured at any
time during the study. They found that 65% of grandmother-mother-infant triads had concordant
attachment classifications.
Attachment theory emphasizes consistency over generations, but it also predicts that adults can
work through or resolve unsatisfactory relationships with their parents and modify their internal
working models, either through self-reflection or with the aid of therapy or counseling. A study
of survivors of the Holocaust in World War II (Bar-On et al., 1998) found that although many
survivors (grandparents by then) scored unresolved on the AAI, due to the traumatic way in which
they lost their parents at an early age, few of their children scored unresolved, and their grand-
children appeared to be indistinguishable from the remaining population in terms of attachment
characteristics.
Family Sociology and Family Systems Theory

Concepts from family sociology have been employed extensively in describing aspects of grandparent-
grandchild relationships. Key concepts have been cohesion or solidarity, refined into associational,
affectual, consensual, functional, normative, and goal components and measures of intergenerational
family structure (McChesney and Bengtson, 1988). Qualitative sociological studies such as those by
Cunningham-Burley (1985) and Gauthier (2002) have drawn attention to how grandparents per-
ceive their role in a changing sociocultural context. The concept of social capital—which attempts
to integrate the intellectual traditions of sociology and economics—has also been applied to explain
how strong relationships with grandparents might have value for a young person’s development
(Coleman, 1988).
Family systems theory (Kerig, 2019; Minuchin, 1988) emphasizes the importance of viewing
families holistically, as complex, organized, dynamic systems. Family systems theory has been used to
understand how grandparents’ involvement with their grandchildren is influenced by the relationship
238
Grandparenting
between the grandparents and the child’s parents as well as by the grandparents’ youthful experiences
with their own grandparents (Mueller and Elder, 2003). It also has potential in elaborating how the
roles of grandparents and the effects of their involvement may change in response to family chal-
lenges or transitions such as parental divorce or adolescent childbearing (Cox and Paley, 1997).
Life-Span and Life-Course Perspectives

Life-span and life-course theories provide an important way of viewing adulthood, aging, and inter-
generational phenomena (Baltes, 1987; Elder, 1998; Mayer, 2009). These perspectives can be used as
a framework for understanding how grandparents’ roles are affected by historical-cultural changes
(Bengtson, 1987; Uhlenberg and Cheuk, 2010) as well as by the needs of their grandchildren and
other family members (Silverstein and Marenco, 2001). They also underlie research into the impact
of nonnormative or “off-time” life events, such as grandparents becoming full-time custodial car-
ers of their grandchildren or grandchildren caring for grandparents (Fruhauf, Jarrott, and Allen,
2006; Hayslip and Kaminski, 2005). The life-span perspective recognizes that grandparents influ-
ence grandchildren in both direct and indirect ways (Tinsley and Parke, 1984) and that caring for
grandchildren involves both gains and losses (Hayslip and Kaminski, 2005). Overall, life-span and
life-course theories emphasize the importance of viewing grandparenting in the context of the
entire life span, and as the result of a complex interplay between the individual and an ever-changing
social world.
Central Issues in Studying Grandparenthood

Some issues central to the study of grandparenthood in contemporary society discussed here are the
frequency and nature of contacts between grandparents and grandchildren, the role of proximity and
use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), varying characteristics of grandparents
and grandchildren, great-grandparents, styles of grandparenting, perceptions of grandparents, grand-
parents affected by divorce or death of a grandchild, diverse family types, grandparents of grandchil-
dren with disabilities, and the nature of grandparenting in different cultures.
Contacts Between Grandparents and Grandchildren: How Frequent

and How Satisfying?
The consensus of a considerable number of studies on contemporary grandparents and grandchil-
dren is that they see each other moderately frequently, and the relationship is usually (though not
invariably) quite close and satisfying, rather than conflictual. However, “frequent” and “satisfying”
are somewhat relative terms, and how one sees the typical grandparent-grandchild relationship may
depend on one’s expectations. The extent to which grandparents are likely to live in the same house-
hold as their grandchildren, be part of the daily life of families, and play an important role in childcare
varies considerably across different geographic regions and different ethnic groups (Buchanan and
Rotkirch, 2016b; Jappens and Van Bavel, 2012; Owen, Mooney, Brannen, and Statham, 2004).
Even in individualistic United States and Western European countries where it is relatively
uncommon for grandparents and grandchildren to live together, it seems that most grandchildren
see their grandparents regularly. A study of a nationally representative sample of 11- to 16-year-olds
in England and Wales found that over half of the adolescents had face-to-face contact with their
maternal grandparents at least twice a week and that 40% saw their maternal grandparents daily or
twice weekly (Griggs, Tan, Buchanan, Attar-Schwartz, and Flouri, 2010). Pollet, Nettle, and Nelis-
sen’s (2007) study in the Netherlands revealed that 57% of grandparents saw their grandchildren at
least weekly, and 87% had contact at least once a month. In Finland, 64% of maternal grandmothers
239
and 55% of maternal grandfathers saw their grandchildren at least monthly (Hurme, 2006, as cited in
Hurme, Westerback, and Quadrello, 2010).
More frequent contact between grandparents and their grandchildren is associated with greater
satisfaction in the grandparent role (Reitzes and Mutran, 2004; Silverstein and Marenco, 2001) and
with closer grandparent-grandchild relationships (Davey, Savla, Janke, and Anderson, 2009). Never-
theless, the majority of grandparents perceive their role as significant, valued, and satisfying (Mahne
and Motel-Klingebiel, 2012; Moore and Rosenthal, 2014). Most children, in turn, view their rela-
tionships with their grandparents as important and positive (Attar-Schwartz, Tan, and Buchanan,
2009; Dench, Ogg, and Thomson, 1999).
Several studies in the United States have noted that even young adults (often college students)
typically perceive their relationships with grandparents as close (Sheehan and Petrovic, 2008). Of
course, not all grandchildren get on with their grandparents. Kemp (2007) cautioned that methodo-
logical and publication biases have caused the positive aspects of grandparent-grandchild relation-
ships to be overemphasized. Grandparent-grandchild relationships may be distant or even hostile as
well as affectionate and supportive. One of Kemp’s (2007, p. 869) interviewees noted “My [paternal]
grandmother would have cheerfully throttled me. I’m not kidding. Yes. There was [physical and
mental] abuse from her.”
In summary, most grandparents see many grandchildren at least once a month, sometimes much
more often, and generally the relationship is seen as positive, and important, by both generations.
However, this general picture should not be allowed to hide the great variation in contact and satis-
faction in grandparent/grandchild relationships.
The Role of Proximity and Use of ICTs

Geographical proximity is the most important factor in frequency of face-to-face contact between
grandparents and grandchildren (Barnett, Scaramella, Neppl, Ontai, and Conger, 2010; Griggs et al.,
2010; Mueller, Wilhelm, and Elder, 2002; Uhlenberg and Hammill, 1998). Grandparents who live
close to their grandchildren are also more likely to provide childcare (Hank and Buber, 2009). Some
studies have found stronger emotional ties between grandparents and grandchildren who live near
one another (Chan and Elder, 2000; Elder and Conger, 2000). However, proximity is a much weaker
predictor of the quality or closeness of the grandparent-grandchild relationship than it is of contact
between them (Boon and Brussoni, 1996; Wood and Liossis, 2007).
Changes in transportation and communication provide other avenues to maintain contact and
possibly remove proximity as the barrier to contact that it once was. For an increasing number of
grandparents, new communication technologies are helping to compensate for a lack of traditional,
spoken communication. Grandparents who live far from their grandchildren are more likely to
contact them using e-mail than those who live close to their grandchildren (Quadrello et al., 2005).
Gathering data from six countries, Ivan and Fernández-Ardèvol (2017) found that keeping contact
with distant grandchildren could be a motivator for older grandparents to use e-mail and Skype. For
example, a 95-year-old woman in Toronto had lost interest in trying to use computers until one of
her grandchildren (and her great-grandchildren) moved to Dubai. She commented,“Oh yes, it’s been
a wonderful thing. . . . Well, I picked it up again . . . at least I can e-mail them and my granddaughter
replies” (op cit., p. 48).
The Nature of Contacts Between Grandparents and Grandchildren

The range of activities that grandparents and grandchildren engage in is wide, and varies greatly with
age, but studies suggest that grandparents in the United States and Europe typically play five broad
roles in relation to their grandchildren (Cherlin and Furstenberg, 1986; Douglas and Ferguson, 2003;
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Grandparenting
Elder and Conger, 2000; Griggs et al., 2010; Kennedy, 1992; Moore and Rosenthal, 2017; Svensson-
Dianellou, Smith, and Mestheneos, 2010).
Carer or Surrogate Parent

Grandparents frequently babysit their grandchildren, transport them, and have them stay overnight.
Less often, they may serve as substitutes for absent parents. (These caregiving roles are discussed in
more detail later.)
Companion, Friend, and Confidante

For many grandchildren, grandparents are a source of treats, fun, and relaxation: Grandparents play
with their grandchildren and tell them stories, and they watch television and eat meals together. Many
grandparents take their grandchildren on trips or outings, or participate in family outings together,
and some spend vacations with them. Grandparents and grandchildren talk with one another, and
grandchildren can share their worries and concerns with grandparents and receive emotional support.
As one Australian grandmother put it, “I want to be that special person that when things aren’t going
quite as well with mum and dad or something they’ve got someone else that they know is there for
them as well” (Moore and Rosenthal, 2017, p. 47). A 19-year-old in the United States said, “I can talk
to my grandma about anything. . . . When you tell her something, she takes it in a very calm and a
professional demeanor and she helps me make decisions” (Pittman, Ioffe, and Keeports, 2016, p. 195).
Mentor, Teacher, and Role Model

Many grandparents teach and encourage their grandchildren in hobbies, games, and sports, and assist
them with learning skills. This includes attending school events and extracurricular activities as well
as participating in joint projects, activities, or pastimes, such as cooking, fishing, and household or
farm tasks. Grandparents help their grandchildren with schoolwork or homework and provide career
or personal advice. They may also transmit values to their grandchildren and engage in religious
activities with them. For example, an American Jewish grandmother said, “I hope to pass on Jewish
values, family togetherness, decency, respect, the multi-generation family” (Geffen, 2014, p. 59).
Family Custodian and Historian

Grandparents attend family events with their grandchildren and may talk to them about their family
history or give a wider historical perspective on life. A 13-year-old girl in Griggs et al.’s (2010, p. 208)
study reflected on how her grandfather had contributed to her education:
My granddad was very into geography and history. . . . They’re always telling us things about
that and he used to take us on like historical visits. . . . I do think that helped at school and
like I’ll choose to do those subjects now.
A 19-year-old African American grandchild described how “I loved listening to her [maternal
grandmother’s] stories. . . . I learned about history in general, because you know about the civil rights
and stuff, but never get to hear about how someone lived through that” (Pittman et al., 2016, p. 196).
Provider of Tangible Support

Sometimes, grandparents assist their grandchildren directly with financial or practical assistance,
such as helping in emergencies. This can be especially true when parents are in financial or other
241
difficulties; for example, a 19-year-old African American grandchild stated how her maternal grand-
parents were “helping me through school now actually, tuition” (Pittman et al., 2016, p. 199). In
Germany, some 28% of grandparents ages 70–85 provide regular financial support, money, or major
gift items to their grandchildren (Mahne, Klaus, and Engstler, 2018).
The grandparent-grandchild relationship is a mutual and reciprocal one, and does not run just
one way (Dench et al., 1999). Particularly from adolescence onward, grandchildren may assist their
grandparents with errands and chores, and help to care for them when they are ill, as discussed later
in benefits for grandparents.
Varying Characteristics of Grandparents and Grandchildren

External factors such as proximity of residence affect grandparent-grandchild contacts and activities,
and so too do factors such as sex, lineage, age, and health of the grandparent; the particular grand-
child and age of grandchild; and the qualities of the larger family system of which grandparents and
grandchildren are a part.
Gender
The grandparenting role is related to overall life satisfaction and morale in both genders, but just as
mothers are more often the closer parent to children, many studies find that grandmothers are more
involved with grandchildren than grandfathers. Grandmothers anticipate and become involved in the
role sooner than grandfathers, are more likely to care for grandchildren, and have greater satisfaction
with their current and expected grandparenting role (Dias, Azambuja, Rabinovich, and Bastos, 2018;
Moore and Rosenthal, 2017).
Often, however, differences in the involvement of grandmothers and grandfathers are small, and
the contributions of grandfathers can be underestimated (Buchanan and Rotkirch, 2016b; Mann,
2007). Grandfathers can offer different types of support, or what Bates (2009) called generative
grandparenting, often more instrumental and task oriented (Hayslip and Fruhauf, 2018; Moore and
Rosenthal, 2017). Consistent with traditional gender roles, grandmothers may be more likely to serve
as caregivers and confidantes, whereas grandfathers may be more likely to act as teachers and advisors
and to participate in outdoor and skill-based activities with grandchildren (Hilton and Macari, 1997;
Van Ranst, Verschueren, and Marcoen, 1995). In many countries, changing views of masculinity and
social ideologies encouraging men’s involvement in children’s lives have encouraged grandfathers
to form closer and more caring relationships with their grandchildren (Coall, Hilbrand, Sear, and
Hertwig, 2016; Rotkirch and Buchanan, 2016). However, more research needs to be conducted into
gender role differences in grandparenting and the impact these roles have on the grandchildren and
vice versa.
Lineage
Grandparents through the mother’s side—maternal grandmother and maternal grandfather—are
more involved than those through the father’s side—paternal grandmother and paternal grandfa-
ther. As discussed earlier in relation to evolutionary theory, gender and lineage of grandparent may
interact as influences, with the maternal grandmother often appearing as having the most contact
and closest relationship with grandchildren, for example, in the United Kingdom (Douglas and Fer-
guson, 2003; Tan, Buchanan, Flouri, Attar-Schwartz, and Griggs, 2010) and the Netherlands (Pollet
et al., 2007). Age of grandparent can be an interacting factor here; because on average women marry
slightly older men, maternal grandmothers are often the youngest of all four grandparents. However,
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Grandparenting
the main explanation probably lies in the strength of mother-daughter bonds, often reinforced by
societal expectations and perhaps in a more distal causal sense by certainty of relatedness.
Age and Health of Grandparent

Poor health or advanced age can limit grandparents’ capacity to be involved with their grandchildren.
As one U.S. grandmother with arthritis put it, “I used to lift them up. Now, I can’t run after them . . .
I spoke to the parents and told them, ‘If you come here and find them dirty, don’t blame me because
I can’t change the diapers’ ” (Abdul-Malak, 2016, p. 76).
Better health in grandparents has been associated with more active involvement and/or greater
emotional closeness in some studies (Chan and Elder, 2000; Hank and Buber, 2009; Tan et al., 2010;
Wood and Liossis, 2007). However, other research suggests that grandparents’ health is not so impor-
tant (Baranowski and Schilmoeller, 1999; Elder and Conger, 2000; King and Elder, 1995; Uhlenberg
and Hammill, 1998). Mild health problems may not decrease relationship satisfaction and may elicit
caring from grandchildren (Cherlin and Furstenberg, 1985).
Similarly, some research has shown that younger grandparents are more involved with their grand-
children (Dench et al., 1999; King and Elder, 1997; Silverstein and Marenco, 2001), but there is no
evidence that adolescent and young adult grandchildren feel closer to younger grandparents (King
and Elder, 1995; Mills, Wakeman, and Fea, 2001; Taylor, Robila, and Lee, 2005; Wood and Liossis,
2007). Grandparents’ age may have less effect on their frequency of contact with grandchildren than
on the nature of the activities they engage in (Cherlin and Furstenberg, 1986). For example, younger
grandparents may be more likely to babysit their grandchildren and to take them on trips or out-
ings, whereas older grandparents may be more likely to spend time with their grandchildren in more
sedentary activities such as reading or telling stories, and to express their affection through providing
gifts or money (Silverstein and Marenco, 2001; Taylor et al., 2005). However, it is important to note
that older grandparents are more likely to have older grandchildren, so the age of grandparents and
grandchildren may be confounded.
Age of Grandchild
Some studies have reported on age of grandchild as a factor in relationships with grandparents. In an
Australian sample, Condon, Corkindale, Luszcz, and Gamble (2011) reported contact hours at 6, 12,
24, and 36 months of grandchild age. Some 10% of grandparents reported no contact; however, the
median contact hours was around 15 for grandmothers and 9 for grandfathers, with some increase
in the first year then leveling off.
Later in childhood, a common finding is that the quantity of grandparental involvement tends
to decline as grandchildren grow older (Griggs et al., 2010; Hank and Buber, 2009; Silverstein and
Marenco, 2001; Tan et al., 2010). Compared with younger children, adolescents tend to have less
frequent contact with their grandparents (Bridges, Roe, Dunn, and O’Connor, 2007), and feel less
close to them (Attar-Schwartz, Tan, and Buchanan, 2009; Dench et al., 1999; Van Ranst et al., 1995).
However, Baranowski and Schilmoeller (1999) found no association between the age of grandchil-
dren and grandparental involvement, and Bridges et al. (2007) found that although the frequency of
contact declined in adolescence, closeness did not. In a study of 11- to 16-year-olds in England and
Wales, Attar-Schwartz, Tan, and Buchanan (2009) found that over a third of adolescents reported
that their closest grandparent was the most important person in their life outside immediate family.
The nature of grandparents’ involvement may also change as children grow older. Grandparents
are more likely to share recreational activities with younger grandchildren; these include activities
such as visiting a park or playground, playing games, watching television, and going shopping or to
243
the cinema (Dench et al., 1999; Silverstein and Marenco, 2001). Attending religious events also tends
to show a downward trend as the grandchild gets older (Silverstein and Marenco, 2001). However,
certain shared activities actually increase as children become older and more autonomous. For exam-
ple, grandparents are more likely to serve as a confidante to older grandchildren, to provide them
with advice, and to talk with them about their family history (Dench et al., 1999; Silverstein and
Marenco, 2001).
Particular Grandchild
The relationship of the grandparent has usually been generalized to all of their grandchildren; but
different grandchildren may have different needs and personalities that result in different forms of
contact. Kemp (2007) used qualitative data from a study of multigenerational families to illustrate
how grandparent-grandchild relationships can vary enormously within families as well as between
them. In some instances, the same grandparent could be a source of support to one child in the
family while maltreating another. A study in Spain (Bernal and Anuncibay, 2008) found that 38% of
grandparents admitted to a favorite grandchild, most likely a firstborn grandchild on the maternal
side, living not too far away.
Mueller and Elder (2003) found evidence for a modest relation between grandparental involve-
ment and grandchildren’s personal traits. Grandparents who rated their grandchildren’s positive traits
highly were more likely to be involved in their lives, but grandparents’ involvement was not signifi-
cantly associated with their perceptions of children’s negative attributes. However, Fingerman (1998)
found that grandparents spent more time with grandchildren they identified as “special” than with
those they described as “irritating.” Grandchildren who were identified as special were defined in
terms of the grandchild’s personal attributes, accomplishments, or love.
Characteristics of the Family System

With the exception of situations in which grandparents are the primary caregivers of grandchil-
dren, contact between grandparents and grandchildren is usually controlled by the parent genera-
tion (Sheehan and Petrovic, 2008). Consequently, grandparents tend to be more involved with their
grandchildren when parents encourage the grandparent-grandchild bond (Mueller and Elder, 2003;
Tan et al., 2010). Children also tend to have better relationships with their grandparents when the
grandparent-parent relationship is positive (Brown, 2003; Fingerman, 2004; Michalski and Shack-
elford, 2005; Silverstein and Marenco, 2001). The relationship between the grandparent and the
grandchild’s mother seems to be particularly important—even for paternal grandparents (Cherlin
and Furstenberg, 1986; Euler and Michalski, 2008). The quality of the grandparent-grandchild rela-
tionship also appears to be associated with children’s relationships with their parents, and the extent
to which the family unit as a whole is close and cohesive (Brown, 2003; Chan and Elder, 2000).
Great-Grandparents
The topic of great-grandparents has been rather neglected in research. The small number of relevant
studies find contact to be less frequent, and the role to be less intense or clear, than that of grandpar-
ent. Wentowski (1985) interviewed 19 great-grandmothers in the United States, ages 66–92. As a
92-year-old commented:
When you’re a grandparent, you love ’em, you’re glad to have them come, you fix ’em food,
do things for ’em because they’re precious to you. When you’re a great-grandparent, you’re
older and you can’t do as much. It’s different.
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Grandparenting
But even the youngest and healthiest great-grandmothers (ages 66 and 71) were not so involved with
great-grandchildren as with grandchildren: “Other people take care of this now” (p. 594).
However, great-grandparents can have a distinctive role in terms of family historian and “kin-
keeper,” being (usually) the oldest in the family. Doka and Mertz (1988) described three roles for the
great-grandparent: personal and family renewal, diversion in their lives, and a mark of their longev-
ity. Reese and Murray (1996) interviewed eight European American and eight African American
great-grandmothers, ages 75–89 years, who saw their role as intrinsic to the family system; they either
initiated family gatherings or were the cause of them.
Burton and Bengtson (1985), in a study of young grandmothers, interviewed a number of great-
grandmothers ages 46–73 and regarded those ages 42–57 as “early” in the role; they also interviewed
seven great-great-grandmothers and one great-great-great-grandmother! Generally, as discussed
later, these “early” grandmothers and great-grandmothers do not like being seen in this role, due to
their own conflicting life concerns and also what they perceive as an association of (great)grandpar-
enthood with aging and its associated negative stereotypes.
Drew and Silverstein (2004) found that in the United States, the role of great-grandparent,
although satisfying, was somewhat diminished compared with that of grandparent. This was because
being older, they gave less help than grandparents, and grandparents and parents acted as facilitators
or “gatekeepers” in arranging meetings. Feelings of well-being associated with being a great-grand-
parent were mainly via the parenting and grandparenting involved. Similar findings were reported in
Israel by Even-Zohar and Garby (2016) in a survey of 103 great-grandparents with great-grandchil-
dren of various ages but average age 6 years. Although having a more minor role than grandparents,
they typically saw great-grandchildren several times a month. Their health, and proximity to great-
grandchildren, were major factors in frequency of contact. This study did find a relation between
emotional closeness in the relationship(s), and quality of life.
Styles of Grandparenting
In describing variations in grandparent/grandchild relationships, researchers have devised typologies
of grandparenting, or different styles of grandparenting. The earliest, and one which has remained
influential, is that of Neugarten and Weinstein (1964). On the basis of interviews with 70 sets of
grandparents, they delineated five major styles: (1) formal (following prescribed roles with a clear
demarcation between parenting and grandparenting responsibilities); (2) fun seeker (seeing grandchil-
dren as fun and a source of self-indulgence or mutuality of satisfaction); (3) surrogate parent (taking
actual caregiving responsibility); (4) reservoir of family wisdom (dispensing special skills or resources,
with authority); and (5) distant (only infrequent contacts with grandchildren on ritual occasions).
They found the formal role to be more frequent in grandparents over 65, whereas the fun seeker and
distant styles were more frequent in younger grandparents. This typology has been used in several
other studies. Sticker (1991) summarized results from several studies, including a number of studies
in Germany, which point to the fun-seeking style predominating with younger grandchildren, and
the formal style increasing with older grandchildren.
The Neugarten and Weinstein roles are a mixture of intrinsically age-related roles (especially
“surrogate parent”) with styles which may be overlapping rather than discrete. Cherlin and Fursten-
berg (1985) distinguished two main aspects of grandparent/grandchild relationships, measured by
scales of several items: those relating to exchange of services (giving and receiving help) and those
relating to exerting parental-type influence (disciplining, advising on problems). Also, they took
account of infrequent (less than once a month) or more frequent contact. This gave them a fivefold
typology. Detached grandparents were low on both scales and had infrequent contact, passive grand-
parents were low on both scales and had more frequent contact, supportive grandparents were high on
exchange of services, authoritative grandparents were high on parent-like influence, and those high
245
on both scales were influential. Compared with other ethnic groups, more African American grand-
parents (especially grandmothers) were authoritative or influential.
Mangen and McChesney (1988) described 14 types of grandparent role based on hierarchi-
cal cluster analysis of a large number of different measures of cohesion in a sample of over 2,000
respondents. The types vary in terms of amounts of contact and exchange, degree of reciprocity,
emotional closeness, and geographical distance.
Perceptions of Grandparents
However social scientists describe grandparent roles, it is another matter whether grandparents them-
selves have a clear idea of their own role, and how these roles are viewed by society generally.
We discuss here societal views of grandparenthood and stereotypes of aging, on-time and off-time
grandparenthood as perceived by grandparents, and perceptions of different generations.
Societal Views of Grandparenthood

There have been changes through the last century in the extent to which grandparents have been
expected to have “authoritarian” or “authoritative” parental-type duties or just be “supportive”
(Kornhaber and Woodward, 1981). One view of grandparents is of someone who spoils grandchil-
dren, being overly lenient or indulgent. As one U.K. song put it,
Granny spoils us, oh what fun, Have some sweets and a sticky bun, Don’t tell mum you were up till
ten, I want to come and babysit again.
(Miller, 1989, p. 4)
This image of spoiling has had some basis in reality. In interviews of 155 older people in the United
Kingdom with grandchildren, Townsend (1957, p. 106) reported that “the grandparents were nota-
bly lenient towards grandchildren.” This leniency and spoiling may have been a reaction, both real
and perceived, against the strict and authoritarian role of grandparents which was, by the 1950s, being
rejected. As one of Townsend’s informants put it, “I used to slosh my children. But I don’t like to
see my grandchildren walloped,” and another said, “the grandmother can be free and easy. She [her
daughter] has to be fairly strict with them” (pp. 106–107). A meta-analysis found that in some studies
grandparental care was associated with indulgent practices that were not beneficial, such as giving
sweets or high sugar content foods (Chambers, Rowa-Dewar, Radley, and Dobbie, 2017).
Johnson (1983) found that U.S. grandmothers were able to give a list of rules that they used to
regulate their behavior with their grandchildren. The “shoulds” typically included being an advocate,
mediator, support, and source of enjoyment; the “should nots” involved not being too intrusive, over-
protective, or parental—too “old-fashioned,” in fact. Many of these 1980s grandmothers seem to have
taken a “supportive” role and rejected an “authoritative” role more common a generation or so before.
Pittman et al. (2016) reported how some U.S. grandparents children had lived with for a while might
be overindulgent, but also some might be strict; much depends on the context of the grandparenting.
Stereotypes of Grandparents and Aging

The media and children’s books have often portrayed grandparents as aged, fussy, domesticated, and
sedentary, probably with infirmities ( Janelli, 1988). A study of images in children’s books from Brit-
ain, Italy, Greece, Finland, and Poland (Sciplino, Smith, Hurme, Rusek, and Bäckvik, 2010) found
that 70% of grandfathers and 59% of grandmothers had gray or white hair. In a follow-up study,
adults rated the apparent ages of 165 images of grandparents; irrespective of nationality, the estimated
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Grandparenting
age of grandparents in children’s books was significantly higher than would be expected for a first-
time grandparent of a 6-year-old child (the age at which most of these books might be read). Simi-
larly, Crawford and Bhattacharya (2014), in an analysis of 220 children’s picture books, found that
few grandparents were shown as employed or with hobbies outside the home, and few were from
nontraditional family structures.
On-Time and Off-Time Grandparents

For most people, becoming a grandparent is described as a positive experience, but this can depend
on the age at which it happens. In an early study, Burton and Bengtson (1985) interviewed Afri-
can American grandmothers and described those who experienced the transition between 42 and
57 years as being “on-time,” within the normal range of variation. Those women who became
grandmothers “early,” between 25 and 37 years, were discontented, feeling obligations placed on
them which they were not ready for. “I don’t have time to do what I would like to do as a grand-
mother. I work everyday. I have young children. Right now I’m just too busy.” They were also
affected by the stereotypes associated with grandparenting and age: “I am just too young to be a
grandmother. That’s something for old folks, not for me” (p. 68). By contrast, those grandparents
who experienced the transition “late,” for example, in their 70s, were likely to be disappointed that
they would have relatively little time left to enjoy their grandchildren, and would be less likely to be
sufficiently well and physically active to make the most of the grandparental role.
Definitions of what age range is “on-time” will change with demographic changes (see earlier).
In the United Kingdom, Dench and Ogg (2002) found that grandparents ages 50–65 years felt closer
to their grandchildren, and found the role more rewarding, than those who were younger than 50 or
older than 65. However, Moore and Rosenthal (2017), with an Australian sample, did not find such
differences in contact or role satisfaction, although there were differences in the kinds of activities
carried out together.
Perceptions of Different Generations

Although three generations are involved in grandparent/grandchild relationships, most studies have
focused on the viewpoint of only one generation. Sometimes, the views of grandparents have been
elicited; more often, the perspective of the grandchild. However, the differing perceptions of dif-
fering generations may be important information. The few studies which have obtained multiple
perspectives regularly report some incongruence. Hurme (1988) found that 38% of Finnish grand-
mothers rated their relationship with the grandchild as “very important,” whereas only 27% of moth-
ers so rated it. Mangen and Miller (1988) reported that correlations across generations for amount of
contact, seemingly an objective fact, varied between .41 and .75. Disagreements here often signified
relationship difficulties; one father claimed to visit the children’s grandmother once a month, but the
grandmother complained that he hardly ever came and that “I do not see my son’s children enough
to know their middle names” (p. 121). Landry and Martin (1988) found reasonable levels of agree-
ment across generations about attitudes, but with the grandparent generation underestimating the
grandparent/parent difference and the grandchild generation overestimating differences with their
parents. These differing perceptions deserve more attention in future, both for their theoretical inter-
est and possible practical benefits that might ensue if misunderstandings can be avoided.
Grandparents, Grandchildren, and Parental Divorce

The incidence of separation and divorce has risen over the last few decades in many countries
including the United States and the United Kingdom (Kennedy and Ruggles, 2014; Rodgers and
247
Pryor, 1998). Parents’ separation and divorce can have a tremendous impact on grandparent-parent-
grandchild relationships. Although much research has looked at the effect of parental separation or
divorce on the parent-child relationship (Ganong, Coleman, and Sanner, 2019; Hetherington and
Stanley-Hagan, 1999), fewer studies have looked at its impact on the grandparents. The relationship
of grandparents to parents, particularly to a custodial parent (or one who has care and control of the
grandchildren) becomes a crucial issue.
Often grandparent-parent relationships are harmonious, opening opportunities for a supportive
role; grandparents can provide stability, support, and nurturance to the grandchild(ren) and family, often
providing financial assistance or childcare (Ferguson, Douglas, Lowe, Murch, and Robinson, 2004;
Yorgason, Padilla-Walker, and Jackson, 2011). Immediately following the separation of their parents,
children are more likely to confide in grandparents and other relatives than anyone else (Dunn, Davies,
O’Connor, and Sturgess, 2001; Dunn and Deater-Deckard, 2001). Grandparents can negotiate rela-
tionship difficulties between the parent and grandchild and be a “stress buffer” during times of family
distress, which can benefit grandchildren even when the grandchild’s relationship with the grandpar-
ent is not intense (Kennedy, 1990, 1992; McCrimmon and Howell, 1989; Wallerstein, 1986). Close
relationships with their grandparents have been associated with fewer internalizing and externalizing
symptoms and greater social competence, self-efficacy, and self-esteem in adolescents from single-par-
ent, stepparent, and divorced families (Attar-Schwartz, Tan, Buchanan, Flouri, and Griggs, 2009; Dunn
and Deater-Deckard, 2001; Henderson, Hayslip, Sanders, and Louden, 2009; Lussier, Deater-Deckard,
Dunn, and Davies, 2002; Ruiz and Silverstein, 2007; Silverstein, Giarrusso, and Bengtson, 2003).
Grandparental involvement has not always been associated with positive outcomes in children
from single-parent, divorced, or stepparent homes, however (Bridges et al., 2007; Cherlin and
Furstenberg, 1986; Hetherington, 1989). Children may show fewer internalizing and externaliz-
ing problems when they are close to grandparents related to the biological parents and stepparents
with whom they live, but closeness to grandparents related to noncustodial parents is associated
with greater difficulties in the grandchild’s adjustment (Dunn and Deater-Deckard, 2001; Lussier
et al., 2002). A difficult or disrupted relationship between grandparents and the custodial parent can
threaten proximity of grandparents to grandchildren, contact, involvement, and fulfillment of a satis-
fying grandparental role (King, 2003; Lavers and Sonuga-Barke, 1997; Lussier et al., 2002). Although
parental custody has been suggested as the greater variable in grandchild-grandparent contact after
divorce and not the maternal or paternal family relationship per se (Dunn and Deater-Deckard,
2001; Hilton and Macari, 1997; Westphall, Poortman, and van der Lippe, 2015), if (as is usually the
case) the children reside with their mother, then paternal grandparents may have to “tread carefully”
in obtaining access to their grandchildren. With some 50% of noncustodial fathers in the United
Kingdom, United States, and Canada gradually losing all contact with their children (Kruk and Hall,
1995), paternal grandparents are at a higher risk of losing contact with their grandchildren than are
maternal grandparents (Westphall et al., 2015).
The consequences of unwanted loss of contact with grandchildren can be devastating. Kruk (1995)
in Canada, and Drew and Smith (1999) in England, sampled grandparents who were members of
support groups; both studies found that after loss of contact with their grandchildren due to parental
divorce, grandparents reported symptoms of bereavement and negative effects on their physical and
emotional health. In a further study with 192 grandparents who were not members of grandparent
support groups, following loss of contact with a grandchild (due to divorce and also to family feud),
Drew (2000) found a range of negative consequences, including intense chronic grief, symptoms of
post-traumatic stress disorder, cognitive intrusion and avoidance, mental health problems, and low-
ered life satisfaction, with some grandparents being clinically depressed. One grandparent stated: “My
feelings most days are as if my heart is being torn from my body” (p. 152). Many of these grandparents
were experiencing a threefold grief: Grieving for their adult child, their grandchild, and their own
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Grandparenting
loss of the grandparent relationship and role. Additionally, the pining/yearning of grandparents was
related to the “hope” of reunion with their grandchildren; not totally unrealistic, these hopes make it
difficult to work through the grief process.
Grandparents can sometimes learn to negotiate their relationship with the custodial parent to have
contact with their grandchild (Schutter, Scherman, and Carroll, 1997). The personality, resources, and
coping strategies of grandparents can be important in maintaining contact after divorce. King and
Elder (1998) found that grandparents who have greater self-efficacy in the grandparenting role find
ways to be involved in their grandchild’s life even when obstacles stand in the way. With time, also,
grandchildren become more independent; Thompson and Walker (1987) found that if young adult
granddaughters had a close intimate relationship with their grandmother, then after parental divorce
they would bypass the parent generation and maintain contact.
Death of a Grandchild
The few studies which have investigated how the death of a grandchild impacts grandparents have
all reported similar findings, despite the varying grandchild ages or causes of the death—accident or
sudden infant death syndrome (Defrain, Ernest, Jakub, and Taylor, 1992; Defrain, Jakub, and Men-
doza, 1991–1992; Fry, 1997; Ponzetti, 1992; Ponzetti and Johnson, 1991). Anguish, grief, sadness,
and emotional and physical pain were reported. Grandmothers were more likely than grandfathers
to discuss the death of their grandchild. Some grandparents focus more on the needs of their adult
child than their own grief (Ponzetti, 1992). Drew and Silverstein (2007) found that a sudden loss of
contact with a grandchild (often death of a grandchild) led to increased levels of depression for some
3 years after the event.
Diverse Family Types and Grandparenting
Step-Grandparenthood
As divorce has become more common in recent decades, so has stepparenting and hence step-
grandparenting (Moore and Rosenthal, 2017). In fact, a grandchild could have three types of step-
grandparent, resulting from a parent remarrying (the most usual), a grandparent remarrying, or the
parent of a stepparent remarrying! Potentially, step-grandparents can have a positive role in help-
ing cohesion in divorced families (Gold, 2015). Such a positive role appears to be easier when the
step-grandchild is younger (Christensen and Smith, 2002). Typically step-grandparents do not feel
as close to grandchildren as biological grandparents, nor do the grandchildren feel as close to step-
grandparents (Moore and Rosenthal, 2017; Soliz, 2009); nevertheless, many are satisfied with the
relationship (Christensen and Smith, 2002).
Grandparents Through Adoption

Whereas divorce has become more common in recent decades, adoption has become less common.
Even so, there is little research literature on grandparents’ relationships with adopted grandchildren
(Moore and Rosenthal, 2017). A study of such families in Britain by Pitcher (2009) found that
many grandparents initially focused on supporting their son or daughter. They acted as “approving
witnesses,” accepting the new parent-child relationship. Developing their own relationship with the
adopted grandchild took time, and it helped if grandparents were told about the planned adoption
early on. As with step-grandparenting, many relationships were satisfactory and supportive, but typi-
cally not as close as with biological grandchildren.
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LGBT Families
Families with a disclosed LGBT member are on the increase, as diversity in sexual orientation
becomes more accepted, and gay marriage is becoming legalized in many countries (Patterson, 2019).
Again, there can be a great variety of types. Orel and Fruhauf (2006) interviewed grandmothers who
were lesbian or bisexual. The role of the parent—facilitating and supportive, or discouraging—was
seen as crucial in relationships with grandchildren. Some grandmothers had very flexible ideas about
what constituted gender-appropriate play for grandchildren.
Within the parental generation, female same-sex couples are most common, although in the
United States, one third of same-sex couple families are gay men (Gates, 2013). For most such fami-
lies, grandparents are fully supportive, perhaps after some time of adjustment (Moore and Rosenthal,
2017). Finally, grandchildren may come out as gay or bisexual. In a review, Scherrer (2010) found
that grandparents were generally very supportive in such cases, again with parents often acting as
important mediators.
Grandparents of Grandchildren With Disabilities

A growing research area has been the role of grandparents within the family when their grandchild
has a disability (Llewellyn, 2019). Several studies have identified grandparents as vital sources of emo-
tional and practical support when a grandchild has a disability (Brandon, 2016; Mirfin-Veitch, Bray,
and Watson, 1996). Using data from a large-scale survey in the United States, Brandon (2016) found
that following parents, grandparents were the main source of care of children during nonschool
hours; this was especially the case for single mothers.
However, sometimes the grandparent’s immediate inability to accept a grandchild’s disability can
be a source of stress to the family system. Myer and Vadasy (1986) reported that the birth of a
grandchild with a disability evokes emotions that are different from those experienced when the
grandchild is healthy. The grandparents often experience a three-fold anxiety for their newborn
grandchild’s health, their adult child’s ability to cope, and their role as a grandparent. Scherman,
Gardner, Brown, and Schutter (1995) and Nybo, Scherman, and Freeman (1998) suggested that
grandparents are frequently trapped in disappointment and grieve for their grandchild as well as their
adult child.
The majority of research with grandchildren with a disability finds that maternal grandparents
provided more emotional support to families (Byrne, Cunningham, and Sloper, 1988; Hornby and
Ashforth, 1994; Seligman, Goodrich, Paschal, Applegate, and Lehman, 1997). Maternal grandparents
were more likely to learn sign language to communicate with their deaf grandchild than paternal
grandparents, due to their closer relationship with their grandchild’s mother (Nybo et al., 1998).
Maternal grandmothers were more accurately able to assess the development of their grandchild
with autism than paternal grandmothers (Glasberg and Harris, 1997).
Schilmoeller and Baranowski (1999) found grandparent education about their grandchild’s dis-
ability was associated with greater acceptance and more involvement with their grandchild. Edu-
cational workshops for grandparents were helpful in not only educating the grandparent but also
letting go of their denial about their grandchild’s disability.
Cultural Differences and Grandparents

The literature on grandparenting outside the Western industrialized countries is scattered. In the
Pacific Rim countries of China, Japan, South Korea, and Indonesia, family ties including grandpar-
ental bonds tend to be especially close. Although nuclear families now outnumber three-generation
families in these countries, many grandparents in China and South Korea still live in three-generation
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Grandparenting
households (Maehara and Takemura, 2007; Settles et al., 2009). In addition, many nonresident grand-
parents provide care and education for infants and preschool children (Röttger-Rössler, 2014; Settles
et al., 2009). South Korean grandmothers from a sample of 1,326 extended families were accredited
with increasing their grandchildren’s resiliency by providing sources of attachment, affection, and
knowledge as well as having indirect effects through their support of parents (Hwang and St James-
Roberts, 1998). According to the Makassar in Indonesia, “Only the aged have the necessary patience
for young children” (Röttger-Rössler, 2014, p. 147).
In Islamic countries, an emphasis on paternal roles and patrilocality often means an expectation of
investment by paternal more than maternal grandparents (Emam, Abdelazsim, and El-Keshky, 2018).
However, there may be discrepancies between norms and actual behavior. In Bangladesh, Perry
(2017) found that although interviewees often expressed such a norm, maternal grandmothers, in
fact, were often primary material resource helpers.
The grandparent role is similarly respected in sub-Saharan Africa, where cooperation and reci-
procity between generations has long been valued. Grandparents have traditionally played important
roles in their families, and particularly in childrearing (Oppong, 2006). In many countries, the car-
egiving and financial contributions of grandparents have become even more important for children’s
survival and development as the AIDS epidemic added to the burdens faced by families already
affected by high rates of poverty and unemployment, conflict, migrant labor, and single parenthood
(Madhavan, 2004; Oppong, 2006). Grandparents in these situations play a vital role in their com-
munities, but the demands placed on them may exact a toll on their physical and emotional health
(Chazan, 2008; Oppong, 2006).
African American Grandparents

Several studies have documented the particular importance of grandparents, especially the maternal
grandmother, in many African American families (McLloyd et al., 2019). About one half of African
American children live in single-parent, female-headed households, about three times the figure for
European American families; also, the generation gap tends to be shorter (Burton and Dilworth-
Anderson, 1991; Tolson and Wilson, 1990). There is thus more opportunity in African American
families for younger grandparents to be involved with and support their grandchildren.
Historically, African American grandmothers were important figures of support and continuity
(Hill-Lubin, 1991) and often acted as supplementary and/or surrogate parents (Burton and Dilworth-
Anderson, 1991). Pearson, Hunter, Ensminger, and Kellam (1990) studied a predominantly African
American community in Chicago and found that 10% of households with target 6- to 8-year-old
children had coresident grandmothers. The grandmothers had substantial childrearing roles in these
families, in control, support, and punishment. They were about half as active as the mothers in these
areas and considerably more active than fathers (if present) and grandfathers. Timberlake and Chi-
pungu (1992) found that active help with grandchildren was associated with more positive evaluation
of the grandparental role in a sample of 100 African American grandmothers. Stevens (1984) found
that African American grandmothers were supportive of teenage daughters with young grandchil-
dren (13–30 months); they passed on useful information about norms of development and modeled
a more responsive and less punitive interaction style with the infants.
Acculturation and the Grandparent Role

Acculturation refers to changes in the cultural behavior and thinking of an individual or group
through contact with another culture. Typically through the influence of the peer group (Har-
ris, 1998), children of immigrant parents and grandparents adopt the language, styles, and customs
of the new, larger culture they are in. These processes can lead to intergenerational difficulties and
251
disagreements, with changes in perceptions of the parent or grandparent role in families (Bornstein
and Cote, 2019).
In a sample of 54 Muslim mothers in extended families in Britain, acculturation was found to
contribute to discrepancies in childrearing practices with grandmothers, often resulting in the moth-
ers having unusually high levels of depression and anxiety (Sonuga-Barke, Mistry, and Qureshi, 1998).
The more acculturated the intergenerational family, the greater amount of discrepancy was found
in childrearing practices, and grandmothers were more authority oriented and mothers more child
centered.
In the United States, Pettys and Balgopal (1998) found that Indian American grandparents were
more accepting of their grandchildren moving away from the culture than they were of their adult
children. They believed it was necessary for their grandchildren to change to get ahead in the
American culture which they perceived as positive, whereas they expected their adult children to
stay close to their ethnic origins. Silverstein and Chen (1999) found that the extent of acculturation
of 375 adult Mexican American grandchildren affected the amount of contact they reported with
their grandparents; however, grandparents did not feel a sense of loss of closeness. Grandparents may
be minimizing the cultural gap to lessen their feelings of aloneness resulting from their immigration
to a foreign country.
Issues of acculturation also affect grandchildren of mixed cultural background. Anderson (1999)
interviewed several families in Athens, Greece, with a Greek father and a British mother. He found
that the differing views of grandparents and parents were difficult to accommodate for grandchildren
from two cultural backgrounds when they were developing their own cultural identity, for example
of Greekness and Britishness.
Direct and Indirect Influences of Grandparents on Grandchildren

What influence do grandparents have on the development of grandchildren? Tinsley and Parke
(1984) distinguished between direct influences, resulting from contact and face-to-face interaction, and
indirect influences, mediated by other means such as parental behavior, and financial support of parents.
Examples of direct influence are giving gifts, being a companion and confidante, acting as an
emotional support or “buffer” at times of family stress, passing on family history or national tradi-
tions, and acting as a role model for aging. The most direct form of grandparent-grandchild influ-
ence is through acting as a surrogate parent. There are three levels of grandparent caregiving: (1)
custodial grandparent or “skipped generation” families, in which the child is cared for directly by the
grandparent(s), (2) coparenting, where grandparents live in a three-generation household with the
child, and (3) temporary childcare or extensive babysitting (Fuller-Thomson, Serbinski, and McCor-
mack, 2014; Jendrek, 1994). Grandparents can modify the behavior of parents or the quality of the
marital relationship by providing social and financial support, friendship, company, and/or advice to
the child’s parents (Botcheva and Feldman, 2004; Yorgason, Padilla-Walker, and Jackson, 2011). They
can also impact children indirectly through the intergenerational transmission of parenting values
and styles.
Direct Influences
Custodial Grandparenting
Custodial care involves grandparents assuming primary responsibility for the child’s care, and is typi-
cally defined as children living with their grandparents and without either parent (Pebley and Rud-
kin, 1999). In the economically developed countries of the Global North, custodial care generally
occurs when parents are no longer able or willing to take care of their children, often due to factors
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Grandparenting
such as parental substance abuse, child abuse and neglect, HIV/AIDS and other illnesses, teenage
pregnancy, divorce, incarceration, or death (Shore and Hayslip, 1994; Smith and Palmieri, 2007).
In developing countries in the Global South, most of the work on custodial grandparenting has
focused on children orphaned as a result of rising AIDS-related mortality rates (Mhaka-Mutepfa,
Mpofu, Moore, and Ingman, 2018). However, the majority of children in the care of their grand-
parents have parents who are alive, but living elsewhere. For example, it is common for children in
sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia to be left temporarily in the care of their grandparents when
their parents migrate to urban areas to seek employment, wish to continue their education, become
involved in a relationship with someone other than the child’s father, or are simply unable to pro-
vide adequately for their children’s needs (Ng and Wang, 2019; Schröder-Butterfill, 2004; Zimmer
and Dayton, 2005).
Much of the research on custodial grandparent care has been conducted in the United States,
where approximately 2% of children live in grandparent-maintained families (Dunifon, Ziol-Guest,
and Kopko, 2014). Several studies suggest that custodial grandchildren evidence higher levels of
behavioral and emotional problems and perform less well academically than children reared by both
their biological parents ( Jooste, Hayslip, and Smith, 2008; Monserud and Elder, 2011; Pittman, 2007;
Smith and Palmieri, 2007); other research suggests that their performance is similar to that of chil-
dren reared by a single biological parent (Solomon and Marx, 1995).
One possible explanation for the elevated risk of mental health and academic problems among
custodial grandchildren found in some U.S. studies is that poor, unemployed and poorly educated
African American families tend to be overrepresented among custodial grandparent families (Duni-
fon et al., 2014). Not only do the family and socioeconomic problems that lead to children being
placed in the custody of their grandparents pose their own risks to child development (Shore and
Hayslip, 1994), but they can also undermine the psychological well-being and parenting of grand-
parents. Additional stresses associated with custodial grandparenting, such as social isolation and
role confusion, may also contribute to poorer psychological functioning in grandparents and lower
quality parenting, which, in turn, is associated with increased maladjustment in children (Smith and
Palmieri, 2007).
Elevated stress levels, poverty and difficulties stemming from the wide generation gap between
grandparents and grandchildren have also been found to pose challenges to grandparents caring for
children orphaned or affected by HIV and AIDS in the Global South (Nyasani, Sterberg, and Smith,
2009; Oburu, 2005; Parker and Short, 2009). However, in a number of sub-Saharan African countries
as well as in rural China, children who lived with a grandmother (and no mother) were just as well-
adjusted psychologically and just as likely to be enrolled in school as those living with their mothers
(Oburu, 2005; Parker and Short, 2009; Tamasane and Head, 2010). Children in the care of their
grandparents were also better-adjusted psychologically and more likely to be in school than those
who were in the care of other relatives or non-relatives, with the last group displaying the poorest
outcomes (Case and Ableidinger, 2004; Parker and Short, 2009; Zhao et al., 2010).
In summary, children reared by custodial grandparents may display more psychological problems
than those reared in two-parent families, but their overall well-being is likely to be similar to that
of children reared by a single biological parent. Furthermore, when parents are deceased or absent,
the evidence supports evolutionary theory by suggesting that grandparents are likely to be the “best”
substitute caregivers for children. Researchers have called for more social support for custodial grand-
parents, such as day care assistance and local support groups within communities (Williams, 2011).
Coparenting in Three-Generation Households

Multigenerational households are common in the Global South, reflecting both cultural prefer-
ences and financial need. For example, about 46% of older adults in sub-Saharan Africa live in a
253
three-generation household (Zimmer and Dayton, 2005). Although less normative in the Global
North, three-generation households increased in prevalence during the worldwide recession of the
late 2000s. In 2012, 8% of U.S. children were living in households that included both parents and
grandparents (Dunifon et al., 2014).
Living with grandchildren in a three-generation household does not necessarily imply that
grandparents are heavily involved in childcare, although research suggests that coresident grandpar-
ents often assume a substantial role in taking care of grandchildren (Pebley and Rudkin, 1999). The
majority of studies in the United States have found that living with a single mother and a grand-
parent is associated with greater educational attainment, less deviant or risky behavior, and fewer
symptoms of depression among adolescents than living with a single parent alone (DeLeire and Kalil,
2002; Dunifon and Kowaleski-Jones, 2007; Hamilton, 2005; Monserud and Elder, 2011; Pittman
and Boswell, 2007). Comparisons with children living with two married parents have yielded mixed
results. Studies have variously found evidence that children living with coresident grandparents dis-
play better, worse, or similar adjustment to those living with both their biological parents (DeLeire
and Kalil, 2002; Dunifon and Kowaleski-Jones, 2007; Monserud and Elder, 2011). One possible
explanation for these varied findings is that family structure is often confounded with co-occurring
risk or protective factors such as financial hardship or parenting practices (Pittman, 2007). Research
conducted in economically developing countries in which three-generational households are more
prevalent than in the United States has found few, if any, negative associations, and some positive asso-
ciations, between the presence of a grandparent in the household and children’s adjustment (Chang,
Yi, and Lin, 2008; Levetan and Wild, 2016; Pong and Chen, 2010).
Temporary Childcare
Childcare or day care from grandparents can provide regular help for the middle generation. Accord-
ing to survey data obtained from over 10,000 respondents in 10 European countries, 58% of grand-
mothers and 49% of grandfathers provided some kind of care for a grandchild age 15 or younger
during the previous year (Hank and Buber, 2009). Large-scale British surveys have found that more
grandparent care of grandchildren is associated with higher rates of hyperactivity at age 4 years, and
with more peer difficulties among both preschoolers and adolescents (Fergusson, Maughan, and
Golding, 2008; Griggs et al., 2010). However, Fergusson et al.’s (2008) study suggests that this find-
ing is largely attributable to variations in the types of families using grandparent care. Grandparent
care was more common in families with financial problems, and those with adolescent, single, and
less well-educated mothers. In contrast, Falbo’s (1991) study in China found that children whose
grandparents had cared for them during their preschool years performed better in school than those
who were cared for by their parents, probably because caregiving grandparents had higher levels of
education than caregiving parents.
Grandchild care can later lead to close grandparent-grandchild relationships that provide high
levels of emotional and practical support. As was reported by a grandchild in Griggs et al. (2010,
p. 210): “It’s someone to go to. . . . It’s like a second set of parents, you know, it’s like having three sets
of parents to all come and help you.” For older children and adolescents, stronger ties to grandparents
are associated with fewer internalizing and externalizing problems and greater school engagement,
even after accounting for other family factors (Lussier et al., 2002; Ruiz and Silverstein, 2007; Yor-
gason et al., 2011). There is also evidence of an association between grandparent involvement and
more prosocial behavior in diverse populations of adolescents (Attar-Schwartz and Khoury-Kassabri,
2016; Attar-Schwartz, Tan, Buchanan, Flouri, and Griggs, 2009; Profe and Wild, 2017; Wild and
Gaibie, 2014; Yorgason et al., 2011). By contrast, no association has been found between grandpar-
ent involvement and adolescent substance use or sexual behavior (Dunifon and Bajracharya, 2012).
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Grandparenting
The association between grandparent Involvement and better mental and behavioral health in
children is stronger for maternal than paternal grandparents, supporting evolutionary arguments
(Tanskanen and Danielsbacka, 2012). Maternal grandmothers and maternal grandfathers both make
positive contributions to children’s well-being, although the impact of their involvement differs
depending on the outcome being assessed. For example, maternal grandmother involvement has
been associated with more prosocial behavior in adolescents, whereas maternal grandfather involve-
ment has been linked to fewer adolescent emotional problems and higher child development scores
at the end of the first year of primary school (Levetan and Wild, 2016; Tanskanen and Danielsbacka,
2016; Wild, 2016).
Contact and closeness with grandparents may take on particular significance for children faced
with family transitions and stress, including parental divorce (Attar-Schwartz, Tan, Buchanan, Flouri,
et al., 2009; Dunn and Deater-Deckard, 2001; Dunn, Fergusson, and Maughan, 2006). Silverstein and
Ruiz (2006) found evidence that the quality of the grandparent-grandchild relationship (assessed in
terms of emotional closeness, frequency of contact, and the extent of confiding) can moderate the
link between maternal and child depression. They found that maternal depression was transmitted
to late adolescent and young adult grandchildren with weak and moderately strong ties to grand-
parents, but not to those with the strongest ties. Social and emotional support from grandparents
has also been associated with fewer externalizing behavior problems among children from rural
methamphetamine-involved families in the United States (Sheridan, Haight, and Cleeland, 2011),
and has been found to moderate the relation between the overall number of adverse life events
experienced and psychopathology in young British adolescents (Flouri, Buchanan, Tan, Griggs, and
Attar-Schwartz, 2010). Thus, although the quantity of children’s contact with grandparents shows lit-
tle association with their well-being, the quality of their relationship may help to protect children and
adolescents from the potential negative effects of a variety of adverse life experiences.
Indirect Influences
The intergenerational transmission of parenting refers to the process whereby attitudes and behav-
iors are transmitted across generations (Kerr and Capaldi, 2019; Van iJzendoorn, 1992). Some of this
work has been conducted within the domain of attachment theory (see earlier); other work has used
more general assessments of parenting styles such as harsh or positive parenting.
Intergenerational Transmission of Parenting Styles

Several prospective longitudinal studies provide evidence that aggressive, hostile parenting and severe
discipline show moderate continuity across generations in a variety of at-risk samples (Capaldi, Pears,
Patterson, and Owen, 2003; Conger, Neppl, Kim, and Scaramella, 2003; Hops, Davis, Leve, and Shee-
ber, 2003). These studies suggest that grandparents’ use of harsh discipline has a small but significant
indirect effect on their grandchildren’s externalizing behavior, mediated, in part, by parents’ own
antisocial behavior and substance use (Bailey, Hill, Oesterle, and Hawkins, 2009; Brook, Zhang, Balka,
and Brook, 2012; Capaldi et al., 2003). Supportive parenting practices characterized by warmth,
involvement, and consistent discipline show a similar tendency to be repeated across generations, in
part by enhancing social and academic competence (Belsky, Jaffee, Sligo, Woodward, and Silva, 2005;
Chen and Kaplan, 2001; Thornberry, Freeman-Gallant, Lizotte, Krohn, and Smith, 2003). Most stud-
ies find that about 15% of the variation in parent behavior can be accounted for in terms of earlier
parental functioning of grandparents (Belsky et al., 2005; Capaldi et al., 2003; Conger, Belsky, and
Capaldi, 2009). The modest strength of these associations highlights the need for future research to
identify moderating factors that either reduce or increase the transmission of parenting styles across
generations in a family (Conger et al., 2009).
255
Effects of Being a Grandparent

Being a custodial grandparent can bring considerable stress. In a U.S. sample, Jang and Tang (2016)
found a relation to depression, although moderated by the extent of social support grandparents
received. The positive moderating effect of social support on depression in grandparents raising
grandchildren was also found in a longitudinal study by Hayslip, Blumenthal, and Garner (2015).
But how does the normal range of noncustodial grandparenting impact on health and cognition?
A number of factors are involved. One is the personality of the grandparent. Ben Shlomo, Taubman-
Ben-Ari, Findler, Sivan, and Dolizki (2010) examined mental health and personal growth in Jew-
ish Israeli women, during their daughter’s first pregnancy and after the birth of the granddaughter.
They also assessed perceived costs (e.g., getting unwanted responsibilities, appearing older). These
perceived costs were less for those grandmothers with good physical health and high self-esteem, but
greater for those who showed attachment anxiety (less resistance to stressful situations).
Another factor is how much time the grandparent spends with the grandchild or grandchildren,
and whether this is voluntary contact or actual caring (i.e., babysitting, not custodial care). Another
study of grandmothers in Australia by Moore and Rosenthal (2014) found that personal growth (life
satisfaction and feelings of generativity) were positively related to frequency of activities with the
grandchild, and satisfaction with the grandmothering role. An Australian study by Condon, Luszcz,
and McKee (2016) of both grandfathers and grandmothers found the transition to grandparenthood
was associated with benefits for mental health when more time was spent in grandchild care (babysit-
ting). A study in Chile on noncustodial grandparents ages 66–68 years by Grundy et al. (2012) also
found beneficial effects on grandparents of providing help for grandchildren, especially if it was at
least 4 hours/week. Over a 2-year period, depression scores went down, and for grandfathers espe-
cially, life satisfaction went up.
A study in Australia by Burn and Szoeke (2015) found a curvilinear relation; the amount of child-
care for grandchildren had a positive effect on measures of cognition (such as executive functioning)
for up to 1 day/week, but not for more than 1 day/week. This study was on older grandmothers
(mean age 70 years). However, a study in 10 European countries by Di Gessa, Glaser, and Tinker
(2016) found health benefits of caring for grandchildren whether this was intensive (>15 hours/
week) or non-intensive, compared with those not caring for grandchildren. A longitudinal study
in rural China by Zhou, Mao, Lee, and Chi (2017) also found benefits of caring for grandchildren
on the physical health of grandparents, especially when there was good emotional support from the
parental generation.
Things may be different so far as adult grandchildren are concerned. In a longitudinal study of
grandparents with adult grandchildren in the United States, Moorman and Stokes (2016) found that
greater affinity reduced depression, but greater contact increased depression. The authors surmise
that increases in contact over time with adult grandchildren may signal nonnormative and troubling
life events that increase stress.
In summary, becoming a grandparent is usually a joyful transition, and active engagement, most
notably in babysitting, can bring benefits from physical activity and meaningful social engagement.
Provisos are likely to be that engagement with grandchildren is largely voluntary, and not excessive
given the age, health, and personality of the grandparent involved.
Practical Aspects of Grandparenting

The increased recognition of the practical importance of grandparenthood is shown by two develop-
ments in modern industrial societies. One is the advent of courses for effective grandparenting and
of foster grandparent programs. The other is the growing pressure for grandparents to have visitation
rights in cases of family separation and divorce.
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Grandparenting
Grandparents in Society
A number of community and education programs support grandparents, especially in the United
States. A pioneering program by Strom and Strom (1989, p. 163) offered “an educational program
for grandparents to help strengthen families” including components on sharing feelings and ideas
with peers, listening to the views of younger people, learning about life-span development, improv-
ing family communication skills, and focusing on self-evaluation. Interventions following these pro-
grams were self-evaluated and found to be effective within various communities, including in Japan
and Taiwan. A range of programs developed in subsequent decades are described by Moore and
Rosenthal (2017; Chapter 9); they point out that many lack rigorous evaluation for effectiveness.
However, a randomized control was employed by Kirby and Sanders (2014), who adapted a parent-
ing program for use with grandparents. After nine sessions, the intervention grandparents reported a
range of positive outcomes including less anxiety, more confidence, and improved relationships with
grandchildren. A similar program and randomized control trial in Hong Kong also produced benefits
for grandparent self-efficacy and a decrease in child behavior problems (Leung, Sanders, Fung, and
Kirby, 2014).
There are also “foster grandparent” programs. Werner (1991, p. 78) described how these give
“elders with low income the opportunity to provide companionship and caring for a variety of high-
risk children and youths in return for a tax-exempt stipend.” These take place in hospitals, residential
institutions, day care programs, and family shelters. The evaluation of these programs appears to be
positive. More recently, an “Adopt a Grandparent” movement has spread to many countries, with
the internet and social networks (such as Facebook) being used for offering, and finding, surrogate
grandparents/grandchildren. Potentially a positive development, safeguards are important, and more
efforts for regulation and research in this area is needed (Moore and Rosenthal, 2017).
Obtaining Contact: The Courts or Mediation?

An important issue for grandparents is what access and visitation rights they have with grandchildren
of a noncustodial parent (Cavanagh and Cauffman, 2019). Generally, what is in the best interests of
the child is considered as the prime criterion in making legal decisions. Nevertheless, grandparents’
rights can vary by country, and by state in the United States.
Thompson, Tinsley, Scalora, and Parke (1989) reviewed the then legal situation in the United
States; statutes granting grandparents legal standing to petition for legally enforceable visitation with
their grandchildren, even over parental objections, had been passed in all 50 states. Contact orders
have been transferable from state to state since 1998, following the Visitation Rights Enforcement
Act. However, in many states, parents have challenged such laws on the basis that the statute is an
infringement of their fundamental constitutional right to rear their children as they see fit. A land-
mark decision in 2000 by the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the law in the state of Washington
that gave grandparents rights to contact with their grandchildren, a precedent followed by a few
other states such as Florida and Tennessee. The American Grandparents Association is dedicated to
pursuing the best for grandparents and their families, and their website summarizes rights in every
U.S. state (www.grandparents.com/family-and-relationships/grandparents-rights).
In the United Kingdom, the 1989 Children Act, which highlights the interests of children, allows
any person (not just grandparents or relatives) to request a leave to seek an order for contact with a
child (Douglas and Lowe, 1990). When deciding whether to grant a leave, the court will consider the
applicant’s connection with the child. But even if the grandparent has obtained a contact order, there
is little which holds the parent to abide by the court ruling. Legal action by the grandparent would
likely increase the anger of the parents; also court proceedings can be very expensive, and often
beyond the means of grandparents who have retired and are on fixed incomes. The Grandparent
257
Association in the United Kingdom has defended rights of grandparents, and advice can be found at
websites such as www.thefamilylawco.co.uk/information/what-are-grandparents-rights/.
In Australia, the Family Law Act of 1975 states that children have a right to spend time on a
regular basis with, and communicate on a regular basis with, both their parents and other people
significant to their care, welfare, and development (such as grandparents or other relatives). To obtain
contact with a grandchild, a grandparent must attempt mediation with the parents before issuing
court proceedings (https://www.diyfamilylawaustralia.com/pages/child-issues/what-are-grandpar-
ents-rights-to-see-their-grandchildren/#.W2MjVk2Wzcs).
Generally, mediation has been found to be effective in some cases, and is clearly to be preferred as
the best initial option. However, sometimes legal contact orders are the only way of preserving the
child’s continued contact with their grandparent.
Future Directions for Theory and Research in Grandparenting

Here, we focus on the integration of theoretical approaches, the challenge of historical change, and
the impact of new communication technologies.
Regarding methods of obtaining data, it remains true that most studies of grandparenthood have
employed interviews or structured or semi-structured questionnaires. Other approaches, such as
direct observation of behavior in standard situations, and projective or open-ended methods (such as
essays or drawings about grandparents), together with case studies and more qualitative approaches,
can add important insights and complement more quantitative results (Smith and Drew, 2002).
It also remains true that most research on grandparenthood has been carried out in Western
countries, notably the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia. However, there is now a greater
range of studies from other cultures, and Shwalb and Hossain (2018) provide reviews from across the
globe. A challenge for theory is to account for both the differences between cultures and the com-
monalties across cultures.
Some aspects of theory have developed, especially approaches from evolutionary theory. What
is still lacking, however, is an integration of different theoretical perspectives. Ideas from evolution-
ary theory can be quite compatible with those developed from, for example, attachment theory, or
behavioral economic approaches, but these need to be elaborated on to provide a more comprehen-
sive understanding of aspects such as grandparental investment in grandchildren (Friedman, Hechter,
and Kreager, 2008), the costs and benefits to all parties, and the different factors involved.
Furthermore, a fuller account needs to be taken of historical changes. “The past is a foreign
country: they do things differently there” (Hartley, 1953, p. 5). We are very aware that research find-
ings from the 1970s or 1980s (on, for example, the nature and frequency of grandparent-grandchild
contacts) may not be applicable to contemporary circumstances. Demographic, economic, and social
changes can have major impacts on intergenerational relationships.
Longitudinal studies are a powerful way of examining changes with age and (given multiple time
assessments) of disentangling cause-and-effect relations. But, inevitably, the earlier assessments will
be referring to times past—sometimes, considerably past. For example, Moorman and Stokes (2016)
made use of the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG) data from the United States. This study
started in 1971, with subsequent waves of data collection, up to 2004 for Moorman and Stokes’s
analyses. As the authors comment (p. 418), “These data are growing old, and as they age, they become
less representative of modern grandparent-adult grandchild relationships.”
Of course, older studies may still have an historical interest, insofar as we attempt to describe and
explain how grandparent-grandchild relationships have changed over the decades, and why. Cohort-
sequential designs are really needed to explore these complex issues.
The impact of historical change over the last decade is brought home dramatically by the rise
of the internet, social networking sites, and communication technologies such as Skype. These new
258
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technological developments have enhanced the possibility of easy and regular communication over
long distances and have likely led to some reduction in the importance of proximity as a variable in
terms of satisfying grandparent-grandchild relationships. For example, Condon et al. (2016) found
(contrary to their hypothesis) that having no direct contact with a grandchild did not have significant
negative impact on grandparents’ mental health. They suggested (pp. 6–7) that one possible reason
may have been “the use of technologies (e.g., video Skype) to help minimize the effects of a lack
of actual physical contact.” The use of such technologies needs to be fully incorporated in research
designs, and a fuller examination of the impact of these new technologies is a priority area for research
in grandparent-grandchild relationships. This will be an ongoing process, as these technologies con-
tinue to develop, and as newer generations of grandparents become more accustomed to their use.
Conclusion
Demographic trends in modern industrialized societies mean that grandparenthood is an important
part of the life span for most people. In understanding grandparenthood, theoretical perspectives can
be brought to bear from evolutionary theory, psychoanalysis and attachment theory, family systems
theory, family sociology, life-span development, and gerontology.
Being a grandparent does not usually have as much significance as being a parent, but relation-
ships with grandchildren are usually seen as being positive and satisfying. Typically, grandparents may
see grandchildren once or a few times a month. Grandparents engage in a variety of activities with
grandchildren, including acting as family historian, as a confidante, and as a support in times of fam-
ily discord. Living close to grandchildren, being a grandmother (especially maternal grandmother),
being relatively young and healthy, all predict greater contact. In addition there are individual and
cultural differences in style and role perceptions: among African Americans, for example, the mater-
nal grandmother tends to have a particularly influential role.
Grandparents can be “on-time” or “off-time” depending on when they first become a grandpar-
ent; generally, “on-time” grandparents experience the most satisfaction in the role. Great-grandpar-
ents, and step-grandparents, tend to have less contact and lower satisfaction.
Grandparents can influence their grandchildren’s development in many ways. Some are direct,
via contact. Some grandparents become particularly close to young grandchildren by acting as a
surrogate parent or running a grandparent-maintained household. Some are indirect, via support of
parents and intergenerational transmission of parenting skills. Generally, the influence of grandparents
can be very positive. On occasions, it can be less so, if grandparents conflict with parents on childrear-
ing values, or even abuse grandchildren. Similarly, grandparents themselves generally benefit in terms
of physical and mental health, provided demands on them are not too great. Some issues connected
to grandparenthood have direct societal implications, including programs for grandparents and issues
around rights of access to grandchildren separated from them by their parent’s divorce.
Research on grandparenthood is growing in strength and relevance: Future directions may use-
fully see a greater integration of theoretical perspectives, including around historical change, and
more assessment of the impact of new technologies on intergenerational relationships.
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8
SINGLE PARENTHOOD
Introduction
What does it mean to be a single parent? Single parents are parents raising their children alone. They
can be unmarried and living alone, or separated, divorced, or widowed. They can be male or female,
young or old, educated or uneducated. Often, single parents are classified as single because they are
unmarried, but the “single parent” is actually living in a home with a partner who is sharing the
parenting responsibility. In this chapter, we explore what it means to be a single parent in the United
States today. We describe the changing incidence of single parenthood over the last half century, and
we explore the many types of single parenting situations. We address the question of whether there
are unique features of single-parent families that put these families at risk, or whether the circum-
stances that have contributed to the increasing formation of single-parent families in recent decades
are responsible for many of the risk factors that have been observed. Finally, we acknowledge that
not all children of single-parent families are at risk; some children of single-parent families emerge
strong and grateful for being the children of dedicated, hard-working parents who model strength
and courage.
Rising Incidence of Single Parenthood

The proportion of children living in single-parent families has increased markedly around the world
since 1970, and this increase has been especially significant in the United States (Burns, 1992; Cher-
lin, 2004; Cherlin, 2010; Hobbs and Lippman, 1990). The United States has a higher proportion
of single-parent households than nearly any other developed country. In 1970, the vast major-
ity of American families with children under 18 years of age were married-couple families, and
single-parent families made up less than 12% of all families. By 2016, this situation had changed
dramatically. Currently, what are commonly called single-parent families make up nearly a third of
all families (Cherlin, 2014). Now, with 35.2 million American families with children under 18, only
24.5 million (69%) families are married-couple families; 8.4 million families (24%) are considered
mother-only families, and 2.2 million (6%) are considered father-only families (U.S. Census Bureau,
2016). Figure 8.1 shows this dramatic change over time in the numbers and percentages of mar-
ried, mother-only, and father-only families with children under 18 living in the home. Although
most single-parent families are headed by a mother, nearly one in six of all single-parent families are
headed by a father (U.S. Census Bureau, 2016).
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40000
35000
30000
Married couple
25000
20000
Mother only
15000
10000
Father only
5000
0
1950 1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015
Figure 8.1 Families with children under 18 (number of families in thousands)

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2017. Historical living arrangments of children [data file]
1
0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
1960 1968 1969 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015
Two parents One parent Mother only Father only
Figure 8.2 Living arrangements of children: 1960 to present

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2016. Living arrangments of children. Available: http://www.census.gov/hhes/families/files/
graphics/CH-1.pdf
Another way to look at these changes is in terms of children’s living arrangements. The U.S. Cen-
sus Bureau data presented in Figure 8.2 show how the proportion of children in the United States
living with one parent increased since 1970, whereas the percentage of children who reside with two
parents decreased. As the figure shows, nearly 90% of all children resided with two parents in 1960,
and the percentage of children living in a single-parent family was only 9.1%. Around 1970, the
proportion of all children living with one parent began a steady increase such that by 2005, the per-
centage of children living in single-parent families had tripled to 27.4%. This is a 200% increase in
the number of children living in a single-parent family. Since 2005, however, on average, the number
of and percentages of children living in single-parent families have remained stable. Today, nearly 1
in 3 children are living, for at least some part of their lives, in what the Census Bureau calls a single-
parent home (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 2016).
Not unique to the United States, these changes are part of an international trend. According to a
2016 report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD, 2016),
the proportion of children under 18 years of age living in a single-parent household is about 20% in
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most OECD countries. Latvia is the country with the highest rate of single-parent households, and
the United States is close behind. Turkey and Greece, with about 10% of single-parent households,
are among the countries with the lowest percentage of single-parent households (Eurostat, 2015).
Belgium, Denmark, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States all have at least 1 in 5 five
children living with a sole parent.
Single parenthood occurs in all groups across the United States. In 2017, slightly more than 27%
of all children under 18 years old lived with a single parent. About 4% of all children lived with their
father only, whereas nearly 23% of all children lived with their mother only (U.S. Census Bureau,
2017). There are differences in the prevalence of married, single-mother, and single-father families
across ethnic groups. According to 2015 Census Department figures (U.S. Bureau of the Census,
2015), many African American children are living in mother-only (49%) or father-only (4%) fami-
lies. While about half of all African American children are living in two-parent families, the majority
of Asian American (83%), White (74%), and Hispanic children (60%) are living in two-parent fami-
lies. Premarital births among African American women have been more common than in any other
group, but the increase in the number of and percentage of premarital births has been shared across
ethnic groups. In fact, the largest percentage of decreases in births outside of marriages has been for
African American and Latina women.
Attitudes Toward Single-Parent Families

Wide-scale public alarm concerning single parenthood was raised in 1965 with Daniel Patrick
Moynihan’s report, “The Negro Family: The Case for National Action.” As U.S. Assistant Secre-
tary of Labor in President Johnson’s War on Poverty, Moynihan hoped that his report would serve
to stimulate more successful federal programs designed to create economic and social equality for
African American families living in poverty. However, by singling out family structure as an impor-
tant intervening variable in the “tangle of pathology” (Moynihan, 1965) among African Americans,
Moynihan’s report focused concerns on single-parent families themselves rather than on the com-
plex socioeconomic conditions that he argued were responsible for the growing number of African
American female-headed families (Chafe, 2015). By not addressing the economic and social inequal-
ities that Moynihan identified as contributing both to poverty and to the formation of single-parent
families, inequalities worsened. The incidence of single-parent families in the United States not only
increased in the decade of the 1960s, but also accelerated over more than four decades.
Concerns about the rise in single-parent families increased as single parenthood appeared to
spread beyond the African American family. In the 1990s, some observers saw single parents as a
prime symptom of the erosion of American culture, blaming single-parent families for society’s
declining values and the breakdown of the social fabric. Indeed, the term “single parent” became a
euphemism for family breakdown, a kind of social pathology, and a major contributor to all that is
wrong with our society (Kamerman and Kahn, 1988).
These concerns were further supported by additional research from sociologists and psychologists
(Amato, 1988; Amato and Keith, 1991; Astone and McLanahan, 1991; Cashion, 1982; Dawson, 1991;
Herzog and Sudia, 1973; McLanahan and Bumpass, 1988; McLanahan and Sandefur, 1994) showing
that children of single-parent families were more likely to have unfavorable outcomes compared
with children from married-parent families. Specifically, children from single-mother families were
shown to be more likely to have behavioral problems, lower educational attainment, later mar-
riage, and earlier childbearing compared with children of two-parent families (Sigle-Rushton and
McLanahan, 2002). Because children of single parents appeared more vulnerable than children of
two-parent families to a wide variety of societal problems, children of single-parent families became
routinely referred to as “at risk” for developmental difficulties.
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Alarms concerning single-parent families appear to be diminishing somewhat in recent decades.

Since the1990s, the public has become more accustomed to seeing single-parent families on the
national scene. For example, popular television shows now feature single-parent families of vary-
ing types (Baftijari, 2016), and two of the last three U.S. presidents—William Clinton and Barack
Obama—and the well-known television comedian/commentator Trevor Noah have described their
experiences growing up in single-parent families (Clinton, 2005; Noah, 2016; Obama, 2004). Pew
researchers documented attitudinal changes toward single parenting from 2005 to 2013. In 2007,
71% of Americans saw the growing trend of single mothers as a “big problem”; in 2013, this fig-
ure was down to 64%. Young adults (42%) were less concerned than older adults (65%) about this
trend, and non-White people (56%) were less likely than Whites to view it as a big problem (67%).
Men and women do not differ (Wang, Parker, and Taylor, 2013). Even the television show Murphy
Brown famously maligned by Vice President Dan Quayle in a speech during the 1992 presidential
campaign for having a single mother as star of the series, is making a comeback on a major television
network in 2018 (http://deadline.com/2018/01/murphy-brown-revival-candice-bergen-creator-
diane-english-cbs-2018-2019-season-1202267897/).
Research on “Fragile Families”

Researchers have provided detailed information about the effects of being born into a family with a
nonmarried parent. In the late 1990s, researchers at Columbia and Princeton Universities designed
and implemented a large and ongoing national study—the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing
Study (FFCWS; Reichman, Teitler, Garfinkel, and McLanahan, 2001). They interviewed the mar-
ried and nonmarried mothers and fathers of nearly 5,000 children born in hospitals located in 20
large U.S. cities between 1998 and 2000. They tracked families when the children were 1, 3, 5, 9, and
15 years old with interviews as well as assessment of the home environment and the child’s cogni-
tive and emotional development. (As of this writing, data have just been released for children up to
15 years of age; soon, findings from analyses of these more recent data will be available.) Three quar-
ters of the families selected for the nonrandomized study were termed “fragile families”—individuals
or couples who were not married when their children were born. The researchers compared these
fragile families with married families in the study whose children were born during the same time
period in the same hospitals. Their research was directed to understanding the conditions of fragile
families, the nature of the relationships between biological mothers and fathers in fragile families,
the long-term effects on children living in fragile families, and the effects of different policies and
environmental conditions on the stability of fragile families.
Today, the bulk of empirical research on fragile families confirms that children who grow up with
only one biological parent in the home are likely to have lower academic success and more behavior
problems than children living in families with married two biological parents (Waldfogel, Craigie,
and Brooks-Gunn, 2010). When measured at age 5, children born to single-parent households have
higher rates of asthma and obesity, lower cognitive scores, and higher levels of behaviors associated
with social problems.
The effects of living in a single-parent family are not restricted to children. McLanahan and
Percheski (2008) reported that unmarried mothers are poorer and less educated than married moth-
ers. In addition, Waldfogel et al. (2010) reported that compared with married mothers, unmarried
mothers receive less financial and instrumental support from their children’s biological fathers, have
a lower quality coparenting relationship with the child’s father, and are more likely to be stressed
and depressed. Fewer than 3% of unmarried parents have a college degree compared with a third
of the married parents. Parental incarceration rates are also higher in fragile families. By the time
the children were age 5, half the fathers in the fragile families study had been incarcerated at some
point in their child’s lives. Although nonmarried mothers were more disadvantaged than married
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mothers before their pregnancies, preexisting disadvantages did not account fully for deficits in fam-
ily income and maternal mental health mothers experience later in life (Lichter, Graefe, and Brown,
2003: McLanahan, 2004, as cited in Martin and Brooks-Gunn, 2015). Even after statistically adjusting
for income and selection effects (Ryan, 2012), fragile family effects on children’s behavioral problems
remained. Additional research shows that some of the observed effects may have been moderated
by involvement of the biological father and presence of other figures in the child’s life (Waldfogel
et al., 2010).
Single-Parent Families at Risk?

These studies show that children growing up in single-parent families have more problems than
other children, but the majority of children growing up in single-parent families are not more harmed
than children growing up in two-parent families under similar conditions. Most children who grow
up in mother-only families or stepparent families become well-adjusted, productive adults (Solo-
mon-Fears, 2014), and some are truly exceptional (Ford, 2017). Research shows that growing up in
a single-parent family has more positive effects than growing up in a conflict-ridden married family
(Musick and Meier, 2010). At the same time, there is widespread agreement that because children
growing up in single-parent families have statistically higher average scores on problematic child and
parent measures than children in stable two-parent families, they are considered at risk for subsequent
developmental problems.
What is “risk”? To say that a child is “at risk” is a statistical statement, indicating that probabil-
istically speaking, children in single-parent families are more likely to have unfavorable outcomes
or lower scores in comparison to other children. One factor that puts children from single-parent
families at risk is that single-parent families, particularly those composed of single mothers, are dis-
proportionately poor compared with other families (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 2016). Data from
the 2016 census indicate that among children living in a single-parent household, about 38% were
living below the poverty line in 2016 compared with only 11.7% of children living in two-parent
families. As a consequence of poverty alone, many children grow up in deteriorated and danger-
ous neighborhoods, often with inferior housing and educational systems. Although the majority of
children of single-parent families are not living in poverty, the group as a whole is considered at risk
because its poverty rate is higher than those of children living in two-parent families. Similarly, con-
trary to stereotypical views, only about half of single mothers draw funds from government assistance
programs (Grall, 2016; Irving and Loveless, 2015). Among children living with a single-parent father,
about 22% live in poverty (U.S. Census Bureau, 2016). Thus, children living with a single father are
at lower risk than children living with a single mother, but all children living with single parents are
considered “at risk” because their poverty rates are nevertheless higher than children growing up in
two-parent families.
How much of the single-parent risk status is related to poverty and how much of the single-parent
risk status is due to other factors also associated with single-parent families are questions with impor-
tant psychological and social policy implications. Researchers continue to examine other factors in
addition to poverty that provide risk or resilience to children growing up in single-parent families
(Murray and Farrington, 2010; Ryan, 2012; Taylor and Conger, 2014; Waldfogel et al., 2010).
Variations Among Single-Parent Families

To unravel the multiple factors that may be related to our understanding of whether children of
single-parent families are at risk, we need to understand the unifying and divergent characteris-
tics among different kinds of single-parent families. One of the most important characteristics of
single-parent families and their children is their heterogeneity. The phenomenological experience of
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growing up in a single-parent family varies depending on the nature of the family, the experiences
of the parent, and the family context. Single parents may be divorced, widowed, or unmarried; they
may be teenage or older; they may have been previously married or not married. Not surprisingly,
single mothers with the lowest poverty rates are women with full-time year-round employment or
a college degree or higher. Single fathers have been less likely than single mothers to receive public
assistance. Although most single parents are women, the number of male single parents is modestly
increasing. Of the 11 million single-parent families with children under 18 years old, nearly 2.5 mil-
lion are single-father headed households (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 2016).
Differences in how the parents came to be single parents affect the parents’ employment, their
financial circumstances, their relationships with other adults, their involvement with their child, and
their competence as parents. The etiology of the parent’s single parenthood also may have implica-
tions for the child’s perceptions and experiences growing up. For example, imagine that 10 children
from different types of single-parent families are brought together to discuss their experiences. They
would describe many common experiences, such as not having enough money, missing their moth-
ers or fathers, and problems getting along with their mothers and their fathers. These concerns,
however, do not differ substantively from those of children living in all families. Those issues that
are unique to single-parent families are issues for which there are large individual differences across
single-parent families. Depending on their age, children with nonmarried, cohabiting parents may
not notice any differences between their families and other families in their neighborhood, but they
may wonder why their parents are not married and they may worry that their parents may not stay
together. Children of recently divorced single-parent families might talk of anger at their parents’
separation, of fights between mother and father over custody and child support, and about what hap-
pens on dad’s day for visitation (Ganong, Coleman, and McCalle, 2012). Some single-family children
of divorce may wonder why their parents are no longer living together; others may be relieved to be
free finally from the marital discord. Children of adolescent single mothers may have difficulty with
mothers’ inexperienced and immature ways and wonder when she will ever finish going to school,
whereas children of widowed single parents may be mourning their parent’s loss. Children of some
nonmarried mothers may wonder about their father, who he is, what he is like, and where he is.
Some children may be confused about who their fathers are, and why they are not around, whereas
other children, albeit a minority, may be learning to live without a mother. Some children may feel
isolated and alone, whereas others are living in cramped households, with not too much in the way
of material goods but with plenty of people to be with and love. Some children may not see their
single-parent family as unusual at all, because many children in their neighborhood live in a family
with only one parent present. Researchers need to unravel these various psychological experiences
to understand what it is about the single-parent family that might contribute to the at-risk status of
these children and what variables might serve as protective factors.
These issues are our foci in this chapter: To describe similarities and differences across parenting
situations in single-parent families and to explore some of the parenting factors that might or might
not place children growing up in single families at risk. In the first section, we consider the chang-
ing demographics of single-parent families over the past several decades. We show that not only is
the number of single-parent families increasing, but also the circumstances that are responsible for
the formation of single-parent families—divorce and separation, widowhood, and out-of-marriage
births—are changing, too. In the next section, we summarize the literature on parenting in com-
mon types of single-parent families—adolescent parents, not-married single mothers, single-parent
fathers, and divorced custodial mothers and divorced fathers. Our intent is to identify parenting
features both unique to these specific single-parent family types and common to single parents as a
group. We suggest that single-parent families that arise from different circumstances differ in a num-
ber of important ways, and these differences need to be considered before any understanding of the
more general effects of rearing children in a single-parent family is attained. In the third section, on
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the basis of these findings, we advance a model of single parenting that offers suggestions for public
policy and intervention. In the fourth section, we consider research directions that appear to be
especially promising. In the final section, we consider with a broad brush directions for public policy.
Demographic Changes in Single-Parent Family Formation

The distribution of the types of single-parent families has changed dramatically from that of previous
decades (Amato, 2000; Goldscheider, Bernhardt, and Lappegård, 2015; Kennedy and Bumpass, 2008).
Whereas in the 1970s, most single-parent families were created by divorce or separation, census data
indicate the proportion of single-parent children living in a family created by divorce or separation
has continually declined—from 86% of all single-parent families in 1970, to 73% in 1990, to 58% in
1997, to only 45% in 2015. Also declining, from 5% in 1997 to 3.9% in 2015, is the proportion of
children living in single-parent families created by the death of a parent (U.S. Census Bureau, 2015).
The most significant change is the increase in single-parent families headed by a never-married
parent (Mather, 2010). This group increased from approximately 6% of all single-mother families in
1970, to 26% in 1990, to 37% in 1997, and to 46% in 2017 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2017). This increase
in the proportion of children living in a home with a never-married mother is partly a function of
the decrease in the proportion of single-parent families created by divorce, separation, or the death of
a parent and largely due to the decrease in the birthrate among married women.
In 2015, 41% of single parents (both single mothers and single fathers) were never married, 22%
of single parents were separated, 27.5% of single parents were divorced, 8% of single parents were
widowed, and nearly 5% of single parents had a married spouse who was absent (U.S. Bureau of the
Census, 2017). Figure 8.3 showed the information for children living alone with their mother, and
Figure 8.4 shows the corresponding information for children living alone with their father. About
half the children in single-mother families had a mother who was never married (49%), and 42% of
children who lived in a single-parent household had parents who are divorced or separated. About
4.8 million children (28%) lived with a divorced single mother, and about 2.3 million children
(14%) lived with a separated single mother. Among children living with a single father, 1.2 million
lived with a divorced single father (46%), 842,000 lived with a nonmarried, single father (31%), and
351,000 lived with a separated, single father (13%).
Married spouse absent Widowed Divorced Separated Never married
Figure 8.3 Living arrangements of children under 18 years living with mother only, 2015
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2015
277
Married spouse absent Widowed Divorced Separated Never married
Figure 8.4 Living arrangements of children under 18 years living with father only, 2015
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2015
Yet children born to never-married mothers are not technically living in “single-parent families”;
all these children have two biological parents, and many of them see both parents and have both par-
ents in their lives, just often not at the same time. Even more important, many children categorized as
living in single-parent families are living with both their biological parents; it is just that these parents
are not married. Many of what are considered single-parent families are really two-parent, cohabit-
ing, nonmarried parent families. In 2015, 40.3% of births to unmarried women were to cohabiting
parents (National Survey of Family Growth, 2015). (We describe the special circumstances of cohab-
iting parents later in this chapter.)
Increasing Percentage of Births to Unmarried Mothers

The increase in the number of single-parent families headed by unmarried mothers is a result of dra-
matic fluctuations in the numbers of births and birthrates both to nonmarried and married women.
In the 1960s, nonmarital births averaged 285,600 per year. This number quadrupled over the next
two decades to approximately 1.1 million by 1990 and peaked in 1994 at nearly 1.3 million. Non-
marital births have leveled off since peaking in 2007 and 2008; since then, the nonmarital birthrate
has been relatively stable.
Although nonmarital birthrates have fallen or leveled off, the percentage of nonmarital births as
a proportion of all births continues to increase. That is, the proportion of unmarried women’s births
to births to all women (both married and nonmarried) has been increasing. In 2015, the percentage
of unmarried women’s births as a percentage of all births was 40.3%. For a number of reasons—
increased employment, delayed marriage, reduced likelihood of marriage, and delayed childbear-
ing, single motherhood has increased most dramatically among affluent and well-educated women.
A 2016 Child Trends report (Child Trends, 2016) attributes the rising percentages of nonmarital
births to two important changes. First, there has been a large increase in the number of unmarried
women in the childbearing years, and, second, there has been a 40% decrease in birthrates for mar-
ried women since 1940. These factors combine to show a dramatic rise in the percentage of births to
unmarried women over all births. In addition, the marriage rates have also steadily decreased. In the
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span of 14 years, the rate fell from 8.2 marriages in 2000 to 6.9 marriages in 2014 (National Center
for Health Statistics, 2017).
Ethnic differences in premarital births persist, but the changes over time differ for different groups.
Premarital births have been more common among African American women than among women
from other ethnic groups since at least the early 1960s. In 2013, 71% of all African American births
were to unmarried women while 66% of all American Indians or Alaskan Native were to unmar-
ried women, 53% of all births to Latinas were to unmarried women, 29.3% of all White American
births were to nonmarried women, and 17% of all Asian American births were to unmarried women.
While responsibility for the increase in the number of and percentage of premarital births has been
shared across groups, African American and Latina women have had the largest decrease in the per-
centages of births outside of marriages over the last few years. In 2002, Latinas had their highest
nonmarital birthrate (87 per 1,000); this rate increased 4 years later in 2007 (102 per 1,000), but later
decreased 28% by 2012 (73 per 1,000) (Curtin, Ventura, and Martinez, 2014).
The rising incidence of births outside of marriage has been particularly dramatic among White
American, more educated, older, and mothers in managerial and professional occupations. In 2007,
births to unmarried mothers with at least a bachelor’s degree accounted for 2.2% of all births; by
2015, births to unmarried mothers with at least a bachelor’s degree accounted for 7.2% of births
(U.S. Census Bureau, 2017). For professional or managerial mothers, the percentages more than
doubled from 3.1% in 1980 to 8.2% in 1990. According to Bachu (1998), the “propensity to marry,”
that is the tendency to avoid a nonmarital birth with a forced marriage, decreased most dramati-
cally for White American women by over 30% from the 1930s to the 1990s. The desire to marry to
avoid birth before marriage has historically been lower for African American women than for White
American women, but this propensity to marry has also decreased for African American women over
time (Bachu, 1998; Cherlin, 1998). The statistics of the declining propensity to marry partially reflect
the abating stigma associated with a nonmarital birth, the concurrent financial gains women have
made, and the declining popular interest in marriage. For low-income women in general, that there
are fewer eligible or appealing men to marry has also fueled the declining marriage rate (Cherlin,
1998; Edin and Kefalas, 2006).
Perhaps the most dramatic change in the nature of single-parent births has been changes in the
proportion of births as a function of mothers’ age and changes in the birthrates of women at dif-
ferent ages. As Figure 8.5 shows, the distribution of births to unmarried women have differentially
increased by age group. In 1970, unmarried women who were under 20 years old accounted for
approximately 50% of all births to unmarried women, unmarried women ages 20–24 accounted for
32% of all births to unmarried women, unmarried women ages 25–29 accounted for 10% of all births
to unmarried women, unmarried women ages 30–34 accounted for 5% of all births to unmarried
women, and unmarried women over 35 years accounted for 3% of all births to unmarried women.
In 2015, unmarried women who were under 20 years old accounted for only 13% of all births
to unmarried women, unmarried women ages 20–24 accounted for 35% of all births to unmar-
ried women, unmarried women ages 25–29 accounted for 27% of all births to unmarried women,
unmarried women ages 30–34 accounted for 16% of all births to unmarried women, unmarried
women over 35 years accounted for 9% of all births to unmarried women. Thus, the percentage of
births to adolescent women went from 50% in 1970 to only 13% in 2015, whereas the percentage of
births to women over age 30 went from 8% to 25%.
Figure 8.5 shows the changes in the birthrates to unmarried women at different ages. The non-
marital birthrate is the number of nonmarital births per 1,000 unmarried women. Although teen
birthrates have fallen for all population groups, the drop in teen birthrates has been sharpest for
African American women and Latinas (Hamilton, Martin, Osterman, Curtin, and Mathews, 2015).
Between 2006 and 2014, births to all American teenagers dropped more than 40%, and declines
in births among Latina American and African American teens declined 51% and 44%, respectively.
279
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
1970 1972 1974 1976 1978 1980 1982 1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014
Less than 20 Years 20-24 years 25-29 years 30-34 years 35+ years
Figure 8.5 Percent distribution of births to unmarried women by age group: United States 1970–2015
However, birthrates among African American and Latina American teens remain twice as high as the
rates for White American teens. The percentage of women over 30 having children out of marriage
is growing (Curtin et al., 2014). Rates rose for all age groups over age 30, reaching a historic peak
for women ages 30–34 in 2016 (Martin, Ryan, Riina, and Brooks-Gunn, 2017). Overall, the age of
single mothers has increased over the last several decades. In 2014, nearly 40% of single mothers were
over 40 years old (Grall, 2016).
Clear differences in birthrates exist as a function of education, income, and parity (Shattuck and
Kreider, 2013). Women with less education are much more likely to have a nonmarital birth than
women with college degrees. For example, in 2011, 57% of the nonmarital births were to women
who had not yet completed high school, and only 9% were to women who had completed college.
Nearly half of the never-married mothers in 2012 had incomes below the poverty level, and only
19.8% had incomes above $50,000 (Solomon Fears, 2014). Most people think births to single moth-
ers are first and only births, but Child Trends (2011) reported that more than half of nonmarital
births were to mothers who already have one previous child.
Single-Parent Families Created by Adoption

The number of single parents, both male and female, who adopted children increased in the 1980s
(Groze, 1991), but these percentages have remained small ever since (National Survey of Family
Growth, 2015). In 2002, 1.1% of all females ages 18–44 had ever adopted a child. In 2006, slightly less
than 1% had ever adopted a child; in 2015, about .7% or 400,000 women between the ages of 18 and
44 had ever adopted a child. It appears that the number of single parents who adopt children is still
low compared with the number of single-parent households in the general population (Groza, 1996).
Shireman (1995, 1996) and others (Feigelman and Silverman, 1977; Shireman and Johnson, 1976)
have suggested that most single-parent adoptions are to women, and when single parents adopt, they
tend to adopt children of the same gender as themselves. Adoptions by single fathers are still uncom-
mon. Perhaps as a consequence of the fact that most single adoptive parents are women, single-parent
adoptive families tend to have lower incomes than dual-parent adoptive families (Groze, 1991; Shire-
man, 1996; Shireman and Johnson, 1976).
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Single Parenthood
African American Families

Although the dramatic increase in the percentage of single-parent families pervades all social strata
and ethnic groups, the preponderance of single-parent families in African American homes requires
special attention (McLoyd, 1990). Overall, there are more White American children reared in single-
parent homes than there are African American children reared in single-parent homes. However, an
African American child has a higher probability of growing up in a single-parent home than a White
American child because there is a higher incidence of single parenthood among African American
households than among White households.
That a higher proportion of African American children are born to unmarried mothers than is
the case for other American families reflects historical trends concerning marriage and childbearing
(Dixon, 2009). Over the last few decades, the marriage rate among African Americans has declined
significantly. In 1970, 64% of African American women were married; by 2004, only 32% were
married. In 1970, nearly 95% of African Americans had ever been married at ages 40–44; by 2012,
that figure was closer to 60% (Raley, Sweeney, and Wondra, 2015). Increasingly, African American
women are less likely to marry or remarry than are African American men or women from other
ethnic groups (Hurt, McElroy, Sheats, Landor, and Bryant, 2014). Also, African Americans are more
likely to get divorced or separated than White Americans. The declining marriage rate among Afri-
can Americans, according to Cherlin (1998, p. 56) could be accounted for by the “inseparable web
of society-wide cultural change, the African American cultural heritage, and worsening economic
constraints.” More recently, Coates (2015) attributed the declining marriage rate to increasing incar-
ceration rates and complications related to incarceration (see Dallaire, 2019). Additional, and often
related, reasons include economic instabilities of men and women, concerns about trust, pain from
past relationships, and feelings of not being ready for marriage (Edin and Kefalas, 2006; Levine, 2013).
Some observers report that many women are happy not to be married, mainly as a result of conflict-
ing messages from their elders and their communities about the untrustworthiness of partners and
the importance in the African American community for women to be self-reliant and independent
(Boyd-Franklin and Franklin, 1998). Chronic and increasing male unemployment and the low ratio
of male to female wages have made African American women less likely to marry and less tolerant
of unsatisfactory relationships.
Long-standing cultural traditions stemming from African styles of family life, specifically the
greater emphasis on ties to a network of kin that extend across households (Garcia-Coll, Meyer,
and Brillon, 1995), have also contributed to a reduced emphasis on marriage as the foundation of
family life. The influence of the history of slavery as contributing to the higher incidence of Afri-
can American single-parent families has been refuted (Chafe, 2015). Contrary to stereotypes, the
dramatic increase in the number of African American single-parent families appears to be largely a
response to the nature of the U.S. economy rather than a contributor to social or economic prob-
lems. Although economic problems contribute to higher rates of single-parent families in the African
American community, the processes by which these economic factors influence parenting behavior
within single-parent African American (McLoyd, Jayaratne, Ceballo, and Borquez, 1994) and two-
parent White American (Conger, Ge, Elder, Lorenz, and Simons, 1994) families appear to be similar.
For those women and men who wish to marry, there are significant barriers to marriage, includ-
ing structural inequalities in education and employment as well as unfavorable sex-ratios (Harknett
and McLanahan, 2004) in the marriage market. This is particularly true in families of color, largely
but not exclusively due to the large number of incarcerated minority men (Clayton and Moore,
2003; Coates, 2015; Dallaire, 2019; Lane, 2004) and the high rates of mortality and morbidity among
African American males (as cited in Hurt et al., 2014). According to Western and McLanahan
(2000), “the expansion of the penal system over the last two decades emerges as a key suspect in
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explaining the growing number of single-parent families in disadvantaged communities” (p. 2). At

the same time, the incarceration rate for women and mothers has increased (Dallaire, 2019). Incar-
ceration has direct effects on reducing individuals’ availability to live with their families, and indirect
effects by reducing parents’ employment prospects, earning capacity, and relationship skills.
Growing since the 1970s has been the trend for women’s reduced reliance on men for eco-
nomic support. With increasing economic equality and opportunities in the workforce, women find
themselves less likely to marry for financial stability than ever before (Hertz, 2006). This seems to
be especially true in the African American community, as Hurt et al. (2014) illustrated from their
in-depth interviews with a sample of African American married men who completed the Program
for Strong African American Marriages. There are also micro-level factors and difficulties with inter-
personal trust that impact African American marital rates, some of which have been traced back to
gender relationships, communication difficulties, and confusion about gender roles between African
American men and women, issues that relate back to conditions of discrimination generations ago
(Pinderhughes, 2002). Consequently, it is not surprising that in two early samples of married and
unmarried parents from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (Western and McLanahan,
2000), half the unmarried mothers were African American compared with just 16% of the married
mothers. Among fathers, African Americans constituted half the unmarried sample (48%) and only
14.9% of the married sample.
Cohabiting Families
Single parents have been defined as parents who are not married. However, not all single parents are
“single.” In fact, most children classified on their birth certificates as being born to single parents are
really born to cohabiting couples, a man and a woman who are living together but not married and
often are the child’s biological parents. Because the birth certificate lists the mother as not married,
the child is listed in Census Bureau statistics as single. The FFCWS project found that 82% of the
unmarried mothers in their study were romantically involved at the time of the child’s birth and
optimistic about their future together with the child’s biological father. Mothers reported relatively
high levels of relationship quality, and about half were living together and had hopes of getting mar-
ried. More than 80% of unmarried fathers provided support to the mother during pregnancy, and
more than 70% of the fathers visited the mother and the baby in the hospital. The majority of fathers
said they wanted to help rear their child (Edin, Kefalas, and Reed, 2004).
These findings raise important questions about what it means to talk about being a “single-
parent” or “growing up in a single-parent family.” The rising rates of single parenthood are not about
an increasing number of single parents rearing children alone; they are about having and rearing a
child outside of marriage. The FFCWS uses the term “fragile families” to identify these families.
Child Trends (2015) reported that between 2006 and 2010, 58% of unmarried births were to cohab-
iting parents. Thus, the majority of children born to single mothers live especially during infancy
with both of their biological parents who are not married to each other. Of those children who
are born to single mothers who are not married and also not cohabiting, many mothers arrange for
non-cohabiting biological dads or for “social dads” (fathers not biologically related to the child) to
coparent the child to ensure the child’s optimal development (Hertz, 2006).
In the FFCWS study, using data collected in 1998–2000, 72% of the unmarried mothers and 90%
of the unmarried fathers at the time of the child’s birth said that they had a 50/50 chance of getting
married. The majority (65% of mothers and 78% of fathers) said that they believed that marriage
is better for children than growing up in a single-parent home. Many studies show that support for
marriage is high within all ethnic groups; both cohabiting parents and unmarried parents seem to be
as “enthusiastic” for marriage as other members of the general population.
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Single Parenthood
So why don’t parents get married? First, it is important to note that the United States is not
unique in this regard. According to Garrison (2007), marriage is in decline all over the industrialized
world. A 2016 report from the OECD noted that living with two cohabiting parents is becoming
increasingly common across all countries (Eurostat, 2015). The share of children living with two
married parents decreased between 2005 and 2014, from 72.3% to 67.1%, whereas the share of chil-
dren living in households with sole parents stayed relatively stable, and the proportion of children
living with cohabiting parents increased from 10.3% in 2005 to 15.2% in 2014. In other words, the
average share of children living with two cohabiting parents increased by almost 50% in the years
between 2005 and 2014. Compared to all other OECD countries, the United States was among the
lowest, with 5% of all children living with two cohabiting parents, and the U.S. increase from 2005
was about a third smaller increase than that of most other countries. In the United States, marriage
rates declined more in African Americans than White Americans (Garrison, 2007). Another con-
tributing factor to the increase in the percentage of cohabiting couples is the decrease in the rate of
childbearing of married couples (Heuveline and Timberlake, 2004).
Observers have offered a number of explanations for why children’s biological parents do not
marry. First among these reasons for not marrying before or after the birth of a child are financial rea-
sons. Economic researchers have shown that higher male earnings and possibilities for future wages
are positively associated with marriage; marriage rates decline during periods of low employment
and earnings (Garrison, 2007). Interviews with new parents corroborate these economic concerns.
According to Cherlin (2004), many adults believe that it is important to be “economically set before
you get married” (p. 856).
Some observers and researchers have suggested that parents’ over-idealization of marriage is par-
tially responsible for delaying marriage until after childbirth. Parents interviewed for the FFCWS
project reported that they wanted to postpone marriage until they could afford a nice wedding a
house or a good job (McLanahan, Garfinkel, Reichman, and Teitler, 2001; Waldfogel et al., 2010). In
a Pew Research Center report of survey data collected in the summer of 2017, many never-married
adults (59%) said that they were not married because they had not found the right person, but many
also cited financial reasons (41%) for not marrying. Never-married adults of color (48%) were more
likely than White American (33%) to say a major reason they were not married is that they were not
financially stable (Parker and Stepler, 2017).
In her book Ain’t No Trust, sociologist Judith Levine (2013) describes yet another perspective
on low-income mothers’ unwillingness to marry. Levine’s in-depth interviews show how mothers’
experiences with partners’ failures as economic contributors, as emotional supports, as fathers, and as
sexually loyal partners contributed to a pervasive distrust of men and unwillingness to form lasting
unions with the fathers of their children.
Public opinion and attitudes toward marriage, cohabitation, and childbearing are shifting (Gar-
rison, 2004) as cohabitation for many people, even those who are not yet parents, becomes more
common. According to the 2006–2010 National Survey of Family Growth (Copen, Daniels, and
Mosher, 2013), by age 30, 74% of women had lived with a male partner without being married to
him. Trends have changed from marrying before pregnancy, to marrying as a result of pregnancy, to
becoming pregnant and not marrying (Wildsmith, Steward-Streng, Manlove, 2011). “Shotgun mar-
riages” (marriages which are triggered by pregnancy), which were common in the 1950s, are less
common today (Bachu, 1998). What has occurred is “de-linking of marriage and having children”
(Roberts, 2007, as cited in Solomon Fears, 2014).
Although some have attributed the rise in births to nonmarried women to increased sexual
activity outside of marriage, participation in risky behaviors that often lead to sex, and improper use
of contraceptive methods, many observers have pointed to the lack of a marriageable partner. This
is especially true for African American women who have highest rate of nonmarital births. Some
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researchers have attributed the high rate of births in unmarried African American women to a
shortage of marriageable African American men. Demographically speaking, there are wider differ-
ences in the numbers of unmarried males for each unmarried African American female compared
with other groups (Carlson, McLanahan, and England, 2004). For example, in 2012 (Solomon Fears,
2014), for every 100 African American females, there were only 75 unmarried males; for every 100
White American women, there were 88 White American men. If the number of desirable p artners—
men with steady jobs, men without a criminal record, and heterosexual men, for example, is included,
the ratio of marriageable men to women is further reduced, and differences among ethnic groups
increased
Single-Father Families
A small group of single-parent families that has shown increases, especially in the past decades, is sin-
gle-father families. Approximately 17% of all single-parent families in 2012 were headed by fathers,
up one-third since 1990, and three times the number of single-father families in 1970 (Livingston,
2013a). Compared with single-parent families headed by mothers, single-parent families headed by
fathers are more often created by circumstances of divorce, and the fathers are more likely to be
employed and less likely to be economically disadvantaged. Single-parent fathers are more likely to
have custody of older children, more likely to be older, more likely to be living with a cohabiting
partner, and more likely be of White American background than single-parent mothers (Livingston,
2013b). Reasons for fathers becoming single parents have also changed. Instead of becoming single
parents from widowhood, as was common around the turn of the twentieth century, most fathers,
and most single parents in general, are becoming single parents because of divorce or separation or
are assuming responsibility for the child from a nonmarital birth (Amato, 2000). More important, the
gap between single fathers who are divorced and single-parent fathers who have never been married
is narrowing. The fastest growing group of single-parent fathers living with their children includes
single-parent fathers who have never been married. About half of these fathers are living without a
cohabiting partner, whereas about 40% are living with a nonmarital partner and about 10% are mar-
ried but living apart from their spouse (Livingston, 2013b).
Summary
There is great heterogeneity across single-parent families with regard to the conditions that lead to
their formation. Unlike 50 years ago, when the preponderance of single-parent families had been
created from situations of divorce and widowhood, today nearly one half of the single parents were
not married when they became parents. Nonmarried mothers today are more likely to be older
and better educated than previous single-parent mothers. Increasingly, single fathers are becom-
ing primary custodial parents. In the next section, we examine the unique features of each of these
single-parent family types to better understand why it may be misleading to generalize across all
single-parent families in describing parenting circumstances and parenting behaviors.
Similarities and Differences Across Different Types

of Single-Parent Families
We begin this section by examining the circumstances common across single-parent families, and
then we examine the special cases of single parents in different situations. We start with single parents
who are considered single parents because they are not married at the time of their child’s birth.
These parents include most teen parents, single parents living in a cohabiting situation, and single-
parent fathers. Then we address the issue of older unmarried parents and mothers who are identified
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as “single-parent by choice,” lone parents, or solo parents. In the final section, we describe the special
circumstances of divorced single-parent families. Because of the small percentages of single-mother
families created by widowhood, and the dearth of new findings in this area, we do not discuss single
mothers by widowhood.
Overview of Families With Single Parents

Compared with married parent families, families with a single-parent are more likely to experience
poverty (U.S. Census, 2016), stress (Taylor and Conger, 2014) and lower levels of social support
(Taylor and Conger, 2017). Single mothers are also more likely to be younger and less educated
than married mothers (Cairney, Boyle, Offord, and Racine, 2003). Single mothers are more socially
isolated than other parents. They work longer hours, receive fewer emotional and tangible supports,
and have less stable social networks (Harknett and Harknett, 2011). Single mothers are more likely to
report that their own parents had alcohol, drug, and depression problems, and they also report higher
rates of childhood abuse than married mothers (Lipman, MacMillan, and Boyle, 2001). These prob-
lems may contribute to difficulties in developing and maintaining a committed, long-term relation-
ship with a parenting partner, especially because available marriage partners are subject to the same
poverty, low education, and mental health problems (Lahey, Hartdagen, Frick, McBurnett, Connor,
and Hynd, 1988). More educated, emotionally stable, and financially able women also become single
mothers, often planning to address romantic needs later after parenthood.
Special Cases: Parents Who Are Single at the Birth of Their Child
Teen Mothers
In the 1940s and 1950s, teen birthrates were much higher than they are today, but they were mostly
in the context of marriage (Razza, Martin, and Brooks-Gunn, 2015). Births to teen mothers were
not recognized as a national problem until the 1980s, when births to unmarried teens began to rise
and researchers began to report on poor academic and behavioral outcomes in children growing up
in single-parent families (McLanahan and Sandefur, 1994). Since 1991, birthrates for women in their
adolescent years have been declining. Birthrates to teens have fallen by more than half since 1995,
and they continue to drop. Birthrates declined 9% from 2014 to 2015 for teenagers ages 15–19 (to
20.2 per 1,000 in 2015; Martin et al., 2017). These reductions have been attributed to decreased lev-
els of sexual activity, increased use of contraception among teens, increased availability of abortions
(Schneider, 2017), and increases in educational attainment (Erdmans and Black, 2015). As a result,
researchers are paying less attention to teenage births today and more attention to unmarried births
in general.
Despite the downturn in teen birthrates, a 2004 national poll showed that 79% of adults judged
teenage pregnancy a very serious or important problem for the United States (Erdmans and Black,
2015). This public concern is warranted because, as Martin and Brooks-Gunn (2015, p. 734) noted,
teen mothers “face more difficulties than unmarried adult mothers due to their developmental status,
education, living arrangements, and long-term prospects for work.”
Unmarried teen mothers come from more disadvantaged segments of the population in terms
of social class, ethnicity, and geographic location. Demographic research reviewed by Erdmans and
Black (2015) shows that teenage pregnancy is especially affected by chronic exposure to neighbor-
hood poverty, especially in adolescence. Data from the 2001 to 2002 ECLS-B shows that about half
of all teenage mothers lived below the federal poverty line compared with one fifth of older mothers,
and more than half (56%) of the infants in poverty lived with a mother who had been a teen mother
(Halle et al., 2009). In the United States, teenage birthrates are highest for states in the South and
285
Southwest and lowest for states in the Northeast and Midwest. Teen birthrates are highest for Latina
and African American teens, nearly double those for White American teens. Native Americans fall
between African Americans and White Americans; Asian American teen births have the lowest teen
birthrates.
Higher religiosity and limited access to family planning are associated with higher rates of teen-
age pregnancy.
With data aggregated at the state level, conservative religious beliefs strongly predict U.S.
teen birth rates, in a relationship that does not appear to be the result of confounding by
income or abortion rates. One possible explanation for this relationship is that teens in
more religious communities may be less likely to use contraception.
(Strayhorn and Strayhorn, 2009, p. 6)
The effects of teen mother parenting on the child depend on whether the pregnancy was intended
or wanted (East, Chien, and Barber, 2012, as cited in Erdmans and Black, 2015). Martin and Brooks-
Gunn (2015) quoted findings from Mosher, Jones, and Abma (2012) that a greater proportion of
teenagers’ births than older women’s births are unintended, and teenage mothers are less likely than
older mothers to get prenatal care. Teenage parenting is often less than optimal. Razza et al. (2015)
cite research showing that adolescent mothers are more punitive, less sensitive, and less stimulating as
parents with their young children than older mothers. However, for those mothers in neighborhood
cultures where teenage pregnancy is more accepted, the effects of teenage parenting can sometimes
be positive (Ford, 2017). At the same time, grandparent circumstances and the relationships between
the mother, the biological and social father, and the grandparent can either ameliorate or complicate
teenage parenting effects (Muzik et al., 2016; Scannapieco and Connell-Carrick, 2016).
Previous research had suggested that teenage pregnancy was associated with lower educational
outcomes for the teenage mothers, but more recent research shows that it is educational disengage-
ment prior to pregnancy that contributes to teenage pregnancy. Teenage motherhood, in general,
may be more of an outcome than a contributor to poverty and the chaos that accompanies it.
According to interviews with teenage mothers (Erdmans and Black, 2015), limited economic and
social options along with the “life worlds of chaos”—including violence, abuse, risky neighborhood
and inequalities—contribute to teenage motherhood and other kinds of risks. As Erdmans and Black
(2015) explained, motherhood can motivate a young woman to become a good mother, increase
her education, and get a good job, but the limited resources and unreliable social supports available
to many teenage mothers make motherhood very difficult. That some young women succeed under
these difficult circumstances shows the complexity and importance of understanding teenage moth-
erhood and its effects.
In Telling Our Stories, Culturally Different Adults Reflect On Growing Up In Single-Parent Families
(Ford, 2017), successful African American professionals who grew up in single-parent families share
their personal stories to counter the prevailing stories of failure and defeat they heard growing up.
Mostly university professors and administrators, high school counselors and teachers, these individu-
als talk about how it felt to be seen by society as “inferior” for having come from single-parent
homes, and they describe how they had to consciously defy these expectations. Some felt different
because friends and neighbors came from middle class, two-parent families, but most reported feeling
normal—others around them had similar family and economic situations. In contrast to the instabil-
ity and uncertainty they experienced as a result of poverty, they describe hardworking mothers and
tight kinship communities who were there to support them when they needed help, creating in them
a sense of hope and an expectation that obstacles posed by poverty could be overcome. For their
professional success, they credit their mothers’ model of hard work, provision of unconditional love,
and high academic expectations. For their personal success, they cite their mothers’ strong spiritual
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Single Parenthood
and moral guidance and her expectation that they take responsibility for themselves and other family
members at an early age.
Research using propensity score matching has shown that most of the consequences of teenage
single parenthood are not as negative as previously thought (Erdmans and Black, 2015). Using data
from the FFCWS, Waldfogel et al. (2010) found that the association between teenage parenthood,
lower academic scores, and increased behavior problems was moderated by father involvement. They
also found that most of the negative outcomes of being a single-parent or growing up in single-
parent families derive from the social disadvantages experienced before the teenagers became moth-
ers. Difficulties in accessing education and job training, already challenging for low-income women,
pose even greater challenges for teenagers, and even greater challenges for teenagers who find them-
selves caring for an infant or young child.
One factor that several authors have noted that amplifies the problems of teenage parenthood is
having multiple partners. Partly as a function of their longer reproductive lives after their first baby,
and partly as a function of their youth and immaturity, having multiple partners is more likely for
single mothers who have their first baby as teens. Thus, it is no surprise that teenage parents are more
likely than any other group of single mothers to have multiple pregnancies over the course of their
lives with other partners after their first (Carlson and Furstenberg, 2006).
Single Parents in Cohabiting Relationships

Most births to single mothers are not to families with a single mother, but to cohabiting parental
partners—biological mothers and fathers who are often living together but not married. Women
included in the statistical reports of women unmarried at childbirth include those who are unmar-
ried but living with a partner in an extralegal relationship. Although many of these couples are com-
posed of a man and woman, some are also same-gender pairs (Patterson, 1992).
Cohabiting parent families can be of two types. One type is a household in which both parents
are the child’s biological parents not married to each other, and the second type is one in which
only one parent is the child’s biological parent. The number and percentage of births to biologi-
cal parents not married to each other increased between the early 1980s when the percentage was
about 6%, and the early 2000s, when the percentage increased to about 25%. This type of cohabiting
families, characteristic of the families studied in the Eiduson and Weisner (1978) and FFCWS studies
described ahead, is estimated to be about 43% of all cohabiting families, and the rate has remained
stable (Manning, Brown, and Stykes, 2016).
Early research on cohabiting couples, conducted by Eiduson and Weisner (1978) and Weisner
and Garnier (1992), focused on “social contract” or “unmarried couples by choice” in their study
of nonconventional family lifestyles of the 1970s. Generally, these were women and men who were
experimenting with living together. Eiduson (1983) reported that the circumstances of unmarried
mothers living with male partners were similar to those of married women except that their partner-
ships tended to be more unstable and the values and beliefs about childrearing authority relationships
and morality were less traditional. Compared with married couples and their children, these mothers
and their children experienced relatively more frequent changes in their household composition,
lived on lower and more unpredictable incomes, and often faced various social stigmas, such as lower
teacher expectations (Weisner and Garnier, 1992). Regardless of these potential risks, Weisner and
Garnier noted that when parents from nonconventional lifestyles had a strong commitment to their
chosen family style, their children did not differ from children living in more traditional families on
measures of adjustment and school performance.
More recent data comes from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (https://fragile-
families.princeton.edu/), a study that followed a large sample of unmarried mothers, married moth-
ers, and cohabiting families from the time of childbirth. At the time of their child’s birth, about half
287
of the non-cohabiting mothers, a third of unmarried cohabiting mothers and fathers, 13% of the
married men, and 14% of the married women were poor. Compared with married partner families
in the FFCWS study, cohabiting parents were more likely to have started parenting in their teens
and to have had children with other partners, more likely to be depressed and substance abusing, and
more likely to have spent time in jail than parents from married couples. Fewer than 3% of cohabit-
ing parents had a college degree, compared with a third of the married parents. Parents in cohabiting
families went on to have higher rates of incarceration than parents in married families. By the time
the children were age 5, half the fathers in these fragile families had been incarcerated at some point
in their child’s lives. Compared with married mothers, cohabiting mothers were less likely to engage
their children in literacy activities and more likely to use harsh discipline and have less stable home
routines, such as regular mealtimes and bedtimes (Geller, Jaeger, and Pace, 2018).
Most single parents in the FFCWS had high hopes of eventually marrying their child’s biological
parent, but they were not successful in either marrying or establishing long-term coparenting rela-
tionships (McLanahan and Sawhill, 2015). Despite the romantic inclinations of many of the unmar-
ried parents, these relationships were less than ideal. At the interview in the hospital after the child’s
birth, “9% of the unmarried mothers reported being ‘hit, slapped, or seriously hurt’ by the father,
compared to three percent of married mothers” (RWJF Program Results Report, 2014). Nearly half
the cohabiting others and almost 80% of the non-cohabiting unmarried mothers had ended their
relationship with their child’s father by the time their children were 3 years old (McLanahan, 2004).
Five years after the birth of their child, only 35% of the unmarried FFCWS couples were still living
together, and fewer than half were married.
In the general population also, the longevity of cohabiting unions is lower than that of traditional
marriages. Solomon Fears (2014) reported several sources showing that the median duration of the
first premarital cohabitation among women ages 15–44 was about 22 months; the median length of
marriage before divorce was 8 years. Bumpass and Lu (2000) estimated that the median length of
time children spent living with a cohabiting parent (1.5 years) is considerably less than the 11.5 years
living with married parents (including stepparents).
A second type of cohabiting parent family is one in which children live with one biological par-
ent, mother or father, and the parent’s partner who is not the child’s biological parent. Manning and
Brown (2013) report that 56% of children live in this second type of cohabiting parent family. These
families are often more complex than other families, because they often include half or stepsiblings
and the children are often older than in married parent families. The effects on the child of living
in a stepparent cohabiting family depend on the child’s age, with more negative effects for younger
children.
Observers concur that across all cohabiting families, the biggest problem with cohabitation is fam-
ily instability. It is family instability that is associated with poorer child outcomes and poorer parent-
ing behaviors (Cooper, McLanahan, Meadows, and Brooks-Gunn, 2009; Meadows, McLanahan, and
Brooks-Gunn, 2008; Mitchell et al., 2015). Evidence suggests that both coresidential and dating tran-
sitions are associated with higher levels of maternal stress and harsh parenting (Beck, Cooper, McLa-
nahan, and Brooks-Gunn, 2010). Stable cohabiting families with two biological parents do not appear
to differ from married biological parent families in the benefits that they provide to their children
(Manning et al., 2016), but evidence suggests that married mothers report better mental and physi-
cal health than unmarried cohabiting mothers the year after children’s birth (Meadows et al., 2008).
Not surprisingly, predictors of relationship instability include poverty, multiple parent fertility,
depression, and substance abuse (McLanahan and Carlson, 2004). Men with multiple partner fertil-
ity or depression are likely to become absent fathers. Families separate when the mother and father
report different levels of stress, if the mother has had children with other fathers prior to this child, if
the mother had been receiving public assistance before the child’s birth, and if the mother but not the
father regularly attends religious services. Separation is more likely if the family is African American
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than if the family is White American, and least likely if the parents are Latina. Families are more
likely to be stable if the father has higher income or is abusing drugs, and families are more likely to
be stable if father attends religious services and mother does not or if neither parent attends services.
Family stability does not appear to be related to child gender, but if the child has a disability, it is less
likely that the parents will be together 3 years later.
Most of what we know about cohabiting parents applies to different-sex parent families. Increas-
ingly, with marriage rights, same-sex parent families are marrying, and their children are being reared
in two-parent married families. Among families with LGBT parents, the vast majority—two thirds—
were either married or cohabiting couples (Gates, 2015).
Single-Parent Families Headed by Fathers

Until the 1980s, most single-father families were created by divorce and secondarily by widowhood.
Today, that situation has changed. Single-father families are still most likely to be created by divorce
(43.8%); the second most frequent cause (30.6%) of single-father families is as a result of births to
never-married single fathers (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 2015). Like never-married mothers, never-
married fathers are more likely to be from minority and less educated backgrounds (Mincy and
Nepomnyaschy, 2005; National Survey of Family Growth, 2015).
The circumstances of single-parent fathers and single-parent mothers differ. Single-parent fathers
are more likely to be employed and less likely to be as economically disadvantaged as single-parent
mothers (Livingston, 2013b). In addition, single-parent fathers are more likely to have custody of
older children, to be older, to be living with a cohabiting partner, and White American than single-
parent mothers (Livingston, 2013b). One large difference between never-married fathers and never-
married mothers is that never-married fathers are more likely to be cohabiting with another adult
who is not the child’s parent than are mothers (22.4% versus 10.5%). Thus, for fathers as for single
mothers, there are questions about whether a large portion—25%—of single-father households are
in a truly “single” parenting situation.
The FFCWS provides useful information concerning the formation of single-parent families
headed by fathers. Cohabiting fathers were more likely to become single fathers after cohabitation
if the mother had had children with different fathers before this child and if the mother had been
receiving public assistance before the child was born. Single-parent fathers were also more likely to
be younger than fathers who did not become single-parent fathers. According to Schneider et al.
(2016), 3-year-old children were more likely to be living with their fathers than their mothers if the
child’s mother had emotional or mental health problems, more drug or alcohol abuse than the father,
or mental health problems such as depression. Children were less likely to be living with the custodial
mother or father if that parent had children from previous partners. There are no ethnic differences
in which parent becomes a single-parent after separation from coresidential status.
With the increasing prevalence of single-parent fathers, research on custodial single fathers has
gone from a heavy reliance on qualitative research to more quantitative research findings. Summariz-
ing research, Coles (2015) reported that single fathers are less likely than single mothers to engage
in private talks with their children and in housework, and single fathers are more likely than single
mothers to be involved in play and be employed for longer hours. Coles also noted that “single moth-
ers tend to provide more closeness, monitoring and supervision than do fathers, who appear more
lenient, allowing children to experiment a bit more” (p. 159). Reviewing the findings concerning
child outcomes in single father and single-mother homes, Coles reported few differences between
children in internalizing behavior and academic performance, but children from single-father fami-
lies participate more in externalizing behaviors and substance use (though not abuse). Coles noted
that it is difficult to rule out selection effects such that older and more troublesome children might
be more likely to live with their fathers than their mothers.
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Older Single-Mother Families

The fastest growing group of single parents is nonmarried women over 25 years of age. Many of
these mothers may be living in cohabiting relationships, although the exact number is not known.
Observers have noted several cultural changes that have contributed to this international trend for
women to have and rear children outside of traditional marital relationships. These include later age
of marriage for men and women, increased infertility and childlessness of later marrying women,
increasing divorce rates, and changing social attitudes (Burns and Scott, 1994; Edin and Kefalas,
2006; Hertz, 2006; Kamerman and Kahn, 1988). The social stigma attached to having a child out of
marriage has been declining since the 1960s, as witnessed by the increasing acceptance of unmar-
ried mothers as characters in popular films and television programs. Even the politicized labels that
have been used to describe unmarried mothers and their children—“out-of-wedlock mothers” and
“illegitimate children”—have been replaced in the popular literature with more morally neutral
terms like “single mothers” or “unmarried mothers.” Within the group of unmarried mothers, there
is great diversity, and this diversity has important implications for understanding parents, parents’
circumstances, and the effects of these differences on parenting and subsequent child outcomes. In
this subsection, two groups of single parents are considered “single mothers by choice” and a more
inclusive group, whom we call “solo mothers.” Each is described in turn.
Single Mothers by Choice

One group of women with nonmarital births has been described as single mothers by choice
(SMCs). Single Mothers by Choice (SMC) is a national support and informational group founded in
New York City in 1981 by Jane Mattes. SMC defines a single mother by choice as a woman who
starts out rearing her child without a partner. A single mother may have decided to have or adopt a
child, knowing she will be her child’s sole parent at least at the outset (Mattes, 1994). Mothers who
identify with SMC align with other single mothers in their struggle to assert their legitimacy as
competent parents. Information concerning the incidence of single mothers by choice, their living
circumstances, their parenting experiences, and effects on children growing up in these homes is
available on the SMC website www.singlemothersbychoice.org/. Most research in this area is in the
form of in-depth interviews, many with women identified as members of SMC. Generally, there are
no comparison groups, and the sample sizes are not large.
As a participant-observer in a SMC support group for 2 years, Bock (2000) interviewed 26
single mothers by choice. She found that they decided to have or adopt a child only after serious
thought and consideration of the child’s ultimate well-being. They often sought guidance from vari-
ous sources including their SMC support group, members of their spiritual community, parents, and
friends. Bock noted that women were often discouraged from having or adopting children if they
failed to meet the criteria SMC recommend before embarking on becoming SMCs: being older,
responsible, emotionally mature, and financially capable. Many of the single mothers by choice Bock
interviewed made serious lifestyle changes before having or adopting a child. Some of these changes
included buying a new home in a more child-friendly community, saving money for the child, and
changing jobs or careers to be better prepared to be both a mother and a solo provider.
Hertz (2006) provided detailed qualitative information from interviews with 65 mothers whom
she described as “single by chance and mothers by choice,” asking them about motherhood, men,
and how they managed their lives and families as single-parent mothers. These were not randomly
selected mothers, but mostly well-educated mothers who had taken a range of different paths to
motherhood, from buying anonymous sperm from sperm banks over the internet, to within-country
or international adoptions, to sometimes planned and sometimes not-so-consciously planned preg-
nancies. Hertz found these women to be quite conventional in their careers and life decisions, with
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one exception—they chose to become a mother and rear their children before becoming part of a
committed relationship. Their one shared feature was that they were eager to be a mother and to
nurture a child, but for varied reasons, they did not have a partner. These women were not willing to
get married just to have a child, nor were they willing to wait until they found the “right” partner.
Hertz described the varied paths these women took to motherhood and their sometimes highly
creative approaches to combining motherhood and employment. These mothers formed creative
alliances with their roommates, friends, relatives, and in some cases, childcare providers to help them
care for their hard-won children. Many of these mothers deliberately sought out men to be male
figures in their children’s lives. A number of them were not parenting alone—they had friends, rela-
tives and, in some cases, romantic partners who sometimes also served as parenting figures to their
children. What distinguished these women was their eagerness to show that despite their unconven-
tional choices, they were rearing their children without government support to be healthy, happy,
and independently functioning.
Observers of single parents by choice report that these parents have a high level of emotional
maturity, have a high capacity for frustration tolerance, and are not overly influenced by others’
opinions (Branham, 1970; Groze, 1991; Hertz, 2006). Single mothers by choice appear to be in their
middle to upper 30s, mostly but not exclusively White American, and of middle to upper-middle
socioeconomic status. They tend to be more financially secure, well educated, and more likely to be
employed in well-paying professional jobs than many married mothers (Bock, 2000; Hertz, 2006;
Kamerman and Kahn, 1988; Mannis, 1999; Mattes, 1994). The majority of these mothers gave very
serious attention to either becoming pregnant or adopting a child. Some single mothers by choice
became pregnant accidentally and found themselves delighted at the possibility of having children
even though they were not married. Although the single mothers studied by Eiduson and Weisner
(1978) chose their lifestyle as a result of feminist concerns and the desire to live independently of tra-
ditional family styles, the single mothers by choice of the 1980s and the 1990s appear to be motivated
by a “ticking biological clock” (Bock, 2000; Kamerman and Kahn, 1988) and the desire to follow
one’s dream of motherhood (Hertz, 2006). For many women, the decision to become a single parent
was a long and difficult one, but one that brought a great deal of joy and fulfillment (Hertz, 2006).
Some single people who decide to become parents choose to adopt, most single-parent adop-
tions are to women, and many single parents adopt children of the same gender (Shireman, 1995,
1996). Often a high level of maturity is necessary because, as Shireman (1995) reported, many of the
children that single parents are eligible to adopt are children with special needs. Adoptive single par-
ents are often oriented toward children and derive great personal fulfillment from their interactions
with them ( Jordan and Little, 1966; Shireman and Johnson, 1976). The single adoptive parents that
Groze (1991, p. 326) observed “had an ability to give of themselves, were not possessive of their chil-
dren, and were capable of developing a healthy relationship with their children.” In recent decades,
international adoptions have become more common for both singles and married couples (Hertz,
2006). Because of the expense, upper-middle socioeconomic single parents are more likely than
other parents to pursue international adoptions (V. Groza, personal communication, August 24, 2000)
(Hertz, 2006). Different countries have different rules about who is allowed to adopt, but overall,
single women are permitted to adopt in more countries than are single men.
Single parents by choice, whether they birth or adopt a child, face similar difficulties other single
parents face in meeting the demands of single parenthood. Like other single and married parents,
they have difficulty procuring quality childcare, balancing parenthood and career plans, and obtain-
ing emotional support for themselves (Hertz, 2006; Kamerman and Kahn, 1988). The extent to
which single parents by choice have recognized and prepared for these difficulties may help them
better adapt to these circumstances than other single parents.
Some observers have questioned whether this classification of mothers as single by choice is use-
ful from a scientific, descriptive point of view. Adopting the label “single mother by choice” serves
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to differentiate these mothers from other single mothers, making it clear that for these mothers,
becoming a single mother is a carefully chosen identity. Yet, this nomenclature is often viewed as
discriminating against other single mothers (Bock, 2000). The words “by choice” imply that other
single mothers did not choose to be single parents, or at least did not come to choose this way of life
as conscientiously and responsibly as these single mothers by choice did. However, just how different
SMC are from other single mothers who choose to remain single may be open to some question.
Clearly these mothers do not have to contend with the effects of divorce and separation or contested
custody or child support payments, and they are older than adolescent mothers. To what extent is
this SMC category a socioeconomic, sociopolitical distinction, based solely on a mother’s access to
resources? To what extent is the SMC category an attempt on the part of some women to distance
themselves from stereotypes of poor and adolescent mothers? Bock (2000) reported that the single
mothers she interviewed see themselves as at the top of the single parenthood hierarchy. Hertz (2006)
described these mothers as women trying to show that they are much like other mothers, and cer-
tainly, as successful in rearing their children as these other mothers.
Edin and Kefalas (2006) interviewed 292 White American and African American low-income
mothers in three U.S. cities. Almost all single mothers reported that they preferred to live separately
or to cohabit with the fathers of their children rather than marry. Cohabitation allowed these moth-
ers to enforce a “pay and stay” rule. If the father contributed to the household and followed the
agreed-on rules, he could stay. If not, the mother had the power to evict him, because his name was
generally not on the rental lease or mortgage. Are not these women single mothers by choice?
There is reason to believe that many more women are single mothers by choice than commonly
believed. Census data indicate that women are not only less likely than ever before to marry, but
also women are less likely to marry to avoid a nonmarital birth (Cherlin, 2004). With contraception,
adoption, and affordable abortion as options, women who have babies can all be considered to have
become mothers by choice. Many women—rich and poor alike—think hard before continuing a
pregnancy and entering the institution of marriage. In their interviews with less privileged single
mothers in Chicago, Illinois, Charleston, South Carolina, and Camden, New Jersey, Edin and Kefalas
(2006) learned that poor mothers held clear reasons for avoiding marriage, with economic factors
most important. Poor mothers were reluctant to take in a husband who did not contribute in a pre-
dictable manner to the family’s economic welfare. Men with illegal earnings and unstable employ-
ment were viewed as poor economic risks. The women Edin and Kefalas interviewed held marriage
in high esteem, and they wanted to be sure to find worthy partners who would treat them fairly.
They worried that a man who was frequently out of work or engaged in criminal activity would not
only be a poor economic risk, but also, he would neither enhance their status nor be a parental role
model. Noting the possibly stalled gender-role revolution among the lower socioeconomic groups,
Edin and Kefalas reported that women were also unwilling to enter relationships in which they
perceived would have a subservient role in bargaining and decision-making. They were also fearful
of being joined legally to a man whom they might not fully trust emotionally to support them or
their children. Finally, approximately half of the White American women and approximately a fifth
of the African American women Edin and Kefalas interviewed reported concerns about domestic
violence. The women Edin and Kefalas interviewed chose to have their children outside of mar-
riage, not because they did not value marriage as an institution, but because they preferred to forego
marriage until a partner could be found. Edin and Kefalas’ findings suggest that low-income women
have high ideals for marriage and resist unions that promise trouble.
Thus, many rich and poor single mothers can be said to be “single mothers by choice,” remain-
ing single for a number of clear and easily understood reasons. Like the single women in Bock’s
study and those interviewed by Hertz, the women in Edin and Kefalas’s study were not opposed to
the idea of marriage; they simply wanted to wait until the right man came along. A major differ-
ence between these two groups of mothers may have to do with legal regulations concerning child
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support. Because they are dependent on federal or state subsidies to rear their children, the poor
women in Edin and Kefalas’s study are required to identify the children’s fathers for child support.
Another difference may be related to the amount of preparation that went into deciding to become
a single-parent before pregnancy or adoption that was reported by the women in Bock’s study. Cer-
tainly, the women in Bock’s and Hertz’s studies were better educated, and they may have been more
career oriented. No doubt, because they had more money, they were perceived to be better able
to provide for their children. But the similarities between these women raise questions about the
unique denomination of “single mothers by choice” selected by some women over others.
Solo Mothers
In this subsection, we discuss the findings from several studies with a focus on mothers who appear
to be rearing their children outside a partnered union without regard to the reasons for their single-
parent status. One is a small study that relied primarily on interviews with parents and observations
of them with their children. The other two studies used large-scale national data sets and utilized
mainly questionnaire-type measures.
In a series of reports, Weinraub and Wolf (1983, 1987), Gringlas and Weinraub (1995), and Wolf
(1987) focused on a group of women they called solo mothers: adult women rearing their children
from birth without a male partner. This group of mothers included single mothers by choice as well
as other mothers who may not have deliberately chosen to be single when they became pregnant.
As a result of circumstances not always under their control, these mothers had been rearing their
children from birth or shortly thereafter without a male father figure in the home. Children of these
solo mothers were those who had, at least in their memory, no experience living with a father fig-
ure in the home and, more important, no experience of family dissolution, marital discord, or family
realignment since early in life, or at least before the onset of language.
Weinraub and Wolf (1983) compared the solo mothers and their children with mothers and
children of two-parent families matched on characteristics, including maternal age, education, eth-
nicity, per capita income, neighborhood, child age, and child gender. The solo mothers were a varied
group. Some mothers were not married or had already been divorced when they unintention-
ally conceived; some were married and then separated from their husbands soon after conception
or pregnancy; and some mothers deliberately became pregnant with full understanding that there
would be no father in their young child’s life. Some of these mothers could be classified as solo
mothers by choice, some could be seen as divorced mothers. Most mothers were college educated
and professionally employed.
Observational measures of maternal and child behavior were taken in the laboratory when the
children were between 27 and 55 months of age, and parents completed questionnaires and in-depth
interviews in their homes. Of the families, 70% returned for observation and interviews when the
children were between 8 and 13 years of age (Gringlas and Weinraub, 1995). For the older children,
child measures included a self-perception profile and maternal and teacher reports of behavior prob-
lems, social competence, and academic performance. Maternal measures included maternal and child
reports of parenting practices, social supports, and stress.
Comparisons between solo-parent mothers and comparable married mothers highlight some of
the important ways in which even the most stable of solo-parent families differed from married-
parent families. First, despite careful attempts to match solo- and two-parent mothers on employ-
ment status, solo parents worked longer hours both when their children were in preschool and at
preadolescence. When their children were in preschool, solo parents reported more difficulties cop-
ing with finances, more daily hassles, and slightly more stresses relating to employment. Solo mothers
of sons reported more stressful life events relating to interpersonal areas of their lives. The largest
difference between the mothers concerned social supports. During the preschool period, solo parents
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received fewer emotional and parenting supports. During the preadolescent period, solo mothers of
sons reported lower satisfaction with their emotional supports. Their friends and relatives either did
not understand or did not address their emotional and parenting needs as well as those of solo moth-
ers of daughters or two-parent mothers.
Observations of parents administering a teaching task to their preschool-age children revealed
differences in solo mothers’ parenting as a function of the child’s gender. Although no differences
in maternal communications and degrees of maternal nurturance were observed, solo mothers had
difficulties exercising control over and setting appropriate maternal demands on their sons. Preschool
boys from solo-parent homes were less compliant with their mothers’ requests than boys from two-
parent homes. By preadolescence, teachers reported that children of solo mothers had more behav-
ior problems, lower social competence, and poorer school performance than children of married
mothers.
Within each group, maternal social support and stress predicted parenting and child outcomes.
During the preschool period, maternal social supports contributed to more optimal parent-child
interaction for both solo- and two-parent families. The more mothers received support in their role
as parents, the more optimal was their behavior in interaction with their preschool child. During
preadolescence, only for solo parents did social support predict children’s academic performance.
At both assessment periods, more stressful maternal life events predicted less optimal child out-
comes but, again, only for solo-parent families. During the preschool period, solo mothers with
frequent stressful life events had less optimal interactions with their children in a teaching task, and
their children were perceived as moodier and had lower intelligence and readiness-to-learn scores.
More frequent stressful life events were associated with reduced parental effectiveness, poorer com-
munication, and less nurturance in solo-parent families.
The effects of maternal stress not only indirectly affected child outcome by means of maternal
parenting behavior, but also had direct effects on child outcome independently of the solo mother’s
parenting behavior. During preadolescence, children from solo-parent families with high levels of
maternal stress were described by teachers and mothers as having the most behavior problems.
Children from low-stress solo-parent families were indistinguishable from children from two-parent
families.
These results are similar to other findings documenting the psychological vulnerability of women
rearing their children alone (Burden, 1986; Compas and Williams, 1990; Elder, Eccles, Ardelt, and
Lord, 1995; Hastings-Storer, 1991; McLanahan, 1983). This vulnerability seems to affect children of
single-parent families not only indirectly through parenting behavior, but also possibly directly as
well. These findings suggest that reduced social supports and increased stresses may be more common
for solo parents, even when there are no separation, divorce, and custody difficulties and even when
mothers are mature, well educated, and from secure financial circumstances. Differences in social sup-
port and stress can affect parent behavior and child outcomes, especially in solo-parent families. Most
important, stress may be the main factor placing solo-parent children at risk; children from solo-
parent families with low stress do not appear to be at any increased risk. In fact, a study examining the
effect of neighborhood stress among low-income single mothers’ psychological distress on positive
parenting practices found that social support influenced positive parenting particularly among moth-
ers who reported low levels of support (Kotchick, Dorsey, and Heller, 2005).
In Great Britain, single mothers have been referred to as “lone mothers.” In a number of stud-
ies, lone mothers were identified as having poorer physical as well as mental health (Benzeval, 1998;
Hope, Power, and Rodgers, 1999; Macran, Clarke, and Joshi, 1996; Whitehead, Burstrom, and Dider-
ichsen, 2000). Various researchers have examined why lone mothers and particularly never-married
lone mothers have poorer health compared with that of their cohabiting or married counterparts.
According to these studies, the poorer health of lone mothers appears to stem from the higher levels
of psychological distress they experience. The higher levels of psychological distress that characterize
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lone mothers are related to financial hardship and lack of support both from the community, friends,
and family (Benzeval, 1998; Hope et al., 1999). Surprisingly, employment status did not appear to
affect psychological or physical health (Baker, North, and ALSPAC Study Team, 1999).
Using a large American data set, Amato (2000) examined data from the 1987–1988 National
Survey of Households and Families (NSHF). Focusing on 1,515 single parents who were not cohabi-
tating, Amato examined how different groups of single parents varied along such measures such as
income, psychological well-being, and relationships with children. With regard to income, Amato
(2000, pp. 161–162) found that the poorest single parents “were mothers, high school dropouts, sepa-
rated or never married, aged 24 or younger and living with kin.” With regards to psychological well-
being, Amato found no differences between men and women or never-married and other women
on indices of happiness, depression, and health. However, single parents who reported being sepa-
rated from their spouse reported being the least happy and most depressed of the single parents who
were widowed, divorced, or never married. Married mothers were more authoritative than single-
parent mothers, and more educated single parents were more authoritative than other single parents.
In the NSHF survey, Amato found no single social address variable that most effectively predicted
parenting, but he identified a complex, intertwined combination of factors that affected the parents’
situation and ability to effectively parent. Having a child outside of marriage did not necessarily put
a mother at risk for being stressed, depressed, unemployed, or inadequate. However, having an out-
of-marriage birth in combination with little education put a mother and her child at risk for poverty.
Poverty placed families and children at developmental risk, introducing a myriad of stresses and
strains, including hunger, lack of material necessities, poor educational resources, and unsafe, crime
ridden neighborhoods (Amato, 2000; Magnuson and Duncan, 2016).
Divorced Custodial Parents

Custodial parents are single parents who are responsible for their children on a regular, daily basis.
Their custodial situation may be the result of divorce, separation, or widowhood, unmarried birth,
or separation from a cohabiting relationship. According to Grall (2016), in 2014, five times more
women (82% versus 17.5%) are custodial parents than men. However, men are more likely than
women to become custodial parents as a result of divorce, and women are more likely to become
custodial parents never having been married. Few parents become single parents (less than 2%) as a
result of widowhood. Custodial fathers are more likely than custodial mothers to be White Ameri-
can (59%) and less likely to be African American (17%) than other custodial fathers. Although many
custodial parents are not formally divorced, in this section, we focus on the unique situations of
divorced custodial parents because it is a more defined situation.
When marriages end in divorce, newly single parents have to come to terms with the loss of their
marriage and often, too, with the failure of their marital hopes and expectations. The single parent’s
partner may have served as an attachment figure or a best friend, and these emotional losses can be
devastating (Weiss, 1979). Resolving these emotional experiences can take months or years. During
this time, these emotional experiences may affect the parent’s adjustment, well-being, and relation-
ships with other adults, and the parent’s interactions with the children. Soon after separation and
divorce, divorced mothers have higher stress (Hope et al., 1999) and more depression and anxiety
than never-married mothers (Afifi, Cox, and Enns, 2006).
During the time of separation and divorce, household routines become reorganized, and chil-
dren often become more angry, aggressive, and resentful (Bolton and MacEachron, 1986). These
conditions pose significant challenges for competent parenting. Many families experience dramatic
changes in financial status (Morrison and Cherlin, 1995). Mothers seem to suffer more financial
setbacks postdivorce than fathers, but fathers too are affected. Even though almost half of all custo-
dial parents have child support awards (52% for mothers and 31% for fathers) and 74% of custodial
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parents awarded these awards receive full or partial payment, 31% of custodial mothers and 17% of
custodial fathers are still considered poor (Grall, 2016). About 62% of custodial parents receive non-
cash support from noncustodial parents.
As further stress, some families experience employment and housing changes, creating adjustment
difficulties for parents as well as for children ( Jones, 1984; Richard, 1982). Parental responses to divorce
and the subsequent life-altering events include anger, anxiety, and depression, with possible impul-
sive and antisocial behavior and excessive swings of mood and self-confidence (Hetherington, 1993).
Recurring health problems and difficulties with the immune system are not uncommon (Richard,
1982). Given what is known about how economic and psychosocial stress may affect parents (McLoyd,
1990; McLoyd et al., 1994), it is not surprising that during the first months and years after divorce,
divorced parents are more irritable and unresponsive in their interactions with their children (Thiriot
and Buckner, 1991). They show poor supervision and erratic and sometimes punitive discipline (Camara
and Resnick, 1988; Hetherington, Cox, and Cox, 1982; Wallerstein, Corbin, and Lewis, 1988). Many of
these symptoms subside as families attain a new homeostasis, usually within 2 years (Hetherington and
Stanley-Hagan, 1995) provided they are not faced with sustained or new adversities.
Loneliness, task overload, and increased childrearing stress are common experiences of divorced
custodial parents. However, financial security, employment stability and satisfaction, at least neutral
relationships with their ex-spouses, confidence in their parenting skills, and the formation of a new
intimate support relationship are factors can increase the well-being and parenting skills of the cus-
todial parent (Richard, 1982; Thiriot and Buckner, 1991). Within 2 years, three fourths of divorced
women report that they are happier in their new situation than in the last year of their marriage, and
most, in spite of the stresses, find rearing children alone easier than with a disengaged, undermining,
or acrimonious spouse. Furthermore, in addition to perceiving themselves as more able parents than
mothers in conflictual, unsatisfying marriages, divorced women on the average are less depressed,
show less state anxiety, drink less, and have fewer health problems than those in unhappy, acrimoni-
ous, or emotionally disengaged marriages (Amato, 2000). Investigating 626 divorced single mothers
and 100 divorced single fathers with custody, Hill and Hilton (2000) reported that satisfaction with
the new role was the strongest predictor of adjustment in both groups.
The custodial situations of fathers and mothers differ. Generally, mothers have to adjust to a new
role as a financial supporter, and fathers have to adjust to a new role as a homemaker (Hill and Hil-
ton, 2000). Divorced custodial mothers and fathers both face new challenges in trying to balance
family and career goals. New challenges for custodial fathers in the primary caregiver role include
cutting back on hours at the office or work and conflicts in scheduling business trips. For mothers,
adding the primary provider role may be especially frustrating. According to Hill and Hilton (2000),
it may be easier for fathers to incorporate the primary parenting role than it is for mothers to add
the primary provider role. Compared with mothers who were previously homemakers and returned
to work upon divorce ( Jones, 1984), newly divorced fathers rarely needed to find new employ-
ment, most continued in their same jobs, and income levels rarely plummeted as they did for newly
divorced mothers. Many fathers cut back on employment so that they could devote more time to
household and childrearing duties. Fathers were often surprised at how unsympathetic employers
are to their situation of having to combine childrearing and employment, and many working-class
fathers find these changes a huge challenge, if not impossible in their work.
Divorced fathers generally receive more offers of support from their relatives and community, but
they are less likely to take them. Sometimes, their lack of experience with housekeeping, household
chores, childrearing, and arranging childcare and activity schedules make the transition difficult, but
most fathers adjust quickly, soliciting help from their children, particularly older children, most par-
ticularly daughters (Greif, 1985; Kissman and Allen, 1993).
As time goes on, both divorced fathers and mothers develop a household and social routine
adequate to their family needs. DeFrain and Eirick (1981) questioned 33 divorced single-parent
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fathers and 38 comparable single-parent mothers on a wide variety of topics and found substantial
similarities between fathers and mothers. Both reported that their marriages before the divorce were
“more bad than good,” with lack of communication, extramarital affairs, sexual problems, and loss of
interest given as reasons for the breakup. Both mothers and fathers rated divorce as a medium—high
to highly stressful event. Both men and women reported that their moods had improved since the
divorce and many of their initial fears had subsided, with the majority of both groups feeling that they
were doing “reasonably well.” The minority of parents who reported yelling at and/or hitting their
children after the divorce said that those behaviors had decreased over time, and they found it much
easier to control their children since the divorce. Both men and women reported they did not get to
spend as much time with their children as they would prefer. Nevertheless, fathers reported feeling
quite satisfied with themselves for coping as well as they did in their new role as a single parent.
Divorced fathers and mothers both report having an easier time with younger than with older
children (Greif, 1985). They report more difficulties with sons than daughters, but single-parent
fathers experience more childrearing problems with daughters than do single-parent mothers (Greif,
1985; Santrock, Warshak, and Elliott, 1982). Compared with their age mates, boys in single-parent
father homes appear equally sociable and mature; daughters in single-parent father families are less
sociable, less independent, and more demanding (Santrock et al., 1982). Many fathers in Greif ’s
study reported difficulties understanding and meeting their daughters’ emotional needs, and they
sometimes called on their daughters to shoulder childcare and household chores disproportionately.
Puberty seems especially difficult for fathers and their daughters, with fathers uncomfortable talking
about maturation and sexual matters (Greif, 1985).
One of the greatest stresses reported by divorced custodial fathers is combining work and chil-
drearing (Greif, 1985; Kissman and Allen, 1993); with nearly 4 out of 5 fathers in Greif ’s sample
reporting that this was difficult. Men reported that compared with their experiences before divorce,
after divorce they had more interruptions in their daily work schedules and fewer opportunities to
take on additional hours and projects, inhibiting their hope for career progress and higher incomes.
Of the 1,136 fathers Greif interviewed, 66 men had to quit their job because of conflicts with
childrearing responsibilities, and 43 men reported being fired. They also experienced problems
with having to arrive at work late or leave early, missing workdays, or not being able to engage in
work-related travel. Only 27% of the men interviewed reported that no work-related changes were
necessary.
As stressful as childrearing-employment conflicts are for single-parent fathers, they are often more
stressful for single-parent mothers. In Greif ’s (1985) comparison of single divorced mothers who
were asked the same questions as men, women reported greater employment—childrearing conflicts
than men. Only 10% of the women said that work had not been difficult, and more mothers than
fathers were fired from or had to quit their jobs.
In summary, the situations of divorced single parents, both men and women, are different from
the situation of nonmarried single parents. Divorced fathers and mothers face more adjustment and
role changes than other single custodial parents. Although the first months and years after separation
or divorce are filled with multiple changes, often including relocation, changing roles and changing
family schedule, many of these stresses subside within 2 years, and parents report great satisfaction
with their lives postdivorce than during marriage. Divorced single parents are the most prosperous of
all single parents, and divorced fathers are more financially stable than divorced mothers, with better
jobs and incomes than unmarried mothers and fathers.
Summary
The group of parents identified as single parents is varied and diverse. Current statistics show that
approximately one third of families are headed by single parents. Of these, 41% of single-parent
297
families were families in which the mother was never married. Some of these single parents may
not be truly “single” parents. Although not married, 51% of these mothers are living in homes—
cohabiting—with a partner who is often the child’s biological father. Although parents in these single
parent cohabiting families are more likely to be poor and less educated than parents in two-parent
families, a major problem with these families is that they are “fragile”—more likely to come apart than
families with married parents. As the early research of Eiduson and Weisner (1978) and Patterson
(1995) showed and the Fragile Families Study has confirmed, when nonmarried parents are stable—
committed to each other and their chosen lifestyle, their children do not differ from children of more
traditional household unions on measures of psychological adjustment and school performance.
Family circumstances vary widely among single-parent homes. For adolescent mothers, negotiat-
ing the multiple challenges of personal identity, preparation for adulthood, and parenthood poses sig-
nificant risks for the adolescent and her child, especially because the adolescent is often coming from
a situation of economic and educational disadvantage. Older unmarried parents, sometimes cohabit-
ing and sometimes single mothers by choice, often face life circumstances revolving around issues
of financial, social conventions, and relationship stability. Now replicated by large-scale studies, the
early observational research of Weinraub and her colleagues showed that variations in these stressful
life events and social supports, even when taking into consideration family income, influenced the
quality of mothers’ interactions with their children, especially sons. These social context differences
and the differential effects they may have on single parents may ultimately be the most important
factors separating single-parent from two-parent families. For divorced families, disruption of the
family members’ lives and their household present major challenges; how the parent negotiates these
challenges has important implications for the child’s temporary coping and long-term adjustment.
Because the common factor influencing parenting across all of these different single-parent families
is the degree of economic, interpersonal, and emotional stress along with the degree of social support
in the family and community, these variables hold the keys for predicting whether single parenthood
will affect children’s development.
Single Parenthood and Child Outcomes:

A Conceptual Model
Understanding single parenthood is challenging because single parents are not all alike. There are
different types of single-parent families, each created by complex and interacting antecedent condi-
tions, and these conditions pose different challenges and have different consequences. Of course, this
process is neither linear nor direct; there are many influences that reverberate throughout the system,
and these challenges are differentially experienced as a result of moderating factors, such as culture,
income, education, and the child’s experiences. Many researchers have provided complex models to
show how different influences unite and co-act to influence child outcomes.
In the conceptual model we present in Figure 8.6, we list the factors in each category that need
to be considered in understanding how single parenthood can affect family circumstances, parenting
and, ultimately, child development. Antecedent factors (those factors that contribute to individuals
becoming single parents) include variables that have been shown to or are hypothesized to predict
single parenthood—poverty, low education, low wage jobs, undesirable or unavailable marriage part-
ners, and mental health problems. These factors often continue throughout the child’s and parents’
lives, affecting each component of the model. Possible family consequences of single parenthood
include reduced amounts of parenting input, parents’ low wage and unstable jobs, unfavorable liv-
ing conditions, low-quality schools and dangerous neighborhoods, family instability, and stress for
both parents and children. Potential parenting behaviors affected by these circumstances can include
reduced stimulation in the home, fewer learning opportunities for the child, and inattentive, harsh,
or unresponsive parenting. All of these variables, along with the continuing effects of poverty, low
298
SELECTION
SINGLE
FACTORS / POSSIBLE FAMILY POSSIBLE PARENTING CHILD
PARENTING
ANTECEDENT CONSEQUENCES OUTCOMES OUTCOMES
STATUS
CONDITIONS
Reduced
Poverty parenting Less stimulation
input in the home
Low wage
Low education and
Births to unstable jobs
and nonmarried Fewer learning
low wage jobs women opportunities
Unfavorable living
conditions, poor schools, and
dangerous neighborhoods
Undesirable or Insensitive, harsh,
unavailable Separation /
divorce or unresponsive
marriage partners
Life achievement
parenting
Family instability /
School performance
unstable relationships /
Behavioral adjustment
multiple partners
Mental health Expectations for

problems Stress increased
responsibility
MODERATORS/ PROTECTIVE FACTORS:

AVAILABILITY OF
INCOME / SOCIAL SUPPORT / SPIRITUAL /
CULTURE AND ETHNICITY INCOME ADDITIONAL
EDUCATIONAL LEVEL MORAL GUIDANCE
AUTHORITY FIGURES
Figure 8.6 A conceptual model of single parenting

education, and mental health problems cumulate and interact to affect child outcomes across a vari-
ety of areas—school performance, behavioral adjustment, and children’s life achievements.
Also included in the model are variables—culture and ethnicity, family income, social support,
and parental educational level—that that moderate the effects of each of these component, often
serving as protective factors.1 Less studied, but probably critically important as a protective factor for
children of single-parent families, is the spiritual and moral guidance provided by the single parent
and community members and the availability of additional authority figures outside the home, such
as teachers, coaches, and religious or community leaders.
Father Absence
Notably absent from the model and from this entire chapter so far is the term “father absence.” There
are three reasons for this. First, not all single-parent families are absent father families, and nearly one
fifth of all single-parent families today are father-only families. Second, even in single-mother cus-
todial families, there is often a biological father or social “dad” who contributes to the family. Third,
the research on father absence has been long criticized for its reliance on cross-sectional research and
for the confounding of father absence with separation and loss as well as family conflict that precedes
father absence in the case of divorce, and the selection bias, stress, and financial difficulties that gen-
erally accompany father absence in nearly all cases (Weinraub, 1978). Some studies in the 1990s and
2000s tried to adjust for these effects, but most left questions of causal inference.
McLanahan, Tach, and Schneider (2013) investigated the status of father absence effects by
reviewing studies published in peer-reviewed journals using innovative research designs to identify
the causal effect of father absence. The studies that McLanahan and her colleagues included in their
review used a variety of statistical techniques to examine the causal contributions of father absence
on development in educational attainment, mental health, relationship formation and stability, and
labor force success. (See McLanahan et al., 2013, for a description of difficulties in drawing causal
inferences from studies of father absence. Their article also provides a table of findings from father
absence studies from 1992 to 2010 included in their review.) Although they found that the effects of
father absence were not completely consistent and smaller in size than had been previously assumed,
there remained persuasive evidence that father absence influenced high school graduation rates in
the United States children’s socioemotional adjustment, and adult mental health. Father absence
increased externalizing behavior, with stronger effects for boys and stronger effects when father
absence occurred during early childhood than later. In adolescence, McLanahan et al. reported con-
sistent findings that father absence increased risky behavior, such as cigarette smoking, drug use, or
alcohol use. Finding mixed or weak effects of father absence on cognitive ability, McLanahan and her
colleagues speculated that educational attainment differences may emerge from increasing problem
behaviors over time rather than any impaired cognitive ability. Although there was some evidence
that children who grew up in divorced families had lower levels of adult employment, there was little
consistent evidence in the literature that father absence affected adult children’s subsequent marriage
or divorce rates, income or earnings, early childbearing, or the attainment of a college degree. They
found little evidence that father absence was differentially affected by ethnicity or social class.
However, McLanahan and her colleagues note that their analysis of the effects of growing up in
a single-parent family do not fully take into consideration the effects of parental self-selection. Their
finding that divorce seems to have negative effects although widowhood does not can be taken as
evidence of parental selection into different types of family situations, a factor that is difficult to
account for even in the most sophisticated types of analysis.
Analyses such as these are valuable in pinpointing associations, but they do not tell the full story
of the process by which fathers, and their absence, might affect child outcomes. Studies comparing
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Single Parenthood
different types of single-parent families have yielded some useful information about the role of fathers
in child development (Parke and Cookston, 2019). Research on children of remarried single-parent
families (Acock and Demo, 1994; Amato and Keith, 1991; Vuchinich, Hetherington, Vuchinich, and
Clingempeel, 1991; Zimiles and Lee, 1991) showing that children whose mothers have remarried do
not necessarily show better psychological adjustment than children whose mothers have not remar-
ried, suggests that the presence of a male figure in the home may not be the critical variable responsi-
ble for the at-risk status of single-parent families. Similarly, studies of two-adult households in which
one parent is not a father figure (Kellam, Ensminger, and Turner, 1977; Patterson, 1992) indicate that
children reared in these households may not differ substantially from those in households in which
there is a father, suggesting further that it may not be the father’s “genderedness” that is responsible
for his important contribution to the family so much as it is his role as a “second,” although not
second-class, parent. The importance of father’s contributions may derive more from his serving as
one of two involved, accepting, warm, nurturing caregivers who support each other emotionally and
financially more than it derives from the uniqueness of the father’s male gender (Weinraub, 1978).
Indeed, father absence and father involvement can be a double-edged sword. Taylor and Conger
(2014) reported studies that show that under some circumstances and for children of different ages
and in different cultures, father involvement can be negative.
Another key to understanding the effects of fathers and their absence comes from a study examin-
ing the effects of father absence on child telomere length. Telomeres are the protective nucleoprotein
ends of chromosomes thought to reflect cell-functioning and overall health. Shorter end telomeres
are associated with cardiovascular disease and cancer in adults and appear to be related to increased
stress and reduced immunological functioning. Mitchell et al. (2017) measured telomere length in
the nearly 5,000 children in the FFCWS to see whether father loss as a result of incarceration, death,
separation, or divorce affected telomere length. Overall, children who had lost their father before
9 years of age had 14% shorter telomeres than children who had not. More specifically, children who
lost their father due to death (16% shorter) had the largest association with telomere length, followed
by incarceration (10%) and separation and/or divorce (6%). Changes in income partially mediated
these effects, and the effects were stronger for boys than girls. There were no differences as a func-
tion of ethnicity, but some suggestion that the effects of father absence differed with measures of the
child’s genotype.
Certainly, biological effects are to be expected when behavioral effects are known to exist. These
behavioral changes need to be “housed” in the individual someplace. Nevertheless, finding the spe-
cific location of these effects helps us understand the nature of the effects of father absence. These
findings—that father absence affects telomere length, a particular biological indicator of health asso-
ciated with stress and disease outcomes—suggest that father absence affects children, and possibly
their mothers, through its association with increasing stress in the child’s life. This information sug-
gests that interventions to reduce family stress may serve to counteract concerns regarding the nega-
tive effects of the rising number of single-mother families.
Promising Research Directions in Single Parenthood

Research into understanding single parenthood has made great leaps since the last edition of this
Handbook. Researchers have documented the diversity between and within different types of single-
parent families, and they have begun to untangle the complex, dynamic processes—both systemic,
psychological, and now biological—associated with different types of single-parent families. Using
large and representative samples and sophisticated statistical methods, researchers have begun to
tease out the effects of a wide variety of co-occurring variables associated with single parenthood—
variables such as poverty, family instability, employment, low-quality childcare—on child outcomes.
301
Qualitative in-depth interviews and observational studies have helped to flesh out the psychological
processes that lay beneath the theoretical and statistical analyses. Now, more research is needed to and
identify supports that can help single parents be more effective in raising healthy children and that
can help policy makers understand how to best support different types of single parents.
In the hopes of reducing the incidence of single parenthood, researchers from multiple disciplines
have examined factors that encourage and maintain marriage. Economists have explored how tax
and transfer policies can affect marriage rates in low-income families; educators and sociologists have
examined how educational interventions might hold promise for improving the quality and stability of
low-income parents’ relationship. So far interventions inspired by these research approaches have not
proven effective in reducing the incidence of single parenthood. Most observers agree that reducing
the incidence of single parenthood will require a range of public policy, and cultural and civic strate-
gies (Haskins, 2015; Wilcox, Wolfinger, and Stokes, 2015); further research into these factors influenc-
ing the occurrence and consequences of single parenthood might prove helpful. Efforts directed at
reducing the antecedent conditions that lead to single parenthood, such as poverty, low education, and
mental health problems and ameliorating the correlates of single parenting, such as stress and reduced
social supports may hold the most promise for intervention. In addition, efforts to support parents
once they are single parents—with quality infant childcare, pre-K, and after school programs; access
to education and training; improved mental health services; and access to public transportation—are
likely to provide direct benefits to single parents and their children, enabling parents to provide less
stressed parenting and for single parents and their children to have increased educational opportunities.
Conclusion
Understanding the diverse etiology and nature of single-parent families requires consideration of the
specific contextual issues and factors confronting these families. These issues and factors may pose
significant risks as well as potential benefits to the successful socialization and parenting of children.
Single-parent families are a heterogeneous group, and knowing that a parent is single may not be as
helpful as knowing the factors that contributed to the parent becoming a single-parent and chal-
lenges she or he faces given the parent’s specific life circumstances.
Parenting is a difficult process. Parents who face the challenge of parenting without the sup-
portive assistance of, or collaboration with, other concerned and involved adults may find their
parenting abilities strained beyond limit. In particular, economic disadvantage, employment, minimal
social supports, and physical exhaustion can exact a toll on a single parent’s parenting abilities and
resources. Poor parental psychological well-being hinders parents’ ability to develop and maintain
child-directed energy, optimism, and achievement. Primary risks to the development of children
living in single-parent homes can derive from an ongoing pattern of stress, exhaustion, depression,
and isolation experienced by family members. Economic difficulties, incarceration, chronic illness,
and intellectual, academic, or emotional child difficulties place increased stress and demands on
single-parent families. If a single-parent is frequently unavailable because she or he is overly stressed,
exhausted, or depressed, younger children may be at risk for social withdrawal and depression, and
the discipline of older children may be erratic and inconsistently enforced.
Given this myriad of potential difficulties, it is critical to remember that many single parents can
and often do rear their children successfully. Decades ago, in a chapter on family variations, Sargent
(1992) described what he believed to be central features that led to effective childrearing in single-
parent families. He cited emotional support from a social network, secure financial status, quality
alternative sources of childcare, capacity to maintain appropriate discipline, capacity to parent when
exhausted or overwhelmed, abilities to develop one’s own rewarding social life and relationships,
and capacity to collaborate effectively in childrearing with other involved adults. These are also the
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Single Parenthood
parenting variables that researchers in the twenty first century have found to be critical in under-
standing and predicting successful child outcomes.
Single parents are a strikingly diverse group, yet single parents have the same hopes and dreams
for their children as their married counterparts do. Despite concerns that the increasing incidence of
single-parent families reflects growing disaffection with marriage and two-parent childrearing, there
is reason to believe that the rising incidence of single-parent families reflects the high esteem that
many parents still hold for the institution of marriage. It may be precisely because of this high regard
for the institution of marriage that parents are reluctant to commit to a relationship that does not
promise continuity, trust, intimacy, safety, and love. As women see themselves growing more com-
petent and powerful in the workplace, they are less inclined to commit themselves to a marriage in
which they are challenged economically and subjugated personally.
The United States and many other Western countries have seen enormous cultural change in
how families are created and maintained. No longer does marriage precede childbirth for the major-
ity of families; in some cases, marriage does not happen at all. Policy initiatives to encourage rela-
tionship skills and marriage (Hymowitz, Carroll, Wilcox, and Kaye, 2013) have largely failed. Instead,
researchers and policy makers are learning that what it takes to rear healthy children may not be a
two-parent family, but a community in which parents can earn a decent living wage, provide qual-
ity childcare and education, and stable living arrangements in safe neighborhoods for their children.
Moynihan was right in pointing out that what families need is access to economic and social equal-
ity to ensure that all children have an opportunity to become successful, contributing citizens. The
question for researchers and policy makers is whether the community—not simply the marital
relationship—can now provide the necessary social, emotional, and economic supports to promote
healthy parenting and child outcomes for all children.
Acknowledgments
The first two editions of this chapter were written while the first author was supported by the
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care and Youth
Development (U10-HD25455). Barbara Wolf, Marcy Gringlas, and Danielle Dallaire were coau-
thors on those editions, and Jennifer Tweed provided editorial and bibliographic help in the first
edition. This third edition of the chapter was prepared when the first author was supported on sab-
batical from Temple University. We are indebted to Jeanne Brooks Gunn, Judith Levine, and Ronald
Taylor for suggestions and comments on early drafts of this manuscript. Finally, we express our caring
and appreciation to all the other single-parent families who have taught us so much about parenting
and child development.
Note
1. This model builds on the Family Stress Model (FSM; Conger et al., 2010), which describes how economic
pressures create parental hardship-related emotions, behaviors, and conflicts that influence parenting and
child outcomes and the Family Investment Model (FIM, Conger and Donnellan, 2007), which describes
how families with higher socioeconomic status have greater access to money, education, and skills, and social
capital (connections to and the status and power of other individuals). For a more specific and detailed
description of these models, how factors within the models may interact, and how these models may affect
individual differences in risk and resilience within single-mother families, see Taylor and Conger (2014). For
research that demonstrates the contribution of each of these components and more information about how
they are affected by moderating factors, see Acock and Demo (1994); Conger, Conger, and Martin (2010);
Cooper, Osborne, Beck, and McLanahan (2011); Duncan, Brooks-Gunn, and Klebanov (1994); Kalil and
Ryan (2010); Kotchick et al., 2005; Larson and Gillman (1999); Lee and McLanahan (2015); Ryan, Claessens,
and Markowitz (2015); Sandstrom and Huerta (2013) and Taylor and Conger (2014, 2017).
303
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9
DIVORCED AND REMARRIED
PARENTING
Lawrence H. Ganong, Marilyn Coleman, and Caroline Sanner
Introduction
Every year in the United States, there are approximately 800,000 divorces (CDC, 2015). Although
not all divorcing individuals are parents, an estimated 36% of all divorcees in 2014 reported having
at least one minor child living in their household (Eickmeyer, 2016). Divorce is an international
phenomenon, with rates of many European nations being comparable to the United States; divorce
rates in Asia and Latin America are slightly lower, but increasing rapidly (divorcescience.org, 2016).
Divorced parenthood is widespread.
Remarriage is also common. In 2013, 4 in 10 marriages in the United States included at least one
partner who had been previously married; 8% of newly married adults are in at least their third mar-
riage (Livingston, 2014). Although having children slightly reduces the likelihood of remarrying, an
estimated 26% of all U.S. marriages include stepchildren (14% of first marriages and 63% of remar-
riages; Stykes and Guzzo, 2015). In nearly half of remarriages (46%), one or both partners have at
least one child from a previous union living with them (Manning, 2013). In the United States, about
13% of children reside in a household with a remarried parent and a stepparent (Kennedy and Fitch,
2012). An unknown number of children live periodically on a part-time basis with a remarried par-
ent and stepparent. Remarriage rates in other nations often are difficult to calculate, but remarriage
appears to be less frequent than in the United States (Beier, Hofacker, Marchese, and Rupp, 2010;
Navarro, 2013). Perhaps this is because couples cohabit rather than remarry, an increasingly common
phenomenon in the United States as well. Demographic data, however, indicate that remarriage is a
relatively common worldwide experience that affects many parents and their children.
Divorce and remarriage are marital statuses. As adjectives, the terms “divorced” and “remarried”
describe a person’s “social address” conveying to others whether they have a spouse, and if they do, that
the spouse is not their first. These terms convey nothing about an individual’s parental status, nor do they
communicate information about the quality of parent-child relationships, about the experience of parent-
ing, or really, much of anything regarding parenting. The experiences of divorce and remarriage, however,
have enormous implications for parents and their children. As interpersonal processes and family transi-
tions, divorce, and remarriage affect parenting and parent-child relationships in multiple ways. The term
“stepparent,” however, does not describe marital status but rather identifies that the individual is neither a
biological nor adoptive parent to children. Instead, “a stepparent is an adult whose partner has at least one
child from a previous relationship” (Ganong and Coleman, 2017, p. 2). Stepparents are not related geneti-
cally or legally to stepchildren, and they may be either married to a parent or cohabiting with them. The
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Lawrence H. Ganong et al.
phenomenon of stepparenting is usually quite distinct from parenting, and although their experiences vary
substantively, they also are similar in many ways.
In this chapter, we explore how the interpersonal processes of divorce and remarriage affect par-
enting and stepparenting and how these roles have been examined by social and behavioral scientists.
We first discuss historical considerations that have shaped the cultural context of divorced parent-
ing and remarried and stepparenting over time. Next, we outline central issues faced by divorced
and remarried parents and stepparents, followed by a discussion of the theoretical frameworks that
have been used to investigate these challenges, including stress-related theories, coparenting theo-
ries, and selection models. Subsequently, in a summary of classical and modern research in divorced
and remarried parenting, we identify four general eras in the development of scholarly research on
postdivorce families and stepfamilies: (1) the social problem/social address phase, (2) the growing
recognition phase, (3) a decade of progress, and (4) the New Millennium. We then highlight efforts
at state and local levels to implement intervention programs for divorced and remarried parents,
drawing particular attention to divorce mediation efforts and stepfamily education programs. Finally,
we propose key areas for future direction in the study of divorced and remarried parenting, includ-
ing qualitative approaches and theory development, research on process and structure, and greater
attention to underexamined parents. To achieve a comprehensive understanding of the key issues
surrounding divorced and remarried parenting, it is necessary to first turn our attention toward
understanding how the context of divorced and parenting has changed over time.
Historical Considerations in Divorce and Remarriage

Parenting does not happen in a vacuum. Rather, parents’ experiences are shaped by ever-changing
cultural conditions. In this section, we outline historical contexts that have shaped divorced and
remarried parenting over time, including reasons behind fluctuating rates of divorce and remarriage,
changing divorce legislation and policy, and new precursors to remarriage and stepfamily formation.
Divorced Parenting Over Time

According to family historian Coontz (2005, p. 247), “It took more than 150 years to establish the
love-based, male breadwinner marriage as the dominant model in North America and Western
Europe. It took less than 25 years to dismantle it.” In 1900, only about 10% of marriages ended
in divorce. By 2000, it had risen to 40–50% (Amato, 2010). For most of human history, marriage
dissolution occurred because of the death of a partner, and it was not until 1974 that divorce sur-
passed death as the main cause of marital dissolution.
In the United States, divorce rates have gradually increased since records were kept, reaching a
peak in 1981 (Coontz, 2005) and then stabilizing at slightly lower—but still relatively high—rates
since then (divorcescience.org, 2016). Because the reasons for marriage have changed over time,
so too have the reasons for divorce. For instance, whereas marriage was once seen as essential for
matters like economic production and procreation, people now expect marriage to fulfill needs of
personal happiness and fulfillment (Cherlin, 2010; Coontz, 2005). Today people marry for love—a
fragile basis on which to build a “lifelong” union. Although divorce is still somewhat stigmatized,
particularly for parents (Amato, 2004), people increasingly feel that staying in a loveless marriage out
of commitment to the institution should not come at the expense of personal happiness.
After World War II, unsatisfied spouses increasingly sought to end their marriages, leading to
changes in legal grounds for divorce in the early 1970s. Since the Colonial period, the spouse filing
for divorce had to charge the other spouse with a violation of marital duties (e.g., desertion, cruelty,
adultery); starting in California in 1969, states gradually created so-called no-fault divorce grounds,
whereby individuals could claim that marriages were irretrievably broken without blaming one
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Divorced and Remarried Parenting
spouse or the other (Amato, 2004). Although some social critics have asserted that “no fault” divorce
laws stimulated an increase in divorce (Amato, 2004), there is ample evidence to suggest that legal
changes reflected ongoing social trends and changes in attitudes about divorce and were not causal
in encouraging divorce.
Public policies, particularly as embodied by laws regarding divorce, child custody, and child sup-
port, have had large effects on parenting after divorce. For many years in the United States, beginning
in the Colonial period, women initiated divorce more than men, but fathers usually received physical
custody of children after divorce. Children were generally seen as assets to fathers in the agrarian
society that existed prior to the twentieth century. It was not until the early part of the twentieth
century, when childrearing advocates began promoting mothers as the natural experts in nurturing
children, that changes in custody shifted so that sole custody of children went predominately to
mothers after divorce (Clarke-Stewart and Brentano, 2006).
This shift in physical custody to mothers was facilitated by the so-called Tender Years Doctrine
that asserted that mothers were better parents for children in their tender years (basically birth
through age 8; Clarke-Stewart and Brentano, 2006). Judges consequently awarded custody to moth-
ers, and fathers were generally expected to do little parenting after divorce. For much of the first
two-thirds of the twentieth century, divorced parenting was mostly divorced mothering, and there
is little scientific research about postdivorce father involvement with children much before the last
decade of the century. In a large national study, Furstenberg and Nord (1985) reported that fewer
than half of all children between the ages of 11 and 17 had seen their divorced fathers in the previ-
ous year, and almost 40% had had no contact with their fathers in the previous 5 years. Not surpris-
ingly, postdivorce fathering was seldom studied because as a society, the United States did not expect
fathers to be involved.
In the last quarter of the twentieth century, however, fathers’ rights groups and feminists, in par-
allel movements, advocated for the idea that divorced children needed contact with both of their
parents. Fathers’ rights groups complained that men were discriminated against by the legal system in
their preference for mothers as custodial parents (Clarke-Stewart and Brentano, 2006), and feminists
advocated for the principle of egalitarian rights and responsibilities for parents of both genders. Social
and behavioral scientists also began to assert, sometimes with evidence and sometimes without, that
children benefited from having contact with both parents after divorce (Amato and Sobowlewski,
2004). Courts in the 1970s and 1980s began to move away from the Tender Years Doctrine pre-
sumption that mothers were the better parents for young children to a concern for the “best interests
of the child.” This ambiguous concept left it to judges, attorneys and, yes, even parents, to decide
which custody arrangement was in a child’s best interests after parents divorced. Usually, judges
accepted what parents had agreed on, but when they could not agree, the “best interests” principle
was often applied. The quality of parent-child relationships, special needs of children and parents,
parents’ abilities to provide for children’s needs, continuity of care, parental conduct and lifestyle,
and even children’s wishes all were factors considered by judges when determining the child’s best
interests (Clarke-Stewart and Brentano, 2006).
Consequently, courts began to give preference to joint legal custody (i.e., both parents are
empowered to make decisions about children) and, increasingly, to shared physical custody. Although
physical custody was seldom defined as a 50–50 division of time between parental households, fathers
generally benefited by having their children reside with them more often than when mothers had
sole custody and fathers had “visitation” (Clarke-Stewart and Brentano, 2006).
Sharing legal and physical custody meant that divorced parents were legally mandated to con-
tinue to work together in childrearing, which came to be known as coparenting. An unintended
consequence of mandated coparenting was that parents either had to negotiate at least a minimal
level of cooperation or they continued engaging in conflict about children and childrearing decisions
(Emery, 2012).
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The increases in shared custody awards coincided with increased scholarly interest in postdivorce
parenting and coparenting. As fathers became more involved in childrearing after divorce, researchers
began studying them along with mothers. Variations in physical custody became a focus of research
interest, as parents and policy makers raised questions about “best practices” for childrearing after
divorce.
Remarried Parenting and Stepparenting Over Time

Remarried parenting is not a new phenomenon. For most of human history, life spans were relatively
short. Until well into the twentieth century, making a living often entailed many dangers that con-
tributed to short lives, and childbirth was a frequent cause of maternal deaths well into the twentieth
century (Albanesi and Olivetti, 2016). When a parent died, the remaining spouse usually quickly
repartnered to enhance the odds that he or she, and the children, would survive (Coontz, 2005).
Remarried parenting has always been relatively widespread but has been largely ignored by research-
ers and practitioners. Presumably, remarried parenting was perceived to be similar to parenting in a
first union, and stepparents were often thought to be substitutes for deceased parents.
Despite the ubiquity of post-remarriage parenting and stepparenting, researchers showed little
interest in them until the last quarter of the twentieth century, when for the first time most remar-
riages followed divorce rather than death (Ganong and Coleman, 2017). The change in precur-
sors to remarriage meant that stepfamilies became much more complicated; parents were less often
childrearing alone when they remarried after widowhood and more frequently coparenting with a
former spouse. Coparenting with a former spouse also meant that stepparents could not automati-
cally presume to replace an absent (deceased) parent but were additional parent-figures. Adding one
or more stepparents to stepfamily systems frequently changed the coparenting relationships (Ganong,
Coleman, Jamison, and Feistman, 2015), and parent-child relationships were often affected by the
addition of a stepparent (King, 2006, 2007, 2009). Postdivorce remarried parents and their new part-
ners had to define and negotiate new roles, with few social norms to guide them (Cherlin, 1978),
which contributed to stress for family members, conflicts and, sometimes, to additional divorces.
Researchers initially focused on the stepparent-stepchild relationship and stepchildren’s well-being,
and only in recent years have remarried parents received much scholarly attention (Ganong and
Coleman, 2017).
Taken together, cultural and historical shifts have altered the context in which divorced and
remarried parenting occurs. Greater acceptance for leaving unsatisfying marriages, the implement
of no-fault divorce legislation, changing norms and policies pertaining to child support and cus-
tody arrangements, and shifting precursors to stepfamily formation have shaped the experience of
divorced and remarried parenting. We now turn to central issues commonly faced by parents who
divorce and remarry.
Central Issues in Divorced and Remarried Parenting

Researchers have devoted considerable attention toward understanding the unique challenges of
divorced and remarried parenting. Because divorce and remarriage generally involve periods of reor-
ganization and change, they tend to come with sets of unique challenges. We first outline the central
issues faced by divorced parents, and then we turn to issues face by remarried parents and stepparents.
Divorced Parents
In response to the rise of the divorce rate in the twentieth century, scholars became increasingly
interested in the impact of divorce on families. The majority of research in this area focused on
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the effects of divorce on children. Researchers have consistently shown that children with divorced
parents are more at risk than children with continuously married parents on social, emotional, behav-
ioral, academic, and health outcomes (Amato, 2010). Similar results have been found for the effects
of divorce on adults: Compared with married individuals, divorced men and women report lower
levels of physical and mental health, exhibit more symptoms of depression and anxiety, and are even
at greater risk of overall mortality (Amato, 2010).
Children’s adjustment to divorce and parents’ adjustment to divorce are inextricably linked; when
parents fare well after marital dissolution, children are more likely to fare well also (Kelly, 2012).
Consequently, researchers have sought to identify the unique challenges that divorced parents face
that may undermine parents’ and children’s well-being. Parents face many central issues after divorce,
but we categorize them broadly into four groups: adjusting to custodial arrangements, establishing
coparenting relationships, maintaining appropriate parent-child boundaries, and renegotiating per-
sonal identities. We introduce these issues here and then discuss theoretical frameworks that have
been used to investigate some of these challenges.
Adjusting to Custodial Arrangements

When parents divorce, a major task involves establishing and then adjusting to new custody arrange-
ments. Parents range from having sole parenting responsibility to losing contact with children, and
the central issues faced by divorced parents depend largely on the extent to which children reside
with them after divorce. Generally, there has been a shift from the assumption that children fare best
with their mothers after divorce to the belief that children benefit from continued contact with both
parents (Kelly, 2012). As a result, shared custody has become increasingly common.
Even when shared custody is awarded, however, parents vary in the frequency with which they
see their children after divorce. For example, children might live with one parent during the week
and another parent on the weekends. Divorced parents face the task of adjusting to a net loss of time
spent with children, and although having reduced time with children is usually true for both parents,
less time with children is particularly salient for nonresidential parents. To compensate for lost time
spent with children, nonresidential parents tend to be more likely to use their time with children on
leisure activities and less likely to be involved in the more mundane tasks of daily life, such as home-
work or chores (Stewart, 1999). The lack of consistency and routine can sometimes produce feelings
of awkwardness or discomfort during visits to nonresidential parents (Feistman, Jamison, Coleman,
and Ganong, 2016). Children also have described logistic concerns such as sleeping arrangements
(e.g., having to sleep on couches or blow-up mattress at the noncustodial parent’s house) as diffi-
cult adjustments that had the potential to produce feelings of displacement (Feistman et al., 2016).
Children generally have reported feeling more “at home” at the house of the parent with primary
custody; however, those parents have other unique challenges in parenting after divorce.
When parents have sole or primary responsibility for the care of children, they are more likely to
experience economic decline than nonresidential parents. Because mothers are generally more likely
to be the primary custodians than fathers, women tend to experience greater economic decline
after divorce than men (Barber and Demo, 2006). To compensate for the loss of household income,
residential parents may find themselves working longer hours, pursuing a second (or third) job, or
reentering the workforce to provide for their families. At the same time, residential parents must ful-
fill childrearing duties, such as cooking, cleaning, providing transportation, assisting with homework,
managing sibling conflict, and other childrearing responsibilities. In a two-parent household, these
responsibilities can be delegated between adults, but in a one-parent household, divorced parents
find themselves bearing sole responsibility for these tasks, and this transition is often stressful. For
some, role overload may result if managing various roles and responsibilities produces intense feel-
ings of burden and stress (Perry-Jenkins, Goldberg, Pierce, and Sayer, 2007). Out of necessity, parents
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may rely on children to help manage familial tasks. Furthermore, low-income custodial parents are
vulnerable to geographic relocation; due to financial constraints, parents and children may need to
change residences, which could result in relocating to lower quality neighborhoods and uprooting
children from their schools, communities, and friends (Barber and Demo, 2006). Given that experi-
encing multiple transitions increases maternal stress and undermines parenting quality (Osborne and
McLanahan, 2007), parental divorce followed by subsequent transitions such as relocation tends to be
challenging for parents and children.
Establishing Coparenting Relationships

The growing belief that joint custody is in the best interests of the child due to continued relation-
ships with both parents led the courts to increasingly grant joint custody arrangements to divorcing
parents (Kelly, 2012). As a result, there is a greater number of postdivorce coparenting relationships
now than ever before (Kelly, 2012). Researchers, therefore, are interested in documenting how for-
mer spouses navigate postdivorce relationships, with an emphasis on how coparenting relationship
quality affects child well-being (Afifi and Schrodt, 2003; Bonach, 2005; McHale and Sirotkin, 2019;
Riggio, 2004).
Coparenting relationships between former spouses can range from cooperative to highly con-
flicted. Ahrons (1994) studied interactions between divorced parents and developed a typology of
postdivorce coparenting styles. A small but significant minority of divorced parents (12%) were “per-
fect pals” who coparented while remaining close friends, interacting frequently with high-quality
communication. Their postdivorce parenting was similar to their pre-divorce parenting. Another
group of amicable couples (38%) was defined as “cooperative colleagues.” These divorced parents
had business-like relationships with boundaries, but they interacted positively for the sake of their
children and managed conflict productively to ensure that children were not caught in the middle.
Unfortunately, not all divorced parents coparent so effectively. Half of Ahrons’s (1994) sample fell into
the “angry associates” or “fiery foes” categories. Angry associates struggled to confine their anger and
keep conflict separate from children, and fiery foes held such disdain for each other that they actively
used children as pawns in fights. Given that such coparenting conflict is particularly detrimental to
children’s adjustment outcomes (Amato, 2010; Buchanan, Maccoby, and Dornbusch, 1991; Davies
and Cummings, 1994), postdivorce coparenting conflict is of particular interest to researchers. Fur-
ther, given that courts increasingly use joint physical custody as a compromise solution among high-
conflict couples (Fehlberg, Smyth, Maclean, and Roberts, 2011), researchers’ interest in coparenting
conflict is relevant. Specifically, the literature has aimed to understand predictors of conflict between
former spouses as well as the effects of conflict on children and parent-child relationships.
Researchers have identified multiple influences that contribute to high levels of postdivorce con-
flict between parents, including high levels of conflict during the marriage, attributing the cause of
divorce to the other partner, having younger children and a larger family, and perceiving the other
parent to be lacking parenting skills, too lenient in discipline, or unreliable in parenting (Bonach
and Sales, 2002; Maccoby, Buchanan, Mnookin, and Dornbusch, 1993; McBroom, 2011). Another
strong predictor of coparenting quality is the degree to which one or both parents feel satisfied with
their access to the children and child financial support (Madden-Derdich and Leonard, 2002). In
one study, when one parent overestimated the satisfaction of the other parent regarding the custody
arrangement, interparental conflict was especially prevalent (Madden-Derdich and Leonard, 2002).
Fathers who perceived mothers to be unaccommodating and unwilling to compromise about visita-
tion reported more coparental conflict, particularly when mothers did not perceive themselves to be
this way (Baum and Shnit, 2003; Madden-Derdich and Leonard, 2002).
Interparental conflict is one of the strongest predictors of how well children adjust to the sepa-
ration or divorce of their parents (Amato, 2010). Researchers have identified several ways that this
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conflict impacts children in divorced families. For instance, in a decade review of research on the
consequences of divorce on children, Amato (2010) noted that conflict between parents has been
linked to an increased risk of behavioral, psychological, and academic problems among children.
Other researchers have found that repeated exposure to conflict between parents increases children’s
emotional and behavioral reactivity and reduces their ability to regulate emotional arousal (Davies
and Cummings, 1994).
Some of the most consistent findings on conflict between divorced parents have involved relations
between coparental conflict, parenting, and parent-child relationship quality. For instance, high levels
of interparental conflict have been linked to low levels of positive parenting and reduced parental
responsiveness (Kelly, 1993). Witnessing parents engage in high levels of conflict may jeopardize
children’s secure attachment to primary caregivers and violate children’s sense of emotional security
(Davies and Cummings, 1994). In fact, exposure to postdivorce parental conflict has been found to
have long-term consequences for parent-child relationships. For instance, conflict between divorced
parents in childhood has been linked to perceptions of having fewer available social supports as young
adults, greater anxiety in personal relationships, increased conflict-prone relationship behaviors, and
poorer parent-child relationship quality (Riggio, 2004). Even beyond the time that a child may be
residing with a parent and, therefore, having the most exposure to interparental conflict, the long-
term consequences of coparenting conflict indicate that parent-child relationship quality suffers.
Renegotiating Parent-Child Boundaries

Many of divorce’s negative effects on children occur when appropriate parent-child boundaries are
violated, such as when parents take on children as confidantes and reveal negative information about
the other parent (Afifi, Afifi, and Coho, 2009) or about the divorce process and divorce-related stress-
ors in general. Nonetheless, parents often discuss divorce-related stress with their children, including
negative thoughts and feelings about the other parent (McManus and Donovan, 2012). The likeli-
hood of revealing inappropriate information to children, however, has not been found to be related
to a lack of social support and the severity of the stressors (Afifi, McManus, Hutchinson, and Baker,
2007). Having confidantes besides children, therefore, did not reduce the likelihood of sharing inap-
propriate information, and having more extreme stressors did not increase this likelihood. The only
factor that influenced the risk of disclosing inappropriate information was a parents’ lack of control
over the divorce stressors, regardless of their severity (Afifi et al., 2007). A common motivation for
sharing negative information about an ex-spouse is to shape the child’s impression of their other par-
ent (Koerner, Jacobs, and Raymond, 2000). For instance, mothers have reported that they hoped that
sharing certain information with their daughters would get their child to let go of an idealized view
of their father and help them understand that the mother was not solely to blame for the divorce
(Koerner et al., 2000). However, disclosure over topics such as negativity toward ex-husbands and
financial and personal concerns is significantly associated with daughters’ greater psychological distress
but not with greater feelings of mother-daughter closeness (Afifi et al., 2007; Koerner et al., 2000).
Because children often lack the emotional capacity to fulfill a peer-like role for their parents, the
violation of appropriate parent-child boundaries can produce great psychological stress and anxiety.
Breaching parent-child boundaries is particularly problematic when it involves triangulation.
When parents form alliances with children against the other parent, a triangulation occurs that fur-
ther obscures boundaries between parents and children (Buchanan et al., 1991). Intergenerational
triangulation can be problematic as well because it violates the appropriate hierarchy of family roles.
Even when parents do not succeed in forming alliances with children, their attempts to do so can
be harmful. In fact, children have cited the badmouthing of one parent by another, and attempts to
triangulate them into loyalty conflicts, as the most stressful component of parents’ divorce (Moné,
MacPhee, Anderson, and Banning, 2011). Children whose parents talked badly about each other,
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asked children to relay information, or inquired about information regarding the other parent’s
activities described feeling “trapped” in the middle of parental conflict and forced to choose sides,
which has been associated with higher levels of depression, anxiety, and deviant behavior in adoles-
cents (Afifi and Schrodt, 2003; Buchanan et al., 1991; Fabricius and Luecken, 2007).
Conversely, children have described being drawn to the parent who does not pull them into a
loyalty dilemma—when one parent speaks negatively about the other, children can mistrust the
integrity of the that parent, and thus facilitate closeness with the other parent (Arditti and Prouty,
1999; Feistman et al., 2016). When parents did not attempt to triangulate their children or retaliate
against the parent speaking negatively, children respected them for it (Feistman et al., 2016). Other
than being too honest, not lying to children is also an important factor. Children who feel deceived
by their parents about the divorce process report lower levels of communication satisfaction with
their parents and lower levels of self-esteem (Thomas and Booth-Butterfield, 1995). Children gener-
ally feel that they want their divorce-related questions answered, but they want an emphasis to be
placed on continuous love and security (Westberg, Nelson, and Piercy, 2002).
Renegotiating Personal Identities

Underlying the issues outlined previously is the task of renegotiating one’s identity. This intraper-
sonal process is one of the more ambiguous tasks that divorced parents face. To be sure, identity
renegotiation occurs throughout the life span as individuals move in and out of various roles and
work toward defining a sense of self. However, despite the relative visibility and prevalence of divorce
today, few people plan on it happening to them, and incorporating the label “divorced” into one’s
definition of self is a difficult task (Emery, 2012). Significant life roles such as “wife” or “husband”
tend to be deeply rooted in one’s identity and losing those roles forces people to face the question
“Who am I . . . now?” (Emery, 2012, p. 59). It is critical to recognize that at the same time as parents
are adjusting to new custodial arrangements, establishing coparenting relationships, and maintaining
parent-child boundaries, many are simultaneously experiencing a painful time of grief and loss. Los-
ing one’s role as spouse, along with a host of other losses that divorce carries, is not easy. However,
those who are able to process their grief in healthy ways accept the occurrence of an unplanned
and challenging life event, and make meaning of the “life” and “death” of the marriage in a way that
stimulates self-growth and discovery are those who are best equipped for avoiding the parenting
pitfalls that place children at risk.
Remarried Parents
When divorced parents remarry, new parenting challenges may arise. Although a growing body of
literature has explored stepparents’ parenting practices, limited research exists on the practices of
remarried biological parents. The research that does exist in this area suggests that when one or both
coparents repartner, parents face the task of maintaining boundaries around coparenting relationships
and making decisions about the extent to which new partners will or will not be involved (Ganong
et al., 2015). In one study, mothers described seeing themselves as “captains” of the coparenting
team when either they or their ex-spouses repartnered, and they wished to maintain control over
parenting and disciplinary decisions when a stepparent entered the family (Ganong et al., 2015;
Schoppe-Sullivan and Altenburger, 2019). The specific strategies that they used to retain power over
the coparenting system depended on which parent repartnered. When biological fathers repartnered,
mothers initially set limits with the intention of excluding stepmothers from the coparenting system
by communicating with the fathers only. Over time, mothers generally recognized their inability to
exert control over the father’s household and gradually accepted stepmothers as secondary coparents.
When biological mothers repartnered, they continued to play an active role in regulating how much
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parenting stepfathers did. Mothers were the gatekeepers of children’s interactions with stepfathers,
controlling things like the stepfathers’ initial introductions to their children as well as time spent with
children and what they did together (Ganong et al., 2015).
Remarried parents are unique in that the biological parent-child dyad has more shared history
than the marital dyad, which presents interesting challenges for parents, because when children
have greater “institutional” memory than stepparents, potential insider-outsider dynamics may make
stepparents feel uncomfortable (Papernow, 2013). These dynamics may ensue particularly when
remarriages occur after biological parent-child boundaries become enmeshed from residing in a
single-parent household (Cartwright and Seymour, 2002). Stepparents entering the family system
may feel like “outsiders” to the biological dyad (Dupuis, 2007), and parents who are trying to main-
tain ties to their children may experience guilt from having to divide time and attention between
children and their new spouse (Visher and Visher, 1996). In other words, remarried couples experi-
ence loyalty binds between different people in stepfamilies. For instance, in one qualitative investi-
gation, remarried parents often described that they had a difficult time simultaneously meeting the
needs of their spouses and those of their children (Martin-Uzzi and Duval-Tsioles, 2013). Biological
parents described feeling caught in the middle of children and spouses, forced to choose one over the
other, and more than half of stepparents interviewed described feeling like their needs came last in
the family, and many resented consistently making sacrifices that prioritized their stepchildren above
their marriage (Martin-Uzzi and Duval-Tsioles, 2013). Such findings suggest that enmeshed parent-
child relationships disrupt the development of close spousal relationships in stepfamilies, as they may
create loyalty binds that put the couple secondary to the parent-child bond.
Stepparents
Generally, the parenting practices of stepparents are more complex than those of biological parents,
in part because stepfamily roles are characterized by a lack of social norms and clear expectations
for “appropriate” stepparenting behaviors (Ganong and Coleman, 2017). Indeed, research from the
perspectives of stepparents generally reflects their frustrations with role confusion (Martin-Uzzi and
Duval-Tsioles, 2013). Because role construction and enactment is heavily influenced by gender,
stepfathers and stepmothers typically experience their parenting roles differently. For stepfathers,
cultural expectations of men as emotionally reserved disciplinarians may lead them to see little value
in establishing friendships with stepchildren, instead choosing to employ parenting practices that are
low in warmth and high in control. Generally, however, stepfathers who seek to assume a friend role
and allow stepchildren to take the lead in how quickly the relationship develops are more success-
ful at establishing closer ties (Ganong, Coleman, Fine, and Martin, 1999). Higher levels of stepfather
involvement (e.g., doing chores together, watching shows, playing sports, everyday talk) have been
associated with higher-quality stepfather-stepchild relationships ( Jensen and Pace, 2016) as well as
the quality of the mother-child relationship and adolescents’ adjustment prior the stepfather’s entry
to the family system (King, Amato, and Lindstrom, 2015).
Because children tend to live with their mothers following parental divorce, the majority of step-
family research has focused on the mother-stepfather household; less is known about the parenting
practices of stepmothers (Ganong and Coleman, 2017). When stepmother-stepchild relationships are
examined, research tends to support that stepmothers are less successful than stepfathers in develop-
ing positive relationships with their stepchildren (Ahrons, 1994; Ganong, Coleman, and Jamison,
2011; MacDonald and DeMaris, 1996; Schmeeckle, 2007). Although stepfathers also face role ambi-
guity, stepmothers’ roles are particularly ambiguous because they include contradictory expectations
of being involved as women in the family yet distant as stepparents, thus creating confusing messages
about how to be a “good” stepmother (Weaver and Coleman, 2005). Nonresidential stepmothers
have described fulfilling “mothering but not mother roles” (Weaver and Coleman, 2005, p. 477).
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Although they made efforts to engage in mothering behaviors and embody certain mother-like
qualities, they were careful not to infringe on the role of the biological mother. Studies from the
perspective of adult stepchildren likewise suggest that stepmothers’ careful negotiation of these roles
is important for positive stepparent-stepchild relationships. For instance, one researcher found that
young adult stepdaughters who described positive stepmothering behaviors—although they identi-
fied five unique styles of positive stepmothering roles—all reported that their stepmothers did not
attempt to replace their mothers (Crohn, 2006). Furthermore, cultural images and stereotypes of the
wicked stepmother affect stepmothers’ parenting practices. For instance, stepmothers have described
actively avoiding disciplining stepchildren out of fear of reinforcing the “wicked stepmother” label
(Weaver and Coleman, 2005). In fact, fear of associating themselves with negative stepmother stereo-
types has even prevented stepmothers from seeking social support about their stepparenting frustra-
tions (Craig and Johnson, 2010).
For stepmothers and stepfathers alike, entering the family when stepchildren are young tends to
result in less parenting friction than entering the family when stepchildren are adolescents (Ganong
et al., 2011). Despite the potential for stepparents to experience parenting challenges, stepchildren
have described appreciating stepparents’ efforts to develop relationships and valuing stepparents’ con-
tributions to the family (Ganong et al., 1999).
Clearly, divorced parents, remarried parents, and stepparents each face unique challenges to par-
enting. Divorced parents experience issues surrounding adjusting to custodial arrangements, estab-
lishing functional coparenting relationships, maintaining appropriate parent-child boundaries, and
renegotiating personal identities. Remarried parents often face issues pertaining to gatekeeping
behaviors and loyalty binds, and stepparents may face challenges in developing relationships with
stepchildren or understanding their roles in the stepfamily. Researchers have sought to explain some
of these findings with various theories about divorced and remarried parenting with a number of
theoretical perspectives.
Theories About Divorced and Remarried Parents,

Stepparents, and Step(Parenting)
Theories about divorced and remarried parents are essentially attempts to understand or predict how
parent-child relationships and interactions are affected by marital transitions. They are, at some level,
theories about continuity and maintenance of relationships. Theories about stepparenting, in con-
trast, are about developing relationships. Stepparents and stepchildren are usually individuals of differ-
ent generations and age cohorts who are brought together because each is connected to one specific
person, the stepparent’s romantic partner and the stepchild’s parent. How these step-relationships
develop is the issue at the core of theories about stepparents and stepparenting. In this section, we
summarize the theories that have been used to study divorced and remarried parents, stepparents, and
(step)parenting, which fall broadly into three categories: stress-related theories, coparenting theories,
and selection models.
Although parenting and stepparenting are experienced in different contexts and are distinctly
different role sets, researchers have generally used similar theories to frame their studies. Because
children are more likely to be living with mothers than fathers after divorce, and with mothers and
stepfathers more often than fathers and stepmothers after remarriage (Stykes and Guzzo, 2015), much
of the theorizing has been about residential divorced mothers and residential stepfathers after remar-
riage (Ganong and Coleman, 2017). Consequently, nonresidential parents after divorce, nonresiden-
tial and residential stepmothers, and remarried mothers and fathers have been relatively neglected
by researchers. By far the largest body of research has been on children’s well-being after parental
divorce or remarriage, and it is this scholarly work that serves as the context within which theories
about postdivorce parents and stepparents have been proposed (Ganong and Coleman, 2017).
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Researchers generally have used a narrow array of theories to study divorced and remarried
parents, stepparents, and (step)parenting. Although a few scholars have used attachment, identity,
bioecological, evolutionary, and other theoretical perspectives, most have focused on family system
theories (Kerig, 2019), often not to generate specific hypotheses, but to frame studies or to interpret
results (Demo and Buehler, 2013). For instance, stress-related theories have been widely used.
Stress-Related Theories
The processes of divorce and remarriage are stressful for family members, involving multiple changes
(e.g., relocations, losses of friends, changes in resources, alterations in family roles and relationships),
interpersonal conflicts, and transformations in personal and familial identities—so it is not surprising
that most studies about divorced and remarried parents, stepparents, and (step)parenting are based on
stress-related theories. Divorce is a process that extends often over months or years and may begin
even before parents physically separate (Emery, 2012). There are multiple stressors associated with
divorce and parental remarriages as family structure transitions. Parents and children who have expe-
rienced parental remarriage usually have been exposed to earlier structural transitions (e.g., divorce,
bereavement). Increasingly, they have likely undergone multiple family transitions prior to remar-
riage, such as re-divorces or separations of cohabiting unions (Kennedy and Fitch, 2012). Because
structural transitions are stressful, researchers have theorized about the negative effects of divorce and
remarriage on parents, parent-child bonds, and parenting behaviors as consequences of this stress. In
stepfamilies, multiple transitions increase family and relational complexity, which affects stepparents,
parents, and stepchildren.
Change and Instability

The simplest theoretical perspective is that relational and structural changes due to divorce and
remarriage increase stress, which negatively affects parents, parenting, parent-child relationships, and
children’s development (Cavanagh and Huston, 2006; Delongis and Preece, 2002; Sweeney, 2007).
A variant of this perspective, the cumulative effects hypothesis, proposes that multiple transitions accu-
mulate additional stressors, which, in turn, has greater negative impacts on parents and their children
(Dunn et al., 1998; Osborne and McLanahan, 2007). Support for both change and instability and cumu-
lative effects hypotheses has been found, which has led to specific speculations about how transitional
stressors affect children and their parents—a common view is the diminished parenting hypothesis.
Diminished Parenting Hypothesis

Some scholars have proposed that poor parental adjustment to separation and divorce stressors and
the additional demands on divorced parents reduce parenting capacity. Three reasons for diminished
parenting are given: (1) reduces parental monitoring of children, (2) lowers their involvement in
childrearing, and (3) decreases the effectiveness of parenting behaviors (Amato, 2000; Sandler, Miles,
Cookston, and Braver, 2008).
In terms of reduced parental monitoring, work demands and living apart from children are the
primary time drains for parents, although some parents also engage in dating and other social activi-
ties that draw them away from childrearing duties (Kalmijn, 2015). The economic burdens of sepa-
ration and divorce mean that parents often must work additional hours or take extra jobs to meet
financial obligations, so they have less time to monitor their children (Manning and Brown, 2006;
Pong, 1997).
Although remarriage often adds another income-producing adult to the family, there are addi-
tional resource demands after remarriage (e.g., stepparents with child support obligations). Both
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adults in stepfamilies also are more likely to be employed outside of the home than in first marriage
families, so parental work demands are hypothesized to affect monitoring of children after remar-
riage (Manning and Brown, 2006). Nurturing the newly formed spousal bond also demands time
and attention that may also reduce monitoring of children from prior unions. It is not clear, however,
if remarried parental monitoring differs from that of first-marriage parents’ monitoring (Bulcroft,
Carmody, and Bulcroft, 1998; Fisher, Leve, O’Leary, and Leve, 2003).
In terms of parental engagement, although it is possible for children to spend more time after sepa-
ration with a parent than before, work and relational demands on divorced parents have been hypoth-
esized to reduce parents’ time and involvement with children and, subsequently, to lower p arent-child
relationship quality and children’s well-being (Amato and Sobolewski, 2004). Most of this research
has focused on nonresidential fathers (Goldberg, Tan, Davis, and Easterbrooks, 2013; Troilo and
Coleman, 2013). Findings are not uniform, but when divorced nonresidential fathers actively engage
with children there are increased positive outcomes and less negative internalizing and externalizing
behaviors for children (Amato and Gilbreth, 1999; Amato, Kane, and James, 2011; Sarkadi, Kristians-
son, Oberklaid, and Bremberg, 2008). There also is evidence that how fathers are engaged matters
more than time spent together; authoritative fathering is better for children than authoritarian par-
enting (Amato and Gilbreth, 1999: Coley and Medeiros, 2007; Troilo and Coleman, 2013).
Parental engagement may change after remarriage. Engagement is important, because children
who maintain close emotional ties with remarried parents have better developmental outcomes than
children whose bonds are less close (Carlson, 2006; Kim, Hetherington, and Reiss, 1999; Planitz,
Feeney, and Peterson, 2009; Schenck et al., 2009; Thomson, Hanson, and McLanahan, 1994). Close
ties with mothers appear to mitigate poor stepfamily adjustment for adolescents—it is easier for
mothers and their children to communicate and assist each other to cope with stepfamily living
when they are emotionally connected.
Nonresidential fathers interact with children less often following the remarriage of either parent
(Amato, Meyers, and Emery, 2009; Baxter, 2012; Juby, Billette, Laplante, and LeBourdais, 2007; Tach,
Mincy, and Edin, 2010), although mothers’ new romantic partnerships may reduce father involve-
ment more than fathers’ own new partnerships (Tach et al., 2010). This disengagement is related to
the number of children fathers have in subsequent unions and to the number of stepchildren in their
households (Manning and Smock, 2000; Manning, Stewart, and Smock, 2003). Fathers appear to trade
or swap children when they become stepfathers—they spend time and resources on children they
live with (either biological children or stepchildren), rather than on children from prior unions liv-
ing elsewhere. This has been labeled the “package deal hypothesis” (Furstenberg and Cherlin, 1991).
The “new responsibilities hypothesis” suggests that how nonresidential fathers feel about main-
taining their parental roles may change after they remarry or repartner (McGene and King, 2012).
When a father acquires a new partner, relationships with his children may still be enjoyable and
involvement in important activities continued, but the combination of old responsibilities with new
responsibilities from the remarriage may create stress for fathers. According to this hypothesis, added
constraints on time and resources reduce nonresidential fathers’ engagement with their children.
Although father involvement with children has not been found in every study (e.g., McKenry, McK-
elvey, Leigh, and Wark, 1996; Seltzer and Bianchi, 1988; Veum, 1993), Guzzo (2009) found that low-
income fathers’ contact with children decreased when they entered new romantic partnerships and
increased after those partnerships ended, which provides evidence for the hypothesis.
The processes by which fathers maintain nonresidential parent-child relationships remain largely
unclear. There are few norms for relationships between nonresidential parents and children (Greif
and Kristall, 1993), and this ambiguity may be one reason why nonresidential father involvement
varies greatly and contact is erratic (Amato et al., 2009). Furthermore, although we know that con-
tact between nonresidential fathers and children is affected by fathers’ coparenting relationships with
mothers, repartnering of either parent, children’s ages, physical distance, and work demands (Berger,
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Carlso, Bzostek, and Osborne, 2008; King, 2009; King, Amato, and Lindstrom, 2015; Klaus, Nauck,
and Steinbach, 2012; Schwartz and Finley, 2006; Yuan and Hamilton, 2006), research and theory
about how nonresidential fathers maintain relationships with children after remarriage or repart-
nering of one or both parents is limited. There is evidence that, “package deals” and “child swap-
ping” aside, in some stepfamilies, a new stepfather does not reduce nonresidential father involvement
(Dunn, Cheng, O’Connor, and Bridges, 2004; King, 2009), especially if nonresidential fathers and
children have developed routines of contact with each other ( Juby et al., 2007).
There have been few studies of nonresidential mothers’ engagement with children. However,
nonresidential mothers maintain contact with their children more frequently and more regularly
than nonresidential fathers (Gunnoe and Hetherington, 2004; Stewart, 1999). Maternal engagement
is important—adolescents’ adjustments were more strongly associated with perceived social support
from nonresidential mothers than nonresidential fathers (Gunnoe and Hetherington, 2004).
In terms of stepparent involvement, as newcomers to the stepfamily, stepparents’ tasks have been
perceived to be quite different from those of parents. Stepchildren almost never are as close to
their stepparents as they are to their parents (Heard, Gorman, and Kapinus, 2008; Schnettler and
Steinbach, 2011), especially at first. As relative strangers to stepchildren when relationships begin,
researchers have proposed that stepparents should focus on bonding and relationship-building with
stepchildren (Ganong et al., 1999). In general, researchers have found that stepparents spend less time
with and are less involved with stepchildren than are parents (e.g., Hofferth and Anderson, 2003).
The main theoretical explanations for this finding come from economic models and evolutionary
psychology.
The social capital model states that stepparents invest their time and energy on the repartnered
couple’s shared relationship or on children from prior unions rather than on their stepchildren
(e.g., Gorman and Braverman, 2008). From evolutionary scholars, the parental investment/parental
discrimination proposition states that stepparents invest little in stepchildren because they are not geneti-
cally related, discriminating in favor of their genetic offspring, has received some research support
(Case, Lin, and McLanahan, 2001; Schnettler and Steinbach, 2011). Evolutionary theory and parental
discrimination also have been employed to explain stepchild abuse. Children in households with
non-related adults, particularly stepfathers, mothers’ boyfriends, and other men, have been found to
be at greater risk for sexual abuse (Margolin, 1992) and physical abuse (Daly and Wilson, 1996) than
children living with parents only.
Other potential explanations for why stepparent involvement in childrearing has been more lim-
ited than residential parents’ involvement include the following: (1) stepfathers may find it hard to
break into tightly knit mother-child systems because both mothers and children work to keep them
at a distance (Bray and Kelly, 1998), (2) some mothers want romantic partners but not coparents and
may discourage childrearing involvement by stepfathers (Ganong et al., 2012; Weaver and Coleman,
2010), and (3) nonresidential parents may discourage active involvement by stepparents, out of jeal-
ousy and fear that they might be supplanted by the stepparent in their children’s lives. Stepchildren’s
reactions to stepparents’ efforts to engage also have been found to be relevant for stepparent involve-
ment; stepchildren reject stepparents who engage in discipline and control early in the relationship
(Bray and Kelly, 1998; Ganong et al., 1999).
Not all researchers, however, have found reduced investment in stepchildren by stepfathers (Bul-
croft et al., 1998). There is growing evidence that fathers, mothers, and stepfathers are figuring out
how to allow parents and stepparents to participate in the lives of children (Ganong et al., 2015) in
ways that benefit everyone (Carlson, 2006; King, 2006; 2009; Schenck et al., 2009; White and Gilbreth,
2001; Yuan and Hamilton, 2006). For instance, stepparents who intentionally engaged in affinity-
seeking behaviors, who try to develop positive relationships by engaging in friendship-developing
actions, and who maintained those behaviors over time have warmer, closer bonds with stepchildren
than do other stepparents (Ganong et al., 1999). A key to the success of affinity-seeking efforts may be
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stepchildren recognizing and reciprocating stepparents’ affinity-seeking efforts (Ganong et al., 1999;
Ganong et al., 2011; O’Connor, Hetherington, and Clingempeel, 1997). Another key to affinity-
seeking success is that parents allow that process to develop without their interference (Ganong et al.,
2011).
Children seem to be able to compartmentalize relationships with nonresidential fathers and step-
fathers. In fact, the added adult hypothesis—that stepchildren benefit when stepparents are engaged
with stepchildren in positive ways—also has received some support from researchers (e.g., Bulcroft
et al., 1998; Sweeney, 2007). When stepfathers demonstrate to stepchildren that they matter to them,
internalizing and externalizing behavior problems are reduced (Schnettler and Steinbach, 2011);
when stepparents spend more time with stepchildren, step-relationships are closer and children ben-
efit emotionally (Schenck et al., 2009; Schrodt, Soliz, and Braithwaite, 2008).
Marsiglio (1992) found that residential fathers who are also stepfathers display more father-like
role identities toward stepchildren than do men who are stepfathers only. Living with their biological
children appears to help fathers be better stepfathers to their stepchildren than they would be other-
wise (Marsiglio, 1992; Palisi, Orleans, Caddell, and Korn, 1991). Stepfathers who are also biological
fathers may be drawn closer to their stepchildren and may have fewer negative attitudes toward them
because of the strategies they adopt in striving to treat both sets of children equitably. The presence
of their own children in the household may force men to employ more parenting behaviors than if
they had merely been absorbed into a preexisting family. It is also possible that fathers who have joint
or sole physical custody of their children are more committed to the parental role. Men who seek
joint custody may be psychologically predisposed toward a positive perception of fatherhood (Palisi
et al., 1991). There also is evidence that fathers and stepfathers can work together and even serve as
allies in coparenting (Marsiglio, 1992). For example, Crosbie-Burnett (1989) found little competition
between fathers and stepfathers in complex stepfamilies, and she speculated that men who actively
participate in rearing their own children as well as stepchildren work at co-fathering better than
stepfathers who do not have children of their own.
King (2007) proposed four hypotheses to explain differential patterns of children’s closeness to
mothers and stepmothers—(1) the primacy of biology hypothesis is that children are closer to mothers
because of shared genetic bonds, (2) the primacy of residence hypothesis is that affective bonds will be
greater for children and adults who share a residence (more opportunities for bonding experiences),
(3) the accumulation hypothesis is that children will be close to both mothers and stepmothers if the
adults are nurturing and positively connected to the children, and (4) the irrelevance hypothesis is
that as children get older, they developmentally pull away from both women and are close to nei-
ther. For stepfathers and fathers, King (2006) added a fifth possibility, the substitution hypothesis, in
which residential stepfathers emotionally and functionally replace nonresidential fathers. King (2007)
speculated about factors that may influence closeness to parents and stepparents (e.g., marital quality,
father involvement, age when step-relationship began). She found evidence for both the primacy of
residence hypothesis (children were closer to residential stepmothers than to nonresidential mothers)
and for the biology hypothesis (close ties to nonresidential mothers were related to fewer internal-
izing problems for adolescents, close ties to residential stepmothers were not related to the number
of adolescents’ problems). In this stepfamily study, children were closer to residential fathers than to
mothers or stepmothers (King, 2007).
Stepchildren may sometimes be actively resistant to stepparent engagement (Klaus et al., 2012).
Step-relationships are characterized by more disagreements than are parent-child relationships, par-
ticularly when stepchildren are adolescents (Barber and Lyons, 1994). Even when positive stepparent-
stepchild relationships are established when children are preadolescents, conflicts may arise when
children get older (Hetherington, 1993). Stepchildren’s reactions are key to predicting the amount
of stepparent involvement in childrearing—stepchildren may accept a stepparent as a parental figure,
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see the stepparent as a friend, or they may rebel against stepparents, creating distance and conflicts
(see Ganong and Coleman, 2017, for a review).
Parental Effectiveness
Stressed parents are ineffective parents. Marital transitions are hypothesized to increase parental stress
and reduce parental effectiveness. For instance, the Disneyland dad hypothesis proposes that nonresi-
dential fathers, concerned about losing the affection of their children (Emery, 2012), restrict their
parenting to having good times with children when they are together. Mothers have been hypothe-
sized to make children their emotional confidantes and best friends to cope with transitional stressors
(Emery, 2012). It is likely that fathers engage in these behaviors as well if they have full custody of
their children. Caring for children alone leaves little time for finding an adult confidante.
Sharing inappropriate disclosures with children (parental inappropriate disclosures; Koerner,
Rankin, Kenyon, and Korn, 2004) is one type of ineffective parenting in response to stress. Research
on PID is based on privacy management theory (Petronio, 2010) and family systems theory. Parent-
child communication helps children understand family events and processes; reduces children’s fears
and uncertainty (Afifi and Schrodt, 2003; McManus and Nussbaum, 2011); redefines and rees-
tablishes family roles, expectations, and boundaries (Golish, 2003); and facilitates positive family
relationships (Afifi, 2003; Golish, 2003). Parental communications, however, also may add to chil-
dren’s distress if disclosures are developmentally inappropriate or hurtful to children and to family
relationships (Afifi, et al., 2007). Divorced coparents engage in PID to prevent their children from
being emotionally close to the other parent (Afifi, 2003) and to defend themselves against the other
parent’s disclosures (Koerner et al., 2000). Moreover, divorced mothers share their concerns with
their children to seek comfort and emotional support (Afifi, Schrodt, and McManus, 2009) and are
likely to engage in PID when feeling a lack of control (Afifi, Schrodt, et al., 2009). Although PID
is more intentional in high-conflict situations (Afifi, Schrodt, et al., 2009), parents are not always
aware of what is appropriate or inappropriate to disclose to children (Anderson et al., 2004; Cohen,
Leichtentritt, and Volpin, 2014).
Family Complexity and the Incomplete

Institutionalization Hypothesis
In a paper on remarriage as an incomplete institution, Cherlin (1978) argued that stepfamilies created
after divorce were stressful environments because stepfamily members lacked cultural norms to guide
their behaviors. In the absence of guidelines for how to stepparent, or how to coparent after divorce,
distressed stepparents and parents struggled to define roles and relationships, which create stress for
children as well. Pointing to a lacuna of customs, language, and laws to assist remarried parents and
stepparents, Cherlin (1978) made a convincing case that the complexity of postdivorce stepfami-
lies led to higher rates of remarital dissolution. The incomplete institutionalization hypothesis has
received some research support (e.g., Barrett and Turner, 2005).
Resilience Processes
Albeit stressful, divorce potentially has positive effects on parents’ well-being, if parents leave mentally
and physically abusive relationships, reduce daily stress and conflicts, and gain autonomy that allows
them to be more comfortable with themselves and their lives (Coleman, Ganong, and Russell, 2013).
Remarriage is usually seen by parents as a positive source of stress, although children often do not
agree with this perspective (Coleman et al., 2013). Resilience views have not been prevalent in the
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study of postdivorce and remarried parenting (Ganong and Coleman, 2017), but this perspective
proposes that parents who experience benefits from leaving their marriages will be more effective
parents and will create more satisfying bonds with children.
Coparenting
In addition to stress-related models of divorced and remarried parenting and stepparenting, research-
ers also have hypothesized about coparental functioning after divorce and the effects of coparental
relationships on children’s adjustment (Ahrons, 2006; Amato et al., 2011). Although parents may
assume that coparenting after separation will resemble responsibilities and interactions that occurred
during the marriage, gradually parents are confronted with new realities (Ganong et al., 2015).
A major task for divorced parents is to negotiate new ways of interacting as nonromantic coparents
while concurrently dissolving their marital partnerships, often under duress (Coleman, Ganong, and
Mitchell, 2018; Sandler et al., 2008). Most theory and research on postdivorce coparenting have
focused on cooperation and conflict between parents.
Coparental relationships for remarried parents include research on the biological parents’ ongoing
relationships as coparents of their children and their coparenting with new partners, the stepparents
of their children. These two coparental relationships (note, there may be more than two if parents
have reproduced with multiple partners) often exist concurrently, adding complexity to parents’
lives and more relationships to manage. Children are affected by all coparental dyads, of course. As
with the research on postdivorce coparenting, cooperation and conflict have been the emphases on
remarital coparenting.
Coparental Cooperation
Theories suggest that parents who either cooperate or coparent in a business-like fashion are more
likely to see better outcomes for children than divorced coparents who are disengaged or hostile
(Ahrons, 2006; Emery, 2012). There is some support for this hypothesis (Ahrons, 2006), but not all
researchers agree; Amato et al (2011) reported little evidence that cooperative coparenting buffered
children from the negative effects of divorce on well-being or academic achievement, and another
study found that parallel parenting, in which both divorced parents were actively engaged with their
children but not with each other, was as effective as cooperative coparenting (Beckmeyer, Cole-
man, and Ganong, 2014). Study design differences may account for some of the discrepancy, and
more research is needed on the effects of postdivorce coparenting cooperation on children (and on
parents).
Coparenting With Former Spouses/Partners

Conflicts between children’s biological parents and conflicts between bio-parents and stepparents
negatively affect behavioral and psychological outcomes for stepchildren (Feinberg, Kan, and Heth-
erington, 2007), and coparental conflicts affect children more in stepfamilies than in nuclear families
(e.g., Hanson, McLanahan, and Thomson, 1996). This may be because coparental conflicts in step-
families are prone to include children (Baxter, Braithwaite, and Bryant, 2006; Weaver and Coleman,
2010). Loyalty conflicts, which are disputes involving coparents and a child or a parent-stepparent-
child triad, have been found to affect stepchildren’s sense of well-being (Baxter et al., 2006). These
conflicts place stepchildren “in the middle” of emotionally tinged struggles between adults, which
is not only stressful, but also harmful to stepchildren’s emotional and psychological development
(DeLongis and Preece, 2002).
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Coparenting With Remarried Spouses

Most research on coparenting between parents and stepparents has sampled mother-stepfather pairs.
Mothers are generally the primary parents, assigning responsibilities and tasks to stepfathers (Ganong
et al., 2015; Weaver and Coleman, 2010). When stepfathers assume they will serve as replacements
for absent fathers, this may lead to conflicts with both mothers and stepchildren (Coleman et al.,
2001). Stepfathers who are uncertain about how to relate to their stepchildren are less satisfied with
their stepfamilies (Erera-Weatherly, 1996). Stepfathers’ uncertainty may be a consequence of moth-
ers and stepfathers not clearly communicating about desired childrearing roles—stepfathers may
be asked to do some parenting duties (e.g., pay for school lunches, enforce curfews), but defended
against when they overstep the mothers’ preferences (Papernow, 2013). Mothers and stepfathers often
do not discuss these issues prior to remarriage (Cartwright, 2010).
Coparental Conflicts
Coparental conflict increases negative outcomes for children (Emery, 2012; Fabricius and Luecken,
2007). Children in joint-custody arrangements whose parents report high interparental conflict
experience more psychological problems than do children in sole-custody arrangements (Lee, 2002).
It has been proposed, with some empirical support, that coparental conflicts may mediate the relation
between parental divorce and childhood internalizing behavior, externalizing behavior, and interper-
sonal problems (Amato, 2004).
Coparental conflicts with remarried spouses may occur when stepparents want more involvement
as disciplinarians. Most children want mothers to be the primary disciplinarian and rule-maker in
stepfamilies (Moore and Cartwright, 2005), and they want stepfathers to take a secondary role in
discipline (Koerner et al., 2004). Coparenting conflicts erupt when stepfathers think mothers are not
doing well in parenting or when they perceive that parents are too lenient and expect too little of
their children (Ganong and Coleman, 2017). Coparenting conflicts also occur when the biological
parent thinks the stepparent is too hard on the children or does not understand them (Ganong and
Coleman, 2017). Ongoing conflicts between remarried mothers and their partners regarding chil-
drearing are a major source of marital conflicts and dissatisfaction with remarriage (Stanley, Mark-
man, and Whitton, 2002).
Gatekeeping
Given the challenges of coparenting after marital dissolution, and the theoretical importance of
coparenting to children’s well-being after divorce, the concept of gatekeeping has become the focus of
a small but growing body of scholarship and theorizing (Schoppe-Sullivan and Altenburger, 2019).
Gatekeeping has been defined as the “facilitative and inhibitory functions exercised by one or both
parents that determine who will have access to their children and the nature of that access” (Pruett,
Williams, Insabella, and Little, 2003, p. 171). Originally, gatekeeping was conceptualized as moth-
ers restricting nonresidential fathers’ access to children, usually because of concerns about paternal
competence, child safety, or anger associated with relational issues (Fagan and Barnett, 2003; Herzog,
Umaña-Taylor, Madden-Derdich, and Leonard, 2007). Gatekeeping is now seen as a more complex
phenomenon, with facilitative actions by either parent, or gate opening (Trinder, 2008), and protec-
tive actions (Austin, Pruett, Kirkpatrick, Flens, and Gould, 2013) being added to the initial conceptu-
alization of this phenomenon. Despite the changes in definition, gatekeeping is primarily studied as
if it were a process done mainly by mothers against fathers (Ganong, Coleman, and Chapman, 2016;
Puhlman and Pasley, 2013; Schoppe-Sullivan and Altenburger, 2019).
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When mothers repartner, they may intensify restrictive gatekeeping with nonresidential fathers
because they want their new partners to assume paternal functions. They perceive that it simplifies
their lives to have their new families operate as if they were first marriage nuclear families (Ganong
et al., 2015). This is facilitated if stepfathers are willing to assume paternal roles with stepchildren
(Ganong et al., 2011; Manning and Smock, 2000; Marsiglio, 2004) and if stepchildren accept them as
additional parents (Ganong at al., 2011; King, 2006; White and Gilbreth, 2001).
This gatekeeping phenomenon is also found in lesbian-headed stepfamilies (Moore, 2008). Mater-
nal gatekeeping begins before remarriage (Anderson and Greene, 2011; Weaver and Coleman, 2010)
as mothers regulate the amount of stepparent involvement allowed in childrearing. Although moth-
ers’ restrictive gatekeeping generally lessens over time in stepfamilies, there is no reason to expect that
mothers stop doing this completely, and in some cases, mothers’ gatekeeping may persist. In general,
stepfathers have less involvement with stepchildren than fathers do in first marriage families (Bray
and Berger, 1993; Henderson and Taylor, 1999), which may be partly due to mothers’ gatekeeping.
Whether this is harmful to stepfamily functioning may depend on the stepfathers’ expectations for
his roles in the family (Bray and Kelly, 1998). Some mothers also engage in facilitative gatekeeping, or
gate opening (Ganong et al., 1999; Ganong et al., 2015; Ganong et al., 2016). Mothers who encour-
age stepfather involvement, however, do so only under their implicit supervision or direction, at least
until the stepfamily has been together for years (Ganong et al., 2015).
Selection
People with certain personality characteristics or who have mental health issues or behavioral prob-
lems (e.g., substance abuse or physical abuse) may be predisposed to divorce (selected into divorce)
because they are difficult to live with and not prone to maintaining romantic relationships. Selection
models reverse causality compared to other theories; with selection, parents’ preexisting characteris-
tics increase interpersonal stress, which leads to divorce, rather than divorce leading to certain nega-
tive parenting outcomes. It is often assumed that the same personality, temperament, or behavioral
characteristics that lead to divorce also may affect the quality of parenting or parent-child relation-
ships (Cavanagh and Huston, 2006; Liu and Heiland, 2012). This theory has not been widely applied
to postdivorce parenting, however, but rather on children’s outcomes when parents separate, divorce,
or remarry.
Theories most commonly applied to the study of divorced and remarried parenting, or to expla-
nations of children’s outcomes when parents divorce or remarry, include stress-related theories
(e.g., change and instability, diminished parenting hypothesis, family complexity and the institution-
alization hypothesis, resilience processes), coparenting theories (e.g., coparental cooperation, copa-
rental conflicts, gatekeeping), and selection models. Looking at the evolution of research on divorced
and remarried parenting over time, we turn to a discussion of the general eras that have been key in
the development of this body of knowledge.
Classical and Modern Research in Divorced

and Remarried Parenting
It is difficult, if not impossible, to identify one or even a handful of studies that could be considered
classical in the sense that they were methodologically or conceptually groundbreaking, setting the
standard for later research and theorizing. Instead, as with many other social and behavioral science
content areas, the scholarship on postdivorce parenting and stepparenting developed incrementally.
We identified four general eras or phases of development of scholarly research on stepfamilies: (1)
the social problem/social address phase, (2) the growing recognition phase, (3) a decade of pro-
gress, and (4) the New Millennium (Ganong and Coleman, 2018). This trajectory also applies to
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research on postdivorce families. These overlapping eras are characterized by (1) increasing com-
plexity of research design, analysis, and interpretation, (2) greater understanding of postdivorce and
stepfamily dynamics and relationships, and (3) enhanced awareness of relational processes that were
still unknown.
The Social Problem/Social Address Phase

Researchers’ interest in postdivorce families and stepfamilies began in the United States when divorce
rates peaked and postdivorce stepfamilies began to outnumber post-bereavement stepfamilies for the
first time. Divorce and, by extension, remarriage and the creation of stepfamilies were perceived to be
major social problems that particularly affected children (Amato, 2004; Ganong and Coleman, 1994).
Family structures, usually simply defined as nuclear, single-parent, and (remarried) stepfamilies, were
seen as social addresses that explained individual and family well-being. In this first phase, research-
ers seldom measured family processes or used them as explanatory mechanisms. Parenting behav-
iors after divorce were rarely examined. A common research design was a cross-sectional approach
that compared children, and less often adults, from first-marriage families, postdivorce single-parent
households, and remarried households, and any differences were attributed to family structure effects.
Four studies from this era are relevant. Oddly, they were not methodologically representative of
the era—two were qualitative studies (Ahrons, 1981; Wallerstein and Kelly, 1980) and the third was
a mixed-methods study (Hetherington, 1988). All became longitudinal investigations. The fourth
study (Crosbie-Burnett, 1984) was an investigation of triads of stepfathers, mothers, and their resi-
dential (step)children. Crosbie-Burnett found that the stepparent-stepchild relationship was more
predictive of stepfamily satisfaction than was the marital bond; she argued, in contrast to the prevail-
ing family systems perspective that married couples were the architects of families’ foundations, in
stepfamilies, the step-relationships were key.
Another study described paradigmatic constraints on stepfamily researchers and research designs
(Clingempeel, Flescher, and Brand, 1987). These constraints included both epistemic beliefs and values
(norms about how research should be conducted) and nonepistemic beliefs (cultural values and atti-
tudes). Epistemic constraints included a bias for between-group comparisons of family structures; a
disciplinary bias in which methods, perspectives, and theories of other disciplines are ignored; and
what Clingempeel and colleagues called the rational objectivity bias, beliefs that scientists can and
should be objective about the subject matter. Instead, Clingempeel and colleagues (1987) advocated
for more within-group designs that examine changes over time and the inclusion of family process
variables (e.g., parenting dynamics, family conflict) to explain outcomes. Researchers were encour-
aged to move outside of disciplinary silos to learn new approaches and designs, new theories, and
new ideas in general, and to employ qualitative as well as quantitative research methods. Clingempeel
and his colleagues (1987) also argued that non-epistemic beliefs rooted in nuclear family ideology were
responsible for many research limitations of the social problem/social address phase. These limita-
tions included (1) minimal attention to the structural complexity and heterogeneity of nonnuclear
families, (2) emphasis on problems rather than on potential strengths, and (3) disregard for how
postdivorce and stepfamily relationships and dynamics might differ in basic ways from those of first
marriage nuclear families. These non-epistemic beliefs reflected the predominant societal views of
the 1970s and 1980s that family structure changes represented a decline in the American family
(Popenoe, 1994).
Another article from this era was Cherlin’s (1978) theoretical piece on how remarriage, and
the families formed by remarriage, were incompletely institutionalized. Over the past 40 years, this
incomplete institutionalization hypothesis often has been applied to step-relationships, including
stepparents. Years later, Cherlin (2004) claimed that other family forms, including marriage, were or
were becoming incompletely institutionalized as well.
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The Growing Recognition Phase

The second era of the research trajectory on postdivorce families and stepfamilies began in the mid-
to late-1980s and ended in the mid-1990s. In this phase, a growing recognition of the complexity of
family structures led researchers to larger, more representative data sets and more sophisticated study
designs (Ganong and Coleman, 1994). More effort was made to account for differences across family
types either by controlling for variables such as income or by more carefully limiting samples to spe-
cific types of family structures to control for extraneous effects. Researchers also began to examine
the intersections of family processes like relationship closeness and parental monitoring with family
structures. Longitudinal research began to appear, as did within-group designs (Bray and Berger,
1990; Hetherington and Clingempeel, 1992).
Classic work in this era was a second longitudinal study by Hetherington of remarried mother-
stepfather households (Hetherington and Clingempeel, 1992; Vuchinich, Hetherington, Vuchinich,
and Clingempeel, 1991). Comparison groups of nuclear family households and divorced single-
mother households were included, matched on target children’s ages and, for divorced and remarried
mothers, years since their divorces. Concurrently, Bray conducted a multi-method, multi-measure
longitudinal study of stepfather households and nuclear family households (Bray and Berger, 1992).
In both studies, multiple family members provided data; the samples were local and drawn from
convenience, and consisted predominately of White and middle-class families. Although the restric-
tive samples were not representative of all postdivorce stepfamilies, these studies pulled the field away
from cross-sectional between-groups comparisons and toward more complex conceptualizations of
parents, stepparents, and family dynamics.
The Decade of Progress: The 1990s

In this era, researchers from Australia, New Zealand, and Europe, and from diverse fields of study
helped reduce the disciplinary bias found in earlier eras (Clingempeel et al., 1987). Cross-cultural
comparisons were made for the first time. Scholars from the fields of communication studies (Braith-
waite, Baxter), anthropology (Flinn, Martin and Daly), and gerontology (Vinick) joined family
scientists, sociologists, psychologists, and social workers who had been the field’s main research con-
tributors. This expansion of disciplines contributed to increasingly diverse research designs, ranging
from examinations of large national data sets to small-scale, in-depth qualitative investigations. Several
large, national data sets became available during this period, allowing researchers to investigate more
variables and to control for inherent differences between family structures in ways that had not pre-
viously been possible (Bulcroft et al., 1998; Menaghan, Kowaleski-Jones, and Mott, 1997). Although
sometimes hampered by the intrinsic limitations of these large secondary data sets, researchers began
giving greater attention to key contextual variables, such as the number and timing of family transi-
tions (O’Connor, Pickering, Dunn, Golding, and the ALSPAC Study Team, 1999). Between-group
comparisons to other family forms still predominated, but more researchers explored within-group
differences. In this era, researchers also began to make more use of grand and mid-range theories to
explain phenomena and to test propositions. Inductive theories emerged from qualitative inquiry,
such as Braithwaite and colleagues’ study of stepfamily rituals (Braithwaite, Baxter, and Harper, 1998).
In addition, reports from longitudinal studies were published, framed from the perspective of mul-
tiple family members with data collected from children, parents, and sometimes teachers or others
(Bray and Kelly, 1998; Dunn et al., 1998; Hetherington, 1993; Hetherington and Clingempeel, 1992;
O’Connor et al., 1997). Reports from a longitudinal study of adolescents whose parents had divorced
also were published (Buchanan et al., 1991, 1992).
Researchers’ conceptualizations became more complex and more closely connected to the reali-
ties of postdivorce families and stepfamilies. A few researchers began to expand their lens beyond the
330
household (e.g., nonresidential parents were included in a few studies; Hanson et al., 1996). A study
in England took an ecological framework to study stepfamilies (Dunn et al., 1998), and Braver began
a longitudinal study of nonresidential fathers (Braver and O’Connell, 1998).
In the last decade of the twentieth century, more than 200 studies focused on the effects on
children of living with a stepparent. Focusing on the effects on children reflected the importance
of the topic as well as continuing societal concerns about the effects of divorce and remarriage on
children (Coleman and Ganong, 1995). It also reflected the availability of those large data sets and
the increasing ease with which family structure and a variety of child outcomes (e.g., self-esteem,
grades) could be measured.
Many challenges remained. “Deficit comparisons” continued to predominate, operating on the
assumption that nuclear families should be the standard by which all other family forms should be
compared. Between-group designs remained common, comparing children living in different family
structures (e.g., stepfamilies, first-married families, and single mothers) on a selected outcome variable
while statistically controlling for various demographic characteristics. Too often, causal relations were
inferred from these correlational, between-group data (see Amato, 2000; Coleman et al., 2000, for
reviews). Data were obtained mostly from only one family member, usually a parent or stepparent; the
vantage points of children were rarely represented. Stepfamilies of color were seldom included or their
numbers in samples were too small to draw conclusions. Mothers in postdivorce families and stepfa-
thers in stepfather households dominated the research. Few researchers focused attention on biologi-
cal parents, nonresidential parents, or extended kin networks. In addition, factors related to the larger
social environments, such as how parents interacted with schools and other institutions, remained
largely unexplored. Finally, although theoretical complexity increased in the 1990s, researchers contin-
ued to focus on negative findings, and statistically significant but small effects often were treated as if
they were large effects generalizable to all (see critiques by Amato, 1994 and Cherlin, 1999).
The New Millennium Phase: Increasing Conceptual

and Methodological Sophistication
In the New Millennium Era, beginning roughly at the start of the twenty first century until the pre-
sent, most of the promising trends evidenced during the final decade of the twentieth century con-
tinued at an even faster pace. These include more international scholars, greater methodological and
theoretical sophistication, and much more emphasis on stepfamily processes, such as parenting. From
a problem-focused emphasis that simply linked outcomes to different family structures during the
1980s, to a mix of structural or process studies in the 1990s, quantitative researchers in this latest era
are examining the interactions of family structure and family processes, using theoretically informed
and analytically sophisticated designs.
One ongoing challenge for researchers has been the lack of fit between their study designs and
their aspirations to draw causal inferences. This is partly because researchers are unable to control for
all variables that may affect the phenomena being examined. For instance, differences in outcomes
between family structures may be selection effects that co-occur with family structure (e.g., income,
household relocations, changes in household membership). Some selection effects can be controlled
via sampling strategies (e.g., sampling only divorced mothers or sampling only stepfather house-
holds), but these methods cannot entirely rule out other selection effects. Establishing cause and
effect requires ruling out selection effects. Assessing all potentially relevant variables is likely impos-
sible and disentangling potential causes is difficult. In the New Millennium Era, researchers have had
access to a variety of sophisticated analytic procedures to examine selection effects, including “fixed
effects analytic designs” (Gibson-Davis, 2008; Kowaleski-Jones and Dunifon, 2006) and “differences-
within-differences approaches” (Meyer and Cancian, 2012). When used in longitudinal designs, these
techniques have great potential for exploring critical cause-effect relations.
331
Many gaps in research on divorce and remarried parenting have been addressed since the turn
of the century. For instance, new work examining biogenetic and genomic effects on children has
begun (Ulbricht et al., 2013) as well as investigations of stepchildren’s effects on parents and steppar-
ents (Hawkins, Amato, and King, 2007). In addition, a small body of research on stepfamilies headed
by gay and lesbian couples began to grow, such as work on the development of stepparent-stepchild
relationships (Moore, 2008; Patterson, 2019).
Research on postdivorce and remarried parenting across racial and ethnic groups also began to
appear with greater frequency in the New Millennium Era, yielding a clearer picture about parenting
processes among people of color. For example, African Americans are more likely to share parent-
ing responsibilities with stepparents than are White parents of European descent, in part because of
cultural and historical factors such as beliefs about fictive kinship (e.g., othermothers, social fathers).
African Americans more often hold pedi-focal beliefs (emphasizing children’s well-being) rather
than patric-focal beliefs (greater concern about adults); the cultural values of fictive kinship and
pedi-focal emphasis may facilitate cooperative coparenting among African Americans’ divorced and
remarried coparenting subsystems (Sanner, Coleman, and Ganong, in review). Latinos/as, on the
other hand, hold strong cultural values about patriarchy and familism, which appears to mitigate
against flexible coparenting boundaries that include three or more parents (Skogrand, Barrios-Bell,
and Higginbotham, 2009). Research about race, ethnicity, and postdivorce coparenting, however, has
only begun to scratch the surface of parenting dynamics. Similarly, with a few exceptions (e.g., Bur-
ton and Hardaway, 2012), parents in low-income divorced and remarried families have not often
been studied. Socioeconomic status (SES) is frequently included in large-scale studies of secondary
data sets, so we know that SES often predicts parenting dynamics and parent-child relationship qual-
ity. SES is related to parental financial stress and to a host of relevant contextual variables such as
communities, neighborhoods, and schools (Kowaleski-Jones, and Dunifon, 2006; Lee, 2002). Finally,
although there has been an increase in international studies about postdivorce and remarried parents
(e.g., Cartwright, 2010; Dunn et al., 2005; Juby et al., 2007; Navarro, 2013), cross-cultural compari-
sons of parents and parenting are rare. The expansion of research on family transitions holds great
promise for our understanding of similarities and differences in postdivorce and remarried parenting
between cultures.
Qualitative studies in the New Millennium Era have focused on illuminating interpersonal
processes, leading to grounded theories about key aspects of family dynamics, testable quantitative
hypotheses, and more understanding of how social contexts affect families experiencing structural
transitions (Ganong and Coleman, 2017). Mixed-methods designs have also increased, combin-
ing qualitative and quantitative data. The sophistication of analytic models, the availability of large,
representative longitudinal data sets from multiple nations, and refinements in qualitative research
approaches signal that the study of stepfamilies is experiencing significant growth in quality as well
as quantity.
However, significant challenges remain. A major demographic trend over the last 25 years, the
rise in cohabiting stepfamilies, has required that researchers think more complexly about stepfamily
issues. Unlike when divorce surpassed death as the precursor to remarriage, the trend in cohabiting
stepfamilies lacks a discernable demographic turning point. Gradually and increasingly, single parents
have chosen to cohabit with romantic partners rather than to re/marry. European societies long ago
moved from marriage as a predominant social institution toward domestic partnerships (cohabiting
unions; Allan, Crow, and Hawker, 2011); North American societies are now following this trend
(Ganong and Coleman, 2017). Serial romantic partnerships and multiple partner fertility are creating
ever more complex families. As families become more structurally intricate, family research neces-
sarily becomes both more difficult and more complicated.
The demographic turning points of relatively high divorce rates and subsequent robust rates of
remarriage (and more recently, cohabiting and multiple partner fertility) have contributed to a stable
332
of scholars who have long-running programs of research on postdivorce families and stepfamilies, not
limited to parents and stepparents but certainly including them. Among these scholars are Amato and
colleagues (Amato; 2001; Amato and Afifi, 2006; Amato and Booth, 1991; Amato and Fowler, 2002;
Amato and Keith, 1991; Amato and Sobolewski, 2004), Dunn and colleagues (Dunn et al., 1998;
Dunn et al., 2004; Dunn et al., 2005), King (King, 2006; 2007; 2009; King et al., 2015), Emery (2012),
Braithwaite (Braithwaite, Toller, Daas, Durham, and Jones, 2008), Ganong and Coleman (Coleman
et al., 2001; Ganong et al., 1999; Ganong et al., 2015; Troilo and Coleman, 2013), and Cartwright
(Cartwright, 2005, 2006, 2010).
In sum, the development of scholarly research on postdivorce families and stepfamilies maps onto
four key phases: (1) the social problem/social address phase, (2) the growing recognition phase, (3) a
decade of progress, and (4) the New Millennium. Although progress has been made in conducting
more methodologically and theoretically sophisticated research on divorced and remarried parent-
ing, many challenges remain. Importantly, developing research questions and designs that capture the
realities of postdivorce families and stepfamilies is critical for informing the content of interventions
designed to support divorced parents.
Interventions to Support Divorced Parents

Here we highlight intervention programs for divorced and remarried parents, drawing particularly
attention to divorce mediation efforts and stepfamily education programs. In the United States,
state and local legal systems have facilitated the creation of most intervention programs for divorced
parents and their children. These legal systems are interested primarily in reducing burdens on
judges and courts by promoting cooperative coparenting, which presumably keeps parents from fil-
ing motions to modify divorce decrees and parenting plans. Consequently, programs initiated by legal
systems have centered on (1) educational programs for divorced parents and (2) divorce mediation.
The common goals of educational programs are to facilitate cooperative coparenting and reduce
coparental conflicts, teach parents how to keep children out of parental disputes, and help parents
learn ways to communicate with their children about divorce-related issues (Wolchik et al., 2002).
Unfortunately, most educational programs have not been evaluated carefully, although a few stud-
ies have shown promise in maintaining and strengthening children’s relationships with mothers and
fathers and reducing children’s adjustment problems (Pruett et al., 2016; Wolchik et al., 2002) and
enhancing cooperative coparenting skills (Pruett et al., 2016; Sandler et al., 2008; Sullivan, Ward, and
Deutsch, 2010).
Divorce Mediation Efforts

Divorce mediation has become an increasingly popular form of alternative dispute resolution (ADR),
which originated out of parents’ dissatisfaction with traditional adversary methods (e.g., attorney
negotiations or litigation) for settling custodial or financial disputes. Mediation involves the interven-
tion of a neutral third party into the negotiation process, whose goal it is to help both parties reach
a resolution as cooperatively as possible. Divorce mediator and researcher Emery (2012) described,
“Legally, the goal of mediation is to negotiate a settlement that forms the basis of a binding, legal
agreement. Psychologically and emotionally, the goal is to help partners to preserve their parental
relationship even as their marriage is coming apart” (p. 3). Divorce mediators are trained to identify,
clarify, and explore the issues, and each party’s underlying interests around those issues, in a way that
prepares clients emotionally and practically for the negotiations to come. Rather than attorneys
assuming responsibility for negotiating, the parents themselves are primarily responsibility for nego-
tiating, and the mediator’s role is to facilitate the discussion and manage the expression of strong
emotions in a way that is productive rather than destructive (Emery, 2012). Research evaluating the
333
effectiveness of divorce mediation has been positive. One study that randomly assigned parents to
either mediate or litigate their custody disputes found that 12 years later, an average of only 6 hours
of mediation caused nonresidential parents to remain significantly more involved in their children’s
lives, to be better parents, and to be better coparents (Emery, 2012; Emery, Laumann-Billings, Wal-
dron, Sbarra, and Dillon, 2001). Parents have also reported being more satisfied with their settlements
and with the negotiation process itself after using mediation over litigation (Emery, 2012). Profes-
sionals increasingly support the use of mediation and its potential to reduce the negative efforts of
divorce on parents and children alike.
Interventions for Remarried Parents and Stepparents

Clinical scholars have long written about ways in which parents and stepparents can effectively
rear children in stepfamilies (Browning and Artelt, 2012; Papernow, 2013; Visher and Visher, 1980;
1996). Most challenges facing parents and stepparents in stepfamilies may be resolved with educa-
tional efforts rather than psychotherapy. The Vishers created a U.S. national self-help association,
the Stepfamily Association of America (SAA), which stimulated the birth of the British Stepfamily
Association and the Japan Stepfamily Association. The SAA dissolved after the death of the Vishers,
but the other organizations remain functional. The SAA essentially reinvented itself as the National
Stepfamily Resource Center (NRSC). The NRSC maintains a web site with materials for stepfamily
members, helping professionals, and researchers (www.stepfamilies.info/).
Self-help groups and educational programs for remarried parents and stepparents in the United
States have struggled to recruit program participants (Skogrand, Reck, Higginbotham, Adler-Baeder,
and Dansie, 2010). This may be due to a lack of awareness of the existence of such programs, reluc-
tance to identify as a member of a step-couple/stepfamily, or unwillingness to see the need. The
content of stepfamily education does not seem to vary if programs are billed as pre-remarriage or
post-remarriage educational programs (Higginbotham and Skogrand, 2010). Unfortunately, evidence
on their effectiveness is limited because rarely have adequate evaluations with randomized control
groups and sound measurement tools been conducted. Lucier-Greer and Adler-Baeder (2011) iden-
tified 28 programs that had any evaluation, but only four programs had randomized control groups
as comparisons and used established measures (DeGarmo and Forgatch, 2007; Gelatt, Adler-Baeder,
and Seeley, 2010; Henderson, 2001; Nicholson and Sanders, 1999). Adler-Baeder and Higginbotham
have had success delivering the Smart Steps program to low-income, ethnic minority families, but
likely because participants and programs were heavily incentivized by the U.S. government. None-
theless, intervention services (e.g., divorce mediation and stepfamily education programs) designed
to help divorced and remarried parents through family transitions can be supportive resources for
parents and children alike.
Future Directions of Theory and Research in Divorced

and Remarried Parenting
Much remains to be explored in the field of divorced and remarried parenting. Considering future
directions of theory and research, we identify three key areas ripe for future investigation: (1) qualita-
tive approaches and theory development, (2) research on process and structure, and (3) greater atten-
tion to underexamined parents.
Qualitative Approaches and Theory Development

The complexity of postdivorce families, particularly stepfamilies and families where there have
been multiple transitions due to parental separations and repartnering, creates many challenges for
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quantitative researchers. Large data sets help researchers deal with complexity because more variables
can be controlled and included in models as moderators or mediators, but there are limits to using
these data sets as well—complexity can be managed only when the data sets contain items that allow
the assessment of family structural complexity and diversity.
An alternative approach is to collect rich, in-depth data using grounded theory methods, eth-
nography, phenomenology, and other qualitative research approaches. These inductive data collec-
tion methods, which are increasingly found in the postdivorce parenting literature, are well suited
to creating theory about relationships and family dynamics (Ganong and Coleman, 2017). These
approaches, along with mixed-methods designs, should be fruitful sources of new knowledge and
new theories in divorced and remarried parenting.
Research on Process and Structure

The best current quantitative scholarship on divorced and remarried parents uses sophisticated con-
ceptual and statistical models that include family structural variables, parenting process variables,
measures of relationship quality, stress associated with family dynamics and sociocultural conditions
(e.g., economics, ethnicity), mental health measures, community variables, family transitions, and
physiological variables (Ganong and Coleman, 2017; Ganong, Coleman, and Russell, 2015). Mul-
tiple definitions of family structure are employed, as are multiple reporters/data providers (parents,
children, stepparents, others); researchers will be increasingly including nonresidential parents in their
studies, as they think “outside of the box.”
Greater attention will be given to selection effects in between-group designs, and new analytic
methods to test for selection effects will likely become more common.
Greater Attention to Underexamined Parents

Researchers have often focused their attention on divorced mothers who live with their children,
remarried mothers, and residential stepfathers. Nonresidential divorced fathers have received some
attention, but nonresidential mothers and nonresidential stepparents largely have escaped the atten-
tion of researchers, as have gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender parents after divorce and remarriage.
Ethnic minorities also have been underrepresented in research on divorced and remarried parenting,
and that should change.
In terms of phenomena to be investigated, how parents, their relationships with children, and
their parenting behaviors are affected by family transitions continues to be a rich area for research. In
addition, coparenting scholarship has begun to scratch the surface of what needs to be known—the
effects of technology on parenting by divorced and remarried parents, coparenting among three
or more parents and stepparents, how children manage relationships with more than two parental
figures, what happens to stepparent-stepchild relationships after re-divorce. These phenomena have
begun to be studied, but much more research is needed to understand how phenomena such as
technology, legal issues, multiple parents, and ex-stepparent involvement are associated with family
transitions. Indeed, in the New Millennium Era, continuing to devote efforts toward furthering the
conceptual and methodological sophistication of our research will aid in achieving a more diverse
and comprehensive understanding of divorced and remarried parenting.
Conclusion
There are many postdivorce and remarried parents and stepparents. As their numbers have grown,
so too has the information, programs to assist, and clinicians to help them. Despite these increases
in parents and programs, the argument can still be made that these parents and their families are
335
incompletely institutionalized, and even still somewhat stigmatized. Postdivorce and remarried par-
ents and stepparents still feel often as if they are alone as they experience family structure transitions.
Research and theory about postdivorce and remarried parents have become more conceptually
and methodologically sophisticated, and, consequently, there is greater understanding of the experi-
ences of these parents and their children than ever before. Greater diversity of research designs, theo-
ries, and locations of research (i.e., races, ethnicities, countries, communities) should be encouraging
to educators, researchers, practitioners, and parents. Families and the cultural contexts in which they
live are not static, however, and multiple family transitions, unmarried parenting, and cohabita-
tion, and changes in legal policies about custody, child support, and parental rights contribute to
making postdivorce and remarried parents moving targets for practice and research. Continuing to
focus on the problems and challenges to parents in families in transition should be augmented with
resilience perspectives that focus on positive outcomes and parental problem-solving and problem
avoidance. Although divorced and remarried parents face unique parenting challenges, it is important
not to equate these challenges with dysfunction; parent-child and stepparent-stepchild relationships
in divorced and remarried families have the potential to be healthy, satisfying, and associated with
positive benefits for those who adjust successfully. Indeed, because family transitions are likely to
continue to be a common phenomenon, efforts to move toward a new era of research productivity
will be important for contributing to the well-being of parents (and their children) who divorce and
remarry.
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10
LESBIAN AND GAY
PARENTHOOD
Introduction
The central heteronormative assumption that everyone is or ought to be heterosexual has influenced
research on parents and children for many years (Patterson, 2016). Under this assumption, children
and their parents are generally expected to exemplify heterosexuality in their attitudes, values, and
behaviors. In this way, lesbian and gay parents and their children become less visible, and may seem
not to exist. In contrast to such beliefs, however, many lesbian women and gay men are parents, and
many children are being reared in their homes. Increasingly evident in literary works, television
shows, movies, media news, legal cases, and policy debates, lesbian and gay parents and their children
are more visible today than ever before (Capsuto, 2000; Mennel, 2012; Schoonover and Galt, 2016).
In this chapter, I first sketch the historical context in which lesbian and gay parenting has emerged.
I then provide an overview of lesbian and gay parenthood today, including information about the
prevalence and diversity of lesbian and gay parenting, and about the legal contexts in which lesbian
and gay families live, both in the United States and abroad. I then describe the results of research on
lesbian and gay parents and their children, and discuss some resources for lesbian and gay parents and
their children. The chapter concludes with a discussion of directions for research and theory relevant
to the needs of lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children.
Historical Context of Lesbian and Gay Parenting

The emergence of large numbers of openly self-identified lesbian women and gay men is a historical
phenomenon of relatively recent vintage (Bronski, 2011; Faderman, 1991). Although the origins of
homophile organizations date to the 1950s and even earlier (D’Emilio, 1983), the origins of con-
temporary gay liberation movements are often traced to police raids on the Stonewall Inn bar in the
Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City in 1969, and to resistance shown by gay men
and lesbian women to these attacks (D’Emilio, 1983). In the years since that time, more and more
gay men and lesbian women have abandoned secrecy, declared their identities, and begun to work
actively for lesbian and gay rights (Bronski, 2011).
With greater openness among lesbian and gay adults, a number of family forms in which one or
more of a child’s parents identify as lesbian or gay are becoming more and more visible. Many of
these families involve children from previous heterosexual marriages. Others involve children born
or adopted after parents have identified themselves as lesbian or gay. In the last 30 years, such families
345
have been the subject of increasing attention in the media and in the popular press (Capsuto, 2000;
Mennel, 2012).
To the extent that parental influences are seen as critical in psychosocial development, and to
the extent that lesbians and/or gay men may provide different kinds of influences than heterosexual
parents, then the children of lesbians and gay men should be expected to develop in ways that are dif-
ferent from children of heterosexual parents. Whether any such differences are expected to be ben-
eficial, detrimental, or nonexistent depends, of course, on the viewpoint from which the phenomena
are observed. Many people have held negative stereotypes about lesbians and gay men, especially
those who are parents. Lesbian and gay families with children thus present an unusual opportunity
to test basic assumptions about gender and sexual orientation in parenting that many scientists have
long taken for granted (Goldberg and Allen, 2013; Patterson and D’Augelli, 2013).
Role of Theory in Research on Lesbian and Gay Parenting

In part because of the historical context in which research on lesbian and gay parenting emerged, a
considerable amount of research has been guided by questions posed by negative stereotypes rather
than by full-blown theories. In other instances, interest has focused more on description than on
explanation, more on questions about what is the case rather than on questions about why any par-
ticular findings may have emerged. As Farr and her colleagues have pointed out, specific theory
testing has been less prominent in this area than in other areas of family research (Farr, Tasker, and
Goldberg, 2017).
Although specific theoretical formulations may not be prominent in the research on lesbian and
gay parents, two general meta-theoretical orientations have prevailed in this area—the assimilation-
ist and the separatist perspectives. From one standpoint, lesbian and gay people are best regarded
as being just like other people around them. If sexual orientation is not an important difference
among people, then researchers might expect mainstream theories to be more than adequate to
guide understanding of lesbian and gay family lives. This might be called an assimilationist view. If,
however, lesbian and gay people are seen as fundamentally different from heterosexual people, then
different theoretical structures are required to comprehend their experiences. This might be called a
separatist view. As the poles of a long-standing discussion, variations of these two views have guided
much research and debate of recent years in this area.
The assimilationist perspective has guided some research that has challenged heteronormative
ideas, and it has had some notable successes. For instance, development among children of lesbian
and gay parents has been shown to be similar to that among children of heterosexual parents in many
ways (e.g., their trajectory of cognitive growth). Likewise, predictors of positive adjustment among
children and adolescents with lesbian and gay parents have proven to be similar to those among the
offspring of heterosexual parents (Golombok, 2015; Patterson, 2016). In these and other ways, lesbian
and gay people are just like other people, and predictors of their behavior are also similar.
Lesbian and gay family lives are, however, in many respects, different from those of others. For
instance, in many parts of the world, lesbian and gay parents live without legal recognition of their
relationships with one another and with their children, and hence must survive without many of the
legal rights and benefits that other couples rely on (Patterson, Riskind, and Tornello, 2014). Even
when gay and lesbian people must accomplish the very same tasks as others, there is evidence that
they may do so in varied ways. For example, lesbian and gay parenting couples are more likely than
heterosexual parents to share the work involved in childcare (Patterson, Sutfin, and Fulcher, 2004).
Thus, theories that explain the behavior heterosexual parents may not fit the behavior of lesbian or
gay parents nearly as well.
One of the conceptual challenges of contemporary research in this area, then, is to know when to
think in terms of assimilation, and when it is more effective to think in terms of separatism. When,
346
Lesbian and Gay Parenthood
and for what purposes, are lesbian and gay parents just like other parents? When, and for what pur-
poses, should lesbian and gay parenting be seen as fundamentally different from parenting by others?
When sexual orientation does not affect parenting, research will reveal additional dimensions of
generality for existing theories. When sexual orientation is an important determinant of behavior,
however, the field’s theoretical toolboxes may need expansion. Thus, in lesbian and gay parenting, the
value of research may, in some cases, be to demonstrate generalizability of existing theoretical insights.
In other cases, it may be to reveal the need to enlarge theoretical edifices. Either way, research find-
ings should stimulate a more inclusive understanding of families.

How many lesbian and gay families with children are there in the United States today? What are
the important sources of diversity among them? And what is the nature of the legal context within
which lesbian and gay families are living? In this section, I briefly discuss each of these questions
in turn.
Prevalence of Lesbian and Gay Parenthood

The exact numbers of lesbian and gay parents in the United States today are not known (Gates, 2013,
2015; Patterson and Friel, 2000). Because the numbers of lesbian and gay adults in the United States
today are not counted by federal agencies such as the Census Bureau, their size must be estimated
from other available sources of information. Due to fear of discrimination, some nonheterosexual
people conceal their sexual orientation. Whether to protect themselves or their children, lesbian and
gay parents may be especially likely to conceal information about their sexual orientation.
Despite acknowledged difficulties, estimates of the numbers of lesbian and gay families with
children in the United States have been offered. One approach to making estimates of this kind is
to extrapolate from what is known or believed about base rates in the population. For example, in
2017, there were about 325 million people in the United States, and about 250 million of those
were 18 years of age or older (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 2018). If one assumes that about 4% of
the adult population is lesbian or gay (see Gates, 2017), that would place the numbers of lesbian and
gay adults in the United States today at about 10 million. Analyses of data from the General Social
Survey suggest that about 37% of lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults have had a child or children (Gates,
2013). Calculations using these figures suggest that there may be 3–4 million lesbian, gay, or bisexual
parents in the United States today. Assuming that about half of these adults are bisexual suggests that
anywhere from 1 to 2 million are lesbian or gay parents. If, on average, each lesbian and gay parent
has two children, that would mean that in 2017, there were more than 2 million people with lesbian
and gay parents in the United States (see Gates, 2013, 2015).
The accuracy of such estimates is, of course, only as good as that of the figures on which they are
based (Gates, 2013). Estimates that include bisexual as well as lesbian and gay adults are, of course,
larger in size, but many bisexual parents have had children with opposite-sex partners. Even after
estimates are adjusted so they include only lesbian and gay adults, however, they still involve large
numbers of people. In addition, larger proportions of the population are identifying as lesbian or gay
every year (Gates, 2017), so the numbers seem likely to grow. Overall, it is clear that sizeable numbers
of lesbian and gay parents live in the United States.
Diversity Among Lesbian Mothers, Gay Fathers, and Their Children

There are many sources of diversity among families headed by lesbian and gay parents. Areas of diver-
sity include all the variables that differentiate among other families, such as age, ethnicity, education,
347
and income. They also include some variations that are more clearly linked with sexual minority issues.
Some of these latter types of difference among lesbian- and gay-parent families are examined next.
One important distinction among lesbian and gay families with children involves the situations of
parents at the time of a child’s birth or adoption. Probably the largest group of lesbian and gay parents
today are those who had children in the context of heterosexual relationships between biological
parents, and who subsequently acknowledged nonheterosexual identities (i.e., “came out”). These
include families in which the parents divorced when the husband came out as gay, families in which
the parents divorced when the wife came out as lesbian, families in which the parents divorced when
both parents came out, and families in which one or both of the parents came out and the parents
decided not to divorce. Unmarried lesbian or gay parents may be single, or they may have same-
sex partners. A lesbian or gay parent’s new same-sex partner may or may not assume stepparenting
relationships with the children. In other words, lesbian and gay families with children born in the
context of heterosexual relationships are themselves a relatively diverse group (Tasker, 2013).
In addition to children born in the context of heterosexual relationships, lesbians and gay men
are believed increasingly to be choosing parenthood after having come out (Bos, 2013; Patterson,
2013). Many such children are conceived by means of donor insemination (DI; Golombok, 2015,
2019). Lesbians who wish to bear children may choose a friend, relative, or acquaintance to be the
sperm donor, or may choose instead to use sperm from an unknown donor. When sperm donors
are known, they may take parental or avuncular roles relative to children conceived via DI, or they
may not (Bos, 2013; Patterson, 1994a, 1994b, 2013). Gay men may also become biological parents
of children whom they intend to parent, whether with a single woman (who may be lesbian or
heterosexual), with a lesbian couple, or with a gay male partner; these plans may or may not involve
use of surrogacy arrangements (Berkowitz, 2013). Many adoption agencies are open to working with
lesbian and gay prospective adoptive parents (Brodzinsky, 2012; Pinderhughes and Brodzinsky, 2019),
and options pursued by lesbians and gay men include both adoption and foster care (Farr and Pat-
terson, 2013). Thus, children today are being brought up in a diverse array of lesbian and gay families.
Another set of distinctions concerns the extent to which family members are related biologi-
cally to one another (Golombok, 2015). Although biological relatedness of family members to one
another is less and less common among heterosexual-parent families, as heterosexual stepfamilies
proliferate, it is often even more prominent as an issue in lesbian- and gay-parent families than in
heterosexual-parent families (Golombok, 2015). When children are born via DI into lesbian families,
they are generally linked biologically only to the birthmother, not to her partner. Similarly, when
children are born via surrogacy to a gay couple, only the father who served as a sperm donor is likely
to have biological links with the child. In adoption and foster care, of course, children will generally
have no biological relation to any adoptive or foster parent.
Another issue of particular importance for lesbian and gay families concerns custodial arrange-
ments for minor children. As in heterosexual-parent families, children may live with one or both bio-
logical parents, or they may spend part of their time in one parent’s household, and part of their time
in another parent’s home. Although less common now than in earlier years, some lesbian mothers
and gay fathers have lost custody of their children to heterosexual spouses following divorce, and the
threat of custody litigation almost certainly looms larger in the lives of most divorced lesbian mothers
and gay fathers than it does in the lives of divorced heterosexual parents (Ball, 2012). No authoritative
figures are available, but it seems likely that a greater proportion of lesbian and gay than of hetero-
sexual parents has lost custody of children. Probably for this reason, more lesbians and gay men may
be noncustodial parents (i.e., do not have legal custody of their children) and nonresidential parents
(i.e., do not live in the same household with their children) than might otherwise be expected.
Beyond these basic distinctions, many others can also be considered. Identities and behavioral
patterns may change over time, making categorizations of sexual minorities difficult (Diamond,
2013). Ambiguities in the definition of sexual and gender identities should also be acknowledged
348
(Diamond, 2013; Dworkin, 2013; Parsons and Grov, 2013). Moreover, lesbian and gay parents may be
involved in various parenting arrangements (such as a lesbian and a gay couple parenting together)
that do not appear among heterosexual parents. Although such variability undoubtedly contributes
to differences in the qualities of life, little research has yet been directed to understanding such dif-
ferences among lesbian and gay families.
Legal and Public Policy Issues

The legal and policy environments within which lesbian and gay people conceive and rear children
have undergone tremendous change in recent years, both in the United States and in many other
nations (Ball, 2012; Patterson et al., 2014). In other parts of the world, however, particularly in most
parts of Asia and Africa, the legal climate remains hostile to lesbian or gay people, and particularly to
those who are parents (Patterson et al., 2014). Although the legal climate for lesbian and gay parents
and their children around the world is undeniably more positive today than in earlier years, dramatic
variations from one nation to another, and sometimes from one state or locality to another, still exist.
In the United States, an important change occurred with the Supreme Court decision in Oberge-
fell v. Hodges (2015), which introduced marriage equality across the country (Cavanagh and Cauff-
man, 2019). Married spouses have many legal rights in parenting any child born to their marriage,
and Obergefell made these rights available for the first time to married lesbian and gay couples as well
as to married heterosexual couples in the United States. As an example, Obergefell made it possible
for both married same-sex spouses to be recognized as legal parents of a child born to their marriage,
whereas in earlier years, in many cases, only one (i.e., the one who was biologically linked with the
child) would have received this recognition. This ruling was underlined by the Supreme Court in
Pavan v. Smith (2017), which held that, like married opposite-sex couples, married same-sex couples
are entitled to list the names of both spouses on their child’s birth certificate.
At the same time, a number of discriminatory legal and policy issues continue to affect lesbian and
gay parents and prospective parents in the United States. So-called religious freedom laws in some
states allow individuals and agencies to refuse service to people who are perceived to be members of
sexual minorities, making it more difficult in some cases for lesbian and gay adults to become foster
or adoptive parents (Farr and Goldberg, 2018; Kazyak, Scherer, Woodell, and Finken, 2018). Some
provisions of family law may also have differential effects on child custody and visitation when mar-
ried same-sex versus opposite-sex couples separate or divorce (Kim and Stein, 2018). Even in the
most welcoming areas of the United States, lesbian and gay couples with children still need to pursue
extraordinary legal protections (e.g., second-parent adoptions, which allow a second parent to adopt
a child without the “first parent” losing any parental rights) to ensure their families’ rights will be
protected in the event of travel to other jurisdictions (Baumle et al., 2018). Overall, then, the legal
environment for lesbian and gay parenting in the United States, though undeniably more favorable
than in previous years, still presents some challenges.
Outside the United States, the legal and policy picture for lesbian and gay individuals and parents
is highly variable. Although homosexuality is legally allowed and same-sex marriages are recognized
by law in more than 20 nations—including Canada, Mexico, France, and Spain—homosexuality
itself is illegal in a number of others—including Afghanistan, Iran, Jamaica, and Tanzania (Martel,
2018). Where same-sex sexual behavior is criminalized and lesbian/gay people fear for their safety,
support for their parenting desires is especially difficult to find. Thus, legal and social environments
for lesbian and gay parenting vary enormously around the world and the numbers of openly lesbian
and gay parents likewise differ across settings (Patterson et al., 2014). Even so, some research with
lesbian and gay parents and their families has begun to emerge not only in the United States and
Western Europe, where relatively positive legal environments prevail, but also in countries with less
favorable legal climates.
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Research on Lesbian Mothers and Gay Fathers

Many lesbian and gay people are interested in becoming parents. Results of a poll of lesbian, gay,
bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) adults in the United States showed that 51% are either already
parents or would like to have children in the future (Pew Research Center, 2013). Indeed, LGBT
people become parents in many ways ( Johnson and O’Connor, 2002; Patterson, 1992, 2000). Some
children were born or adopted in the context of heterosexual relationships that later dissolved when
one or both parents came out as lesbian or gay. In other families, children were born or adopted after
parents had affirmed nonheterosexual identities. Most families of the first type have experienced the
challenges that accompany parental separation and divorce. Families of the second type, however,
have not necessarily experienced parental separation or divorce. Therefore, the experiences of family
members are likely to be quite different. For this reason, data on each are presented ahead in separate
sections.
Divorced Lesbian Mothers

Many women who had children in the context of heterosexual marriages and later came out as
lesbian have faced legal challenges in the U.S. courts (Ball, 2012). Lawyers, judges, and others have
sometimes voiced derogatory stereotypes and negative assumptions about lesbian and gay people
(Haney-Caron and Heilbrun, 2014). For instance, disputes about child custody and visitation rights
have included questions about the mental health and parenting abilities of LGBT parents (Falk,
1989). Negative stereotypes have sometimes been used to justify removal of children from the cus-
tody of lesbian and gay parents (Richman, 2009).
Much early research compared mental health and parenting ability of divorced lesbian mothers
and divorced heterosexual mothers. Lesbian mothers were at least as likely as heterosexual moth-
ers to enjoy good mental health and to exhibit good parenting abilities (Goldberg, 2010; Patterson,
1992). Divorced lesbian mothers did, however, report more fears about loss of child custody than
did divorced heterosexual mothers (Lyons, 1983; Pagelow, 1980). Although lesbian and heterosexual
mothers did not differ in their overall mental health or parenting abilities, lesbian mothers neverthe-
less voiced some special concerns.
It might be tempting to dismiss these findings as outdated. However, many divorced lesbian
mothers remain concerned about their legal rights. Shapiro, Peterson, and Stewart (2009) studied
mental health among lesbian and heterosexual mothers living in Canada or in the United States,
most of whom were divorced. The international contrast was of interest because, despite many
similarities between the two countries, Canada provided a more supportive legal climate for lesbian
mothers and their children at that time. For example, adoption and marriage rights were available to
all lesbian mothers in Canada, but were not available to lesbian mothers in most parts of the United
States. Shapiro and her colleagues (2009) found that lesbian mothers in the United States reported
more concern about legal problems and about discrimination based on sexual orientation—but not
more general family worries—than did lesbian mothers in Canada. Among heterosexual mothers,
whose family relationships enjoyed protection of the law in both countries, there were no differ-
ences across national boundaries (Shapiro et al., 2009). Thus, contextual factors may influence mental
health among lesbian mothers.
Case reports about lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children began to appear in the psychi-
atric literature in the early 1970s and mid-1970s (Weeks, Derdeyn, and Langman, 1975). Systematic
research on these families began with studies of children of divorced lesbian and gay parents (Pat-
terson, 1992, 2009). In the context of questions that arose in disputes about child custody arrange-
ments following divorce, a number of studies examined adjustment among divorced lesbian mothers
and their children, comparing it with adjustment among divorced heterosexual mothers and their
350
children. Against the backdrop of widely held assumptions about the inherent superiority of tradi-
tional family structures (Baumrind, 1995; Lamb, 2012), many investigators expected that develop-
ment among children of lesbian or gay parents would be characterized by difficulties. Using methods
common to research on socialization, early studies evaluated this idea, and revealed that concerns
about children of lesbian and gay parents were without empirical foundation (see Patterson, 1992,
2016).
An important example of this early research was reported by Golombok, Spencer, and Rutter
(1983), who studied children of divorced lesbian mothers, comparing them to same-age children
of divorced heterosexual mothers. Using standardized instruments as well as open-ended interview
questions, Golombok and her colleagues (1983) studied children’s gender development, behavior
problems (e.g., hyperactivity, conduct problems), emotional difficulties, peer relationships, and social
development. Their analyses revealed no significant differences in child outcomes as a function of
parental sexual orientation; children’s adjustment was not associated with parental sexual orientation.
Many other investigators also reported that parental sexual orientation was unrelated to child
adjustment (Biblarz and Stacey, 2010; Goldberg, 2010; Patterson, 1992; Stacey and Biblarz, 2001).
Lesbian mothers themselves were found to be as likely as heterosexual mothers to be healthy and
well adjusted. In studies of adolescents and young adults, as well as of children, behavior problems,
social competence, peer relationships, and self-esteem were all found to be unrelated to parental sex-
ual orientation. These conclusions, and the data on which they were based, have been summarized
by major professional organizations and have informed many legal and policy debates in Europe and
Latin America as well as in the United States (Patterson, 2009; 2016; Patterson et al., 2014).
Divorced Gay Fathers

Probably because most divorced gay fathers have not been custodial parents, and because most
have lived apart from their children after divorce (Golombok and Tasker, 2010), little research has
evaluated their mental health or parenting abilities. Gay fathers who were once married to women
describe similar reasons for becoming parents and show parenting abilities that are at least as well
developed as those of divorced heterosexual fathers (Golombok and Tasker, 2010; Patterson and
Chan, 1998). In this way, findings from research on divorced gay fathers have paralleled, to some
degree, those from research on divorced lesbian mothers.
Research has also addressed changes over time in gay father identity among those who were once
married to women. Early work by Miller (1978, 1979) and Bozett (1980, 1981a, 1981b, 1987) was
designed to conceptualize the processes through which men who considered themselves hetero-
sexual fathers came to view themselves as gay fathers. Both authors emphasized the pivotal nature
of identity disclosure and of others’ reactions to this disclosure. Emerging relationships in the gay
community were seen as crucial to men’s integration of their parental and sexual identities. As men
came out, fell in love, and disclosed gay relationships to others, while remaining connected to their
children, they came to integrate their parental and their sexual identities and to call themselves gay
fathers (Golombok and Tasker, 2010).
Heterosexual relationships were once the main pathway through which gay men became fathers.
As gay men come out earlier and consider other pathways, heterosexual marriages may be less com-
mon, but divorced gay men still constitute an important group of nonheterosexual parents. In a web-
based study of gay fathers from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom, more
than half of the participants under 50 years of age reported that they had become parents through a
previous heterosexual relationship; this was also the case for more than one third of gay fathers under
50 who lived in the United States (Patterson and Tornello, 2010; Tornello and Patterson, 2015).
Heterosexual marriage may be a less common pathway to parenthood for gay men today than it once
was, but there are still many divorced gay fathers (Golombok and Tasker, 2010).
351
Planned Lesbian- and Gay-Parent Families

Coming out as a lesbian woman or, particularly, as a gay man once carried the assumption of perma-
nent childlessness, but this is less and less the case today. Increasingly, lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults
are choosing to become parents after coming out (Hermann-Green and Gehring, 2007; Johnson and
O’Connor, 2002; Rabun and Oswald, 2009). This trend has created new types of families that may
be called planned lesbian- and gay-parent families. As lesbian and gay people increasingly become
parents after coming out, questions about the desire for children, pathways to parenthood, the transi-
tion to parenthood, and related issues become increasingly important (Patterson, 2013; Patterson and
Riskind, 2010).
Parenting Intentions and Desires

To choose to become parents, both lesbians and gay men must overcome popular assumptions that
parenting is an exclusively heterosexual prerogative (Berkowitz and Marsiglio, 2007; Gianino, 2008).
Results of research suggest that they are doing so with increasing frequency. As a result, some lesbians
and gay men around the world are expressing their desire to become parents. Using data from the
2002 U.S. National Survey of Family Growth, Gates and his colleagues (2007) reported that 41%
of childless lesbians and 52% of childless gay men expressed a desire to have children. These num-
bers were somewhat lower than those for heterosexual adults, but they are higher than many had
expected. In further analyses of this data set, gay men who reported their desire to become parents
were less likely than their heterosexual peers to express an intention to become parents (Riskind and
Patterson, 2010). In other words, there was a bigger gap between desire and intention for gay than for
heterosexual men. This was not true for women; lesbian women who desired parenthood were just
as likely as other women to intend to become parents (Riskind and Patterson, 2010).
Similarly, many Israeli gay men express the desire to become parents but report that they did not
expect this to happen; these men reported more depressive symptoms than did men who expected to
fulfill their dreams of parenthood (Shenkman, 2012). These patterns have also been replicated with
samples of Italian lesbian women and gay men (Baiocco and Laghi, 2013), Chinese lesbian women
(Lo, Chan, and Chan, 2016), and Portuguese lesbian women and gay men (Costa and Bidell, 2017).
Overall, it is clear that many nonheterosexual people wish to become parents. Some may be
uncertain about how or if they could actually achieve this aim. Those who do not believe that they
can fulfill parenting desires may be at risk for internalizing problems such as depression.
Barriers to and Supports for Parenthood Outside of Heterosexual Relationships

Having made a decision to pursue parenthood, a number of issues are likely to emerge for same-sex
couples and LGBT individuals (Goldberg, 2010; Patterson, 1994b, 2000). Some of these issues are
social in nature. For example, even in cases when they had accepted their loved one’s nonhetero-
sexual identity, family members may disapprove of parenthood outside of heterosexual marriage
(Goldberg, 2010). Moreover, it may be difficult for LGBT individuals to find accurate information
about routes to parenthood.
Lesbian and gay adults’ experiences as they consider parenthood are influenced by many factors
(Riskind, Patterson, and Nosek, 2013). Many adoption agencies across the United States work with
lesbian and gay prospective adoptive parents (Brodzinsky, 2012), but it may be difficult for some
individuals to locate or visit these agencies. Many reproductive health services are available to lesbian
and gay adults, but some healthcare workers may refuse to provide services on the basis of client
sexual orientation or marital status (Gurmankin, Caplan, and Braverman, 2005). Thus, identifying
352
agencies and clinics that are open to all may be a challenge. Even after locating appropriate services,
the financial costs associated with adoption or reproductive health services may be important barriers
(Brodzinsky and Pertman, 2012). These and related issues are likely to emerge for lesbian and gay
individuals as they begin to pursue parenthood (Patterson, 1994b).
Many lesbian and gay adults in the United States feel confident about overcoming such barri-
ers, but some do not (Riskind et al., 2013). Barriers to the pursuit of parenthood have been found
to loom particularly large for lesbian and gay adults who are older, who believe that children with
lesbian and gay parents are more likely to experience psychological difficulties as a result of parental
sexual orientation, and who live in social climates that are unfavorable to them (Riskind et al., 2013).
Little is yet known about attitudes or beliefs of lesbian and gay adults outside the United States in
this regard.
Pathways to Parenthood
Lesbian women and gay men can become parents through a variety of pathways (Goldberg, 2010;
Patterson, 2013). Most of those who become parents in the context of heterosexual marriages before
coming out conceive children via heterosexual intercourse. For those who seek parenthood after
coming out, pathways are more varied (Patterson and Riskind, 2010). Lesbian women may conceive
via donor insemination. Gay men may become fathers via surrogacy. Both lesbian and gay individuals
and couples may foster or adopt children.
For many lesbian women, use of donor insemination is a preferred pathway to parenthood.
Whether using sperm from a known donor (e.g., a male friend or relative) or from an unknown
donor (e.g., via the resources of a sperm bank), women who conceive via DI can expect to be geneti-
cally linked with their offspring. For some female couples, one partner might serve as the genetic and
one as the gestational parent, using in vitro fertilization to fertilize one woman’s egg and then insert
it into her partner’s body. Known as partner-assisted reproduction (Golombok, 2019; Riskind, 2011),
this procedure is still unusual, even among affluent groups in the United States. Many lesbian women
do, however, employ some form of donor insemination to have children.
For gay men, surrogacy is an increasingly common pathway to parenthood (Bergman, Rubio,
Green, and Padron, 2010; Carone, Baiocco, and Lingiardo, 2017; Greenfeld and Seli, 2011). In this
case, a woman serving as a surrogate carries a baby conceived either with her own egg or with a
donor egg. The intended father, whose sperm were used to fertilize the egg, will be genetically linked
with the child. Surrogacy is, however, very costly, and it is prohibited by law in some jurisdictions.
Thus, surrogacy may be a viable pathway to parenthood for some gay men but not for others (Blake
et al., 2017).
Both lesbian women and gay men may also become parents via foster care or adoption (Brodz-
insky and Pertman, 2012; Farr and Patterson, 2013; Pinderhughes and Brodzinsky, 2019). Adop-
tions may be arranged via public or private agencies, and they may involve children born in the
United States or in another country (Brodzinsky and Pertman, 2012). They may involve children
to whom the adoptive parent is genetically related (e.g., nieces and nephews), but they more com-
monly involve genetically unrelated children. Adoptions may also vary in the extent to which there
is contact among birth parents, adoptive parents, and adoptive children, that is, in their openness (Farr
and Patterson, 2013).
Thus, many opportunities are now open to lesbian and gay people who want to become parents.
Choices among the options may be affected by financial, medical, and legal issues as well as by indi-
vidual preferences and social networks. Whatever pathway is selected, many lesbian and gay people
are becoming parents in the United States and also in many Western nations (e.g., Italy, Portugal,
Spain, Israel).
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Transition to Parenthood
Becoming a parent is a major life transition this is often both exciting and stressful (Cowan and
Cowan, 2000). As happy as new parents may be, they must also learn new things, cope with new
demands, and adjust to new roles. These realities characterize the transition to parenthood for les-
bian and gay parents, just as they do for heterosexual parents (Bergman et al., 2010; Bornstein,
2019; Gianino, 2008; Goldberg, 2010). Satisfaction with couple relationships often declines during
this transition, and this seems to be as true of same-sex couples as it is of others (Goldberg and Sayer,
2006; Goldberg and Smith, 2008; Goldberg, Smith, and Kashy, 2010). Qualitative research suggests
that time and energy for relationship maintenance and sexual satisfaction may decrease over same-
sex couples’ transitions to parenthood (Huebner, Mackaronis, Mandic, Beougher, and Hoff, 2012).
Although there are many similarities, the transition to parenthood may also have some distinctive
features among lesbian- and gay-parent families (Goldberg, 2009; Ross, Steele, Goldfinger, and Strike,
2007). Prospective parents who identify as lesbian or gay often report feeling less supported than het-
erosexual couples by their friends and by members of their families of origin. For instance, Gartrell
and her colleagues (1996) reported that at the time of a child’s birth, most lesbian mothers in their
sample expected to receive at least some support from relatives, but 15% did not expect any of their
family members to recognize the baby as a relative. Some pregnant lesbian women, interviewed in
their third trimester, reported a lack of support from their families of origin (Goldberg, 2006). Three
months after the baby’s birth, however, these women report that their families had become more sup-
portive (Goldberg, 2006). Goldberg and Smith (2008) also reported that lesbian preadoptive moth-
ers felt less support from family members than did heterosexual preadoptive mothers, but similar
amounts of support from friends. Interviews with gay men who became fathers via surrogacy reveal
that the men felt closer to families of origin after the birth of their children (Bergman et al., 2010).
The experiences of new parents are almost certainly affected by context. Same-sex couples in
the United States who had high levels of internalized stigma and who lived in states with laws that
were unfavorable to lesbian and gay parents reported the greatest increases in depressive and anxious
symptoms over the first year of parenthood (Goldberg and Smith, 2011). Much remains to be learned
about the ways in which transitions to parenthood are experienced by lesbian and gay individuals.
Certainly, a great deal of variation in such experiences might be expected as a function of differences
among social contexts (Patterson and Riskind, 2010).
Family Processes
What are the characteristics of families headed by lesbian mothers and gay fathers, and how do
these families function? How are they similar to or different from families headed by other parents?
Research in this area has focused mainly on describing families headed by lesbian mothers. However,
research is increasingly focusing on the experiences of people in families headed by gay fathers as well.
Family relationships within lesbian-mother families are generally positive (Biblarz and Stacey,
2010). Both children and adolescents enjoy warm and supportive relationships with their lesbian
mothers (Brewaeys, Ponjaert, Van Hall, and Golombok, 1997; Farr and Patterson, 2013; Golombok
et al., 1983; Kirkpatrick, Smith, and Roy, 1981; Wainright, Russell, and Patterson, 2004). In a Dutch
study, lesbian mothers reported greater parenting stress than did heterosexual mothers (Bos, Knox,
van Rijn-van Gelderen and Gartrell, 2016).
Social (i.e., nonbiological) lesbian mothers report being more involved in childcare than fathers
or stepfathers in heterosexual-parent families (Tasker and Golombok, 1997). This pattern has been
reported both in families formed using donor insemination and in families formed via adoption
(Farr, Forssell, and Patterson, 2010). Lesbian couples share childcare more evenly, on average, than do
heterosexual couples (Farr and Patterson, 2013; Patterson, Sutfin, and Fulcher, 2014).
354
Fewer data are available on families headed by gay fathers, but the available findings suggest that
their relationships are also generally warm and positive (Erich, Leung, Kindle, and Carter, 2005;
Farr et al., 2010). In an early study, divorced gay fathers described themselves as more responsive to
their children, more likely to use reasoning during disciplinary encounters, and somewhat stricter
in setting standards than did divorced heterosexual fathers (Bigner and Jacobsen, 1989a, 1989b). In
other work, gay fathers who had partners were more likely to express satisfaction with their lives and
described themselves as being more successful at meeting common challenges involved in parenting
than did those who were single (Barrett and Tasker, 2001; Crosbie-Burnett and Helmbrecht, 1993).
More recent work has focused on family relationships among gay adoptive fathers. In studies of
adoptive families headed by lesbian, gay, or heterosexual couples in the United States, the United
Kingdom, and in Italy, parents in all family types reported long-term, relatively harmonious relation-
ships as well as high relationship satisfaction (Baiocco et al., 2015; Farr et al., 2010; Golombok et al.,
2014). There were no differences in these variables as a function of family type. In the United States,
male and female couples who have adopted children together divide childcare tasks in a relatively
egalitarian fashion (Farr and Patterson, 2013). Gay fathers who report more positive gay identities
report less parenting stress than do those with more negative gay identities (Tornello, Farr, and Pat-
terson, 2011). Much remains to be learned about the family relationships of gay fathers.
Contextual Influences
In what kinds of social contexts do LGBT parents rear their children? How might these social con-
texts be similar to or different from the contexts in which heterosexual parents live? Little research
has explored these issues among children with bisexual, transgender, or gay parents; therefore, we
describe research on lesbian mothers and their families.
Research has focused on children’s contacts with members of their extended family, especially
contact with grandparents (Fulcher, Chan, Raboy, and Patterson, 2002; Patterson, Hurt, and Mason,
1998). Patterson and her colleagues (1998) found that most lesbian mothers reported that their
children enjoyed regular contact with grandparents. In a study that included children of lesbian and
heterosexual parents, there were no differences in frequency of contact with grandparents as a func-
tion of parental sexual orientation (Fulcher et al., 2002). Additional research has also suggested that
a majority of grandparents acknowledge the children of lesbian daughters as grandchildren (Gartrell,
Banks, Hamilton, Reed, Bishop, and Rodas, 1999). Thus, the findings suggest that intergenerational
relationships in lesbian-parented families are generally supportive (Sumontha, Farr, and Patterson,
2016).
Researchers have also assessed children’s contacts with adult friends of their lesbian mothers
(Fulcher et al., 2002; Golombok et al., 1983; Patterson et al., 1998). All of the children in these stud-
ies were described as having contact with adult friends of their mothers, and most lesbian mothers
report that their friends are diverse in sexual orientation, and include lesbian, gay, and heterosexual
individuals. Children of lesbian mothers are no less likely than those of heterosexual mothers to have
social contact with adult men who are friends of their mothers (Fulcher et al., 2002). Thus, find-
ings to date suggest that children of lesbian mothers have positive contacts with many adults in the
context of their family lives.
Some lesbian and gay parents struggle with questions about how open to be about their non-
heterosexual identities. For instance, some lesbian mothers have reported withholding information
about their sexual identities in healthcare settings, particularly if the situation did not seem safe for
disclosure (Perlesz et al., 2006; Weeks, Heaphy, and Donovan, 2001). Some lesbian and gay parents
also report selective disclosure at their children’s schools, based on their evaluations of individual
attitudes and school climate (Byard, Kosciw, and Bartkiewicz, 2013; Casper and Schultz, 1999; Per-
lesz et al., 2006). Most lesbian and gay parents express desire for as much openness as possible in the
355
context of maintaining a safe and welcoming environment for themselves and their children (Tasker
and Patterson, 2007).
Research has also begun to explore contexts of gay father families, and results are similar to
those for lesbian-mother families. For example, Sumontha and his colleagues (2016) studied les-
bian, gay, and heterosexual parents with young children and found that they did not differ in the
amount of social support they received from friends or family members. Similar findings have
been reported from the Netherlands (Bos, Kuyper, and Gartrell, 2017). In both samples, amount
of social support was associated with positive parenting for all types of couples (Bos et al., 2017;
Sumontha et al., 2016).
Children of Lesbian and Gay Parents

Considerable research over the past decades has focused on development of children reared by les-
bian and gay parents. Most of this research has focused on children with lesbian mothers (Patterson,
1992, 1998; Goldberg, 2010). Only a handful of studies has examined the development of children
with gay fathers (e.g., Farr et al., 2010; Golombok et al., 2014).
A great deal of research has been devoted to gender and sexual identity development of children
with lesbian and gay parents. Additional research has addressed social development, exploring topics
such as the typicality of peer relationships or experiences of peer victimization. Other aspects of child
development, such as overall adjustment and academic performance, have also been studied (Bos, van
Gelderen, and Gartrell, 2015; Golombok et al., 2014; Potter, 2012; Potter and Potter, 2016). Research
surrounding lesbian and gay parenting has found no negative associations between parental sexual
orientation and developmental outcomes, but some variations have been observed (for other reviews,
see Biblarz and Stacey, 2010; Bos, van Balen, and van den Boom, 2005; Fedewa, Black, and Ahn,
2015; Goldberg, 2010; Golombok and Tasker, 2010; Miller, Kors, and Macfie, 2017; Patterson, 1992,
1998, 2013). Results of one review suggested that, perhaps due to the relatively high socioeconomic
status of gay fathers, children of gay fathers had more favorable outcomes than did the offspring of
heterosexual parents (Miller et al., 2017).
Gender and Sexual Identity

Considerable research has focused on gender development among children of lesbian and gay par-
ents. In response to negative stereotypes, this research has focused, for example, on questions about
gender role behavior, and gender and sexual identities among children who grow up with same-sex
parents. Children of lesbian, gay, and heterosexual parents show gender and sexual development, that
is, with small variations, generally similar to one another (Bos and Sandfort, 2010; Brewaeys et al.,
1997; Farr, Bruun, Doss, and Patterson, 2010, 2018; Golombok et al., 1983, 2014; Golombok and
Tasker, 1996; Wainright et al., 2004).
Three different aspects of gender and sexual development have been considered. Gender identity
is usually defined as an individual’s self-identification as male or female. Gender-role behaviors are the
behaviors seen as relevant to gender that determine how closely an individual exemplifies cultural
norms about masculine and feminine behavior—for example, in play behavior or occupational aspi-
rations. Sexual identity and sexual orientation refer to an individual’s feelings of being attracted to
sexual partners of same and/or different sexes. I review the findings relevant to each of these three
areas ahead.
The gender identity of children with LGBT parents has been examined with a variety of meth-
odologies, including projective tests (Green Mandel, Hotvedt, Gray, and Smith, 1986), interviews
with parents (Golombok et al., 1983), and self-report questionnaires completed by children (Bos
and Sandfort, 2010). None of these approaches have yielded differences in gender identity among
356
children with lesbian mothers as compared to those with heterosexual parents. For instance, Bos and
Sandfort (2010) compared the gender identity of children between 8 and 12 years of age among
children who were being reared by lesbian mothers and children being reared by heterosexual par-
ents in the Netherlands. In this study, a questionnaire was used to measure different aspects of gender
identity, such as feelings about gender typicality and happiness with gender assignment. Children of
lesbian mothers reported gender identities much like those of heterosexual parents.
A substantial amount of research has focused on parental sexual orientation and children’s gender-
role behavior. This research has employed a number of methodologies, such as observations of chil-
dren’s play behavior (Goldberg, Kashy, and Smith, 2012) and interview measures of occupational
aspirations (Kirkpatrick et al., 1981). Most of this research reported that children of lesbian and gay
parents exhibit gender role behaviors similar to those of their peers (Brewaeys et al., 1997; Farr et al.,
2010; Golombok et al., 1983, 2014); however, there have been variations (Bos and Sandfort, 2010;
Goldberg et al., 2012; Sutfin, Fulcher, Bowles, and Patterson, 2008).
As an example of the main trends in this research, Brewaeys and colleagues (1997) compared
gender role development of 4- to 8-year-old children of lesbian mothers who conceived through
donor insemination with that among same-age children of heterosexual parents who conceived
using donor insemination and with that among same-age children of heterosexual parents who
conceived via natural means. Using a standardized parent-report instrument called the Preschool
Activities Inventory (PSAI), Brewaeys and her colleagues (1997) found no differences in children’s
reported gender-role behavior across the three family types. In another study using the PSAI, Farr
and her colleagues (2010) reported no differences in gender development among preschool-age chil-
dren with lesbian, gay, or heterosexual adoptive parents. In both of these studies, gender role behavior
of children with lesbian and gay parents was similar to that of other children. Similar results were also
reported by Golombok and her colleagues (2014).
In contrast, Goldberg and colleagues (2012) also used the PSAI to assess play behavior of young
adopted children (2–4 years of age) with heterosexual, gay, and lesbian parents. These researchers
found that children of lesbian and gay parents were described as engaging in less gender-typed play
than were children of heterosexual parents (Goldberg et al., 2012). Descriptions of behavior among
children of lesbian and gay parents did not, however, differ from those given in a standardization
sample of families with heterosexual parents.
In a related study, Bos and Sandfort (2010) explored the gender-relevant beliefs and psychologi-
cal development of children 8–12 years of age who had lesbian or heterosexual parents. Children
of lesbian mothers reported less parental pressure to conform to gender stereotypes, were less likely
to report their own gender as superior, and were more likely to question whether they would have
future heterosexual relationships. Similarly, MacCallum and Golombok (2004) reported that young
boys of lesbian mothers and single heterosexual mothers had higher femininity scores compared
with their peers with two heterosexual parents, but that there were no differences in boys’ masculin-
ity scores across groups, and no differences on either scale for girls. Small differences in children’s
gendered behavior such as these may be of interest, but probably do not affect overall development.
With some variations, children with lesbian and gay parents have thus been found to show typi-
cal gender role development. Research examining variations in gender role behaviors and activities
of children has found that these differences are linked to parental attitudes regarding gender roles,
rather than to parental sexual orientation. All researchers have reported that gender role behavior of
children with lesbian and gay parents follows normative patterns.
Research on sexual orientation and sexual behavior among offspring of lesbian and gay parents
has likewise found few differences in sexual development of adolescents and adults. In a study of
adult children of gay fathers, Bailey and colleagues (1995) found that the vast majority identified as
heterosexual. Huggins (1989) compared the sexual orientation of adolescents, half with divorced les-
bian mothers and the other half with divorced heterosexual mothers. In this study, all of the children
357
of lesbian mothers identified themselves as heterosexual, and all but one of the children of hetero-
sexual mothers identified as heterosexual. These are two examples drawn from a larger research
literature (Gartrell and Bos, 2010; Golombok and Tasker, 1996; Green, 1978; Wainright et al., 2004).
Some research has also explored the dating and sexual behavior of children of same-sex parents.
Wainright and colleagues (2004) used data from a national data set to examine the romantic relation-
ships and sexual behavior of adolescents with same-sex parents, compared with those of a matched
group of youth with different-sex parents. There were no differences in the rates of same-sex attrac-
tion, numbers of romantic relationships, or frequency of engaging in heterosexual sexual intercourse.
Similarly, Gartrell and Bos (2010) explored sexual orientation, sexual behavior, and sexual risk among
adolescents who had been born to lesbian mothers versus a representative U.S. sample of adolescents;
they reported that family type was unrelated to adolescent sexual identity. Female adolescents with
lesbian mothers were, however, more likely to report engaging in same-sex sexual behavior.
Social Development
Research has also examined social development as a function of parental sexual orientation. This
work has explored children’s friendships and social networks as well as their experiences of bullying
and victimization. Some children have reported negative experiences, but most have been found to
be experiencing normal growth on important dimensions of social development.
Overall, children with lesbian and gay parents have been found to establish and maintain social
relationships with peers in much the same ways as do children with heterosexual parents (Golombok
et al., 1983, Golombok, Tasker, and Murray, 1997; MacCallum and Golombok, 2004; Wainright
and Patterson, 2008). Golombok and colleagues (1983) found no difference in number of friends
or in quality of peer relationships among children being reared by divorced lesbian mothers ver-
sus divorced heterosexual parents. Wainright and Patterson (2008) explored peer relationships of
adolescents with same-sex parents and of adolescents with different-sex parents from a nationally
representative U.S. data set. They reported no differences in peer relationships based on family type.
Measures included number of friends, presence of a best friend, and amount of support from closest
friends, among others.
Gartrell and colleagues (2005) reported that among their sample of 10-year-old children of les-
bian mothers, 43% of the children reported having experienced homophobic comments. Most of
those who heard such comments reported being upset or bothered by them. In a study of Australian
youth with lesbian and gay parents, almost half of the children from grades 3 through 10 reported
being bullied or teased because of their parents’ sexual orientation (Ray and Gregory, 2001). In the
United States, the majority (89%) of lesbian- and gay-parented adolescents in a large survey reported
hearing negative comments about lesbian and gay people (Kosciw and Diaz, 2008). In another study,
children of lesbian and gay adoptive parents were very unlikely to report teasing of their children due
to parental sexual orientation (Farr, Oakley, and Ollen, 2016).
One question raised by these findings is whether children of lesbian and gay parents are at ele-
vated risk for difficulties as a result of their exposure to teasing and victimization. Farr and her
colleagues (2016) reported that children who were bullied also showed more behavioral problems.
Similar findings were reported by Bos, Gartrell, van Balen, Peyser, and Sandfort (2008) and by Bos,
Gartrell, Peyser, and van Balen (2008).
Research on the incidence of peer victimization has found similar rates of bullying and victimiza-
tion among heterosexual-parented and LGBT-parented children (MacCallum and Golombok, 2004;
Wainright and Patterson, 2006). Two studies—one of adolescents in the United States (Wainright
and Patterson, 2006) and one of adolescents in the United Kingdom (Rivers et al., 2008)—compared
adolescents of same-sex parents with those of heterosexual parents and found that both groups had
low rates of reported victimization; no differences between the two groups could be identified. Thus,
358
although homophobic bullying does occur, the likelihood of victimization does not appear to be
elevated among the offspring of lesbian and gay parents.
Other Aspects of Development

Many other aspects of development have been studied among the offspring of lesbian and gay par-
ents. Research findings suggest that children of LGBT parents show cognitive (Flaks, Ficher, Master-
pasqua, and Joseph, 1995; Green et al., 1986; Lavner, Waterman, and Peplau, 2012; Potter, 2012) and
behavioral (Bos et al., 2007; Brewaeys et al., 1997; Chan, Raboy, and Patterson, 1998; Farr et al., 2010;
Potter and Potter, 2016; Schechner, Slone, Lobel, and Schechter, 2011) development similar to that
of children with heterosexual parents. Research has also revealed that development of self-concepts
is similar, regardless of parental sexual orientation (Bos and Sandfort, 2010; Schechner et al., 2011;
Wainright et al., 2004). Overall, research results have supported the conclusion that important varia-
tions in children’s development are not associated with parental sexual orientation.
Services for Lesbian and Gay Parent Families

In response to the varied special concerns of lesbian and gay families with children, many services
and programs have been created. In this section, examples of programs and services that have arisen
in three different contexts are described: parent groups, healthcare centers, and legal advocacy groups.
Parent Groups
Lesbian and gay parents have formed many different kinds of support groups in localities in the
United States and around the world. These include informal children’s playgroups arranged by
friends; regional associations that hold picnics, carnivals, and other community events; and inter-
national organizations that publish newsletters and sponsor conferences. In addition to addressing
the needs of existing families, many groups also provide services and programs for those who are
considering parenthood (Mezey, 2013).
The largest such group in North America is the Family Equality Council, which lists more than
100 chapters across the United States, and in other countries. Their website, www.familyequality.
org, contains news of national and chapter activities, interviews with lesbian and gay parents, reports
about current legal issues, and notices about other matters of interest for lesbian and gay parents and
prospective parents. Beginning in 1990, the group also sponsored Children of Lesbians and Gays
Everywhere (COLAGE), an organization for children of lesbian and gay parents, which in 1999
became an independently chartered group. The COLAGE website can be found at www.colage.org
(Kuvalanka, Teper, and Morrison, 2006).
Through its central office and chapters, the Family Equality Council sponsors various activities
for parents and prospective parents; collects information regarding the policies of adoption agen-
cies, sperm banks, and fertility programs; researches state laws as they pertain to adoption by openly
lesbian families; creates lists of supportive gynecologists and fertility specialists in every state; and
disseminates this information.
Much of the support that the Family Equality Council provides to prospective parents is made
available through the efforts of local chapters that sponsor workshops and support groups for lesbians
and gay men who are interested in parenthood. Many chapters sponsor support groups for individu-
als and couples who are in various stages of considering parenthood through DI, adoption, and/or
surrogacy arrangements. Through such activities, prospective lesbian and gay parents can learn more
about local parenting opportunities, legal issues, and medical resources as well as meet others in the
lesbian and gay community who are interested in becoming parents (Goldberg, 2010; Mezey, 2013).
359
Healthcare Resources
A national organization, the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association (GLMA, www.glma.org), is the
largest association of LGBT healthcare professionals. GLMA’s membership includes approximately
1,000 physicians, medical students, nurses, physician assistants, researchers, psychotherapists, and
other health professionals. The organization works for improvements in healthcare for LGBT people
around the world.
Some medical clinics that focus on the healthcare needs of lesbian and gay communities also
provide services for parents and prospective parents. Such clinics have generally not been formally
affiliated with hospitals or medical schools but have been established as free-standing primary care
centers for urban lesbian and/or gay communities. A well-known example is the Lyon-Martin
Women’s Health Services in San Francisco. Lyon-Martin Women’s Health Services, founded in
1978, is a primary care community clinic specifically for women, with a primary focus on healthcare
for lesbians and bisexual women (www.lyon-martin.org). The clinic provides an array of medical and
health-related services, including preventive and primary healthcare, HIV services, support services
for mothers, and programs for sexual minority youth. It also provides services for current and pro-
spective lesbian and gay male parents.
Support groups are led by professional health educators and range from 8-week groups for les-
bians considering parenthood to 6-week childbirth education classes. Many informational meetings
and workshops on Considering Parenthood, Legal Issues, Adoption, Choices in Pregnancy and Birth,
and Lesbians and Gay Men Parenting Together are also offered. Panel participants include profes-
sionals in healthcare, social services, and the law, all speaking from a lesbian- and gay-affirmative
perspective.
The Whitman-Walker Clinic also makes available services for lesbian and gay male parents and
prospective parents. In addition, Whitman-Walker has sponsored “Maybe Baby” groups for lesbians
and gay men considering parenthood, and workshops on special topics such as “Options and Issues
for Non-Biological Mothers.” Similar programs are available in many other urban areas.
Legal Resources
Legal advocacy groups within lesbian and gay communities also provide services to current and
prospective lesbian parents. Especially prominent among such groups are the Lambda Legal Defense
and Education Fund and the National Center for Lesbian Rights. Lambda Legal Defense and Edu-
cation Fund (LLDEF; www.lambdalegal.org), founded in 1973 and based in New York City, with
offices throughout the United States, works to advance the rights of sexual minorities through litiga-
tion, policy advocacy, education, and communication. LLDEF attorneys worked on important cases
involving same-sex marriage, such as Baehr v. Miike (which sought unsuccessfully to establish the
legality of same-sex marriage in Hawaii, decided in 1996) and Baker v. Vermont (which established the
rights of lesbian and gay adults to have their relationships treated in equal fashion, resulting in civil
unions for same-sex couples in Vermont, decided in 1999). Work by LLDEF in these and related
cases has been influential in legal advocacy for causes that are critical to lesbian and gay families with
children.
The National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR; www.nclrights.org), founded in 1977 and
based in San Francisco, promotes awareness, respect, and recognition of lesbians and their rights. The
NCLR offers legal representation, amicus work, and technical assistance to cooperating counsel and
other attorneys around the country. For example, NCLR filed amicus briefs in cases involving the
rights of nonbiological lesbian parents following the death of a biological parent and the break-up of
a relationship between biological and nonbiological parents.
360
The NCLR has been a pioneer in second-parent adoptions (Ricketts and Achtenberg, 1990).
Second-parent adoptions enable an unmarried parent to adopt a child without another parent of the
same sex giving up his or her legal rights or responsibilities as a parent. Because this has been a path-
way to secure legal recognition of relationships between nonbiological parents and their children, the
availability of second-parent adoptions has been of particular importance to lesbian and gay couples
who wish to parent, especially in the days before Obergefell v. Hodges (2015) and Pavan v. Smith (2017)
were decided. NCLR continues to advocate for lesbian mothers and their children on issues involv-
ing relationship dissolution, multiple parents, and other areas of family law.
Directions for Research, Service, and Advocacy

Many significant programs and services are now available for lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their
children, as well as for prospective lesbian and gay parents, but much remains to be done. In this
section, directions for research, service, and advocacy relevant to lesbian and gay parents and their
children are suggested.
Directions for Research

One of the important directions for research is to identify and to explore factors that influence
lesbian and gay couples’ and individuals’ inclinations to make parenthood a part of their lives (Pat-
terson and Riskind, 2010). Historically, many lesbians and gay men have not considered parenthood
to be an option. Today, however, many young lesbian and gay individuals expect to become parents
(D’Augelli, Rendina, Sinclair, and Grossman, 2006/2007). What kinds of influences are important
in this shift? Does the degree of an individual’s or a couple’s integration with different parts of gay/
lesbian and/or heterosexual communities make a difference? What roles do personal, social, and
economic variables play in such decisions? We need to know more about the factors that influence
decisions about parenthood among lesbians and gay men.
A related direction for research is assessment of the climate for lesbian and gay parenting in vari-
ous areas. What are the important criteria that should be used in such an assessment, and how do dif-
ferent locales measure up against them? One approach might be to use state-level indicators as rough
indices. For example, a statewide gay/lesbian rights law would be a positive indicator with regard to
the climate for lesbian and gay parenting, as would the accomplishment of second-parent adoptions
in that state. Negative indicators would include a climate of antigay attitudes. Ratings of this sort
could be useful for couples and individuals seeking parenthood, parents considering relocation, and
for activists and advocacy groups deciding how best to direct their activities.
The climates of local communities might also be assessed with the needs of lesbian and gay par-
ents and their children in mind. For instance, one might ask whether there are lesbian and gay parent
groups already in existence within this community, whether any second-parent adoptions have been
completed, and whether relevant healthcare and medical resources are available to lesbian and gay
families. Such assessments should be geared to specific locales; communities that are located in rela-
tive geographical proximity to one another may nevertheless vary tremendously in the climates they
provide for lesbian and gay families with children.
Such efforts to examine and to describe the atmosphere for lesbian and gay family life also raise
questions about what aspects of a community make it an attractive place for lesbian and gay parents
and their children to live. Such characteristics might in some cases be similar to those for hetero-
sexual families (e.g., safe streets, good schools), whereas in other cases, they might vary even among
lesbian and gay families as a function of the family’s other identities, interests, or needs. For instance,
multiracial families might value especially the opportunity to live in multiethnic neighborhoods.
361
It would also be valuable to learn more about the effectiveness of existing services for lesbian
and gay families. Although many services and programs have emerged for prospective parents as well
as for parents and their children, there have been few attempts to evaluate their effectiveness. How
effectively do available services fill the needs that they are intended to address? What populations
are targeted by existing programs, and with what success do programs and services reach the com-
munities for which they are intended? What are the essential elements of effective programs? All of
these are critical questions for community-oriented research on lesbian and gay parenting services.
The knowledge base relevant to lesbian and gay parenting is still limited in many areas. Many
prospective lesbian and gay parents are concerned about relationships with members of their families
of origin as well as with friends, neighbors, and colleagues. Still others focus on family members’
interactions with institutional contexts such as educational, legal, and medical settings. Scientists want
to develop better understanding of the important variables in parenting and parent-child interac-
tions, which requires greater knowledge about parenting and about child development in lesbian and
gay families. Such topics are open to empirical study, and the work has been well begun, but much
remains to be accomplished.
Researchers are also beginning also to turn their attention to areas of diversity among lesbian
and gay families, and are starting to explore conditions that help lesbian and gay families to flourish.
This transition, now well underway, appears to be gathering momentum, and it suggests that research
on lesbian and gay families has reached a significant turning point (Patterson, 1992, 1997). Having
addressed negative assumptions represented in psychological theory, judicial opinion, and popular
prejudice, researchers can now explore a broader range of issues.
Many issues relevant to lesbian and gay families are in need of study. First and most obvious is that
studies representing the demographic diversity of lesbian and gay families are needed. Much existing
research has involved mainly European American, well-educated, middle-class families who live in
urban areas of the United States or in Western Europe. More work is needed to understand differ-
ences that are based on ethnicity, family economic circumstances, and cultural environments (see, for
example, Lubbe, 2013; Moore, 2008). Research of this kind should elucidate differences as well as
commonalities among lesbian and gay families with children, and how these may vary across national,
cultural, social, and legal/policy environments.
Future research should also, insofar as possible, encompass a larger number of levels of analysis.
Existing research has most often focused on children or on their parents, considered as individuals.
As valuable as this emphasis has been, it will also be important to consider other family members,
such as grandparents (Orel and Fruhauf, 2013; Tornello and Patterson, 2016), and the ways in which
intergenerational relationships affect individuals and couples (Sumontha et al., 2016). Assessments
of family relationships and family climate could enhance understanding of individual-level variables
such as self-esteem. When families are considered at different levels of analysis, nested within the
neighborhood, regional, and cultural contexts in which they live, a more comprehensive understand-
ing of lesbian and gay families is likely to emerge.
In this effort, it will be valuable to devote attention to family process as well as to family structure.
How do lesbian and gay families negotiate their interactions with institutional settings such as the
school and the workplace (Byard et al., 2013; King, Huffman, and Peddie, 2013; Russell and Horne,
2017)? How are family processes and interactions affected by economic, cultural, religious, and legal
aspects of the contexts in which these families live (Ball, 2012)? How do climates of opinion that
prevail in their communities affect lesbian and gay families, and how do families cope with prejudice
and discrimination when they are encountered? As research in this area becomes more and more
international in nature, it will be possible to address these questions in new ways (Lubbe, 2013; Pat-
terson, Riskind, et al., 2014).
Gender is a matter deserving of special attention. Inasmuch as lesbian and gay relationships encour-
age the uncoupling of gender and behavioral roles, one might expect to find considerable variability
362
among families in the ways in which they carry out essential family, household, and childcare tasks
(Patterson, Sutfin, et al., 2004). In what ways do nontraditional divisions of labor affect children who
grow up in lesbian and gay homes? In what ways does the performance of nontraditional tasks affect
parents themselves? It will be valuable to learn more about the relative importance of gender and
behavioral roles in lesbian and gay families with children.
One additional issue that should be given special emphasis involves the conceptualization of
parents’ sexual identities. In research on lesbian and gay parenting, scant attention has been devoted
to possible changes in sexual identities over time, or to the implications of any such fluidity for chil-
dren (Diamond, 2013). For instance, many parents are probably bisexual to some degree, rather than
exclusively heterosexual, gay, or lesbian, yet this has rarely been noted or studied directly in the exist-
ing research literature. Increasing numbers of adults seem to be identifying themselves as bisexual
(Dworkin, 2013). Future research might benefit from closer attention to issues in conceptualization
and assessment of parental sexual orientation.
Finally, most research has focused on lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children, but bisexual,
transgender, and other queer parents are increasingly in the public eye, and research is needed to
understand their family relationships. Bisexual individuals are more numerous in the United States
than lesbian or gay people, yet they have often remained all but invisible in research on parenting
(Ross and Dobinson, 2013). Although less numerous, transgender parents have also drawn consider-
able media attention, but research focused on their families has only just begun (Downing, 2013;
Stotzer, Herman, and Hasenbush, 2014). Other families in which parents identify as queer, such
as parents in other cultural traditions or those in polyamorous relationships, also deserve attention
(Kulpa and Mizielinska, 2016; Pallotta-Chiarolli, Haydon, and Hunter, 2013). Learning about these
families will enlarge our understanding of human diversity
Directions for Service

There are a number of ways in which efforts to provide improved services for lesbian and gay parents
might be directed. In part because services for lesbian and gay parents are so new, and in part because
of widespread discrimination, many different kinds of services are needed. At the national level, an
organization like the Family Pride Coalition can develop lists of healthcare, legal, and other resources
on a state-by-state basis as well as provide technical assistance to local groups. At regional and local
levels, individual parent groups are mounting educational events and other programs in support of
lesbian and gay parenting in local communities. Even in major urban areas, however, most such pro-
grams are in a nascent state, depend heavily on the efforts of volunteers, and reach mainly affluent,
well-educated segments of lesbian and gay communities. In many smaller towns and rural areas, there
are as yet few lesbian or gay parenting services of any kind.
One set of needs, then, is for expansion of medical, legal, and social services. Programs and ser-
vices should be developed by and for low-income and ethnic minority lesbian and gay individuals
and couples who are parents or who wish to become parents. Of necessity, such work would involve
identification of medical, legal, and other resources that are open to members of sexual minorities as
well as to ethnic minorities and low-income communities. Additional services might also be devel-
oped for the children of lesbian and gay parents.
In seeking to expand services for sexual minority parenting communities, it will be important
not to overlook important resources outside lesbian and gay communities themselves. For instance,
building public library collections in areas relevant to lesbian and gay parenting can provide an
important resource that is available to large numbers of people, regardless of sexual orientation.
Educational institutions, such as high schools, colleges, and universities, can also provide important
resources for prospective lesbian and gay parents by including accurate information in the curricu-
lum, by providing speakers and other relevant programming, and by making articles, books, and video
363
materials that relate to parenting by individuals with sexual minority identities available to a broad
audience (Byard et al., 2013; Casper and Schultz, 1999; Russell and Horne, 2017). Similarly, religious
groups can offer meaningful support by providing special activities for lesbian and gay families with
children and by educating their congregations about lesbian and gay parenting.
Another major aim of service to prospective lesbian and gay parents is to eliminate discrimination
against lesbian and gay parents and their children. To the degree that this effort meets with success,
many of the special needs of lesbian or gay parents and their children will decrease in significance.
Prevention efforts relevant to lesbian and gay parenting should be designed to counter unfavorable
stereotypes of lesbians and gay men with accurate information about the realities of life in lesbian
and gay families, and to provide an understanding of psychosocial processes underlying prejudice
and discrimination.
Directions for Advocacy

Among the greatest current needs of lesbian and gay families with children is for activism to promote
social and political change. Lesbian and gay parents and their children have issues in common with
those of many other families, but they also have unique concerns that arise from prejudice against
lesbian and gay families.
The basic issues of children and families in the United States are, in many cases, also the issues
of lesbian and gay families with children. For instance, many families with children would benefit
from enhanced neighborhood safety, better public schools, flexible working hours for parents, and
better access to healthcare. A more equal distribution of economic resources would benefit children
in economically stressed lesbian and gay families, just as it would benefit children in other economi-
cally disadvantaged homes. In other words, a common stake is held by gay, lesbian, and heterosexual
families in many issues of public policy relevant to families with children.
Even allowing for overlap with the needs of other families, lesbian and gay families with children
also have unique needs (Byard et al., 2013). Lesbian and gay families with children are less likely than
heterosexual families to enjoy legal recognition for their family relationships, equal access to medical
care, or freedom from discrimination, harassment, and hate crimes. The quality of life for lesbian and
gay parents would be greatly enhanced if they could be confident that their sexual orientation would
not be held against them as they go to work, pursue parenthood, and send their children to school.
Like the offspring of heterosexual parents, children of lesbian and gay parents would feel more con-
fident if they were sure that their families would be respected at school, and they might feel more
secure if their relationships with parents were adequately protected by law. Accomplishment of such
aims is an important goal for advocacy efforts on behalf of lesbian and gay families with children
(Ball, 2012; Byard et al., 2013; Patterson and Goldberg, 2016).
Conclusion
After more than 30 years, research on lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children has, to a large
degree, come of age. Systematic study of lesbian and gay families with children began in the context
of judicial challenges to the fitness of lesbian and gay parents. For this reason, much research has been
designed to evaluate negative judicial presumptions about psychological health and well-being of
parents and children in lesbian and gay families. Although much remains to be done to understand
conditions that foster positive mental health among lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children,
results of the research to date are unusually clear. Children of lesbian and gay parents develop in much
the same ways that other children do. Research does not support the idea that children of lesbian
or gay parents suffer debilitating disadvantages resulting from parental sexual orientation. In short,
the results of research provide no justification for denying or curtailing parental rights because of
364
variations in parental sexual orientation. The consensus of professional groups around this conclu-
sion is reflected in the official statements of many professional associations, such as the American
Psychological Association, the American Bar Association, the American Medical Association, and
the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Although studies of lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children have been fruitful, there is yet
much important work to be done. Having addressed heterosexist concerns of jurists, theorists, and
others, researchers are now engaged in examining a broader range of issues raised by the emergence
of different kinds of lesbian and gay families with children. Results of future work in this area have
the potential to increase our knowledge about lesbian and gay parenthood, stimulate innovations in
our theoretical understanding of human development, and inform legal rulings and public policies
relevant to lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and their children.
Acknowledgments
I want to express my gratitude to the students, former students, and other colleagues who have made
so many contributions to this area of research, and also to the many families who have participated in
research described in this chapter. I also thank the Roy Scrivner Fund at the American Psychological
Foundation, the Lesbian Health Fund at the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association, and the Williams
Institute at the UCLA School of Law for their support.
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11
SIBLING CAREGIVING
Introduction
In April 2017, a 5-year-old boy found his mother collapsed in the shower. Believing she had died,
and not wanting his 2-month-old baby sister to be distressed, he wrapped her in a blanket and carried
her to the safety of neighbors (Wasu, 2017). Although the boy’s quick thinking was credited with
saving his mother’s life, his actions conveyed not only his concern for his mother, but also his com-
mitment to providing care to his vulnerable sister. As evidenced in this story, even at a very young
age, children are sensitive to their sisters’ and brothers’ physical and emotional needs and take action
to respond to those needs (Dunn, 2007; Howe, Della Porta, Recchia, and Ross, 2016; Kramer, 2010).
The fire department in his rural Arizona town named him an “honorary firefighter” for his bravery
in caring for his mother. However, his role in providing both physical and emotional care to his
infant sister received almost no recognition. This is just one example of how siblings’ contributions
to one another’s care and development—which can be life changing—have been overlooked and
understudied historically (Dunn, 2007; East, 2010).
The major objectives of this chapter are to bring stronger focus to the many ways siblings extend
care and support to one another, to explore how these actions both reflect, and are formative for,
individual and family well-being, and, further, how parents can best set the stage for continued care
and support throughout siblings’ relationship across the life course.
Sibling Caregiving as “Unseen” Phenomena

Siblings have great access to one another during childhood and adolescence and, as discussed ahead,
have been shown to be critical agents of one another’s socialization (Kramer and Conger, 2009). As
reported by McHale, Updegraff, and Whiteman (2012), using 2010 Current Population Survey data
(King et al., 2010), a higher percentage of youth in the United States live with one or more siblings
(82.22%) than live with a father figure (78.19%). Time use data have shown that in middle child-
hood, siblings spend more time with one another than with parents, peers, or by themselves (McHale
and Crouter, 1996). For example, Updegraff, McHale, Whiteman, Thayer, and Delgado (2005) found
that adolescent siblings in Mexican American families living in the southwestern United States spent
an average of 17 hours per week in shared activities—more time than they spent with parents or
other family members. Through nightly telephone interviews with a U.S. sample who was largely of
European American descent, Tucker, McHale, and Crouter (2008) found adolescent siblings spend
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Sibling Caregiving
an average of 10 hours per week in shared activities. Despite such access, it is curious that whereas
the contributions of mothers and fathers are well regarded in promoting children’s social, cognitive,
and emotional development and caregiving, siblings are not often recognized for the critical sources
of caregiving they too provide.
The lack of attention to the caregiving acts exchanged among siblings may be understandable, at
least in Western technological societies, as much of sibling interaction may occur outside of parents’
view, especially when parents work outside of the home. Thus, the efforts siblings take to care for
one another may not be readily apparent, often hidden, or “unseen.” As discussed in this chapter,
although parents may not be privy to all of siblings’ exchanges of care, support, and emotional assur-
ance, interactions such as these nonetheless play a formative role in both older and younger siblings’
development (Maynard, 2002).
In many non-Western or rural agrarian societies, where sibling caregiving is recognized as occur-
ring very frequently (Zukow-Goldring, 1989), parents take for granted the significance of these acts.
According to Zukow-Goldring (2002), “The majority of the world’s parents assume their children
will become competent caregivers and depend on their assistance in socializing younger sisters and
brothers” (p. 257). Thus, sibling caregiving may be visible, but yet not considered as anything out of
the ordinary. As a result, adults may fail to recognize its significance for children’s development and
the well-being of the family as a whole.
The Challenge of Promoting Sustained Sibling Caregiving

Mothers and fathers of young children frequently express, in surveys and interviews, the desire that
their children will not only get along well in childhood, but also continue to provide care and sup-
port to one another, especially in later adulthood when parents themselves are no longer present
or able to help (Kramer and Baron, 1995). Because it is not likely that individuals will provide care
and support to a sibling they have a conflictual or hostile relationship with, parents often inquire
about how they can best nurture the types of sibling relationships that will encourage their offspring
to be consistent sources of care and support to one another as adults (Kramer and Gottman, 1992).
The quality of the relationship that siblings establish early in childhood often sets the stage for more
supportive and caring relationships later in life. Longitudinal examinations of continuity and change
in sibling relationship quality, in the absence of intervention, have shown high levels of consistency
in positive and negative forms of sibling interaction over time (Dunn, 2007; Kramer and Kowal,
2005). Although we lack data about whether these patterns persist into adulthood, it is likely that the
exchange of support and care among siblings later in life depends on the quality of the relationship
established much earlier in life. The question of how parents may best encourage sustained caregiving
among siblings is addressed later in this chapter.
Siblings as Agents of Socialization

In an earlier review of sibling caregiving, Zukow-Goldring (2002) presented evidence from around
the globe to advance that, even as children, siblings not only give care to their younger sisters and
brothers to protect them from harm and meet some of their basic physical needs, but also more impor-
tantly serve as “competent socializing agents” (p. 254), introducing their sisters and brothers to ways of
acting and knowing that may be distinct from what they learn from parents and other adults. Relat-
edly, children serve as “culture brokers” (p. 278), moderating relationships their siblings establish within
their immediate family, community, culture, and society. This chapter extends Zukow-Goldring’s
conceptualization of siblings across the globe as capable agents of socialization and culture brokers
to further explore how siblings contribute to one another’s socioemotional development and well-
being throughout the life course. In so doing, this chapter adopts Bronfenbrenner’s (1977) ecological
373
perspective to understand the various contextual influences that may shape expressions of sibling
caregiving, focusing first on broader, more distal systemic contexts and then narrowing to examine the
ways in which sibling caregiving is shaped by proximal familial processes, and by the characteristics
that children and parents bring to these relationships. The discussion begins by examining definitions
of sibling caregiving, the forms it may take, and its potential roles in socioemotional development.
Definitions of Sibling Caregiving

The range of activities included in definitions of sibling “caretaking” and “caregiving”—terms used
relatively interchangeably in the literature—reflects the plurality of perspectives on the role siblings
may play in one another’s well-being and development. Hafford (2010) regarded sibling caregiving
as the temporary transfer of parental authority or supervisory responsibilities to an older sibling, such
as when a parent asks a child to “look after” a sibling while the parent is absent. In a similar vein,
East and Hamill (2013) considered typical sibling caregiving responsibilities to include “monitoring
to keep from harm, feeding or helping to feed, getting siblings ready for school, and helping with
bathing, dressing or homework” (p. 543). These definitions may best fit many of the forms of sib-
ling caregiving observed within families in Western technological societies in which sibling care is
considered to be auxiliary to parental care. Parents are understood as the primary providers of care
to children, if not performing it themselves, then at the very least assuming responsibility for deter-
mining the types of care a child needs (and should receive) and who should provide it (e.g., whether
particular tasks should be delegated to a sibling, other family member, or childcare provider).
Taking a more comprehensive and global perspective, Weisner and Gallimore (1977) conceptual-
ized sibling caregiving broadly, as
activities ranging from complete and independent full-time care of a child by an older
child to the performance of specific tasks for another child under the supervision of adults
or other children; it includes verbal or other explicit training and direction of the child’s
behavior, as well as simply “keeping an eye out for younger siblings.”
(p. 169)
Weisner and Gallimore’s definition takes into account many of the forms of sibling caregiving that
are observed in non-Western or agrarian societies, where children may be delegated extensive care
giving responsibilities, or on occasion in Western societies when a child or adolescent provides
extensive care when a parent is incapacitated (East, 2010). It is notable that Weisner and Gallimore
(1977) included “all kinds of socialization, training, and routine responsibilities one child assumes
for others” (p. 169, emphasis added) as part of their definition of sibling caregiving, reinforcing the
notion that siblings can and do teach one another a myriad of things, and that their contributions to
one another’s welfare extends well beyond the provision of tangible support and supervision. This
broader conceptualization of sibling caregiving remains influential and has been adopted in numer-
ous studies of sibling caregiving (Bryant, 1982; Yi et al., 2012).
Bryant (1989) further broadened the definition of sibling caregiving to include those instances
in which siblings turn to one another “for counsel and emotional support” (p. 143, emphasis added).
Especially as adolescents, caregiving may involve confiding, self-disclosure, and sharing advice (Bry-
ant, 1989; Howe, Aquan-Assee, Bukowski, Rinaldi, and Lehoux, 2000), mediating frustration with
parents (Bank and Kahn, 1975), advocating on one’s behalf (Burke, Arnold, and Owen, 2015; Li,
2006), or serving as a sounding board when trying to solve problems or plan for the future (Tucker,
Barber, and Eccles, 1997). Although the inclusion of emotional support as part of the definition of
sibling caregiving was a departure from more traditional definitions, there is supporting evidence
for considering emotional responsiveness as part of sibling caregiving. For example, the majority of
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Sibling Caregiving
Scottish primary school children interviewed by Kosonen (1996) named their sibling as the person
they would first turn to for assistance when worried (56%) or on encountering something they
needed help with (63%). In fact, siblings were identified as confidantes more frequently than were
fathers and only slightly less frequently than mothers. Thus, as Bryant (1989) advanced, siblings repre-
sent an important component of children’s social/emotional support network; their role as agents of
support may be particularly heightened for children who have an otherwise limited support network
(Kosonen, 1996).
Perceptions about which tasks and responsibilities are considered appropriate forms of sibling
caregiving vary considerably in accordance with culture (Cicirelli, 1994; Maynard, 2002; Nuckolls,
1993; Weisner and Gallimore, 1977; Zukow-Goldring, 2002), ethnicity (Burton, 2007), gender roles
(Grigoryeva, 2017), family structure (East, 2010), and socioeconomic status (McMahon and Luthar,
2007), among other factors. Thus, it is important that the working definition of sibling caregiving
be broad enough to encompass the forms of sibling caregiving that occur in diverse corners of the
world.
In following Bryant (1989), Weisner and Gallimore (1977), Zukow-Goldring (2002), and East
(2010), this chapter adopts a relatively expansive definition of sibling caregiving, considering it to
encompass a range of actions and processes that are directed toward meeting the physical and safety
needs of a sibling, and those that might promote the social, cognitive, and emotional development
and well-being of that child and her family. That is, sibling caregiving is considered to include various
forms of teaching and instruction and socialization as well as the provision of emotional support and
comfort, companionship, advice, and financial and other forms of assistance and advocacy. Defini-
tions of sibling caregiving are also recognized as culturally relevant, that is, the types of caregiving
that are observed are expressions of the culture in which it is embedded and must be understood
using a cultural lens.
This chapter presents an analysis of the wide-ranging forms that sibling caregiving may take
across development and across geography with an eye toward describing the variety of functions
that sibling caregiving may fulfill to enhance the well-being of individuals, families, and society.
The chapter begins with a brief review of the various forms that sibling caretaking may take in
Western and non-Western cultures. This discussion brings focus to the characteristics of siblings
(and their families) that are likely to place them in the respective roles of providers and recipients of
care, the typical precipitants and duration and extent of sibling caregiving, and the different forms
of caregiving that tend to emerge with development. The chapter next addresses the functions that
sibling caregiving may hold for families in diverse cultures, including serving as a family economic
survival strategy or as a mechanism for providing respite or support to parents. Particular emphasis
is placed on the functions sibling caregiving may serve in both reflecting and advancing individuals’
socioemotional development. Next, a broad set of sociocultural factors (i.e., cultural, historical, and
legal factors) are examined for their potential influences on sibling caregiving. This is followed by an
examination of potential familial influences, including family members’ ethnic and cultural identities,
family structure, and experiences of stress and economic pressures. A review of intrafamilial factors
that may influence sibling caregiving follows that includes attention to the characteristics that parents
and children bring to family interactions, such as their personality, health, and mental health. The
chapter culminates in a discussion of how sibling caregiving can be promoted through evidence-
based practice and experimental interventions, and how it may be best studied in future research.
We begin with an exploration of the various forms that sibling caregiving takes around the globe.
Forms of Sibling Caregiving

Although the forms, functions, and frequency of sibling caregiving may vary dramatically across the
globe, “social historians have verified that children have been expected to provide some caregiving in
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much of our history and in most cultures” (East, 2010, p. 56). On the basis of extensive ethnographic
and cross-cultural studies, numerous researchers (Cicirelli, 1994; Larson and Verma, 1999; Nuck-
olls, 1993; Weisner and Gallimore, 1977; Zukow-Goldring, 1989, 1995, 2002) observed significant
variability in both societal expectations and specific sibling caregiving behaviors that occur across
nations, cultures, ethnicities, and economic groups. In light of the diverse factors that may differen-
tially set the occasion for sibling caregiving, it is useful to consider caregiving activities in terms of the
following four dimensions: (1) who provides care to whom, (2) the precipitants of sibling caregiving
(e.g., whether caregiving is spontaneously offered on recognition of a sibling’s need or is performed
upon an adult’s direction), (3) the duration and/or extent of the caregiving activity, and (4) the devel-
opmental periods during which caregiving occurs.
Who Provides Care to Whom
Age
Across the globe, children generally begin to provide care to siblings between the ages of 5 and
10 years, with daughters (mostly eldest daughters) more often assuming such responsibilities than
sons (Zukow-Goldring, 2002). Kosonen (1996) reported that Scandinavian adults consider children
as young as 7 years of age, and Norwegian adults consider children 10–12 years of age, capable of
household task management, including caring for siblings in the absence of adult supervision. In
cultures where mothers have high workloads, children may be prompted to begin even earlier, as
young as 3 years of age (Morrongiello, MacIsaac, and Klemencic, 2007). In large families, caregiv-
ing burden may be greatest when the age span between children is wide, with elder children (typi-
cally daughters) expected to take greater responsibility for the care of younger siblings (East, 2010;
Zukow-Goldring, 2002).
Birth Order
Although elder siblings are more frequently observed to extend care to younger siblings rather than
vice versa (Hafford, 2010; Weisner and Gallimore, 1977), it is also important to recognize that care
giving can be, and often is, reciprocal. Even as toddlers, children may extend some forms of care to
elder siblings, for example, by comforting an older sibling who is hurt (Dunn and Munn, 1985).
Howe et al. (2016) observed sequences of teaching and learning among sibling dyads across two time
points in early childhood, approximately 2 years apart. Across both observations, older siblings were
more likely than younger siblings to engage in teaching; however, younger siblings’ efforts to teach
their older siblings significantly increased from the first observation (at 2 years of age) to the second
(at 4 years of age). These findings suggest that, even in early childhood, forms of caregiving can be
reciprocal, and that the presumption that only elder children give care to younger siblings should be
avoided.
Patterns of sibling caregiving among children very close in age—as may be the case with twins,
half, or stepsiblings—are not yet fully understood. As reviewed by Tancredy and Fraley (2006), across
development, twins are more likely to use one another as attachment figures than are non-twins,
as they more often demonstrate key attributes of attachment relationships, (i.e., proximity seeking,
separation distress, the use of the other as a safe haven during times of stress, and as a secure base from
which to explore the world). In a cross-sectional online study of attachment relationships, Tancredy
and Fraley (2006) found that young adults who had a twin were more likely than those without a
twin to regard their sibling as an attachment figure, especially if they were encouraged to spend time
together during childhood, and as adults, shared interests, experienced empathy for another, and
“included the other as part of the self ” (p. 87). Age differences between non-twin siblings did not
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Sibling Caregiving
predict attachment relationships. This suggests that having a developmental advantage, such as when
one sibling is significantly older or more experienced than another, does not need to exist for siblings
to provide meaningful levels of support and care.
Gender
Research with U.S. samples indicates that older sisters are more often caregivers of younger siblings
than older brothers (Bryant, 1989; Dodson and Dickert, 2004; Garner, Jones, and Palmer, 1994).
Larson and Verma (1999) conducted cross-cultural comparisons of how male and female adoles-
cents within postindustrial (e.g., European nations, North American nations, East Asian nations)
and nonindustrial (e.g., Bangladesh, India, Kenya, Nepal, Philippines, Mexico, Botswana, Kenya)
societies spend their time. In nonindustrialized societies, especially those in which children do not
regularly attend formal schools, girls in early childhood spent nearly 2 hours per day on household
tasks, including cooking and caring for younger children; this number rose to nearly 7 hours per day
by late childhood and early adolescence. Thus, in many nonindustrial societies, by the time female
children reach adolescence, they are expected to engage in comparable amounts of household tasks
(including childcare) as adult females. In comparison, participation in household tasks by adolescents
in the postindustrial countries they studied was less than 1 hour per day (Larson and Verma, 1999).
Although boys also participated in household tasks (including childcare) in nonindustrialized
societies, they devoted significantly fewer hours than girls (Larson and Verma, 1999). Although boys
were observed to participate in household maintenance, these were more commonly outdoor or
out-of-home tasks (e.g., running errands, yard work, caring for animals) rather than sibling care tasks.
However, according to Larson and Verma, important opportunities exist for nonsupervisory forms
of caregiving—as may be the case in instances where a male child or adolescent teaches a brother
how to carry out particular tasks and acquire culturally relevant skills—and such forms of sibling
instruction may occur in a more gender equitable manner. Even considering cross-cultural differ-
ences, Larson and Verma (1999) concluded that “across nearly all populations—regardless of eco-
nomic development or schooling—girls spend more time in household labor than do boys” (p. 707).
Taken together, these findings indicate that across cultures, the provision of care and supervi-
sion of siblings—prominent components of household tasks in all societies—are tasks more often
expected of female than male offspring, and of older rather than younger offspring. In Western tech-
nological societies, where female out-of-the home workforce participation may be more prevalent,
considerably less emphasis appears to be placed on female participation in household labor than in
non-Western societies. An important caveat is that some cross-cultural studies may overlook forms
of sibling caregiving that males are more likely to provide, such as informal forms of teaching and
ensuring the safety of siblings in out-of-home contexts. For example, in a study of low-income fami-
lies in San Francisco who immigrated from the Philippines, China, and Latin America, young adult
daughters reported providing more physical forms of assistance, but sons were more likely to provide
financial assistance to their siblings, parents, and extended family members (Fuligni, Tseng, and Lam,
1999). Thus, the degree to which males participate in the care of siblings may be under-recognized
and appreciated.
Family Structure and Composition

Children who live with a father or father figure may provide relatively lower levels of caregiving
than children in single-parent homes; mothers in two-parent families may provide more caregiving
themselves, as they do not bear the full burden of providing income for the family (East, 2010). Fur-
thermore, children who have large extended families nearby may not be required to provide as much
care to siblings as those with less access to adult relatives (East, 2010). Changes in family structure and
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composition, such as those precipitated by parental divorce and remarriage, offer unique opportuni-
ties and challenges for sibling caregiving.
Ethnicity
Margolis, Fosco, and Stormshak (2014) surveyed adolescents in urban U.S. settings to understand
whom they considered to be the adults who provide care to them. Approximately 35% of Latin
American, 17% of African American, and nearly 10% of European American adolescents listed older
siblings as members of their network of caregivers. The higher percentage of Latin American (and
to a lesser degree, African American) youth who considered adult siblings to be significant caregiv-
ers likely reflects a greater endorsement of the cultural value of familism (East and Hamill, 2013;
Updegraff et al., 2005) in which, among other things, importance is placed on family members
(including children) assuming responsibility for one another’s care. African American families have
long-standing traditions of providing care to family members (Dilworth-Anderson et al., 2005)
and may have greater interest in providing support to siblings in later adulthood than do European
American families (Gold, 1990). Namkung, Greenberg, and Mailick (2017) found that European
American adults providing personal care to an ill or disabled sibling experienced greater caregiver
burden (i.e., more depressive symptoms and lower ratings of life satisfaction) than minority (African
American and Latin American) caregivers.
Personal Characteristics
Personal characteristics of children may influence the degree to which they are asked to assume care
giving duties. Perceived levels of competence, emotional maturity, and/or the possession of specific
abilities or skills (including those that other family members may not have, for example, due to a
language barrier, mental or physical health issues, or developmental delays) may make some children
more likely candidates for caregiving assignments than other children in the family, regardless of
their birth order (Burton, 2007; East, 2010). Particularly in instances in which one child experiences
physical, cognitive, or developmental limitations, birth order may play a lesser role in determining
which child assumes a caregiving role (McHale and Gamble, 1989). As children reach more advanced
developmental stages, caregiving tends to become increasingly reciprocal (Tucker et al., 1997).
Precipitants of Sibling Caregiving

Although many instances of sibling caregiving, especially in early childhood, are prompted by a par-
ent or other adult, child-initiated forms of caregiving also regularly occur (Maynard, 2002; Morrong-
iello et al., 2007). Provisions of emotional assurance, comfort, and support that occur spontaneously
may have different implications for children’s development than caregiving that is performed at the
direction of parents or other adults.
Externally Directed Caregiving

Requests to provide care to siblings are more often initiated by parents than by other adults. These
requests can range from discrete or time-bound duties (e.g., “Make sure you watch out for your sister
on your way to school.”) to broader, continuous expectations (e.g., “I’m counting on you to always
look out for your brother.”). Although parents may assign these tasks with the aim of obtaining help
in an immediate situation or to gain brief respite, particularly in societies in which children’s care of
siblings is truly needed, parents may issue these directives to help children develop requisite skills they
believe children will need as adults (Weisner and Gallimore, 1977). However, resentment may also
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Sibling Caregiving
emerge, particularly if children feel that parents do not demonstrate sufficient appreciation for their
mandated assistance. Such resentment may be directed at the parent who directed them to provide
care or at the sibling whose mere presence may be perceived as precipitating this inconvenience
(Dunn and Kendrick, 1982; Murphy, 1993). Song and Volling (2015) found that preschool children’s
compliance with their mothers’ requests to help change their infant sibling’s diaper was predicted by
preschoolers’ temperament (i.e., soothability) and a cooperative coparenting relationship.
Parents may begin to communicate the importance of supporting one another’s physical and
emotional needs and prepare their children to provide care to siblings at an early age. Howe and
Rinaldi (2004) observed mothers in a laboratory setting as they prepared to leave their toddlers for a
short period in the care of their preschool-age siblings. Prior to their departure, mothers provided the
elder sibling with strategies and instructions to care for their younger child—who they anticipated
would become distressed in their absence. Caregiving was observed as the preschoolers held, kissed,
distracted, and offered reassuring statements to their siblings.
Morrongiello et al. (2007) conducted telephone interviews with a sample of Canadian moth-
ers to estimate the percentage of time younger siblings (age 2 years on average) were supervised in
the home by an elder brother or sister (age 6 years on average) while they were busy with tasks in
another room in the home. Mothers indicated that sibling supervision occurs, on average, 11% of the
time that children are home. (It should be noted that Morrongiello et al. focused on sibling supervi-
sion, and not other forms of sibling caregiving.) However, because mothers were asked to report only
on the times that they specifically designated an older sibling to provide care for a sibling, and not
those times when siblings spontaneously assumed responsibility, the researchers acknowledged that
this statistic is likely an underestimate of the sibling caregiving that routinely occurs (Morrongiello
et al., 2007).
Child-Initiated Caregiving
Caregiving that is provided voluntarily by a child, without prompting or request from a parent, may
be particularly meaningful, and of a higher quality, than if it is extrinsically motivated (Deci and
Ryan, 2000) or directed by an adult. Even at a very early age, children have the capacity to indepen-
dently identify instances in which their sibling requires assistance or support and respond accordingly
(Dunn, 1983, 2007). Stewart (1983) found that half of the preschoolers he observed who were left
alone in a waiting room without their mothers in a simulated “Strange Situation” spontaneously
extended comfort, assurance, and care to their infant siblings. Maynard (2002) observed that Mayan
children as young as 4 years of age independently identified and initiated opportunities to teach
younger siblings new skills. In many cultures, very young children imitate the forms of childcare they
observe their parents performing, both in fantasy (e.g., doll play) and in reality with actual siblings
(Kramer, 1996). With what begins as emulation of parental styles of caregiving, with practice and
over time, children develop their own styles of caregiving (Weisner and Gallimore, 1977).
A young child’s ability to independently identify a younger sibling’s need and then implement
a strategy (without prompting) to meet that need represents a significant milestone in the develop-
ment of social understanding (Dunn, 1983). As part of Dunn’s longitudinal research conducted in
the natural setting of family’s homes in Cambridge, England, Dunn and Munn (1985) observed
young firstborn children as they anticipated the emotions of their family members during conflict
and attempted to address these emotions. As 2-year-olds, the children responded to the distress of
an infant sibling with kisses, pats, and going to their mother for assistance. By 3 years, children were
better able to tailor the type of comfort they provided to the presumed cause of the infant’s distress,
such as by returning a pacifier that the baby had dropped. Observations such as these led Dunn and
Munn (1985) to suggest that through early encounters with siblings, children develop a “practical
understanding of the emotional state of the other family member and how to alleviate it” (p. 490).
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Duration and Extent of Caregiving Behaviors

Caregiving behaviors can range from momentary activities—such as assisting with a diaper change or
helping a younger sibling grasp an object out of his reach—to those that extend over time and across
occasions, as when an adolescent mentors a sibling in a complex task (e.g., learning to tie a shoe or
addressing a difficult situation with a peer). Factors such as whether the caregiving that is provided
is brief or extensive—occurs on a one-time basis or is part of a series—and changes in accord with
the growing capabilities of both the recipient and provider of care can be quite helpful for under-
standing the functions that sibling caregiving plays in particular families. For example, in families in
which a parent (or child) is incapacitated by illness, disability, or other hardship, children may engage
in more sustained and intensive caregiving of siblings (East, 2010). Children in families such as these
may assume near-primary responsibility for ensuring that siblings eat breakfast, make it to school on
time, and complete homework (McMahon and Luthar, 2007).
The extent to which a child assumes responsibility for the care and well-being of a sibling could
be described in terms parallel to those offered by Lamb, Pleck, Charnov, and Levine (1985) to
describe fathers’ level of involvement in supporting their children’s development: (1) interaction,
or the extent of fathers’ actual interaction with children; (2) availability, or the degree to which an
individual is potentially available to children for interaction but perhaps not actually engaging with
them; and (3) responsibility, or the role fathers take to ensure that children are taken care of or have
developed to manage a system of care that addresses their overall well-being (e.g., setting up child-
care, making medical appointments, and securing resources for these tasks). Pleck (2010) revised his
conceptualization of father involvement to include three primary components (positive engagement
activities, warmth and responsiveness, and control) as well as two auxiliary dimensions of responsibil-
ity (social and material forms of care that may be provided outside of interaction with the child, such
as making plans or arrangements to meet a child’s social needs, and process responsibilities, such as
recognizing a child’s needs rather than waiting to be asked to fulfill a child’s needs). Sibling involve-
ment in the provision of care for a brother or sister can similarly be understood as simultaneously
functioning at one or more of these levels. For example, a child could be highly engaged with a
sibling, not only by being available and interactive, but also because the sibling perceives and takes
responsibility for some aspects of the sibling’s well-being (e.g., taking custody of minor siblings when
a parent is unable to fulfill parenting duties).
Thus, the duration and extent of sibling caregiving responsibilities that a child assumes vary con-
siderably depending on family structure and functioning, and in accord with their own developmen-
tal level and other personal characteristics. Siblings deserve consideration for raising the visibility and
value of their contributions to families. Although it is tempting (especially in Western technological
societies) to believe that sibling caregiving is a nonessential, “bonus” contribution, in some families
(such as those with parents affected by psychological disorders or addiction), it is may be entirely
critical to the survival of individual children.
Sibling Caregiving Across the Life Course

Forms of sibling caregiving vary significantly across the life course, with brief, discrete instances of sib-
ling caregiving—such as consoling a crying brother or sister—emerging spontaneously in early child-
hood (Dunn, 1983, 2007) and becoming more complex, intense, and sustained as siblings age (Lu, 2007).
Early Childhood
Toddler-age children typically seek contact with a sibling when distressed or when separated from
a parent, particularly when older siblings respond with comfort and reassurance (Teti and Ablard,
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Sibling Caregiving
1989). Children as young as 2 years old regularly demonstrate an interest in helping and serving the
needs of others (Hepach, Vaish, Grossmann, and Tomasello, 2016; Hepach, Vaish, and Tomasello,
2017), including participating in the care and nurturance of their brothers and sisters (Dunn, 1983,
2007). Caregiving activities during early childhood may be relatively simple in nature (e.g., help feed
or entertain a sibling while a parent is out of the room), may be imitations of acts they have observed
adult caregivers to provide (e.g., verbally soothe a baby when she cries), and be initiated via adult
assignment. As children become acquainted with the more complex tasks associated with meeting
the needs of another, over time, they become able to independently identify opportunities to provide
care (Dunn and Kendrick, 1982).
Middle Childhood
From her cross-cultural review of sibling caregiving practices, Zukow-Goldring (2002) observed that
sibling caregiving activities tend to increase from early to middle childhood, with caregiving respon-
sibilities increasing substantially around the time that the elder sibling reaches 5 years of age and
peaking sometime between ages 7 and 13 or 14 years. Parents may assign more chores and household
responsibilities to children as they reach middle childhood, which may include minding a sibling
(Bryant, 1982). In some cases, parents may instruct siblings to share responsibilities (such as house-
hold tasks), which provide ample opportunities for more experienced siblings to teach or coach their
brother or sister how to carry out tasks successfully (Bryant, 1982). Of course, carrying out these
shared activities can also be a context for bossiness, bickering, irritation, and conflict (Kosonen, 1996).
Middle childhood is a period of tremendous developmental growth in the realms of personal and
ethnic identity development (Umaña-Taylor, 2011), social understanding (Saarni, 1999), social skills
(Downey, Condron, and Yucel, 2015), and interpersonal problem-solving (Rubin and Rose-Krasnor,
1992) and, as such, can be an important period for the development of prosocial sibling relation-
ships (Stormshak, Bullock, and Falkenstein, 2009). It may be during middle childhood that siblings
first begin to view one another as critical sources of knowledge, skills, and strategies that are espe-
cially useful for navigating the social worlds beyond the family. For example, the shared experience
of going to middle school (which parents have only limited knowledge of ) can enable “academic
caretaking” (Bryant, 1982, p. 107) in which a more experienced sibling may use his or her inside
knowledge to coach the other (e.g., help with homework or explain strategies for meeting teachers’
seemingly excessive demands). Additionally, siblings’ exchanges of emotional forms of support and
guidance may also increase during middle childhood (Kosonen, 1996), especially when they, or their
family, face critical transitions or stressors (Bryant, 1982).
Adolescence
Involvement in caregiving, especially in terms of the provision of physical care and supervision,
appears to decrease in adolescence, particularly as the need for care declines and each sibling devel-
ops stronger relationships with individuals outside of the family. However, engagement in emotional
forms of caregiving often persists throughout adolescence and into adulthood (Cicirelli, 1995; Mar-
golis et al., 2014; Maynard, 2002; Tucker et al., 1997). Particularly in late adolescence, older siblings
are perceived as serving as important care providers for younger siblings through sharing advice and
emotional support (Tucker et al., 1997). In home and telephone interviews, Tucker, McHale, and
Crouter (2001) found that first- (M = 16 years) and second-born siblings (M = 13 years) frequently
sought each other out for advice on both nonfamilial (e.g., peer, academics) and familial issues, mak-
ing them particularly poised to provide support during periods of stress. Adolescents often view
their siblings as more knowledgeable and understanding about their experiences—occurring both
within and external to the family—than parents or other adults (Tucker et al., 1997). In particular,
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adolescents may find their sisters and brothers to be helpful in managing relationships with parents
(e.g., how to avoid making a parent angry), given that they have more knowledge of, and experience
with, the parent than would a peer or nonfamilial confidante (Tucker et al., 1997).
The influence of siblings may become more powerful than parental influence during adolescence,
possibly as powerful as peers (McHale et al., 2012). For example, concurrent rates of sexual activity
and adolescent pregnancy (East and Jacobson, 2001), alcohol and drug use (Rende, Slomkowski,
Lloyd-Richardson, and Niaura, 2005; Rowe and Gulley, 1992), and delinquent acts (Criss and Shaw,
2005) among adolescent siblings suggest mutual influences on one another’s behavior. For example,
delinquent acts performed by younger siblings in middle adolescence were predicted by higher levels
of hostility and coercion with their same-sexed sibling in early adolescence (Slomkowski, Rende,
Conger, Simons, and Conger, 2001). Slomkowski et al. also found that in sibling dyads with an older
brother who engaged in delinquent acts, warmth and support in early adolescence were predictive
of their younger brother’s later delinquency. In contrast, lower levels of sibling warmth and support
predicted younger sibling delinquency in dyads with an older sister who engaged in delinquent acts.
In addition to suggesting a “partner in crime” model for brothers in which they socialize one another
to engage in deviant acts, it is also possible that adolescents’ engagement in deviant activities increases
if they have been introduced by a sibling to peers who model such behaviors and/or they become
part of a deviant peer group (Criss and Shaw, 2005).
It is also possible that, as adolescents, individuals may have stronger predilections and/or powers to
resist offers of guidance and support from sisters and brothers (Campione-Barr, 2017). For example,
if the recipient of caregiving views the siblings’ assistance as an infringement of independence, or as
insufficient recognition of their growing capabilities, the sibling may become indignant or resistant
(McHale, Kim, and Whiteman, 2006) and conflict and resentment may follow (East, 2010). Resistance
toward care and support may be especially likely if siblings lack a warm relationship (Cicirelli, 1995).
Emerging and Early Adulthood

Although younger siblings are most often the recipients of emotional caregiving during middle
childhood and adolescence, the level of support and care exchanged between siblings begins to
become more equitable in emerging adulthood (Stocker, Lanthier, and Furman, 1997; Tucker et al.,
1997). However, as young adults leave the family for college and begin their careers, sibling con-
tact generally lessens in frequency and becomes increasingly voluntary and discretionary—they are
not “required” to interact—except perhaps during certain ritual occasions (Cicirelli, 1995). Emo-
tional support and caregiving continues in many families as siblings intentionally maintain their
relationships through phone, e-mail, and text communications; greater sibling relational maintenance
generally occurs among siblings who report greater closeness and intimacy than hostility (Lindell,
Campione-Barr, and Killoren, 2015; Myers and Goodboy, 2010).
As siblings enter early adulthood, their help may be especially useful for navigating challenges
associated with establishing careers, romantic relationships, and financial security (Conger and Little,
2010; Stocker et al., 1997). For example, in families of first-generation college students, elder siblings
may be given full responsibility for guiding younger siblings with their applications for admission
and financial aid as well as helping with their preparation and adjustment to college life and later,
the job search process, given that these are unfamiliar experiences for parents (St. Clair-Christman,
2011). Whereas professionals—teachers and college counselors—may possess knowledge of college
application and admission processes that parents may not possess, parents consider their elder children
to be the real experts; it is they who possess intimate knowledge of the inner workings of the family,
the family’s economic struggles, and the emotional reactions (e.g., fears, worries) family members
may have about a child leaving the home. Thus, elder siblings likely serve as immediate references
for younger siblings as to what types of career paths, economic mobility, and relationships may be
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Sibling Caregiving
possible for them and how to attain such success (Conger and Little, 2010). Given their inside knowl-
edge of the family, emerging adults may be uniquely positioned to guide younger siblings through
the developmental tasks associated with the transition to adulthood.
Middle Adulthood
Sibling interactions may decline in frequency in middle adulthood as individuals’ attention often
turns toward meeting workplace demands, achieving financial security, and rearing a family. Particu-
larly when adult siblings live at some distance, interaction becomes increasingly voluntary; although
as members of the same family, they may feel some degree of obligation to one another (Walker,
Allen, and Connidis, 2005) and understand that help will be mobilized at a time of need (Tolkacheva,
Brouse van Groenou, and van Tilburg, 2010). Lee, Mancini, and Maxwell (1990) found that dis-
cretionary (rather than obligatory) contact between adult siblings was most strongly predicted by
emotional closeness, feeling responsible for one’s sibling, having fewer siblings, geographic proximity
and, paradoxically, greater conflict (which might be explained by greater frequency of interactions).
Sibling support in middle adulthood appears to occur most often among same-sex sibling pairs and
those who live geographically close (Cicirelli, 1995). Among Taiwanese families, sibling contact in
middle adulthood is greatest among sisters than any other gender composition; the least amount of
contact occurs among brothers (Lu, 2007). During middle adulthood, siblings often aid one another
by alleviating child caregiving burden (Hunter, Pearson, Ialongo, and Kellam, 1998); for example, in
Taiwan, adults often provide care to each other’s children (Lu, 2007).
For many adults, siblings continue to play an important role during major life events, such as
the entrance or exit of family members through marriage, the birth of children, divorce, and death
(Connidis, 1992, 2010) or their own illness (Stahl and Stahl, 2017). Siblings may especially seek emo-
tional care from one another in the face of a crisis, such as addressing financial turmoil or the death
or serious illness of a family member (Bedford, 1998; Cicirelli, 1995). When faced with addressing
their parents’ affairs in the face of serious illness or death, sibling contact may increase as they work
to manage needs, share memories, or secure companionship (Bedford, 1998). In addition, the shared
experience of losing a parent, and undergoing the grieving process as a family, may bring adult sib-
lings closer together (Lu, 2007).
However, in instances in which a parent requires long-term care, it is often the case that it is only
one sibling (typically, an elder female) who assumes primary responsibility for the care of that aging
parent (Coward and Dwyer, 1990), with conflict erupting if individual siblings perceive inequity
in who is providing care (Ingersoll-Dayton, Neal, Ha, and Hammer, 2003). Feelings of resentment,
perhaps stemming from childhood perceptions of unwarranted parental differential treatment, can
reemerge as siblings plan for the care of an aging parent (Ingersoll-Dayton et al., 2003; Soli, McHale,
and Feinberg, 2009). Grigoryeva (2017) reported that daughters provide twice as much care to
elderly parents than sons; however, even with these differences, sons tend to provide more care to
their fathers, whereas daughters tend to provide more care to their mothers.
Adult siblings of an individual with a disability typically assume greater caregiving responsibilities
once parents are no longer able. Such caregiving may include financial and legal decision-making;
securing, monitoring, and evaluating services (e.g., home healthcare); and providing companionship
or social interaction (Davys, Mitchell, and Haigh, 2011). Increased caregiver burden can create stress
for these care providers as well as for their immediate families.
Later Adulthood
Although sibling support may occur less frequently than at other ages, it may nonetheless play an
important role in promoting the socioemotional well-being of older adults. For example, O’Bryant
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(1988) demonstrated that regular interaction with married sisters was predictive of positive affect
among recently widowed women over 60 years of age. Relationships appear to be most intimate among
sisters, but same-sexed sibling relationships, in general, appear to be more intimate in later adulthood
than cross-sexed siblings (Bedford and Avioli, 2001). Furthermore, factors such as physical proximity
to a sibling and perceived closeness of the relationship between siblings have associations with both
increased life satisfaction and decreased depressive symptoms (Bedford, 1998). Indeed, closeness and
confiding among older adult siblings appear to be greater when one or both are single, have launched
or did not have children, or have had a spouse pass away (Bedford and Avioli, 2001). The support sib-
lings provide while grieving the loss of a spouse may strengthen their bond (Bedford and Avioli, 2001).
On examining sibling relationships in Taiwan, Lu (2007) found that sibling contact and sup-
port is most frequent during early adulthood, lower in middle age, and lowest in older adulthood.
In addition, individuals who report feeling a sense of emotional closeness to a brother or sister are
also more likely to provide help to that sibling than to those they feel less close (Lu, 2007). Levels of
support exchanged among siblings in older adulthood are associated with the perceived quality of
these relationships (Gold, 1989). On the basis of qualitative interviews with adults 65 years of age and
older, Gold found more emotional caregiving occurred in sibling relationships described as intimate
and congenial, greater instrumental support in siblings described as loyal, and little to no caregiving in
those considered apathetic and hostile.
Furthermore, in later adulthood, siblings may provide acutely increased levels of care in the face
of a particular hardship—such as when one becomes seriously ill or hospitalized, requires transpor-
tation or household assistance, or suffers the loss of their spouse. Cicirelli (1995) found that during
periods of hospitalization, only 6% of older adults in the United States reported desiring or expect-
ing help from a sibling on returning from hospitalization, relying on their spouses or children for
tangible forms of assistance. In contrast, approximately 50% of all respondents indicated a desire for
psychological support from their sibling. This is a notable indication of the significance of emotional
caregiving among siblings, which can extend to the very end of their lives. Given their lifelong
attachment and closeness (Tancredy and Fraley, 2006), the loss of a sibling can be particularly painful
and, as Cicirelli (2009) noted, “the survivors of a sibling’s death may have intense and profound grief
reactions often lasting for decades” (p. 24).
Taken together, these findings suggest that siblings play important roles in providing emotional
support and caregiving for one another across the life course even though the specific functions and
dynamics of these caregiving behaviors may differ over time and in the face of various life events.
Individuals’ needs for sibling caregiving appear to lessen as emerging adults focus on developing their
own social and professional networks of support. However, the need for sibling care and support
often resurfaces later in life, when ironically, the ability to provide such care has diminished with age.
Nonetheless, the emotional bonds and socioemotional support exchanged among sisters and broth-
ers persist well into adulthood—with strong feelings about one’s sibling continuing even beyond
death (Cicirelli, 2009).
Functions of Sibling Caregiving

As the brief review of sibling caregiving across the course of development suggests, caregiving has
the potential to fulfill a wealth of functions that enhance the well-being of individuals, families, and
society. These range from the tangible and pragmatic (e.g., enabling parents to work and contribute
to their communities) to the abstract (e.g., enabling children to develop empathy for others).
Through their extensive ethnographic studies of sibling caregiving that spanned both Western
technological and non-Western societies, Weisner and Gallimore (1977) identified eight domains as
“correlates and consequences” of sibling caregiving (p. 176)—essentially, ways in which sibling care
giving can have a cascading influence on development that goes beyond the momentary provision
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Sibling Caregiving
of care. These correlates and consequence of sibling caregiving are: (1) supporting the mother-child
relationship by relieving mothers of the full responsibility of childcare; (2) promoting the caregiving
child’s maturity and contributions to the welfare of the family and affording that child associated
privileges; (3) providing a structure by which younger siblings become socialized into the world of
peers; (4) developing social responsibility and nurturing behaviors, including the ability to anticipate
and respond to another individual’s needs; (5) learning culturally relevant gender roles, including
the socialization of females into maternal roles; (6) developing personality traits that parallel their
respective roles as primarily requiring, or providing, care; (7) promoting affiliation motivation or “the
tendency of individuals to attend and orient to others” (p. 180); and (8) the formation of motivational
styles and classroom engagement which has implications for learning and cognitive performance.
Thus, as explored ahead, sibling caregiving is a dynamic process, that can have many positive implica-
tions for child and family development.
Sibling Caregiving as a Family Survival Strategy

Particularly in agrarian societies, sibling caregiving is often an instrumental component of ensuring
the economic prosperity and functioning of a family, as providing care for a sibling allows parents to
gather food, direct their attention to other activities (Maynard, 2002), or participate in “heavier and
more skilled tasks that benefit the family” (Larson and Verma, 1999, p. 705). Whereas Cicirelli (1994)
suggested that the function of sibling caregiving in Western societies is often to provide parents with
temporary relief of responsibility, in non-Western societies, elder siblings do “more than just give the
mother free time for other activities; [they] allow the parents to fulfill necessary work roles for family
survival and maintenance” (p. 10). Cicirelli further suggested that sibling caregivers provide economic
security for families “as a backup system in the event that parents do not survive some catastrophe”
(p. 10). In recognition of these important roles, siblings who are caregivers may be regarded with a
higher level of respect than non-caregiving children (Larson and Verma, 1999).
Sibling Caregiving as Processes That Reflect and

Advance Socioemotional Development
As near-age mates who share a host of experiences, siblings have an uncanny ability to understand one
another’s perspectives, needs, and interests (Dunn, 2007; Howe et al., 2016; Kramer, 2010, 2014). These
“powers” of social understanding (Dunn, 2007) enable siblings, even in early childhood, to detect the
needs of others and, on many occasions, to act to address those needs (Hepach, 2016; Hepach et al.,
2016, 2017). Dunn and Kendrick (1982) demonstrated that by studying the interactions of siblings as
young as 2 years of age in the natural context, we can learn much about how children develop socially
and emotionally—with children often demonstrating competencies with their siblings that, on the
basis of prior research and theory, one would not expect them to demonstrate until later in develop-
ment. In line with Dunn’s extensive findings, sibling caregiving behaviors may both reflect, and poten-
tially advance, children’s development of key social and emotional competencies.
Sensitivity to the Needs of Others

On the basis of their ethnographic studies of diverse cultures, Whiting and Edwards (1988) described
how the social and emotional development of a caregiver is reflected in that child’s success in caring
for an infant. As described by Zukow-Goldring (2002):
The inability to assess the internal state of another (treating crying baby as if she is cranky
when instead she is sleepy), to foresee the implications of one’s acts in relation to another
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person’s response (more bouncing will not satisfy a hungry baby), to find alternate solutions
(continuing to bounce a baby who persists in crying rather than stopping, and then walking
with or singing to the baby), and to control one’s own impulses (slapping a fussy baby in
frustration) illustrate missing competence.
(p. 262)
Furthermore, possession of these characteristics may shift from time to time, influencing the degree
and type of caregiving responsibilities one sibling provides another. For example, during a period of
a sibling’s extreme physical illness or injury, a well sibling may engage in greater, or more sensitive,
levels of caregiving than before or after the illness has occurred (Branstetter, 2007).
Advancing the Mastery of New Competencies

Siblings scaffold (Vygotsky, 1978) one another’s mastery of new skills, often enabling brothers and
sisters to complete tasks that require skills beyond their present level of competency. Whereas in very
early childhood an older sibling might retrieve an object out of an infant sibling’s reach and place it
in the infant’s hands, later the older child might instead only move the object close to the younger
sibling so the younger child can work to grasp it. In the same vein, when faced with emotionally
challenging situations, a care-providing sibling may first supply a brother or sister with direct advice
or instruction on how to address such a scenario. In subsequent encounters of this type, the elder
sibling may reduce the use of direct assistance and instead ask probing questions designed to help the
sibling arrive at his or her own conclusion. For example, the elder sibling may remind the younger
sibling about past events and the problem-solving behaviors that proved successful for them in the
past, prompting the sibling to consider how to apply those skills to the current situation. These
scenarios represent basic examples of the role that scaffolding may play in the sibling caregiving
dynamic, and they exemplify the transactional process of sibling caregiving, by which a sibling aims
to provide the level of care that matches the needs of a brother or sister.
Maynard (2002) observed that sibling caregiving practices in the Zinacantec Mayan village cul-
ture in Chipas, Mexico, followed a similar model of teaching and learning as what occurred in adult
apprenticeship of weaving, such that interactions involved “scaffolded help, contextualized verbal
explanations and feedback, and obedience, with virtually no praise or criticism” (p. 978). Maynard
observed discrete stages of caregiving practices, with elder siblings responding to the cognitive and
verbal needs of their younger siblings in progressively more sophisticated ways, for example, from
nonverbal teaching when the younger child was 3–5 years of age, progressing to commands when the
younger child reached 6–7 years of age, and eventually using complex discussion and explanations
when the younger child reached 8–11 years of age.
As these examples illustrate, whereas sibling caregiving can hold significant benefits to the child
who receives care, developmental benefits also accrue to the provider of such care; for example, care
providers advance their skills in the domain they assist with, they experience a sense of satisfaction
that comes from helping another, and they become more sensitive to the needs and capabilities of
others. According to Howe et al. (2016), care-providing siblings are able to capitalize on “inher-
ent developmental advantages, enabling them to direct and control interactions with younger sib-
lings . . . who in turn may benefit developmentally from interacting with more knowledgeable older
siblings” (p. 2).
Social and Emotional Understanding

The exchange of warmth and emotional support, particularly with an older sibling, appears to facil-
itate the development of a younger child’s social understanding ( Jenkins and Dunn, 2009) and
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Sibling Caregiving
promote abilities to provide effective support for one another over time. Dunn, Slomkowski, and
Beardsall (1994) found that the emotional support school-age siblings provide one another in the
face of adverse events (e.g., social difficulties at school, maternal illness, accidents, or illnesses they
themselves experienced) was associated with more close, friendly, and affectionate relationships with
their sibling.
Children’s abilities to accurately perceive what their sibling is experiencing may contribute to
their ability to appropriately respond to their sibling’s immediate physical or emotional needs (Howe
and Ross, 1990; Kramer, 2014; Volling et al., 2017). Perspective-taking, in particular, may be an inte-
gral component of effective sibling caregiving. Stewart and Marvin (1984) assessed the perspective-
taking skills of 3- to 5-year-old children who had toddler-age younger siblings by asking them
to form inferences about another person’s likes or dislikes and knowledge based on information
provided in a brief story. The performance of sibling caregiving behaviors correlated with children’s
perspective-taking abilities. Similarly, Garner et al. (1994) found that preschoolers who had stronger
emotional role taking skills and knowledge of caregiving scripts extended more care and comfort to
their toddler-age siblings during a modified Strange Situation task.
Particularly as they reach middle childhood, children can be very knowledgeable about their
sisters’ and brothers’ tendency to react in particular ways in stressful situations, which can be har-
nessed to provide effective forms of help and support (Kahn and Lewis, 1988). Howe, Aquan-Assee,
Bukowski, Lehoux, and Rinaldi (2001) found that stronger competencies in emotional understand-
ing enable siblings in middle childhood and early adolescence to provide more realistic and, pos-
sibly, more effective assistance in managing life challenges. Children with well-developed abilities
in emotional understanding—as evidenced by, for example, an enriched vocabulary with which to
communicate about emotions and internal states, an understanding of the display rules that govern
the socially acceptable forms of emotional expression, as well as skills in decoding the emotional
expressions of others, and the regulation of emotions—may be better equipped to support siblings as
they encounter stressful situations or difficult interpersonal issues (Howe et al., 2001; Howe, Petrakos,
and Rinaldi, 1998; Kramer, 2014; Volling, McElwain, and Miller, 2002).
Sibling caregiving can provide increased opportunities for learning, companionship, exchange of
warmth and affection, sharing of advice, and provision of mentorship and guidance in the face of
new experiences (Bryant, 1989; Cicirelli, 1995; Kosonen, 1996; Tucker et al., 1997). Additionally,
acts of sibling caregiving reflect, or may actively promote, children’s socioemotional development,
including empathy, perspective-taking, learning to become independent and self-sufficient, and bal-
ancing the often competing demands that emerge in various relationships and contexts (East, 2010;
East, Weisner, and Reyes, 2006). Sibling caregiving may play a beneficial role for children who face
adverse or challenging experiences, as the act of providing care can give youth a sense of purpose and
experience, which can foster personal connections and self-confidence (East, 2010). Contributing
to the care and prosperity of one’s family can also help children to understand how individuals can
work together effectively in a hierarchical society (East, 2010).
As siblings provide care to one another, opportunities for conflict arise. However, even in the
course of sibling conflict, social, emotional, and cognitive skills can be developed if conflict remains
constructive rather than destructive (Shantz and Hobart, 1989). It takes a fair amount of social
competence to engage in, and manage, a fight with another child, and children develop stronger
competencies in argumentation, conflict management, and the regulation of strong negative emo-
tions in the safe confines of sibling relationships (Kramer, 2014). Through negative encounters such
as these, children also expand their emotional vocabulary, and strengthen their ability to recognize,
decode, and interpret the emotions of others (Dunn, 2007) and improve their ability to regulate chal-
lenging emotions (Kennedy and Kramer, 2008). It is a paradox that, despite intense negative affect,
some constructive forms of sibling conflict can be formative for individual’s social, cognitive, and
emotional development.
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The Dark Sides of Sibling Caregiving

Not all experiences with siblings are prosocial, and sibling caregiving can also be associated with a
host of risks and negative interpersonal processes (Kramer and Conger, 2009; Kosonen, 1996).
The Risks of Sibling Supervision

Sibling supervision can indeed pose a risk to a child’s safety, as rates of injuries are 33% higher in
instances where he or she is being supervised by an elder sibling rather than another adult (Mor-
rongiello, 2005; Morrongiello et al., 2007). Rauchschwalbe, Brenner, and Smith (1997) examined
the supervisory arrangements that were in place when 32 toddlers (age 5–15 months) drowned in
bathtubs. Of the 32 deaths reported to the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission, 11
occurred while an older sibling (whose ages were not specified) was left to watch the younger child.
Sibling caregiving may increase the risk of injury to children because caregiving children lack
sufficient judgment (Nathans, Neff, Goss, Maier, and Rivara, 2000) and/or competence (Kurdick and
Fine, 1995) to provide adequate supervision. However, Morrongiello et al. (2007), who examined
sibling supervision with a sample of well-educated, middle- to upper-middle-class Canadian parents
with younger children, who were 1.5–3 years old, and older children, who were 3–13 years old,
found that rates of injuries during periods of sibling supervision are not related to the competency,
skills, or supervisory strategies employed by the sibling supervisors. Rather, a key factor was the
younger sibling’s compliance to these supervisory strategies; the risk of injury to a child was greater
when the supervisee was resistant to the instructions of their care-providing sibling. Although the
mothers interviewed in this study were aware of the increased risk for injury, this did not deter them
from requesting a child to supervise a sibling. Furthermore, mothers did not discourage sibling super-
vision even when siblings did not get along and were more apt to engage in conflict.
Parents may not adequately prepare their child to provide care in the face of resistance or resent-
ment (Morrongiello et al., 2007). Furthermore, parents may send conflicting messages about a child’s
authority—for example, telling children to make a sibling behave appropriately but without granting
them the authority to carry through with instructions, commands, and threats. As sibling interactions
may rapidly fluctuate between the lateral and the hierarchical, there may be considerable confusion
(and frustration) on the part of both children as to who is responsible, and who has the authority,
to direct the other’s behaviors. As children lack preparation for an authoritative role as well as true
authority, they may resort to punitive or highly controlling measures (Bryant, 1989); care-providing
siblings may resort to “excessive authoritarianism, with older children tending to tyrannize, harass,
and threaten younger siblings” (Cicirelli, 1995, p. 111). With little experience in how to manage defi-
ant or challenging behaviors, negative interactions may escalate (Patterson, 1984).
Contexts for Bullying and Abuse

Taken to more extreme levels, in the name of caregiving, siblings have acted as perpetrators of bul-
lying, torment, intimidation (Bowes, Wolke, Joinson, Lereya, and Lewis, 2014; Hoetger, Hazen, and
Brank, 2015; Kosonen, 1996), relational aggression (Stauffacher and DeHart, 2005), and physical and
sexual abuse (Wiehe, 1997). In a longitudinal study conducted in the United Kingdom by Bowes et al.
(2014), 47.4% of participants reported experiencing sibling bullying at some point during childhood,
which, in turn, was associated with depressive symptoms and self-harm in adulthood. Wiehe (1997)
reported the surprising frequency with which physical, emotional, and sexual abuse has been perpe-
trated by siblings outside of parents’ view. Thus, when sibling caregiving occurs in the absence of adult
supervision, the victimization of vulnerable siblings may be more likely to occur (Kosonen, 1996) and
be sustained over time. However, sibling bullying can also occur when adults are present. Skinner and
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Kowalski (2013) found that 40% of their adult respondents recalled that during childhood, sibling
bullying had occurred when one or both parents were in the home. Further inquiry is needed to
understand how sibling caregiving per se provides a context for bullying and aggression in childhood
and how these experiences relate over time to individuals’ socioemotional development and well-
being as well as the quality of relationships children establish with sibling and other family members.
Impact on the Providers of Care

In cases where caregiving is extensive, caregiving responsibilities can interfere with a child’s ability
to engage in age-appropriate behaviors such as leisure activities with peers, attend school functions,
and to complete homework, all of which can contribute to decreased academic achievement and
dropping out of school (East, 2010; East et al., 2006). Caregiver burden has been associated with
symptoms of anxiety and depression, social difficulties, stress, and/or feeling worried or resentful
about caregiving responsibilities (East, 2010; McMahon and Luthar, 2007)
Furthermore, excessive sibling caregiving responsibilities may be associated with the parentifi-
cation or the premature adultification of older siblings—an experience in which a child becomes
involved in “developmentally inappropriate expectations that children function in a parental role
within stressed, disorganized family systems” (McMahon and Luthar, 2007, p. 267). Parentification of
a sibling can be linked to adverse outcomes; for example, Van Loon, Van de Ven, Van Doesum, Hos-
man, and Witteman (2017) found that the parentification of adolescents whose parents have a mental
illness was directly and indirectly (via perceived stress) related to both internalizing (e.g., anxiety,
depression, social withdrawal, somatic complaints) and externalizing (e.g., aggression, rule breaking)
behavior problems at the time the youth were surveyed. One year later, parentification continued to
be associated with internalizing, but not externalizing, symptoms. Van Loon et al. (2017) suggested
that, in some instances, responsibilities to provide care to family members—including emotional
caregiving—can be associated with distorted family boundaries and the assumption of responsibilities
inconsistent with developmental expectations for a child. Developmentally inappropriate expectations
may be especially true in instances in which a parent is incapacitated in some way, such as with a mental
or physical illness.
In summary, whereas sibling caregiving offers a host of benefits for both the providers and recipi-
ents of care, and can be an extraordinary context for the development of a wide array of socioemo-
tional competencies, it may also set the occasion for negative and, sometimes, dangerous sibling
interactions. Researchers, practitioners, educators, and parents need to be cognizant of this potential,
particularly if they aim to promote the types of sibling relationships that will be marked by the
mutual provision of care and support sustained into late adulthood.
Sociocultural Influences on Sibling Caregiving

Caregiving behaviors evolve as both an expression and a function of “cultural priorities” within a
society (Otto et al., 2017, p. 1235). Bronfenbrenner’s (1977) ecological perspective provides a frame-
work with which to understand sibling caregiving practices in light of the various social contexts in
which individuals and families operate. Thus, the following exploration adopts an ecological lens to
consider a variety of contextual factors, ranging from broad sociocultural influences to more proxi-
mal influences.
Cross-Cultural Examinations of Sibling Caregiving

Cross-cultural research has illuminated dramatic variations in sibling caregiving across the globe,
appearing to be a custom more deeply woven into the cultural fabric of non-Western (nonindustrialized
389
or rural agrarian) societies than of Western technological societies. Such variations may reflect the
individualistic nature of many Western societies, particularly those with European influences, where
greater emphasis is placed on the contributions of individuals rather than the family or community
as a collective (Kim, Triandis, Kâğitçibaşi, Choi, and Yoon, 1994). In promoting the independence
and unique success of their children as individuals, parents in Western societies prompt children to
provide care to siblings less often. In contrast, in valuing collectivism (Kim et al., 1994) and intrafa-
milial interdependence and connectedness (East, 2010), parents in some non-Western societies may
encourage sibling caregiving as they emphasize the importance of children actively contributing to
the well-being of the family.
Non-Western Societies
Rabain-Jamin, Maynard, and Greenfield (2003) compared the sibling caregiving practices of the
Zinacantec with that of two villages of the Wolof peoples of Senegal. The comparisons of these two
cultures were particularly rich given how significantly they differed; the Zinacantecs are Catholic and
monogamous, whereas the Wolof are Muslim and polygamous (Rabain-Jamin et al., 2003). Wolof
families live in compounds that consist of a collection of separate homes that house co-spouses and
their children. Compounds vary in size and can contain 10–30 individuals; it is not uncommon for
children to have half-siblings living in the compound who were very close in age. In contrast, the
Zinacantecs live in single-family households, often in close proximity to extended family members.
Reflective of their more individualistic society, Zinacantec elder siblings took responsibility for
integrating their sisters and brothers into social groups (Rabain-Jamin et al., 2003). In contrast, and
perhaps reflective of their more collectivistic society, Wolof children did not require as much help
from their older siblings to become socially integrated into social groups. Wolof children as young as
2 years old demonstrated an active interest in participating in the play of older children and did not
require a formal entrée from elder siblings. Despite stunning differences in the physical and social
structure of these two societies, sibling caregiving figures prominently in the socialization of young
children in both. Taken together, these studies suggest that care-receiving children learn about the
complexities of social hierarchies, acceptable social behavior, and what productive membership of
their society means. In turn, care-providing siblings learn how to nurture—especially how to identify
and respond to the needs of others.
Western Societies
Unlike non-Western societies in which siblings often become well acquainted with childcare prac-
tices through sibling caregiving long before they become parents, the adoption of caregiving roles
in Western technological societies (at least in the present era) does not typically occur until an
individual becomes a parent himself or herself (Weisner, 1989). However, the value and importance
placed on sibling participation in caregiving responsibilities may vary dramatically within Western
societies (Cicirelli, 1994). Within the United States, expectations and practices surrounding sibling
caregiving vary considerably across ethnic and cultural groups (McHale et al., 2012). For example,
Latino families place strong importance on values of “familism”—those principles that reflect an
“interdependence among family members including familial support, obligation, and solidarity” (Soli
et al., 2009, p. 4)—and hence, sibling caregiving likely occurs more often than in European American
families (Margolis et al., 2014).
Elder siblings play an important role in the overall acculturation of families who immigrate
to Western nations—not only as sibling caregivers, but also as translators, culture brokers, and
advocates for the entire family (Fuligni, 2006; Hafford, 2010). For example, elder siblings in Mexi-
can families who have immigrated to the United States often play a prominent role in the daily
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functioning of the family, including assisting with the care of younger siblings, as they may surpass
parents in quickly developing a versatile understanding of the cultural practices expected in the new
culture (Hafford, 2010).
In summary, studies of Western and non-Western families suggest that sibling caregiving occurs
in some form across the globe, albeit the forms caregiving takes vary in accord with the specific social
and cultural characteristics of each society. Furthermore, significant variability in sibling caregiving
is found within Western technological and non-Western societies, particularly with respect to ethnic
and cultural differences.
Historical Factors
Whereas a range of sociocultural factors have historically played a role in shaping sibling caregiving
practices, the exact nature of these influences continually evolves across time and geography, as care
giving practices affect, and are affected by, ever-changing legal, political, and philosophical factors. In
“The Childhood We Have Lost: When Siblings Were Caregivers, 1900–1970,” Pollock (2002) high-
lighted the important roles that siblings have played in childrearing throughout history in Western
technological societies. She pointed out that
in large numbers of working- and lower-middle-class households, for much of the first
two-thirds of the twentieth century, young children and even infants, spent much of their
time under the watch, not of a doting mother, but a sibling—an adolescent or, not infre-
quently, only another child.
(p. 31)
Pollock recalled the work of prominent writers and biographers of the time who generally referred
to elder sisters as “little mothers” (p. 32). Being a “little mother” was not considered a chore or
additional duty but was “something [girls] did with little reason, little protest, and apparently little
consequence” (Pollock, 2002, p. 32). In recognition of their role as caregivers, physicians of the time
regarded the teaching of proper care for infants as just as important for elder siblings as for mothers.
According to Pollock (2002), sibling care (and especially sibling care that relied on the good will
of elder sisters) was thought to have “formed the basis of an affiliative society, serving to ‘integrat[e]
the child into the social context’ ” (p. 33). Family historians such as Coontz (1992, 2016) have warned
of the dangers of idealizing the “golden ages” of family life in America (2016, para. 1), and it is pos-
sible that this view of sibling care as important for establishing an “affiliative society” reflects a “foggy
lens of nostalgia for a mostly mythical past” (para. 11). Indeed, Pollock quoted an unnamed anthro-
pologist who characterized an elder sister’s years spent tending to siblings as “ ‘the worst period’ of a
child’s life” (p. 33). Whereas the role of elder siblings (typically sisters) as providers of care to younger
children was very common in U.S. history, and served a variety of purposes that enhanced family life,
it may not have always been beneficial for the caregiving child.
Shifts in Sibling Caregiving as Women Entered the Workforce

As the employment opportunities available to women began to increase in the second half of the
twentieth century, and as mothers increased their participation in the workforce, caregiving practices
within the home also changed as older sisters were generally assigned greater responsibility for caring
for siblings (East, 2010; Galley, 2014; Pollock, 2002). According to East (2010), sisters’ greater partici-
pation in caregiving in adolescence and early adulthood potentially stemmed from a complex set of
interrelated factors, including pressures to conform to sex role stereotypes, a socially or biologically
driven orientation to nurture others, and gendered socialization practices.
391
As their mothers entered the workforce, over time, adolescent females also began to see the value
in spending time outside of school earning money and obtaining work experience rather than stay-
ing at home to care for younger siblings (Pollock, 2002). Legislation passed during World War II
established childcare options and subsidies that enabled women to work outside the home while
men were deployed; such options expanded in the decades after World War II (Illinois Facilities
Fund, 2000). Thus, increased workforce participation among mothers and elder sisters was associated
with the eventual transfer of supplemental childcare from siblings to childcare professionals (Pollock,
2002), although it is difficult to definitively identify which was the driving factor.
Despite its increased availability and government subsidization, access to quality childcare is finan-
cially out of reach for many families (Otto et al., 2017). Thus, sibling caregiving continues to play a
prominent role in the provision of care for younger children whose parents are employed, especially
among single-parent families (East, 2010). According to East, “Solitary sibling caregiving continues
today, with millions of children singularly cared for by an older sibling while their parents are away
at work” (p. 2). Morrongiello et al. (2007) found that even in households where parents can afford
to hire childcare providers, sibling supervision still occurs, albeit in discrete, short-term periods of
time. In their review of seven studies on children’s participation in family labor, Dodson and Dick-
ert (2004) found that the care of younger children was the form of family labor most commonly
reported, which they considered an “overlooked survival strategy” for parents (p. 318). Despite its
prevalence, many parents in the United States today are reluctant to admit to using a child as a pri-
mary, albeit temporary, care provider, as solitary caregiving is widely stigmatized (Creighton, 1993),
as it may be perceived as poor parenting or even child neglect.
Legal Standards
Whereas sociocultural factors largely govern which forms of sibling caregiving are considered appro-
priate, legal standards appear to play catch-up. For example, the age at which parents permit children
to provide care for siblings in their absence—and what types of care they may provide—is a hotly
debated issue, yet, surprisingly, few legal guidelines exist.
In the United States, only three states currently specify the age at which children can be left alone
or in the care or another child, and each of these states sets different ages—8 years old in Maryland,
14 years old in Illinois, and 10 old years in Oregon (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2013).
Given the wide disparity in the ages specified in these three states, legal standards do not appear
to be based on scientific evidence or even coherent theories that speak to children’s developmen-
tal capacity to adequately provide such care. Although inadequate supervision of a child (which
could include care from an underage sibling) is considered a form of child neglect nationwide, few
guidelines are available to help parents define what “adequate supervision” entails (Child Welfare
Information Gateway, 2013). Tomlinson and Sainsbury (2004) found a lack of consensus among the
recommendations of pediatric health professionals in the United Kingdom regarding the appropriate
age for children to be left without adult supervision, leaving parents to form their own judgments
(Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2013; McCarren, 2015; Turner, 2015), which are often subject
to scrutiny of child welfare officials and the public at large.
In England, figures provided by The Telegraph newspaper estimate that “a parent is arrested every
day on the suspicion of leaving one or more children at home alone” (Turner, 2015, para. 1). In a
widely publicized case in the United States, a Maryland couple was accused of child neglect in 2015
after allowing their 10-year-old child to supervise a 6-year-old sibling while they visited a park
(McCarren, 2015). Whereas the children’s mother felt she was providing them with an opportunity
to practice independence and responsibility, adults who saw the children alone in the park were con-
cerned for their safety and called protective services, which led to an investigation of child neglect
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(McCarren, 2015). Although the investigators concluded that the parents were not guilty of child
neglect (St. George, 2015), cases such as these highlight the need for greater clarity in legal and ethi-
cal standards related to sibling care.
Familial Influences on Sibling Caregiving

As we narrow our examination of factors that shape the occurrence of sibling caregiving, and how
it reflects and stimulates individual growth and development, it is important to consider the range
of contextual factors that may shape sibling caregiving behaviors, such as economic factors, families’
ethnic and cultural identities, changes in parental marital status, or placement in foster care as result
of child abuse, neglect, or other turmoil.
Economic Factors
Families’ economic security, including parental work status, income, and the ratio of dependents to
earners in the household, may influence parents’ reliance on children as care providers for siblings
(Otto et al., 2017; Vandenbroeck, De Visscher, and Van Nuffel, 2008). As lower income families
have less access to quality childcare (Otto et al., 2017), families’ reliance on children to supervise and
care for siblings often increases (East, 2010), which, in turn, escalates safety risks (Morrongiello et al.,
2007). In a study of mother-child dyads living in urban poverty, McMahon and Luthar (2007) asked
children (age 8–17 years) to complete the Child Caretaking Scale (Baker and Tebes, 1994) to assess
the extent to which they assumed caregiving responsibilities and experienced caregiving burden.
Children who were the oldest in their family and whose mothers had lower levels of education and/
or worked outside the home were more likely to be given responsibility to care for their siblings in
comparison to families with higher incomes. Thus, although supervisory roles are assigned to siblings
across socioeconomic strata (East, 2010; Morrongiello et al., 2007), the scope of caregiving respon-
sibilities children assume for siblings may be particularly related to the level of economic pressures
their family experiences.
Ethnic and Cultural Identity

Siblings are important sources of support and feedback as children, adolescents, and emerging adults
develop their own understanding of what it means to be a person of their culture and ethnicity
(Umaña-Taylor, 2011). As individuals who face identical challenges—biological siblings may be
looked toward for help in navigating the intricacies of a unique cultural or ethnic identity and, per-
haps, in addressing discrimination and racism (Butler-Sweet, 2011).
As seen with ethnically blended families (Song, 2010), individuals may view their siblings as par-
ticularly qualified to help them address the unique challenges associated with being a child of multiple
cultures. A young woman interviewed by Song poignantly highlights how siblings may play a unique
role in ethnic identity development; the interviewee was a younger child in a family in which the
mother was Black African and the father was White and English. She remarked that in seeing how her
brothers had each adopted distinct ethnic identities, she realized she, too, was able to adopt her own
approach. Song further found that young adult siblings from ethnically blended families may choose to
not ascribe to one parent’s culture of origin or the other’s, but rather to identify one that unifies them.
Although siblings may elect to develop a shared cultural identity, and one that may be distinct
from either of their parents’ identities, it is vital to acknowledge that through their unique process
of ethnic identity development, individual siblings may forge their own distinct identities (Butler-
Sweet, 2011).
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Parental Marital Status and Relationship Quality

The structure and climate of a family can set the stage for different forms of sibling caregiving.
Although it is understood that greater sibling caregiving occurs in single parenthood than in mari-
tally intact households (East, 2010), little research to date has examined how sibling caregiving prac-
tices occur in alternate family structures, such as divorced or remarried families.
Parental Divorce
Support from a sibling has been identified as a protective factor for children undergoing pronounced
interparental conflict ( Jenkins, 1992; Jenkins, Dunn, Rasbash, O’Connor, and Simpson, 2005) and
divorce (Roth, Harkin, and Eng, 2014). Roth et al. (2014) conducted narrative interviews and
administered questionnaires to female undergraduates whose parents had divorced when they were
7–13 years of age. Respondents recalled that they and their siblings often relied on one another for
emotional support in the face of their parents’ divorce. Birth order was a key factor, as older sisters
reported engaging in heightened levels of sibling caregiving than did respondents who were younger
sisters in their families. Many older sisters recalled exerting greater control and dominance toward
their younger siblings, indicating that they felt it was their duty or obligation to take control when
parents were physically or emotionally absent or used poor parenting strategies. Participants in their
study did not express resentment about the greater responsibilities they assumed for younger siblings;
however, only females were interviewed in this study, and it is possible that males may have different
perspectives on sibling support and caregiving during parental divorce.
Poortman and Voorpostel (2009) examined the long-term impact of divorce on sibling relation-
ships into adulthood in the Netherlands. In-person interviews with adult sibling pairs revealed that
levels of interparental conflict were a stronger predictor of sibling conflict than whether parents
remained married or divorced. Higher levels of interparental conflict were associated with lower
quality sibling relationships, more frequent conflict, and less sibling contact with one another.
Taken together, these results provide evidence of the potential that siblings have to provide care
and emotional support to one another during times of parental discord and may serve as a protective
influence ( Jenkins et al., 2005; Roth et al., 2014). However, in families that experience high levels of
interparental and sibling conflict, such support may not occur.
Stepfamily Formation
Sibling caregiving practices may shift when divorced or single parents begin a new intimate relation-
ship, cohabitate with, or marry a new partner or spouse, particularly if step- or half-siblings are intro-
duced into the family’s life (Anderson, 1999; Dorius and Guzzo, 2016). The challenges associated
with establishing relationships with new siblings, who may come from a very different background,
can be immense, particularly when they share a residence and when significant shifts in birth order
result (such as when a firstborn child becomes a middle child). For only children, the blending of
two families in which their parent’s new spouse brings children may be the first time that child has
ever experienced a sibling relationship (Dorius and Guzzo, 2016). Given the value of sibling support
during parental divorce (Roth et al., 2014), it is likely that such support could also be useful during
stepfamily formation (Anderson, 1999). However, very little is currently known about how sibling
caregiving occurs and functions in cohabitating and remarried families.
Siblings in Foster Care

Sibling support and caregiving also play important roles when children are placed into substitute or
foster care as a result of family turmoil, neglect, or abuse. Herrick and Piccus (2005) estimated that
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between 47% and 59% of children in the U.S. foster care system are placed separately from at least
one of their siblings. They noted that the separation of siblings may not only jeopardize the quality
of siblings’ attachment, but also may be particularly damaging for children and adolescents who have
assumed responsibility for caring for a sibling. Herrick and Piccus found that such separations led
care-providing siblings to feel that they had “failed” their sibling; in contrast, siblings who felt suc-
cessful in their role as caregiver experienced a heightened sense of self-efficacy.
The decision to separate siblings by child welfare officials is often based on concerns that the elder
sibling has become “parentified” to the extent that the younger child is more likely to respect the sib-
ling’s authority rather than the foster parents’ authority, which could impede that child’s adjustment
to foster care. However, the decision to place siblings in separate foster homes may preclude siblings’
ability to support one another during a most traumatic time in their lives. Thus, Herrick and Pic-
cus advised child welfare professionals to recognize the critical importance of siblings as emotional
caregivers, especially in situations in which attachments with other caregivers are disrupted. Linares
et al. (2015) developed a preventive intervention, Promoting Sibling Bonds, to reduce forms of sibling
conflict that may threaten the sustained joint placement of siblings in foster homes.
Although this discussion does not fully capture all of the possible familial-level influences that
can shape sibling caregiving, there is growing evidence that the care and support exchanged among
siblings can be important ingredients for helping families effectively respond to a variety of stressful
events and transitions.
Within Family Influences on Sibling Caregiving

In this section, focus is narrowed to consider the ways in which the individual characteristics of par-
ents and children shape, and are shaped, by sibling caregiving practices.
Parent Characteristics
Personality
Whereas a parent’s decision to assign caregiving tasks may depend somewhat on their perceptions
of qualities of the elder sibling (e.g., Are they old enough? Mature enough?), personality and other
characteristics of the parent in question also play a role in determining parenting behaviors (Born-
stein, 2016). Morrongiello et al. (2007) administered surveys to Canadian mothers to better under-
stand how, when, and why parents assign supervisory responsibilities to elder siblings. Mothers who
scored higher on the neuroticism subscale of the Big-Five Inventory ( John, Donohue, and Kentle,
1991) reported assigning sibling supervision tasks more frequently; in contrast, mothers who scored
higher on the protectiveness/conscientiousness subscale reported assigning sibling supervision less
often. Thus, mothers who feel greater personal responsibility for carrying out caregiving are less
likely to request assistance from children, whereas mothers experiencing stress are relatively more
likely to do so.
Mental Health
Elder siblings are often called on to assume caregiving responsibilities for their younger siblings in
instances in which a parent experiences mental illness (Reupert and Maybery, 2007a, 2007b). May-
bery, Ling, Szakacs, and Reupert (2005) conducted focus groups with Australian parents who either
themselves or their partner had a mental health diagnosis; separate focus groups were conducted with
their 6- to 16-year-old children. Sibling support emerged as a key theme in both the parent and
child focus groups, for example, as fathers noted that their children ceased fighting and voluntarily
395
supported one another when their mother had an episode of mental illness. In child focus groups,
facilitators noted the evident closeness of siblings and their ability to rely on one another when their
parent experienced a mental health crisis.
Chronic Illness of a Parent

Similarly, elder siblings may assume responsibilities for comforting younger siblings in instances in
which a family is coping with a chronic and/or terminal illness of a parent. Christ and Christ (2006)
overviewed approaches for aiding children as they cope with the terminal illness of a parent. In par-
ticular, they noted the difficulty that elder siblings may have in remaining patient with a younger sib-
ling’s questions or confusion about the parents’ illness and/or death, especially while they themselves
are also coping with this critical stressor. Engagement in sibling caregiving under these circumstances
can have important implications both for care recipients (who directly benefit from support) and
care providers (who may experience enhanced self-confidence, sense of power and control, and resil-
ience amid a challenging circumstance; Maybery et al., 2005). At the same time, however, excessive
caregiving responsibilities may also limit children’s and adolescents’ ability to socialize with peers,
achieve personal growth, or excel academically (Reupert and Maybery, 2007a).
Child Characteristics
Sibling caregiving practices also vary dramatically depending on the characteristics of the children
themselves, including the chronic illness, disability, mental health, and propensity toward risk-taking.
Chronic Illness or Disability of a Child

Siblings are inextricably affected when a child in the family experiences a chronic illness or dis-
ability. Well siblings may receive less attention from parents, have reduced access to social and rec-
reational activities, and may be quite concerned about parents’ reactions and well-being (Barlow
and Ellard, 2005). In their systematic review of research related to the psychosocial well-being of
families affected by childhood chronic illness, Barlow and Ellard (2005) found that siblings of chil-
dren with chronic illness were more likely than siblings of healthy children to display internalizing
behaviors, such as anxiety or depressive symptoms. Further, well siblings may attempt to “care” for
the sibling (and parents) by minimizing or even subjugating the needs and demands he or she pre-
sents to parents.
Research conducted with school-age siblings of children with diabetes (age 11–17 years) found
that 55% were directly involved in the medical care of their ill sibling, perhaps by helping to man-
age the child’s diet or administer insulin, even though they reported having a limited understand-
ing of the disease; 40% reported spending more time at home and less time with friends than their
peers (Adams, Peveler, Stein, and Dunger, 1991). Williams, Lorenzo, and Borja (1993) interviewed
100 mothers of children with a chronic cardiac or neurologic condition in Manila, Philippines, and
found that well siblings were assigned increased responsibility for caring for their ill sibling, as well
as for housekeeping, with twice as many responsibilities delegated to girls than boys. Not surpris-
ingly, parental attention and care to healthy siblings is often significantly diminished once a sibling is
diagnosed with a chronic illness (Branstetter, 2007; Williams et al., 1993).
Neurotypically developing children are frequently called on to provide care activities to siblings
with chronic illnesses or developmental delays. Such practices have been shown to present a mix of
positive and negative implications for caregiving children (Burke et al., 2015; McHale and Gamble,
1989), including increased sensitivity, caring, supportive behaviors, and nurturing behaviors along
with more internalizing disorders (Barlow and Ellard, 2005), social withdrawal, somatic complaints,
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Sibling Caregiving
feelings of loneliness/isolation, anger, anxiety, and excessive concern about their chronically ill sibling
(Williams, 1997).
Mental Health
Individuals with psychological diagnoses, behavioral conditions, and/or developmental delays may
also present unique challenges and responsibilities for siblings. In a longitudinal study, Rodrigues,
Binnoon-Erez, Plamondon, and Jenkins (2017) found that the emotional and behavioral symptoms
of 4.5-year-old children were strongly predicted by the presence of similar symptoms in their older
siblings, assessed when they were 2 months of age. Rodrigues et al. advocated for further study of
how the identification of behavioral or mental health problems in elder siblings can be a risk factor
for younger siblings, alerting practitioners to direct preventive resources to these children.
Stalberg, Ekerwald, and Hultman (2004) conducted semi-structured interviews with 16 adult
siblings of individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia. Caregiving emerged as a common coping
mechanism for dealing with feelings of guilt or inadequacy associated with their sibling’s psychiatric
condition. Well siblings reported feeling less helpless and less inadequate when they provided care;
they also felt that providing care kept them involved in their sibling’s life, which was important to
them as they realized that their involvement was more discretionary at this point in their lives.
Caregiving of siblings with a psychiatric illness (or developmental disability) may continue, or
even increase, in adulthood, especially after parents are no longer able to take responsibility (Nam-
kung et al., 2017). Orsmond and Seltzer (2007) surveyed 154 adults with a sibling with autism spec-
trum disorder (ASD) or Down syndrome (DS) about their instrumental and affective involvement
with their siblings. Siblings of individuals with ASD reported experiencing less positive affect in their
relationship with their sibling, greater pessimism about their sibling’s future, and greater interference
in their relationship with their parents as compared with siblings of individuals with DS. These dif-
ferences may reflect the pronounced communication impairments and social difficulties often associ-
ated with ASD (Orsmond and Seltzer, 2007). As children with an autism spectrum disorder age, their
atypical behaviors may become more difficult and unpleasant for a neurotypical sibling, which may
lead to less engagement in shared activities over time (Rivers and Stoneman, 2003) and less positive
affect (Seltzer, Orsmond, and Esbensen, 2009).
These findings suggest that the burden associated with caring for a sibling may vary considerably,
depending on the degree to which the affected individual’s medical, developmental, or emotional
functioning interferes with general well-being of the care-providing sibling. Furthermore, the qual-
ity of the sibling relationship is an important factor as children and adolescents who have warmer
and less conflictual interactions with siblings tend to demonstrate fewer internalizing and external-
izing behavior problems, even in families with a child with psychopathology (Buist, Deković, and
Prinzie, 2013).
Risky Behaviors
Through their roles as socializing agents, culture brokers, and teachers, siblings may play significant
roles in shaping one another’s risk-taking behaviors. For example, younger siblings are more likely to
experience teenage pregnancy if their older sibling is sexually active or has himself or herself faced
teen pregnancy (Miller, 2002). In a longitudinal study of 227 Latin and African American families
that included an elder sister (age 15–19 years) and a younger sibling (age 11–16 years), East and
Khoo (2005) found that a warm sibling relationship reduced the likelihood of risky sexual behaviors
and substance abuse among younger siblings. Surprisingly, low sibling conflict predicted risky sexual
behaviors; this finding may suggest that sibling conflict in African American and Latin American
families may help to limit the scope of risk-taking adolescents engage in. Relatedly, Brook, Brook,
397
Gordon, Whiteman, and Cohen (1990) examined associations between the drug use of European
American middle-class males and that of their peers, parents, and brothers. Participants’ drug use was
more closely related to the drug use of peers and brothers than with parents’ drug use. Brook et al.
also found the effects of parental drug use could be offset if an older brother abstained.
Taken together, the work of East and Khoo (2005) and Brook et al. (1990) suggests that adoles-
cents play an important role in socializing younger siblings’ engagement in appropriate and inap-
propriate behaviors, which can potentially have both protective and detrimental functions. Siblings
have the potential to open up their social worlds to one another and they may be placed at greater
risk for engaging in risky behaviors when they are introduced by their siblings to older peers who
engage in such risky or deviant behaviors (Criss and Shaw, 2005). In instances in which a younger
child engages in risky behaviors, he or she may turn to an elder sibling for guidance (Killoren and
Roach, 2014). Kowal and Blinn-Pike (2004) found that sibling discussions about safe sex, in conjunc-
tion with parent discussions, predicted better attitudes toward safe sexual practices; such discussions
were more likely to occur when sibling relationship quality was positive.
In summary, sibling caregiving practices are influenced by individual characteristics, such as the
presence of developmental delays, chronic illnesses, and mental illness. Relatedly, the behavioral pat-
terns of elder siblings, and their peers, can have a unique influence on the behavior of younger
siblings. Together, these findings provide further evidence of the pronounced role that sibling care
giving can have on the socialization and well-being of children and adolescents.
Promoting Caring Sibling Relationships

Given the power that sibling relationships have to shape individuals’ lives for the better (and for
the worse; Kramer and Conger, 2009), and given parents’ desire to promote the types of positive
engagement that will lead to sustained caregiving across the life course (Kramer and Baron, 1995), it
is important to consider the practical implications of what we have learned about sibling caregiving.
To promote lifelong sibling caregiving, it is necessary to start early and help children to develop
a kind of relationship that includes caregiving as well as the desire to give care or be invested in
the welfare of one’s sibling. On the basis of the results of prior research, Kramer (2010) outlined
an emerging list of evidence-based “essential ingredients” (p. 80) of successful sibling relationships.
These ingredients center on helping children develop nine key competencies shown in previous
research to be predictive of, or contribute to, prosocial sibling interactions. For parents who aim to
promote positive engagement among their children, this may mean adopting childrearing strategies
that: (1) recognize and praise children for their efforts to support or protect their sibling as well as
demonstrations of loyalty, pride, or placing trust in a sibling (Furman and Buhrmester, 1985); (2)
acknowledge both the unique contributions that individual children bring to the family as well as
what they together, as siblings, bring to the family (Kowal, Krull, and Kramer, 2006); (3) help chil-
dren to consider their siblings’ unique perspectives, interests, ideas, and needs as points of view that
are just as valid and important as their own (Dunn, 1988); (4) serve as “emotion coaches” (Gottman,
1997) in helping children to develop skills in identifying, naming, and regulating feelings, thoughts,
and behaviors in emotionally challenging situations and using this emotional understanding to man-
age negative affect, disagreements, and conflicts (Kramer, 2014); (5) work with children to explore
and correct unfounded negative attributions about one another’s behaviors by clarifying intentions
and encouraging communication about the perceived impact of actions (Stormshak, Bellanti, and
Goodman, 1999); (6) model and scaffold effective conflict management strategies, such as collabora-
tive problem-solving (Kramer and Baron, 1995), perspective-taking (Howe and Rinaldi, 2004), and
mediation (Siddiqui and Ross, 2004; Smith and Ross, 2007), and finally (7) avoid forms of differen-
tial treatment that are perceived by children to be unfair or unwarranted while adjusting behaviors
and communication to enable children to feel that their individual needs are being met (Kowal and
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Sibling Caregiving
Kramer, 1997; Kowal et al., 2006; Shanahan, McHale, Crouter, and Osgood, 2008). Further research
is needed to identify additional precursors of prosocial sibling relationships along with studies that
formally test their contributions to enhancing sibling relationship quality.
Several evidence-based interventions have been developed that harness many of these “essential
ingredients” to foster positive sibling relationships, including Siblings Are Special (Feinberg et al.,
2013), Promoting Sibling Bonds (Linares et al., 2015) and the More Fun With Sisters and Brothers
Program (Kennedy and Kramer, 2008; Ravindran, McElwain, Engle, and Kramer, 2015). Experi-
mental interventions such as these can play a critical role in expanding our understanding of how to
promote the types of sibling relationships in which sustained caregiving will occur.
Future Directions for Studying Sibling Caregiving

Despite the headway many investigators have made to better understand the forms and functions
of sibling caregiving across the life course, and across the globe, a multitude of questions remains.
Foremost is: How do we promote and preserve forms of sibling caregiving that have been shown
to contribute to individual and family well-being, especially in the face of Western technological
pressures toward individualistic rather than collectivistic values? How can we better understand the
functions of sibling caregiving in our increasingly diverse and complex societies? How can we help
siblings to maintain the types of relationships that will continue to foster the exchange of support
and care into later adulthood? How can we best test whether sibling caregiving is truly formative for
individual, family, and societal development and well-being? Ideally, longitudinal studies that track
the precipitants and consequences of sibling caregiving over the life course will provide the most
convincing evidence of the contributions caregiving processes can provide. With greater evidence,
families may be convinced that the cultivation of sibling relationships, in which caregiving is an inte-
gral part, is worthy of their time and effort.
Our advice for future researchers is multifold. First, investigators are advised to adopt a defini-
tion of sibling caregiving that extends beyond the traditional—such as the fulfillment of physical
needs—to incorporate the more complex and difficult-to-define dimensions of caregiving—such as
emotional support and social understanding, and service as teachers, coaches, advocates, confidantes,
and consolers. It is particularly important to clarify the many ways in which males may provide care
to siblings that may have been under recognized because they look different from the nurturant acts
commonly associated with female caregiving.
Second, investigators must think outside of their own “cultural box.” Much can be learned from
caregiving practices in different cultures, particularly as we see that many non-Western societies and
U.S. minority groups have already figured out ways to capitalize on children’s abilities to teach and
socialize one another. We reiterate the calls of prior work for enhanced attention to understanding
sibling practices in non-Westernized societies; for example, there is a persistent lack of attention to
families in Middle Eastern cultures (Cicirelli, 1994).
Third, it is important to examine sibling caregiving processes within the natural contexts in which
children live while paying considerable attention to the overarching social and cultural contexts in
which families operate, including the historical, legal, economic, religious, and cultural belief systems
that may shape sibling caregiving practices. Cross-cultural and ethnographic studies have emphasized
the importance of observing children in natural contexts to discern the ways in which siblings care
for and socialize one another (Zukow-Goldring, 2002). A reliance on parental report, or observation
in contrived experimental settings, may not sufficiently reveal the extent and functions of caregiv-
ing behaviors. Such ethnographic research reminds us that the process of caregiving occurs—and
so must be understood—within the contexts of familial and cultural norms that govern language,
emotional expression, response to authority, gender, sexuality (Hafford, 2010), and other culturally
relevant contextual factors.
399
Conclusion
This chapter builds on the seminal work of Weisner and Gallimore (1977), Zukow-Goldring (1995,
2002), and others to recognize sibling caregiving as a notable, dynamic set of processes of socializa-
tion that have significant influences on the socioemotional development of all individuals within a
family system. Acts of caregiving do not simply extend from elder to younger siblings, but rather
are exchanged bidirectionally and are shaped by a host of cultural, societal, familial, and individual
factors. This review supports the conceptualization of sibling caregiving as extending beyond tradi-
tional perspectives of “care” (such as supervision and the fulfillment of physical needs) to also include
forms of teaching and instruction and emotional support (e.g., emotional assurance, soothing, and
the provision of advice and help).
As our understanding of the significance and function of sibling caregiving grows, researchers and
practitioners will be better able to harness this information to better assist families that strive to pro-
mote more frequent and meaningful forms of sibling caregiving among their children. Gains in the
quantity and quality of sibling caregiving may occur through educational programming, and preven-
tion and intervention programs that are evidence based and experimentally evaluated (Kramer, 2004).
In closing, consider this compelling call to action from a father 1 year following the loss of his
adult son, Michael, who had Down syndrome.
Today, as we all remember Michael, I think about what a difference they [siblings Peter and
Amy] made in Michael’s life. They both let us know, pretty early on, that they wanted to be
a part of the ongoing decisions about Michael’s life. Peter and Amy taught Michael so many
things. They were his audience and he was theirs. They could often calm him down when
we were at wit’s end. I know that it was not always easy for them but they were always up
to the challenge.
Michael loved to go see people and it was always amazing to be with him as he antici-
pated seeing his many friends. But, special as that was, it was nothing like his anticipation
before one of his siblings was coming home. He seemed serene about the fact that both of
them left home to pursue their own lives. But he always counted the days before “my big,
big brother” or “my good sister” would be coming home.
During the last year, Cindy and I have heard two things that pertain to us many times.
“I can’t imagine losing a child” and “Michael was blessed to have great parents.” We appre-
ciate it every time we hear that. I hope that Peter and Amy have been repeatedly told that they
were great siblings. Because they were. I can’t imagine them being any better.
—David Buchanan ( July 2017)
In refrain, we call for recognition of the importance of sibling caregiving in promoting individual
and family well-being. Let’s make the contributions of siblings to one another’s development “seen.”
Acknowledgments
This chapter is based on work supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, National Institute
of Food and Agriculture, Hatch Project No. ILLU-793–364. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or
recommendations expressed in this chapter are the authors’ and do not necessarily reflect the view
of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
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12
NONPARENTAL CAREGIVING
Helen Raikes, Abbie Raikes, Jan Esteraich, Amy Encinger,
Aileen S. Garcia, Sukran Ucus, and Elsa Escalante
Introduction
Most parenting in the United States and worldwide is carried out by parents or relatives, but not all
caregiving is conducted in that context. Here, we refer to nonparental caregiving and divide our dis-
cussion into two distinct areas: (1) nonparental caregiving that occurs in myriad childcare and early
education settings during the hours parents are at work, and (2) nonparental caregiving conducted by
child welfare agencies, including foster care and orphanages. In the former case, the children reside
with their parents; in the latter case, this is not so. In each case, we identify the prevalence in the
United States and in other parts of the world. We then turn to the forms this caregiving takes and
the effects of nonparental caregiving on children’s development and, finally, we address elements that
may introduce important variation.
Twenty years ago, the theme of the chapter on nonparental or nonfamilial caregiving was to
explore the effects of rapidly expanding nonparental caregiving due to parental employment on chil-
dren’s development (Clark-Stewart and Allhusen, 2001). Emphasis was largely on the Western world.
In that earlier time frame, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study
of Early Childcare and Youth Development was just beginning to release results from its compre-
hensive study of early care, a study of over 1,400 children, beginning shortly after birth and follow-
ing children’s development longitudinally in their childcare and home settings through school ages
(National Institute of Child Health and Human Development [NICHD] Early Childcare Research
Network, 2005). That earlier review built on the knowledge base about the importance of children’s
attachment, raised questions about effects of childcare/early education on children’s emotional well-
being and parent-child interaction as a function of alterative care and separation (Clark-Stewart and
Allhusen, 2001).
Today, nonparental caregiving has become so prevalent in the Western world and increasingly in
the rest of the world that the predominating research questions are no longer whether this form of
caregiving has a detrimental effect on children’s development. Rather, central questions today focus
on what forms of nonparental caregiving for working parents best support the early development of
children, and what can countries, states, and communities do to build these kinds of systems?
Another major theme is new for this chapter, because millions of young children are displaced
from their families for various reasons including international conflicts, disease, disabilities, abuse, or
are otherwise unwanted or abandoned. Thus, we also address the knowledge base about child welfare.
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The scope of the current chapter further broadened to include a knowledge base that is global,
not predominantly Western. We grant that the knowledge base is still largely Western—more stud-
ies in this area are financed in the Western world—but there are perspectives and findings from
international studies to inform perspectives going forward. Childcare in the developing world looks
different from that in the Western world, so the questions and variable features are bound to be dif-
ferent. Child welfare for children who are unable to live with their families looks different from that
in the Western world, so here, too, the questions and variable features may be somewhat different.
Many of our theories and research frameworks are likely to be useful in both contexts, but the Child
Rights Framework, more frequently utilized in an international context, can similarly inform think-
ing in the Western context.
In this chapter, we begin with conceptual frameworks, then turn to focus on nonparental car-
egiving. The first half of the chapter addresses nonparental caregiving in which children reside with
their parents and caregiving is provided by day by others, called childcare/early education here. In
this first half, we address childcare/early education in the United States and then provide examples
from other parts of the world, acknowledging that equally interesting examples could be portrayed
from any number of countries. In the second half of the chapter, focus is on nonparental caregiving
in which children do not live with their parents, referred to as child welfare. Again, the discussion
begins with a focus on child welfare in the United States and then turns to examples from other
parts of the world. For each section, the discussion begins with definitions and prevalence and effects
on children; in some cases, the discussion explores variable elements. Many countries or regions
have been able to measure the prevalence of childcare/early childhood education or nonresidential
child welfare. The United States and some countries have child outcomes data that can be linked to
that prevalence, which helps to document the possible association between prevalence of childcare/
early childhood education and child development. But in many cases, such linkages can’t be estab-
lished widely. Research on variable elements (e.g., quality, dosage, access) requires sophisticated study
designs and forms of measurement. When data on the links between childcare/early childhood edu-
cation and child development or variable elements in childcare early education or child welfare are
available and measurement systems are established, measurement is addressed within subsections of
this article. In all cases, the studies and outcomes referred to pertain to children from infancy through
prekindergarten, unless otherwise specified.
Theory/Framework of Nonparental Caregiving
Child Right to Care

Child well-being is a comprehensive concept, which encompasses a number of dimensions that
include material well-being, housing and the environment, education, health, risk behaviors, and
quality of school life (Bradshaw, Hoelscher, and Richardson, 2007; UNICEF, 2007a). This multidi-
mensional concept of child well-being is guided by the United Nations Convention on the Rights
of the Child (CRC; United Nations General Assembly, 1989) and encompasses child quality of life
in a broad sense that includes child economic conditions, peer relationships, political rights, and
opportunities for development. The United Nations CRC has drawn the normative framework
for globally understanding, promoting, and guaranteeing child well-being (Casas, 1997). Specifically,
children’s rights are identified in four main categories, including survival rights (e.g., shelter, nutri-
tion), development rights (e.g., education, recreation, knowledge acquisition, freedom of religion),
participation rights (e.g., providing for an active role in the family and society), and protection
rights (e.g., protection from abuse, exploitation, child labor, and in refugee situations). CRC was
augmented and expanded by subsequent United Nations efforts, through the Millennium Develop-
ment Goals (MDG), the General Assembly adoption of the Guidelines for the Alternative Care of
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Children and, currently, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), which were agreed by nations
in 2015 (see Raikes, Yoshikawa, Britto, and Iruka, 2017, for relevance to developmental science).
Specifically, and pertinent to the current chapter, the Sustainable Development Goal 4.2 specifies
that children shall have access to quality early childhood education services, as part of the larger edu-
cation goal focused on promoting learning across all ages and populations (Raikes et al., 2017). The
Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children (Raikes et al., 2017) present desirable orientations
for policy and practice in regards to the protection and well-being of children who are deprived of
parental care or who are at risk of being so.
In the early years, children depend on adults for access to high-quality opportunities to support
their development, through the provision of nutrition, stimulation, and protection. Families and
governments have the responsibility to create enriched and healthy environments where children
can grow, be cared for, and reach their potential, especially for those children who are not under
parental protection and/or who are exposed to risky environments (e.g., human trafficking, dis-
placement, poverty, armed conflict, domestic violence, migration, and other forms of extreme risk)
(European Commission [EC], 2008; Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
[OECD], 2009).
From this perspective, a child’s right to care may require national and transnational systems to
promote child protection and welfare. These systems may operate within the framework of the law
with a coherent framework of policies, procedures, and guidelines, providing a multisector approach
to support the prevention of and response to protection of risks, and lead co-responsible and effective
services for children (UNICEF, 2008). Additionally, experts and practitioners have observed consen-
sus among leading agencies engaged in child protection and welfare and recommend that legislation,
policies, and regulations should be systemic; consistent with the CRC, MDG, and SDG; and relevant
to international and regional conventions and instruments as well as existing laws and bilateral/
multilateral agreements to facilitate cooperation and ensure the provision of services to children
(Save the Children, 2009; UNICEF, 2008; World Vision International, 2011).
Ecological Systems Theory

A theoretical framework frequently applied to nonparental caregiving is Bronfenbrenner’s ecological
systems theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1986; Bronfenbrenner and Morris, 2006). Ecological systems theory
describes concentric, interactive contexts that influence both children and families across time. This
model can be conceptualized as a set of nested systems with the child as central in what is referred to
as microsystem. Influences on development include biology and social environments with the indi-
vidual interacting with family/childcare/early education contexts, including the child’s family, teach-
ers/providers, and peers. Characteristics of the neighborhood and community are referred to as the
exosystem, which includes factors such as quality and structure of institutions, for example, schools,
churches, and community organizations, as well as potential stressors or threats to development, such
as lack of community resources. The outermost concentric circle represents the macrosystem, which
includes factors such as culture, economic, and political structures, as well as policies that set the stage
for nonparental caregiving. The mesosystem represents the interactions among systems that influence
one another, and in the current chapter, influences from all levels are hypothesized to contribute to
both the child’s development and variability in the context of nonparental caregiving.
Attachment Theory
Attachment theories (Ainsworth, 1982; Bowlby, 1969) have been applied to nonparental caregiving
in two ways. Attachment theory postulates that sensitive, responsive interactions primarily with the
mother lead the child to form an attachment and working model that can be secure or insecure in a
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number of ways. A secure attachment with the mother has been associated with a number of impor-
tant subsequent positive developments for children (Matas, Arend, and Sroufe, 1978). Applied to
nonparental caregiving, first, the theory gave rise to a hypothesis that alternative caregiving would be
disruptive to formation of the important mother-child attachment bond, undergirded by the assump-
tion that maternal attachment formed the basis for all subsequent attachments. Second, attachment
theory has been extended in a complementary direction by hypothesizing that children can form
secondary attachments with nonparental caregivers (when caregiving is sensitive, contingent, consist-
ent, and predictable) (Howes and Hamilton, 1992; Howes, Rodning, Galluzzo, and Myers, 1988; van
IJzendoorn, Sagi, and Lambermon,1992), that these relationships provide children with secure base
opportunities during the alternative caregiving periods (Howes et al.,1988), and that the attachment
may be independent from the relationship with the mother (Fox, 1977). This interpretation of sec-
ondary attachment provides a theoretical justification for relationships that supplement the maternal
relationship and may be compensatory (Howes et al., 1988).
Sociobiological Theory
This theoretical framework postulates that adults who are genetically related to children have the
greatest investment in the children’s care and well-being, due to a desire to protect and perpetuate
their genetic line (Ruston, Russell, and Wells, 1984). It suggests that relatives would be more likely to
provide quality caregiving than nonrelatives, which is consistent with worldwide child welfare rec-
ommendations for first placement of children when parents are unable to care for them. However, in
regard to childcare/early education, in a study of family childcare (including related and nonrelated
caregivers), Kontos, Howes, Shinn, and Galinsky (1995) reported lower quality care in relative care
than in nonrelative care.
Cognitive and Social Stimulation Theories Undergirded by Neuroscience

A number of cognitive stimulation and social stimulation theories posit that sensitive, contingent,
minimally stressful stimulation that is appropriate to the child’s developmental level in nonparental
environments will contribute positively to the child’s development (Dennis, 1973; Hart and Risley,
1995; Hunt, 1961). These theories build on science about rapid and malleable brain development
occurring during the early years of life (Center on the Developing Child, 2007). Newer science find-
ings suggest that children’s experiences, supplemented by nutrition and maturation, contribute to the
very architecture of the brain. The mechanism appears to occur during synaptogenesis; when chil-
dren are engaged in stimulating, relatively stress-free experiences, neuronal activity occurs whereby
axons from neurons fire to connect with dendrites from others, thereby creating or strengthening
synapses and ultimately pathways in the brain that create the physiological superstructure for learning
(Champagne, Francis, Mar, and Meaney, 2003; Greenough and Black, 1992; Liu, Diario, Day, Francis,
and Meaney, 2000). Other studies have shown reduced neuronal activity in emotion centers of the
brain under conditions of repeated stress (e.g., abuse) or demonstrate alteration in the hypothalamus-
pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. Children exposed to continuous and intense stress (sometimes referred
to as toxic stress) demonstrate heightened HPA activity that does not follow typical patterns of
activation and resumptions to normal levels of cortisol (Caldji et al., 1998; Gunnar and Donzella,
2002). Indeed, intervention programs such as Head Start and state pre-K programs are designed
to address the well-documented achievement gap (Bradley and Corwyn, 2002; Lee and Burkham,
2002) that low-income children and children reared in stressed environments are vulnerable to, and
the expected outcome from these programs is enhanced school readiness, including both cognitive
and social development (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2012b). Quality childcare
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and child welfare procedures and policies are designed to reduce the stress and trauma that children
in high-risk situations are exposed to.
Summary of Frameworks and Theories

We have postulated five frameworks/theories to guide our discussion and to help in forming
hypotheses about effects on children that could be anticipated from nonparental caregiving. First,
the CRC provides a justification for nonparental caregiving and the needs and rights of the child,
with implications for environments, material well-being, education, and health. The child rights
framework defines what is inalterable for children’s nonparental caregiving and suggests children’s
development and well-being would be compromised when any of these rights cannot be ensured.
Ecological theory places the child in the context of family and concentric systems and suggests that
children not consistently anchored in a series of these systems are vulnerable, as can happen to chil-
dren displaced by war, famine, natural disasters and in other ways or if some systems of nurturance
and care are weak or of poor quality. Attachment theory suggests hypotheses about building strong
mother-child relationships and also points to the role that secondary attachments can play in ensur-
ing the child’s sense of security when the mother is not present, and would hypothesize threats to
child well-being and a host of subsequent developmental sequelae with inconsistent or insensitive
care whether in childcare/early education or child welfare. Sociobiological theories postulate that
family members will have the most invested in care of children, that well-being could be compro-
mised when family systems break down, and that systems incorporating the family will be better for
children’s outcomes. Finally, cognitive and social stimulation theories suggest that organized, stimu-
lating environments and teaching curricula benefit children, particularly low-income children. The
latter theories become the premise for early education intervention programs, such as Head Start in
the United States. and other parts of the world, and are undergirded conceptually by understandings
of early neurological development. Consistent with these theories are attempts to improve quality
in programs, to focus instruction to better prepare children for school and efforts to reduce stressors
and traumas in children’s lives to manageable levels.
Childcare/Early Education in the United States

In this first half of this chapter, we focus on childcare and early childhood education. This is care that
occurs during the daytime but where children reside with their parents some or all of the time. We
address a number of questions: What is the need and prevalence of childcare and education in the
United States? What forms does childcare take? What are models by which this care and education
are delivered? What do we know about effects of nonparental caregiving on children’s development?
What are variable elements in childcare? What are states and communities doing to affect the supply
of quality care overall or to influence variable elements? What are new forms of research in this area?
Prevalence of Nonparental Childcare/Early Childhood Education

Childcare/early childhood education is utilized by a large percentage of U.S. children. Again, child-
care/early education as referred to as occurring during the daytime, but children reside with their
parents or in their homes.
Data on childcare use are collected in the U.S. Survey of Income and Program Participation
(SIPP) and show how many children by age are in alternative arrangements, types of arrangements,
time spent in these arrangements, and distribution of facilities across the United States (U.S. Census
Bureau, 2013). In 2011, 32.7 million children were in a regular childcare arrangement while their
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parents worked or pursued other activities outside the home. This figure represented 12.5 million
children ages 0–4 who represented 61% of children in these age categories, and 20.2 million chil-
dren ages 5–15, representing 50% of children in these age categories. Fully 88% of 0- to 4 year-old-
children whose mothers were employed were in care, and these children spent 36 hours per week on
average in care, and only 28% of 0- to 4-year-old children whose mothers are not employed spent
21 hours on average in care per week. Thus, even children whose mothers are not employed were
still in care and education settings.
The cost of childcare, even adjusted for inflation, nearly doubled from 1985 to 2011. Families not
in poverty paid about 8% of their income on childcare, but families in poverty who make childcare
payments pay about 30% of their income on childcare. Many low-income parents do not make
payments for childcare due to subsidies and subsidized programs they may be eligible for. The SIPP
report shows that 32% of parents make payments for childcare.
Forms of Childcare/Early Education

Childcare/early education in the United States includes a patchwork of different forms of care, with
different auspices and different targeted users. For example, it includes center-based care, and care
provided by relatives and nonrelatives within and outside the family home. Auspices can be public,
which includes Head Start and state-supported prekindergarten programs and programs for children
with special needs/disabilities. States licensed childcare, and requirements for licenses vary across and
within states. The childcare/early education can be private, which includes both for-profit and not-
for-profit programs in centers. Some of the private programs follow particular philosophies and have
their own certifications and program models (e.g., Montessori, Reggio, Waldorf ).
Low-income children who do not speak English, or those with certified disabilities, are more
frequently served in public programs, and children in families with more resources tend to be in
private programs. However, as Bassok, Magnuson, and Weiland (2016) pointed out, public assistance
is not an entitlement. Fewer than one third of federally eligible children under 6 years old receive
childcare subsidies, approximately 42% of eligible 3- and 4-year-olds attend Head Start, and less than
4% of eligible children are served by Early Head Start. Public state prekindergarten programs serve
about 30% of 4-year-olds nationwide and 5% of 3-year-olds in 42 states and the District of Colum-
bia (Brookings, 2017). Still, families—and particularly those who are poor and those with infants and
toddlers—struggle to find affordable, high-quality childcare for their children (Bassok et al., 2016).
The most common form of childcare/early education is provided by relatives (27% of all nonpa-
rental caregiving with half of this provided by grandparents), followed by organized facilities (25%,
including childcare centers, nursery schools, preschools, and Head Start programs), parents (22%,
including fathers who provide care while mothers are working or mothers who take care of their
children while working), other nonrelatives (13%; including in-home babysitters, neighbors, friends,
and family day care), and others (13%, including schools, self-care, or no regular arrangement; U.S.
Census Bureau, 2013).
Effects on Children
There is general agreement that good-quality childcare/early education provides developmental
advantages for young children and is particularly important for children who are vulnerable due
to poverty, for those not speaking English, or those with disabilities (Shonkoff and Bales, 2011) and
who are vulnerable to opportunity/achievement gaps at or before school entry that set trajectories
for school success (Duncan and Magnuson, 2011; Hair, Halle, Terry-Humen, Lavelle, and Calkins,
2006; Hart and Risley, 1995).
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In a comprehensive review of 36 studies of model demonstrations, large-scale public programs

serving low-income preschool-age children including preschools, Head Start programs, and child-
care, as well as home visiting programs, Barnett (1995) concluded that childcare/early education pro-
grams tend to have large, short-term advantages for children’s IQ and long-term benefits for school
achievement, grade retention, placement in special education, and social adjustment.
A leading review concluded that high-quality programs provide benefits for children’s develop-
ment (Zaslow, 2010). The literature is consistent in showing positive effects for cognitive outcomes
(Dearing, McCartney and Taylor, 2009; Tran and Weinraub, 2006) but is somewhat mixed for soci-
oemotional development. Notably, children with greater nonparental caregiving have been found in
some studies to have more reported behavior problems (McCartney et al., 2010), particularly when
care was of longer duration and began early.
By contrast, several studies have reported better outcomes for low-income preschool-age children
in language or cognitive development (Yazejian, Bryant, Freel, and Burchinal, 2015) or socioemo-
tional behaviors (Votruba-Drzal, Coley, and Chase-Lansdale, 2004) when care began early or was of
longer duration but was in good-quality settings. Votruba-Drzal et al. (2004) found internalizing
and externalizing problems decreased as number of hours in good-quality care increased, but these
behavior problems increased with hours in poor quality care. Moreover, the association referred to
earlier between children’s behavior problems and longer durations in childcare was largest for low-
quality programs and smallest for high-quality programs (McCartney et al., 2010). These studies
demonstrating good outcomes in higher quality settings suggest that understanding what goes into
creating a quality setting and experience is important.
Variable Elements
The discussion about childcare/early education in the United States has shifted from an emphasis on
whether childcare and maternal employment has a negative effect on children to when childcare or
early education has a harmful effect and, more commonly, what it takes for childcare/early education
to have a positive effect on children’s development.
The predominating distinguishing feature for positive outcomes associated with childcare/early
education is the quality of the setting and of the experience for children in the setting. Several
features in regard to quality are noteworthy: (1) there currently tends to be a generally accepted
broad definition of quality in the United States, although that definition is evolving somewhat; (2)
U.S. nonparental caregiving is of variable quality; and (3) although much is known about effects on
children in quality environments, there continues to be considerable discussion about what it takes
to make a difference for children’s development. The specific components that compose broad qual-
ity are targets for improvement in the United States, and as a result, there is a multitude of current
initiatives to improve quality and ultimately outcomes for children as we discuss in the next section.
Definition of Quality
Childcare/early education quality refers to the combination of structural features in programs and
process features (National Institute of Child Health and Development [NICHD] Early Childcare
Research Network, 2006), together with a new perspective, instructional quality (MDRC, 2017).
Structural features are framework aspects of childcare/early education, whereas process quality refers
to the interactions that children experience.
Whitebook, Howes, and Phillips (1990) identified structural features of childcare that are regarded
as necessary but not sufficient for developing quality settings and experiences. These include ratios,
group size, teacher training/education, and wages. Other representative studies (Raikes et al., 2006)
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have found that combinations of structural features, referred to as assets, add up to create quality
environments, demonstrating that the combination of “good things” add up to make a difference.
Process quality is the central quality feature that refers to the interactions of children within
programs. Warm, responsive, stimulating interactions between adults and children and facilitation
of daily experiences that are stimulating and build on children’s interests have been defined as pre-
ferred processes for childcare/early education (National Institute of Child Health and Develop-
ment [NICHD], Early Childcare Research Network, 2006). Process quality is often measured using
structured observations, such as Environmental Rating Scales (Harms, Clifford, and Cryer, 1998),
the Caregiver Interaction Scale (Arnett, 1985), or domains of the Classroom Assessment Survey
Scale (CLASS; Pianta, La Paro, and Hamre, 2008). There have been a number of studies linking
structural to process quality. Positive associations have been found between observed quality and
group size, adult-child ratio, and director characteristics (Whitebook et al., 1990); provider beliefs
(Galinsky, Howes, Kontos, and Shinn, 1994); early childhood wages (Ghazvini and Mullis, 2002;
Phillips, Mekos, Scarr, McCartney, and Abbott-Shim, 2000); employee benefits (Whitebook et al.,
1990); and National Association for the Education of Young Children accreditation (Bloom, 1996),
in caregiving/early education programs serving ages infancy through prekindergarten.
Variability in U.S. Childcare/Early Childhood Quality

Studies beginning in the 1990s identified deficits in U.S. childcare quality just at the time that sup-
plies of care and education were expanding (Cost, Quality and Child Outcomes Study Team, 1995;
Kontos et al., 1995; Whitebook et al., 1990). Moreover, childcare for low-income children tends to
be lower quality than is true for more advantaged families (National Institute of Child Health and
Human Development Early Childcare Research Network, 2005).
Newer Investigations of Variability

Although there is agreement that early childhood programs can have positive impacts on children’s
development and that quality is generally necessary for these positive effects to be realized, there is
also concern that effects of at-scale programs, although statistically significant, are typically consid-
erably smaller than effects found in small, carefully controlled demonstration programs (Brookings,
2017). Sometimes this discussion is referred to as “getting into the black box” of programs to better
understand how to optimize environments for different groups of children and to more effectively
take early childcare/early education programs to scale in communities and states. For example, a
group of leading scholars identified six areas of consensus for when pre-K programs can have positive
effects on children (Brookings, 2017). Among other areas of consensus, the researchers emphasized
experiences that lead to rich classroom interactions, such as use of curricula known for building
strong foundational skills and knowledge, and professional development and coaching that enable
teachers to create engaging and organized classrooms.
Newer studies have demonstrated that instruction that is targeted and focused can lead to greater
effect sizes in child growth in the targeted areas, especially for low-income children. Examples include
language and literacy instruction (Wasik and Hindman, 2011), math instruction (Clements and
Sarama, 2008), and other areas and across areas of development (Fantuzzo, 2012; Raver et al., 2009).
This innovative research is leading to newer definitions of quality or of what it takes for non-
parental caregiving to make a difference. Certainly, this newer research demonstrates the dynamic
nature of understanding what is most salient (or makes the biggest difference) in young children’s
nonparental caregiving.
Another line of research has introduced new statistical methods for understanding relations
between quality and child outcomes. Modest effects for quality on child outcomes have been found
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using quality as a continuous variable, but research suggests that there may be important cut points
for quality, and that for childcare/early education programs to have a positive effect on children’s
development, a higher level of quality is required (Burchinal, Zaslow, and Tarullo, 2016). Indeed,
positive associations between the quality of emotional support and child socioemotional outcomes
were reported at higher levels of quality, but less so at lower levels of quality, and at higher levels of
instructional quality for academic outcomes (Burchinal, Vandergrift, Pianta, and Mashburn, 2010).
These findings were reported from an 11-state sample of classrooms. Another study with a rural
sample revealed a similar association between quality at higher levels and fewer child behavioral
outcomes, but this association was not found for language, literacy, or working memory outcomes
(Burchinal, Vernon-Feagans, Vitiello, and Greenberg, 2014).
Efforts to Affect the Supply and Quality of Care/Early Education

in the United States
The abundant literature demonstrating positive outcomes for children in quality care and early edu-
cation together with literature informing the field about the variable elements that compose quality
have led to improved access, improved standards, innovative initiatives, and other community, state,
and federal initiatives and research toward improving access and quality and particularly outcomes
for children. Access to care and education has been sustained or improved through ongoing federal
and state support for childcare subsidies for low-income children, through expansions of the infant-
toddler programs in the Head Start suite of programs, through state pre-K programs and infant/
toddler programs, to serve low-income children and their families. Many are designed to provide
children needed stimulation and support during years of most rapid brain growth and are focused on
preventing the well-known achievement gap due to disparities of income.
With greater clarity around what young children need in their care and education, standards have
been established delineating best practices by the National Association for the Education of Young
Children (NAEYC; 2017), the American Academy of Pediatrics and known as Healthy Child Care
(American Academy of Pediatrics, AAP, 2017), and Head Start Program Performance Standards have
been improved and updated with information from new research and practice (Administration for
Children and Families, ACF, 2016). Nearly every U.S. state has developed early learning guidelines
or standards (Scott-Little, Kagan, Frelow, and Reid, 2009).
Notable among quality initiatives are state Quality Rating and Improvement Systems (QRIS;
National Center on Early Childhood Quality Assurance, 2017); most U.S. states have implemented
or are developing these systems whereby states (and, in a few cases, counties) identify graduated
levels of quality for programs to aspire toward and to structure quality improvements. A QRIS is a
systemic approach to assess, improve, and communicate the level of quality in early and school-age
care and education programs. These systems have been known in various ways as “star systems” and
are akin to hotel ratings systems. Although these systems are still evolving, a number of studies have
demonstrated that they help to drive quality improvements at the systems level (Tout, Zaslow, Halle,
and Forry, 2009; Zellman and Perlman, 2008). In many states, they are augmented by tiered childcare
subsidy reimbursements.
Summary of U.S. Childcare/Early Education

Childcare/early education in the United States is utilized by a majority of U.S. children due to high
rates of parental employment and to interests of the U.S. Federal government and state governments
in making quality early childhood services available to low-income children and children otherwise
at risk. A strong literature base shows positive impacts on early development that associate with qual-
ity early childhood programs regardless of type of program, and such programs undergird efforts to
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close the pervasive achievement gap due to income at school entry. Because quality is so important to
the effectiveness of early education programs, most U.S. states have been vigorous in developing sys-
tems to improve quality, including Early Learning Guidelines and Quality Rating and Improvement
Systems. Although quality is currently known to be key to positive outcomes, research continues to
refine understanding of quality features that will affect child outcomes, to further elaborate what is
in the quality “black box,” and to increase the effect sizes of early childhood programs, especially for
low-income children who stand to benefit from maximally effectively programs.
Childcare in Areas of the World Other Than the United States
Prevalence and Forms of Care

Globally, approximately 60% of women over age 15 years are employed (World Bank, 2017). The
need for nonparental childcare is universal (Samman, Presler-Marshall, and Jones, 2016) and is appar-
ent across all countries, regardless of country income levels or differences in context. There are
common challenges as well: Access to care overall, together with the quality of nonparental care, are
often highlighted as concerns across high-, middle-, and low-income countries (Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development [OECD], 2015; Samman et al., 2016). However, the spe-
cific mix of types of care, issues around access, and elements of quality that are most prevalent varies
by country income, region, and context. Access to early childhood education and care continues to
grow in many countries, with as many as 31% of all children in low- and middle-income countries
in some form of early education programs (Black et al., 2017), but with notable disparities in access
based on family income. Quality of care is also markedly different across countries. For example, in
some countries, nearly 60% of children under age 5 are left unattended or under the care of another
child under age 10 (UNICEF, 2014), whereas in the United States, this number is estimated to be
less than 2% (Samman et al., 2016).
This section highlights three issues in nonparental care that are relevant across countries. First,
the concept of “nonparental” care reflects an underlying assumption that parents, especially mothers,
are the “natural” primary caregivers for young children, which is true in some but not all ecological
contexts (Lamb and Sternberg, 1992). Cultural as well as economic priorities for women’s labor have
long been understood as driving factors in how nonparental care is supplied, and these underly-
ing forces may lead to different solutions in different settings (Lamb and Sternberg, 1992). Second,
the role of government provision of nonparental care varies considerably between countries, and
although related to overall country income, is not synonymous with income. Children in some parts
of the world, especially Europe, have access to nearly universal systems of care that are largely gov-
ernment run (OECD, 2015), but others live in countries with sporadic or no availability of regulated
care. Finally, the blending of early childhood education and care to provide more holistic solutions
for children and families is evident in some but not all parts of the world. In many countries, there
are bifurcated systems of care and education that affect children and families’ abilities to access and
benefit from nonparental care. These three issues are explored in greater detail ahead.
Conceptualizations of Nonparental Care

Decisions on how children should be reared reflect cultural priorities for children’s development as
well as available resources to invest in young children’s development (Lamb, Sternberg, Hwang, and
Broberg, 2014). In agrarian societies, for example, mothers may return to work in the fields when
children are very young, thus necessitating reliance on siblings and older children as caregivers,
which, in turn, encourages young children to develop patterns of behavior that make them easier
to manage (LeVine, Levine, and Keefer, 1996). But because these patterns are culturally responsive,
418
they can also shift in response to new demands and incentives for parental time and investment. One
of these trends has been the increasing emphasis on education for young children, which has shifted
attention toward preparing children for school, in line with national and global shifts in expectations
for education systems (Learning Metrics Task Force, 2014). Another shift has been the decline of
agrarian societies and the movement of many families to urban centers, leading to notable changes
in the type of care available for children and the risks associated with caregiving by older siblings and
in unsupervised environments.
State Involvement in Nonparental Caregiving

The role of the state in providing nonparental caregiving has powerful implications for the type of
nonparental caregiving provided, and the extent to which it is available for all children. In Europe,
several countries provide universal access to nonparental caregiving for children up to primary
school age, beginning when parental leave is over (OECD, 2006). However, in many parts of the
world, there is little to no state involvement in childcare provision, meaning that millions of children
are left in low-quality or dangerous care environments with little regulation (Samman et al., 2016).
Although state involvement does not necessitate quality care, the lack of any state regulation can
create systems with a mix of home-based providers, family care, and for-profit childcare settings that
vary substantially in quality. Differences in quality of care have been noted across countries (Tietze,
Cryer, Bairrao, Palacios, and Wetzel, 1996) that may reflect different levels of state engagement in the
regulation and provision of childcare. Meta-analyses suggest that there are meaningful regional differ-
ences in the quality of childcare across countries and, notably, differences in the associations between
structural and process features of measures highlight the variability in country influences on quality,
both in terms of overall regulatory structures and in how quality is conceptualized and measured
across countries (Vermeer, van IJzendoorn, Carcamo, and Harrison, 2016).
Early Childhood Education

Children’s access to government-run and nongovernment preschool education programs has increased
dramatically over the last decade, with global estimates of 67% of children 1 year below the age of
primary school enrollment attending some form of pre-primary education (UNESCO, 2016). Pre-
primary education is now available in almost all countries, although with varying levels of govern-
ment investment and oversight (Anderson, Raikes, Kosaraju, and Solano, 2017). Community-based
and home-based preschools are common in many parts of the world (Rao, 2014), and can provide an
important supplement and complement to formal, government-run pre-primary settings. State provi-
sion of preschool is sometimes associated with lower functioning in later life, for example, in India
(Singh and Mukherjee, 2017), but sometimes with higher functioning (Rao, 2014). A key question is
how to blend care and education to support child development and family functioning (OECD, 2015),
especially for those most at risk of adverse outcomes due to poverty, family background, and other
factors. In high-income countries, questions of blending care and education have been recognized
and addressed, with many countries moving in the direction of creating more holistic and integrated
models of care and education. However, in low- and middle-income countries, pre-primary education
may not be a sufficient form of nonparental care, with only a few hours of education daily. Moreover,
pre-primary education is available only to the highest income children, or those living in urban areas.
Effects on Children’s Development

Global dialogue on young children’s development has shifted toward preparing children for school,
in response to evidence on the low levels of academic achievement and stark inequities in learning
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that emerge later in life (UNICEF, 2012b). Research conducted synthesizing many studies using
meta-analyses suggests that pre-primary education can have a profound and positive impact on
child development (Rao, Sun, Chen, and Ip, 2017). For example, one of the largest longitudinal
studies of child development, the Young Lives study, indicates that engagement in early child-
hood education can substantially improve children’s well-being and school functioning over time
(e.g., Ethiopia; Woldehanna, 2011), findings that are consistent with results from many other parts
of the world. In low-income countries in particular, any access to early childhood education can
have positive impacts on children’s development and readiness for school by increasing young
children’s exposure to cognitively stimulating activities and interactions (Rao et al., 2012). None-
theless, there is a need for more research on the impact of childcare on children’s development,
specifically the role of typical, nonparental care with little explicit intention to improve children’s
school readiness.
Variable Elements in International Contexts

Inequity in access and quality of pre-primary education is a central concern for young children
in almost every country, with greater disparities in access to quality early childhood settings in
some countries over others (UNESCO, 2016). However, little work has looked systematically across
countries to clarify which elements of quality are important for children’s development, regardless
of context. Recent efforts have attempted to identify common elements of quality across settings
and found consistencies in conceptualizations of quality among researchers and experts from many
parts of the world (UNESCO, UNICEF, Brookings Institution and World Bank, 2017), but these
concepts have not yet been systematically evaluated for relevance across countries through empiri-
cal studies. Studies are now being initiated in several countries to examine the scientific and policy
relevance of these concepts across countries and, critically, to evaluate the elements of quality in pre-
primary settings that are associated with child learning and development. Results from these studies
will build on the small but growing body of evidence suggesting that there are, in fact, elements of
quality that may promote children’s learning across contexts. For example, Montie, Zongping, and
Schweinhart (2006) found that structural elements of quality showed inconsistent associations with
child outcomes, but four classroom elements, including autonomy in children’s choices and time in
non-whole-group settings, were predictive of quality across settings. This work, not yet replicated in
many countries, suggests that there are elements of quality that may emerge as being central to chil-
dren’s development across contexts. Several countries have developed models with unique elements
that have been shown to promote children’s development in many ways (e.g., the Reggio Emilia
approach in Italy; Edwards, 1993). Given the interest in quality pre-primary education that is emerg-
ing in many parts of the world, high-quality research is now needed to determine which elements
of quality are applicable across countries and how quality in pre-primary affects children’s learning
and development over time.
Summary of Childcare/Early Education in Non-U.S. Countries

As is true in the United States, childcare/early education throughout the world is an important and
fast-growing sector, due to maternal employment worldwide. Developed countries and some devel-
oping countries have become involved in providing access to care and in supporting quality in these
efforts. However, particularly in the developing world, access to quality care and even appropriate and
well-developed standards for care are inconsistent, although there is currently tremendous interest.
Research on effects on children is in early stages in the developing world, but the knowledge base
about programs and effects on children in the developed world provides important contributions to
a knowledge base on childcare/early education.
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Child Welfare as Nonparental Caregiving in the United States

The public child welfare service system in the United States is a continuum of programs and services
available to children and their families, who are at risk of abuse or neglect or who have experienced
abuse or neglect. Accordingly, the main goal of the child welfare system is to protect children from
maltreatment by their parents or other caregivers. Child welfare systems vary from state to state in the
United States, composed primarily of public agencies such as family and children’s services and other
social services departments. To provide services, state or county agencies often work with private
child welfare agencies which are required by law to ensure the safety, well-being, and permanent liv-
ing arrangements of children. Passage of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA),
originally enacted in 1974 and most recently amended in 2010, established the National Center on
Child Abuse and Neglect, which provides federal funding for prevention, assessment, investigation,
and treatment planning/activities (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2011).
An essential component of child welfare service is foster care, which is temporary, 24-hour home-
based care provided by an unrelated caregiver or family member other than the parent. The main
goal of the child welfare system is to protect children from maltreatment by their parents or other
caregivers. When parents and caregivers cannot or do not meet the safety and emotional needs of
their children, the system aims to promote permanency for children initially through family pres-
ervation and reunification. They also aim to place children with other families who can meet their
long-term safety, developmental, and emotional needs in a permanent, legal family (Berrick, Needell,
Barth, and Jonson-Reid, 1998). Thus, the goal is to return children to their homes as soon as possible
or to achieve a permanent solution with another family, such as adoption, when retuning home is
not possible.
However, the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 shifted the emphasis from reunification to
child safety, and limits were imposed on how long children remain in the foster care before parental
rights are terminated. This shift allowed states to remove children from homes with chronic or severe
maltreatment more quickly.
Prevalence of Placements in Child Welfare Settings in the United States

An estimated 428,000 children in the United States were in foster care on a given day during the
2015 fiscal year (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2017). This was the largest number since 2008,
after a nationwide decrease from 2005 to 2012, at which time the number of children in the foster
care system started to steadily increase (Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2017). Again, foster care as
defined in the Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R., 2012) is the “24-hour substitute care for chil-
dren placed away from their parents or guardians.” Children may enter the United States foster care
system from infancy up to age 18, but depending on the state, children may remain in foster care until
age 19, 20, or 21. Children 1–5 years old make up the largest percentage of children in foster care
(33%). Not surprising, the youngest children have been found to be most vulnerable to abuse and
maltreatment (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (U.S. DHHS), 2017). During their
first year, children are at the greatest risk of victimization and maltreatment; 24.2 per 1,000 children
experienced reported maltreatment in the national population (U.S. DHHS, 2017).
The primary goal for the majority of children (55%) in the U.S. foster care system is reunification
with their parents or primary caregiver (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2017). Other goals
include adoption (25%), emancipation (4%), long-term foster care (3%), guardianship (3%), and liv-
ing with other relatives (3%). Emancipation applies to minors below the age of majority and those
who age out of the foster care system between the ages of 18–21 (Child Welfare Information Gate-
way, 2017). During the 2015 fiscal year, 243,060 children exited the foster care system, and nearly
half (45%) of those children were reunited with their parents or primary caregivers (Child Welfare
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Information Gateway, 2017). Outcome statistics for the remaining children exiting the foster care
system included 22% adopted, 9% emancipated, 9% living with a guardian, 6% living with another
relative, and 2% with other outcomes (e.g., transfers to other agencies, runaways, and death; Child
Welfare Information Gateway, 2017).
Forms of Child Welfare in the United States

Foster care providers are trained and licensed by their state of residence, and requirements of licens-
ing and training vary from state to state. Children may be placed in foster care for a variety of rea-
sons, including abuse or neglect, serious emotional disturbance, or disability. Placing a child in foster
care occurs by a short-term voluntary agreement with the child welfare agency, helping the family
to strengthen, and operating a family-based approach. Children may move among a variety of set-
tings while in foster care; common foster care placement settings may include nonrelative or relative
family foster homes, kinship care (whether payments for care are made or not made), group homes,
emergency shelters, residential homes, childcare institutions, or pre-adoptive homes.
According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (U.S. DHHS, 2016), nonrelative
family foster care homes (45%) were the primary placement settings for children in foster care, fol-
lowed by relative or kinship foster family homes (30%), institutional care (8%), group homes (6%), trial
home visits (5%), or pre-adoptive homes (4%); the remaining 2% of children had either run away or
were in supervised independent living. The number of children living in relative foster homes is up 6%
from 2006, but still does not meet the number of children residing in nonrelative family foster homes.
Family Foster Care

Children in family foster care homes temporarily live with and are cared for by relative or nonrela-
tive adults who have been approved and licensed by their state to provide shelter and care (Child
Welfare Information Gateway, 2017). Foster parents are trained and credentialed to serve as family
foster care providers. Family foster care parents volunteer to provide family living arrangements for
foster children to ensure that children have a safe, stable opportunity for family and community liv-
ing. Family foster care provides the support and services necessary for children who are removed or
separated from their families, ideally until family reunification or adoption. Another form of family
foster care is treatment foster care, also called therapeutic foster care, which provides more services
and greater structure than a traditional family foster care home. Treatment foster care is often utilized
as a cost-effective alternative to residential treatment facilities when children are needing extra medi-
cal, behavioral, and/or mental health supports.
Kinship Care
Kinship care may take the form of informal, voluntary, or formal arrangements. Informal kinship care
refers to arrangements made by parents and other family members/friends without governmental
or agency involvement. Advocates of kinship care argue that placing children with relatives or kin
as close as possible to the birth home, family, and community helps to provide continuity which is
a critical component of a child’s well-being. However, children reported to child welfare are highly
likely to live in impoverished neighborhoods, and the benefits of placement in a permanent foster
setting in a less disadvantaged neighborhood may outweigh the advantages of a child being able to
remain in his or her home community with kin and friends ( Jonson-Reid, 2004).
During informal kinship care, parents may leave their child(ren) with a relative during an illness,
if unable to care for them, or if they are sent overseas (e.g., for military duty). Legal custody remains
with the parents, and they may take their children back at any time. Informal kinship care providers
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may have difficulty making decisions for children related to medical care, schooling, or accessing
benefits such as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), as they do not have legal cus-
tody of the child. However, most states have consent forms that provide informal kinship providers
some authorization over decisions for a child, but the only assistance program typically available to
informal kinship caregivers is child-only Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF).
Voluntary kinship care arrangements are like that of informal care in which children live with
relatives or friends, but in this type of arrangement a child welfare agency is involved. Children may
be placed with relatives by the court system, but the state does not take legal custody. Children may
be placed with kin in cases of abuse or neglect by the parents, but there may be insufficient evidence
for the court to remove legal custody. The child’s living arrangements will generally be determined
and made among service agencies, parents, and kin. Parents may be more likely to agree to informal
voluntary kinship placement to prevent child welfare agencies’ taking legal custody of their child.
Formal kinship care arrangements are those in which children are placed in the legal custody of
the state by the court system and the welfare agency places children with kin. Working with the
family, the welfare agency makes legal decisions about the children, including medical care, housing,
and school attendance. Parents may be allowed visits arranged through the welfare agency. Formal
kinship care providers must be certified or approved foster parents and are afforded the same rights
as nonrelative foster parents.
Institutional Care and Group Homes

According to the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (U.S. DHHS, 2012a),
institutional care is a facility which provides 24-hour childcare and/or treatment for children who
have been removed or separated from their parents or guardians and require a group living arrange-
ment. Similar to institutional care, a group home is a licensed or state-approved 24-hour care facility
that provides for children in a small-group setting. Often, group homes accommodate anywhere
from 7 to 12 children at a given time. Institutional or group-care facilities may include childcare
institutions, residential treatment centers, or maternity homes (U.S. DHHS, 2012a).
Trial Homes
Trial home placement refers to an arrangement for a child who has been in the foster care system,
but is returning to a parent or guardian for a “limited and specific” amount of time (U.S. DHHS,
2012a). This placement is used as a strategy for reunification when a parent or guardian has made
significant progress on their out-of-home placement plan and the child is deemed by the court to
be safe in returning to their primary caregiver. The child welfare agency and court system continue
to monitor progress to further develop familial strengths and coping strategies as well as assisting in
utilizing community supports to keep the child from reentering the foster care system.
Pre-Adoptive Homes
Pre-adoptive homes are home in which the adults in the homes intend to adopt the child who has
been placed with them. The family may or may not be receiving state funding or an adoption subsidy
to care for the child (U.S. DHHS, 2012a).
Effects on Children
Nonparental caregiving, as is true for parental caregiving, renders children susceptible to a host of
developmental outcomes. Whereas one of the ultimate goals of child welfare is to foster children’s
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well-being and change the trajectory of their development for the better, some forms of child welfare
can pose potential risks to children. This section provides a brief overview of seminal work on child
development in child welfare as well as U.S.-based findings on child outcomes drawn from nation-
ally represented samples.
The National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being (NSCAW, 2001), led by the Chil-
dren’s Bureau of the Administration on Children, Youth and Families, was designed to examine
the characteristics, experiences, and outcomes of children and families who come in contact with
the child welfare system. It is the first national longitudinal study of its kind, and in its baseline year,
involved 6,231 children ages birth to 15 from 97 counties across the United States who were placed
in out-of-home care between December 1998 and February 1999. After a year, data on child func-
tioning were collected from teachers, caregivers, and the children themselves (e.g., Child Behavior
Check List-Teacher Rating Form, Battelle Developmental Inventory, Children’s Depression Inven-
tory). The home environment and caregiver’s well-being were also assessed. NSCAW reported that
children in out-of-home care frequently have impairments in their social and cognitive functions,
possibly as a result of abuse and/or neglect at home that precipitated their placement in the welfare
system (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children, Youth and
Families, 2001). The survey found that 28% of the children in the group scored below national
means in reasoning and academic skills, and 24% of the 2- to 3-year-old group and 51% of the 4- to
18-year-old group scored higher in internalizing and externalizing behaviors compared to a norma-
tive sample. The report also found that children in nonkinship foster care were much more likely to
report depression compared with children in kinship care. Unfortunately, these children continued
to manifest these disadvantages whether they remained in foster care, with researchers noting that
the child’s condition at the time of placement was the best predictor of child outcomes in welfare
(Kerman, Wildfire, and Barth, 2002).
Negative Outcomes
A report on NSCAW II Wave 3 sample composed of 4,448 children 34 months to 20 years showed
that children in foster homes had higher tendencies to develop behavioral and emotional problems
compared with their child welfare peers living at home with their parents or in informal kin care
(Casanueva, Tueller, Smith, Dolan, and Ringeisen, 2014). The report also revealed that children
living in residential programs (e.g., in-group home) were at higher risks of having behavioral and
emotional problems than children in other nonparental care settings. Two studies (Chamberlain and
Reid, 1998; McDonald, Allen, Westerfelt, and Piliavin, 1996) showed that compared with children
in foster care, children and youth who were placed in group care were more likely to be susceptible
to future life challenges, such as early and unplanned parenthood, homelessness, and conflict with the
law (Kerman et al., 2002).
Different findings also emerged for children who were adopted and those who stayed in foster
care. Although youth who remained in foster homes were found to eventually become self-sufficient
adults, children who were adopted earlier in their lives tended to have better outcomes as adults
(McDonald et al., 1996). Advantages for adopted children may be attributed to the likelihood that
adopted children tend to live in affluent neighborhoods, with more permanent and dedicated car-
egivers (Lloyd and Barth, 2011), compared with children who were continuously in foster care or
even those who returned to their homes. Long-term or prolonged foster care has also been related
to a multitude of developmental disadvantages, even after controlling for poverty and caregiver skills
(Lloyd and Barth, 2011).
Alumni of foster care also have more mental health problems in adulthood compared with par-
ticipants who had never been in foster care (Lenz-Rashid, 2005). Attachment theory is essential
here. As foster care placements tend to be temporary, the development of a stable child-caregiver
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relationship is disrupted (oftentimes, more than once), limiting children’s chances of having a secure
base that is known to facilitate future positive outcomes. These findings suggest that (1) although the
child welfare system aims to fill in the weaknesses of inept parenting and serve as a conduit to better
living conditions, it may not fully achieve its intended positive effects on children, and (2) aside from
children’s condition at the onset of welfare, varying characteristics and dynamics of each care context
have specific pathways by which they influence developmental outcomes. With these, child welfare
agencies put permanency planning goals in place. The Children’s Bureau, which oversees matters
related to child welfare, provides funding to states to help facilitate the timely placement of foster
children. The Bureau also provides incentives and awards to states, local agencies, and private organi-
zations that greatly assist in moving children from foster homes to adoptive homes, as improvements
in child welfare are continuously sought.
Positive Outcomes
Although negative child outcomes are often associated with placement in child welfare services, non-
parental care bears positive contributions to children’s development as well. For example, children
who have been in foster care for 1 year were found to talk more frequently about their personal and
school issues with their primary caregivers compared with their counterparts in the general population
(U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children, Youth and Families,
2001). High-quality, specialized intervention programs can help curb negative outcomes associated
with nonparental care. Foster children who participated in Head Start scored higher in various cogni-
tive and school readiness measures (e.g., letter/word recognition, basic math skills, spelling compared
with their non-Head Start child welfare counterparts (Lipscomb, Pratt, Schmitt, Pears, and Kim, 2013).
Merritt and Klein (2015) found parallel results establishing that high-quality early care and education
programs can serve as a protective factor in language development, especially for children who suffer
from neglect. Studies of child welfare children in quality care and education show that the quality of
program and care can extend the benefits of child welfare and offset its inadequacies. It remains, how-
ever, that more studies are needed that systematically define and operationalize quality and identify the
extent by which children in welfare utilize early childhood care and education programs (Klein, 2016).
Variable Factors
A number of factors contribute to variability in child welfare in the United States, above and beyond
variability in types of placements and time in foster care. Child welfare in the United States is com-
plex. Problems surrounding soaring expenses from out-of-home care, serving the client populations,
and managing large caseloads are dilemmas for many states, all of which can influence the services
the child receives (Brooks and Webster, 1999).
There is variability in family engagement in programs and with their children while children are
receiving services. The involvement of child welfare services in family life may include parent educa-
tion, parent engagement, counseling services regarding mental health/alcohol or drug abuse, housing,
and/or childcare. In addition, many service agencies have expanded their programs to include not
only biological family members, but also kinship primary caregivers and other caregivers involved in
a child’s life (Altman, 2008; Brooks and Webster, 1999; Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2016;
Kemp, Marcenko, Hoagwood, and Vesneski, 2009).
Family services also improve caregiver functioning by examining family demographic factors
and determining risk levels and channeling families toward preventive and community-based ser-
vices. Family services in relation to child welfare may include childcare, financial guidance, legal aid,
emergency housing, food assistance, parent education and parent support groups, home visitation,
transportation, job support, and mental health counseling (Rajendran and Chemtob, 2010).
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Child outcomes may be affected by the organizational climate in child welfare systems. Greater
understanding is needed regarding the mechanisms that link organizational climate to child out-
comes (Glisson and Green, 2011) as well as about other variable elements and children’s outcomes.
Summary of U.S. Child Welfare

Child welfare in the United States involves out-of-home care for children to protect their safety
and well-being, consistent with a child rights perspective. The end goal is a form of permanency
in care for the child, starting with the child’s own family but also including adoption as a perma-
nence option. Major representative studies, conducted in multiple waves, and funded by the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services have identified a number of developmental deficits that
children in the child welfare system are vulnerable to, likely emanating from care deficits and abuse/
neglect prompting their entry into the system initially and from challenges in forming and maintain-
ing secure and nurturing relationships with adults. Children who achieve permanency, including
those adopted, seem to fare better than those in long-term foster care, and those in residential set-
tings such as group homes do not seem to consistently fare as well as those who are in foster homes,
but it is difficult to generalize across the diverse and far-ranging circumstances that children in child
welfare experience. That said, there is no doubt that children who require the protection of child
welfare in the United States are also among the most vulnerable children in the country. Protective
functions from intervention programs, such as Head Start, and newer efforts vary elements of care to
learn more about optimizing outcomes for children.
Child Welfare in Non-U.S. Countries

Next, we focus on nonparental caregiving in the international context. Throughout the world,
families experience wide-ranging circumstances that result in the need for nonparental caregiving of
a child, including death of one or both parents due to disease (e.g., HIV/AIDS), prolonged armed
conflict, natural disasters, or displacement due to physical or mental disability, persistent poverty,
political disruptions, violence and abuse, and child exploitation. Also, cultural norms and practices in
some regions of the world oblige parents to send their children to other adult caregivers (usually kin)
in the hopes of better educational opportunities or to provide help to family members.
Prevalence of Child Welfare in the International Context

Estimating the number of children living outside of parental care worldwide is difficult. In 2012,
UNICEF estimated there were 153 million children worldwide who had lost a parent (UNICEF,
2012a), 17.8 million children who had lost both parents (UNICEF, 2012a), well over 2 million chil-
dren who had been placed in institutional care (UNICEF, 2009b), and in 2005, up to 100 million
children on the streets (UNICEF, 2005). Other estimates project that 163 million children worldwide
do not live with a biological parent (Groza, Bunkers, and Gamer, 2011; The Leiden Conference, 2012).
The Convention on the Rights of the Child highlights fundamental tenets in formulating the
best structures for children outside parental care. The CRC recognizes that children embedded in
a family environment have the best chance of developing their full potential, with their parents and
legal guardians as their primary caregivers. If a child is temporarily or permanently deprived of his
or her parental connection, kinship and family care are the preferred forms of care, and the child is
entitled to protection and assistance by the State, which includes assurance of appropriate alternative
care (United Nations General Assembly, 1989). In 2009, the United Nations adopted a resolution
delineating guidelines (hereafter, Guidelines) for alternative care for children deprived of parental
care (United Nations General Assembly, 2010).
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Alternative care includes a continuum approach starting with family support and reunification,
kinship care, foster care, domestic adoption, or formal institutional care. Under the Guidelines, there
are two major forms of alternative care—informal and formal (Roby, 2011), which will be reviewed
with focus on the child welfare systems of low- and middle-income countries (LMIC).
Informal care is defined as a private arrangement within a family environment, whereby the child
is cared for on an ongoing or indefinite basis by relatives or friends (i.e., informal kinship care), at
the initiative of the child, his or her parents or other persons, and without the order of an adminis-
trative or judicial authority. Formal care is defined as all care provided in a family environment that
has been arranged by an administrative body or judicial authority (i.e., foster care) as well as care in
a residential environment (i.e., residential care and institutional care). The Guidelines state that the
desired alternative care for children is in family-based settings, be it kin or nonkin, informal or formal
(Dozier et al., 2014), with institutional care being a last resort option. Described next are the different
types of informal and formal care, the prevalence of each type, and what is known about the effects
of each type of care on children’s development.
Forms and Prevalence of Child Welfare

in Low- and Middle-Income Countries
Kinship Care
For children who have lost one or both parents, informal kinship care is the most common form
of alternative care in LMIC and has been documented in many regions including, but not limited
to, West Africa (Gottlieb, 2004), Oceania (Barlow, 2004), Latin America (Van Vleet, 2009), and
indigenous communities in North America (Strong, 2001). Kinship care encompasses the nurtur-
ance and protection of a child, full-time, by someone other than the parent and who is within the
family network or has a significant prior relationship with the parents (Groza et al., 2011). The care
arrangement can be informal or formal. Informal kinship care is a private arrangement between
family members, not governed or monitored by an administrative body. Formal kinship care is when
the familial arrangement and care is authorized or ordered by a judicial authority (e.g., formal foster
family care and adoption, which will be reviewed later).
In some areas in the world such as Africa, it is a normative cultural practice for children to leave
their biological parents and be in the care of an extended family (Edwards, Ren, and Brown, 2015).
Children may stay with the related family for a considerable time in pursuit of a better education,
to become familiar with urban life, to be an apprentice, or to offer companionship care and shared
labor to extended family members (Lancy, 2008). For example, in sub-Saharan Africa, kinship care of
this form is a traditional system of sharing child labor and opportunities for schooling and 8–40% of
children partake in this extended family care (Serra, 2009; UNICEF, 2007b).
It is very difficult to determine the global prevalence of informal kinship care because it often
exists without a formal tracking system and the information that is available is a patchwork of loca-
tion-specific research. Of children not living with a parent in Central and Eastern Europe, 30–50%
are in kinship care (Every Child, 2005; Save the Children UK, 2007). The prevalence of kinship care
is much higher in other areas of the world such as Africa, especially in countries affected by AIDS,
where up to 90% of children not living with a parent (living or deceased) are living with kin (Roby,
2011). The burden of parental death from AIDS is greatest in southern Africa. For example, 20% of
all Zambian children were orphans in 2005, over half of them due to AIDS, leaving a population of
11.7 million to support more than 1.2 million orphans (UNICEF, 2006). Overall, in sub-Saharan
Africa, an estimated 12 million children have been orphaned due to HIV/AIDS and related diseases
(UNICEF, 2006). In high HIV-affected countries, extended families assume responsibility for more
than 90% of all orphans, with grandparents providing primary care for orphans about 40–60% of the
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time. In lower prevalence countries, the rate of grandparent care is likely to be 20% to 40% (Roby,
2011). In some cases, when both parents have died and other adult caregivers are not available,
orphaned children live in a child-headed household (CHH). Global numbers of CHHs are difficult
to obtain; however, some country-specific data are available. In the Rakai District of Uganda, almost
1,000 CHHs existed, with each household averaging 2.3 children, and 31% of those children were
between the ages of 0 and 9 (Luzze and Ssedyabule, 2004)
Formal Foster Care

Formal foster care is a form of alternative family care where children who are not able to live with
their own parents or extended family are placed in a family by or with the approval of a government
authority (United Nations, 2010). The foster family agrees to provide care and nurturance (tempo-
rary or long term) to the child, to foster his or her socioemotional, physical, educational, and spiritual
development. Formal foster care typically involves an assessment of the foster family and sometimes
includes continuing support and monitoring. Adapted care such as specialized foster family care is
designed for children with special needs (e.g., a child with HIV/AIDS or psychiatric disorders), and
temporary foster care is used when an emergency or crisis arises and the child requires temporary
care (Groza, Bunkers, and Gamer, 2011).
Higher resource countries have systems in place that provide and support foster family care. How-
ever, in LMICs (i.e., Africa and Southeast Asia), formal foster care systems do not exist or are at the
initial stages of implementation (Browne et al., 2005). As a result, institutionalized care is the only
option for children who have no family or community arrangements.
There are no global estimates for the total number of children living in formal foster family care
(Engle et al., 2011). Foster care data are available in most of the industrialized world but in few
low-resource countries (Browne et al., 2005). South Africa is one of the few African countries with
a strong, government-run foster care system. In 2010, there were 500,000 children in care, with a
backlog of over 160,000 applications for children waiting for foster care because of limited human
and financial resources (Engle et al., 2011). Many low-resource countries have begun the processes
involved in creating formal foster family systems. For example, Romania began a foster family system
around 2000, and Guatemala’s government-run foster care system began in 2006, although a change
in political leadership in 2008 halted the consensus work on Guatemala’s goals (Engle et al., 2011).
Institutionalized Care
In contrast to kinship care, institutional care is a residential home or facility where children live and
are cared for by the facility’s staff, and is usually provided and regulated by the government. In most
countries, nongovernmental and religious organizations also provide institutional care. The United
Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the UN Guidelines on the Alternative Care
of Children provide the rights-based framework from which specific programming elements should
be included for children in institutional care. These include the right of children to assessment, case
management, the integration of children with disabilities to receive fair treatment and access, the
right to education, the right to play, the right to cultural identity, and the right to participate in
decision-making (United Nations General Assembly, 2010).
Estimating the number of children in institutional care globally is very difficult. Estimates range
from over 2 million (UNICEF, 2009a, 2009c) to 8 million (Save the Children, 2009) children who
reside in institutions. Accurate counts are elusive because many countries do not report the num-
ber of children in residential or institutional care. For example, in the Eastern and Southern Africa
region, UNICEF found that only two of six countries had any data related to the number of children
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in institutional care and the number of institutions operating in their country (UNICEF, 2009d).
For countries that provide data, these data may underestimate the overall population of children
in institutional care because governments may want to appear in-line with international children’s
rights. Sometimes governments may reclassify institutions to decrease their numbers. In Bulgaria,
for example, in its effort to join the European Union, some institutions were classified as boarding
schools (Carter, 2005).
One of the most predictive factors of children entering institutional care is living in a single-
parent household. The second is the death of one or both parents, and in Africa, this is most com-
monly from AIDS (Dunn and Parry-Williams, 2008). Physical or mental disability also increase
children’s likelihood of institutional placement. In Central and Eastern Europe, a child with a dis-
ability is 46 times more likely to be placed in institutional care than a child without disabilities (Inno-
centi Research Center, 2003). Children from socially marginalized groups, ethnic minorities, and
those living in a violent or abusive family are at a higher risk of institutional care (Pinhiero, 2006).
Children enter institutions not only because of family circumstances but also because a system to
preserve and strengthen families is nonexistent, underdeveloped, or ineffectual. Many countries lack a
coherent alternative care child welfare system that includes adequate gatekeeping to redirect children
to more appropriate care options (Bilson, Fox, Gotestam, and Harwin, 2003). Gaps in the continuum
of care include a lack of preventative interventions such as basic family support services and assistance
programs, lack of documentation and case tracking, failure to recognize children’s rights to appropri-
ate care, and a lack of belief that institutional care should be the last option all contribute to children’s
placement in institutions (Engle et al., 2011). However, when formal family foster care and strong
adoption programs are nonexistent or underdeveloped, the de facto option is institutionalized care.
Effects on Children’s Development

Studies of children’s developmental outcomes when in institutional care and comparisons of out-
comes of children living in foster care versus institutional care are reviewed.
Kinship Care
Kinship care intends to preserve contact with siblings and the extended family network and may
help decrease the distress of relocation and grief of losing a parent (Roby, 2011). A large family can
be beneficial because it comprises a larger pool of people who may be culturally obligated to assist
the child. There is positive evidence that kinship care is advantageous to the child. One of the most
clearly established findings is that degree of biological relatedness is an important predictor of the
quality of care given to children in Uganda (Bishai et al., 2003).
Informal kinship care is beneficial in many regards, but it can also place children at risk for
exploitation (Groza et al., 2011). Living with an extended family provides no guarantee of a child’s
protection or well-being. Poverty-stricken parents may place their children with wealthier relatives
for an apprenticeship or educational opportunities; however, in some cases, the children are made to
do long hours of menial work instead of apprenticeship or educational activity (Leinaweaver, 2014).
For example, of Haitian children living in households headed by someone other than their parent(s),
16% had been placed as child servants, and 22% more were being treated as child servants even
though they were relocated to attend school (Roby, 2011). Other potential risks related to kinship
care include poverty due to overextension of the hosting household, which has been linked to poor
outcomes in school enrollment, separate from orphan status (Ainsworth and Filmer, 2006). Health
and nutrition disparities, disparate treatment within the household, lack of legal status, and psycho-
logical stress are also risks encountered within kinship care (Roby, 2011).
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Formal Foster Care/Institutional Care

Evidence of the effects of formal foster care on children’s development is often based on one study
in Bucharest, Romania (Fluke et al., 2012), which is also considered a test of institutional care. In
this study, children were randomly assigned to a foster care system or remained in institutional care.
Generally, children up to 8 years of age in foster care had better developmental outcomes when
compared with those who remained in institutional care (Ghera et al., 2009; Johnson et al., 2010),
especially the children who were placed in foster care at younger ages (Nelson, Bos, Gunnar, and
Sonuga-Barke, 2011).
Institutional Care
Nonparental, residential, and institutional caregiving renders children susceptible to a host of devel-
opmental outcomes. Whereas one of the ultimate goals of child welfare is to foster children’s well-
being and change the trajectory of their development for the better, different forms of welfare pose
potential risks to children. Although much of what is known about the effects of child welfare is
based on U.S. findings, there is some evidence that risks of entering a system where children are
separated from their parents are compounded in countries with high rates of poverty where quality
and caregiving conditions are often compromised. This section outlines the various effects of welfare
on child outcomes particularly in the context of developing societies.
Effects on Socioemotional Development

Children in institutional care such as orphanages have been found to experience emotional prob-
lems. Aside from the trauma that children have experienced that necessitated them to be in the
welfare in the first place, some children live through other adverse circumstances while in welfare.
A case in point is an orphanage in Tanzania where children received severe corporal punishment
and physical maltreatment from untrained and undereducated caregivers (Hermenau et al., 2011).
Sustained exposure to violence is linked to children’s greater internalizing and externalizing behav-
iors, particularly aggression, even after controlling for the effects of psychotherapy, in the context of
sub-Saharan Africa (Hermenau, Hecker, Elbert, and Ruf-Leuschner, 2014). Moreover, these negative
effects were exacerbated for children who entered the orphanage at an early age (Hermenau et al.,
2014). An exception to this is an orphanage in Mexico where children demonstrated a positive self-
concept, higher self-esteem, and lower anxiety levels after a social and emotional skills intervention
program was conducted (Gallegos, Rodríguez, Gómez, Rabelo, and Gutiérrez, 2012).
Different child welfare systems also have different effects on children’s socioemotional develop-
ment. A study in the Kurdistan region found that although there are similarities in terms of exter-
nalizing problems and symptoms related to post-traumatic stress disorder between orphaned and
fostered children, children in the orphanage display poorer outcomes (Ahmad et al., 2005). The fam-
ily structure present in foster care may serve as a protective factor for children, whereas a setup at an
orphanage (e.g., if there are rigidly scheduled activities, several children placed in one room) may not
be entirely conducive for children’s positive development. Children in orphanages in Egypt also have
lower self-esteem and high rates of anxiety and depression (Fawzy and Fouad, 2010). This finding is
attributed to how orphanages are somehow separated from the outside world, which may preclude
children from establishing healthy social relationships. Similar findings in orphanages in India are
supplemented in that children orphaned by AIDS exhibit more depression symptoms than children
for other reasons (Kumar, Dandona, Kumar, Ramgopal, and Dandona, 2014). It is plausible that the
stigma and discrimination associated with AIDS, together with possible experiences of bullying and
untoward treatment from relatives, prompted differences in depression scores (Kumar et al., 2014).
430
Effects on Cognitive Development

The quantity and quality of cognitive stimulation also impact the development of children in wel-
fare. Research findings are mixed. For example, a China-based study reported that children’s school
grades have improved given the close supervision, support, and motivation that orphanage workers
provide to children (Zhao et al., 2009). However, a comparative study conducted by Morison and
Ellwood (2000) revealed that orphaned children in Romania were outscored by never-institutional-
ized children and early-adopted children in various cognitive measures, including the Stanford-Binet
intelligence test. Aside from genetic influences, these findings can be attributed to the varying levels
of stimulation children receive in orphanages versus early-adoptive versus noninstitutionalized set-
tings. Children who experience chronic stress and early deprivation in Romanian orphanages also
show long-term deficits in expressive and receptive language, concentration, and sustained attention
(Chugani, Behen, Muzik, and Juha, 2001). Overall, these children score below the average range in
global cognitive index.
Variable Elements
Countries worldwide have some form of continuum of care for children living without their par-
ents, ranging from informal, unregulated kinship care to formal systems such as foster family care and
institutional care supported and regulated by the government to formal adoption. The composition of
the continuum of nonparental childcare widely varies, particularly between high- and low-resource
countries. High-resource industrialized countries are moving from informal care to predominately
government-supported, formal family-based foster care (kin or nonkin), with institutional care being
the option of last preference. Lower resourced countries depend more heavily on informal, kin-based
arrangements for alternate family care. When there are no family options available to a child, many
developing countries do not yet have child welfare systems in place that offer formalized foster care
or family support systems, resulting in the only option of institutional or orphanage care. Strong
evidence shows that low-quality institutional care can be detrimental to children’s development (van
IJzendoorn, Luijk, and Juffer, 2007).
However, the emergence of professional child welfare systems incorporating a robust continuum
of care, including family fostering options, in some low- and middle-income countries suggests
that reliance on institutionalization can be reduced and outcomes improved for vulnerable children
(Csaky, 2009; Zeanah, Smyke, Koga, and Carlson, 2005). Nonetheless, the quality of care is important
regardless of setting, and children in family or kinship contexts experiencing abuse, neglect, violence,
or severe malnutrition will not necessarily experience better developmental outcomes compared
with children in established and operated institutions providing high-quality services in the com-
munity (Fluke et al., 2012).
Summary of Child Welfare in Non-U.S. Countries

Worldwide, many millions of children are displaced from their families with estimates ranging, but by
all accounts exceed 150 million. By tenets of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which has
been ratified by most countries in the world, these children are entitled to nonparental caregiving,
although worldwide estimates of availability and adequacy of child welfare homes for these children
are difficult to obtain. Kin care is the most common form of care for these children on a continuum
from informal kin care to formal institutionalized care. Research on child outcomes from this system
is sparse with studies of institutionalized care the most prevalent. Children in institutionalized care,
with at least one exception in China, demonstrate that institutionalized children are vulnerable to
compromised developmental outcomes.
431
Helen Raikes et al.
Conclusion
The current chapter addresses nonparental care in two distinctly different circumstances, when par-
ents are working but children are residing at home (referred to here as childcare/early education)
and when children do not reside with their parents (referred to here as child welfare). In each case,
focus is on the United States, and then the chapter takes a wider view, concentrating on at least
some other countries toward a more worldwide perspective. In the latter cases, the emphasis has
fallen more predominantly on low- and middle-income countries. Childcare/early education is a
fast-growing sector, due to high prevalence of maternal employment in the both the United States
and worldwide. In the United States, several decades of studies document the positive advantages of
high-quality childcare/early education, for all young children but particularly for low-income chil-
dren vulnerable to pervasive achievement gaps at school entry. Findings have led to rapid expansions
of public childcare/early childhood education expenditures at both federal and state levels, and to
increased efforts to further refine the characteristics of quality to augment positive outcomes. States
and communities have also invested in at-scale standards and ratings systems to raise the overall qual-
ity of services. Worldwide and especially in the developing world, efforts to expand access and focus
on quality are underway.
Children who are displaced from their homes in the United States and worldwide are univer-
sally vulnerable, and the prevalence of children displaced worldwide is in the hundred millions,
although rights to care are guaranteed through the Convention on the Rights of the Child, ratified
in most countries, but not in the United States. Child welfare systems are somewhat in place, more
universally in the United States and the developed world, and less comprehensively in the develop-
ing world. Kinship systems, informal and formal, are the most prevalent ways of providing children
nonparental care. Outcomes for children in the child welfare systems have ranged from dismal to less
than desirable but are influenced by variable factors, such as type of care, family support, and when
and how permanency of child placement in their own homes or an alternative permanent home is
attained. Outcomes have been improved by supplementary early intervention program involvement.
Finally, of interest is how nonparental and parental care jointly affect children’s development to
paint a whole-child view of the child’s early development. The National Institute of Child Health
and Human Development (NICHD) Study of Early Care (2005) demonstrated that the parental
component carries greater variance for children’s developmental outcomes than nonparental care.
However, the contribution from the nonparental component is also consequential, ideally, is com-
plementary, and, in some cases, can be compensatory. Crucial is to eliminate nonparental care that is
harmful, which is possible when that care is harsh, abusive, inconsistent, or of poor quality. Put more
positively, of interest worldwide is how to build on the knowledge base so that nonparental care pro-
vides the stimulation and sensitive nurturance now well known to support the early development of
children, thereby helping to optimize outcomes during periods of fastest child growth.
Acknowledgments
The authors acknowledge the assistance in investigating references of Anna Burton and Yao, gradu-
ate students, Department of Child, Youth and Family Studies, at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
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PART II
Becoming and Being a Parent

13
INTERGENERATIONAL
TRANSMISSION OF PARENTING
Introduction
It is often assumed that parenting is passed down through the generations; that is, all things being
equal, parents treat their children the way their parents treated them. Despite the intuitive appeal of
hypotheses about intergenerational (IG) continuity or stability in parenting, rigorously evaluating
these questions is surprisingly difficult. Equally challenging are tests of critical corollaries of these
hypotheses, including questions about which parenting behaviors are transmitted and when and
how this occurs. Such information will guide prevention development as it offers clues regarding IG
discontinuity or instability in parenting and for identifying for whom and under what circumstances
such shifts occur (Belsky, Conger, and Capaldi, 2009). That is, the field may use research findings
to answer both how individuals with adverse or suboptimal parenting histories can be assisted in
providing a healthier rearing environment for the next generation and, relatedly, how individuals
who experienced high-quality parenting can retain positive capacities for rearing their own children.
Until recently, the majority of data available to address these questions was not adequate for the
task. In their review of the IG maltreatment literature—a subset of IG parenting research that was an
early focus of interest—Thornberry, Knight, and Lovegrove (2012) lamented the methodologically
weak evidence base and noted that studies with weaker designs have reported the strongest effects.
To address the biases of retrospective reports of parenting experienced in the family of origin and to
increase understanding of the transmission of parenting, research teams and funders have invested in
a small number of prospective IG studies across the last 30 years. These studies have followed cohorts
of youth (identified as “generation two” or G2) and their parents (G1) as G2 developed from child-
hood to adulthood, and then assessed the generation three (G3) offspring of G2, often across similar
developmental periods.
Drawing on these studies, this chapter focuses on cross-generation transmission of parent-
ing directed toward children (e.g., warm, supportive behavior, discipline). Some parent behavior
(e.g., substance use, intimate partner violence) that is not directed toward the child nevertheless
affects children’s behaviors, including their later parenting (Bailey, Hill, Oesterle, and Hawkins, 2009;
Camacho, Ehrensaft, and Cohen, 2011; Kerr, Capaldi, Pears, and Owen, 2012). However, these
parental behaviors are outside the scope of this chapter except when shown to mediate or moder-
ate IG parenting transmission. Additionally, applying the terminology described by Bornstein, Put-
nick, and Esposito (2017) to IG studies, this chapter primarily concerns stability and instability in
parenting across generations, as captured by correlations between parents’ and children’s parenting
443
behaviors (i.e., similarities in rank ordering across generations). Except where noted, IG continuity
and discontinuity—which denote similarities and differences in mean levels of behaviors across two
or more generations—have not been tested in this field.
This chapter is organized as follows. First is a review and discussion of historical factors that
may affect IG associations in parenting and how they have been studied. Second, theoretical
perspectives guiding IG research are reviewed. The third and most detailed section pertains to
empirical findings on IG associations in parenting, mechanisms (mediators) of stability, and factors
(moderators) that attenuate IG stability or are associated with instability, including a special focus
on IG transmission issues pertaining to mothers and fathers. Given the significant limitations of
retrospective studies of parenting and the strengths and advantages of fully prospective IG designs,
the present review is primarily focused on the findings from these latter studies. As such, a fourth
section of this chapter details the many strengths, limitations, challenges, and promises of prospec-
tive IG designs, including examples from the Oregon Youth Study (OYS; of G1 and at-risk G2
boys) initiated in 1984, and OYS-Three-Generational Study (OYS-3GS of G2 and G3) initiated
in the early 1990s. The chapter concludes with a discussion of promising future directions for
theory and research.
Historical Considerations in Intergenerational Parenting Research

There are long-standing beliefs that aggression and abuse experienced from parents in the family of
origin are the cause of similar parental behavior toward children in the family of procreation (Gar-
barino and Gilliam, 1980; Thornberry and Henry, 2013). Until relatively recently, IG transmission of
other aspects of parenting (e.g., positive parenting; Kerr, Capaldi, Pears, and Owen, 2009) were less
of a focus. A key historical change affecting studies of IG transmission of abusive parental behaviors
is that views regarding physical discipline and the acceptability of specific types of physical discipline
have changed, as has the prevalence of such discipline. For example, physical discipline with an object
(e.g., a cane or paddle) was relatively common in the United States (where most three-generational
studies are based) both at home and in schools (where it is still expressly permitted in 15 states; see
Clark, 2017) yet may be considered abusive behavior by many. As discussed in Capaldi, Kerr, and
Tiberio (2017), in the late 1960s, 94% of parents viewed spanking as an acceptable form of regular
discipline (Straus and Mathur, 1996), whereas by the 1990s, acceptability had fallen to 61% of parents
of young children (Yankelvich, 2000). Furthermore, in some times and places, it was relatively nor-
mative to give young children considerable freedom to roam the streets, which may now be consid-
ered neglectful. The prevalence of some of these parental behaviors has thus changed over time. Such
secular shifts in norms and attitudes resulting in changes in the prevalence of parenting behaviors
across cohorts should be taken into consideration when examining IG continuity and stability of
parenting practices using prospective developmental data.
A second major secular change affecting parenting is the increased participation of mothers in the
workforce. In 2016, 67.9% of married mothers with children under age 18 years were working or
looking for work—defined as labor force participation (United States Department of Labor, 2017).
The participation rate for mothers with children under 6 years of age was 64.7%. The proportion of
working mothers who had children under 18 years of age increased by close to 50% between 1975
and 2015, whereas that of mothers of children under 6 years of age increased by 64%. Thus, there has
been a large change in the situation of mothers, which incidentally coincides with the time period
covered by several IG studies (e.g., in the OYS-3GS, G2 sons were born around 1975). Along with
this change, there has been increased involvement of fathers in caring for children, increased interest
in fathering among researchers, and an emphasis on the importance of coparenting (Cabrera and
Tamis-LeMonda, 2013; McHale and Sirotkin, 2019; Palkovitz, Fagen, and Hull, 2013; Parke and
Cookston, 2019).
444
Intergenerational Transmission of Parenting
Numerous other historical changes also have affected the contexts and consequences of parenting,
including economic variations, both nationally and regionally. For example, boys in OYS-3GS G2
were born around 1975, when the timber industry—a major employer in the area where the families
lived—was strong in Oregon. However, as discussed by Mapes (2012), employment in that sector
experienced a major drop during the deep recession of the early 1980s and again following new
environmental restrictions on logging in federal forests in 1990. These employment changes caused
considerable economic hardship for OYS families. Similar kinds of economic shifts have influenced
the parenting contexts in other times, regions, and cohorts, including those sampled by other pro-
spective IG studies (e.g., G2 from the Family Transitions Project; Neppl, Conger, Scaramella, and
Ontai, 2009). Beyond the economic circumstances, other contextual changes affecting parenting and
its consequences include changes in the acceptability and availability of substance use—specifically,
decreases for tobacco and increases for marijuana (Caulkins, Hawken, Kilmer, and Kleiman, 2012;
Cerdá et al., 2017; Johnston, O’Malley, Miech, Bachman, and Schulenberg, 2017). Additionally, teen
pregnancy and birth rates have decreased due, in part, to increases in contraceptive use (Santelli and
Melnikas, 2010). Such changes may have an impact on the real and perceived “stakes” of parental
monitoring, for example, and thus how different generations approach parenting.
Also impacting modern parenting is the rise in parents’ and children’s media exposure and use
of social media and electronic communication devices. These present parenting challenges—such
as parental distraction from children’s needs, reliance on devices to occupy or mollify children,
balancing “screen time” with physical and social activity, and supervision (e.g., monitoring sites vis-
ited, being aware of cyberbullying; Barr, 2019; Radesky et al., 2016; Sanders, Parent, Forehand, and
Breslend, 2016). On the positive side, such technology also increases possibilities for parental moni-
toring and involvement, such as checking on a child’s physical location from afar, tracking homework
completion on school websites, or texting to keep in touch when teens are away from home. Despite
these secular changes, many of the core concepts and skills related to parenting may be fundamentally
similar. For example, parental involvement is a core concept and may occur via several modes includ-
ing in-person and electronic communication.
A historical issue that relates to IG research approaches rather than to parenting itself is that most
studies of cross-generation associations in parenting conducted prior to the past 20 years relied on
adults’ retrospective reporting of the parenting they experienced in their family of origin, rather
than assessment at the time it occurred. Retrospective reporting is prone to recall and reporting bias,
particularly among those who have depression or other psychopathology, and is subject to rationali-
zation of poor behavior (Capaldi, 1996; Patten, 2003; Thornberry, 2009). For example, parents may
rationalize that they are not abusive toward their children in comparison to how harshly they were
treated as a child. These issues were compounded by the fact that it was usually the same person
who reported on their parents’ behavior toward them in childhood and their parenting of their own
children in the family of procreation. More recently, a limited number (due to costs and other chal-
lenges of long-term longitudinal studies) of prospective three-generational studies have offered more
rigorous designs. Although many IG study teams have focused primarily on transmission of risk
for problems such as substance abuse (Bailey et al., 2009; Henry and Augustyn, 2017; Kerr, Tiberio,
and Capaldi, 2015), they also have used their powerful methodologies to include examination of IG
parenting processes.
Theoretical Explanations of Intergenerational Associations
Genetic and Other Biological Theories

There are several potential biological mechanisms of IG parenting transmission. In terms of genetic
influences, twin studies indicate that both warmth/responsiveness and control dimensions of
445
parenting are heritable, with the former yielding higher heritability estimates (Oliver, Trzaskowski,
and Plomin, 2014). An alternative conceptualization of these dimensions found that it was the nega-
tive forms of each dimension (e.g., hostility and physical discipline) that are more heritable than the
positive forms (e.g., closeness and firm/calm discipline; Oliver et al., 2014). Research on molecular
genetics indicates the inheritance of behavior is more complex biologically than initially supposed
(Plomin and Davis, 2009), and most traits and behavior tendencies are affected by multiple genes
and by genotype-environment transactions or interactions (Plomin and Davis, 2009). For example,
Beaver and Belsky (2012) found prospective associations between negative parenting experienced by
adolescents and the stress they later felt when parenting their own children were stronger for those
with more alleles thought to confer plasticity or susceptibility to environmental influences. These
findings are consistent with Ellis and colleagues’ (Ellis et al., 2011) discussion of differential sensitivity
models and the notion that children differ neurobiologically in their responsiveness to both nurtur-
ing and deleterious caregiving practices. Thus, differential susceptibility factors are relevant to the
strength of IG parenting transmission.
Several types of gene-environment associations that have been elaborated (Knafo and Jaffee, 2013;
Scarr and McCartney, 1983) are relevant to IG parenting transfer. Transmission of parenting can
occur, in part, because G1 parents pass on heritable traits to G2 that are associated with the formation
of particular rearing environments in the current and subsequent generation (passive gene-environ-
ment correlation). Evocative gene-environment correlation occurs if heritable child characteristics
elicit particular parenting responses that impact development and adjustment (e.g., poor inhibitory
control, negative affect, antisocial behavior, social competence) into adolescence and early adulthood.
Such characteristics or aspects of adjustment are, in turn, known to be key predictors of later parent-
ing and indeed are primary mechanisms of IG parenting transfer (Neppl et al., 2009). In general,
prospective IG parenting studies have integrated genetic and biological endophenotype measure-
ments into their models only to a limited degree (Masarik et al., 2014); however, they have been
influenced by these theories and evidence. For example, several IG studies have considered whether
G3 temperament or other characteristics predict the parenting that G2 enacts with them or helps
explain or disrupt G1-G2 parenting transmission (Kerr, Capaldi, et al., 2009; Scaramella and Conger,
2003; Tiberio et al., 2016).
There also is support for nongenetic biological mechanisms of IG parenting transmission. Moth-
ers’ childhood maltreatment experiences are associated with pre- and postnatal differences in devel-
opment of the brain and other systems in their offspring that may contribute to IG stability of
maltreatment (see Buss et al., 2017; Moog et al., 2017). Additionally, endocrine-based pathways may
be involved in the IG transmission of parenting. For example, Bos (2017) noted that insensitive car-
egiving may lead to epigenetic alterations of genes related to the expression of oxytocin. Decreased
sensitivity to oxytocin may have impacts on children’s capacities for empathy and emotion regulation
that, in turn, are relevant to their social development and ultimately their responsive caregiving of the
next generation. Bos (2017) also reviewed evidence that harsh parenting hastens puberty, and earlier
testosterone surges are related to disinhibition and poor impulse control that, after the transition to
parenthood, are associated with insensitive parenting. In light of developing theory regarding these
pathways, it will be important to adapt further the models and measurement approaches of IG par-
enting studies to include both biologic and social influences and their interfaces.
Attachment Theory
Turning to psychological theories, attachment theory indicates parenting behaviors that contribute
to insecure, secure, and disorganized attachment are transmitted across generations. For example,
children whose parents are unresponsive, rejecting, or abusive may become insecurely attached to
them (Cummings and Warmuth, 2019; Egeland and Sroufe, 1981; Schneider-Rosen and Cicchetti,
446
1984) and develop an insecure attachment representation that is maintained into adulthood (van
IJzendoorn, 1995). If they have not resolved this insecure attachment by the time they become
parents—the theory goes—they will be more likely to enact similar behaviors they have inter-
nalized (unresponsive, rejecting, abusive) toward their own offspring (Main and Goldwyn, 1984).
Although there is limited fully prospective research on this topic, at least one such study has reported
an IG association in observed disorganized attachment (Raby, Steele, Carlson, and Sroufe, 2015).
Regarding positive attachments, it is thought that children who experienced sensitive parenting can
develop into parents with secure (autonomous) attachment representations. Such parents promote
secure attachment in their own children by more quickly and accurately detecting and responding
to attachment signals, thus perpetuating these parenting behaviors across generations. Despite the
persistence and appeal of this model, meta-analyses (van IJzendoorn, 1995; Verhage et al., 2016)
indicate that although there are cross-generation similarities in attachment, sensitive parenting does
not adequately explain them, which also calls into question the theory that attachment explains IG
stability in these parenting behaviors.
Social Learning Theory

The predominant, although not mutually exclusive, theory regarding IG associations in parenting
is social learning theory. In terms of direct pathways, social learning theory indicates that children
acquire parenting behaviors from their parents through modeling and social reinforcement. Then,
when individuals become parents, they generalize from their childhood behavioral learning histories,
or they recall explicit episodic memories of how they were treated by their parents, and enact similar
behaviors with their own children (Garbarino and Gilliam, 1980; Patterson, 1982). For example, for
one parent, the learned repertoire of how to deal with problematic child behavior might be to scold
and spank, whereas for another parent, it might involve structuring the situation to avoid problem
behavior (e.g., providing coloring books and crayons so their child will not be bored in a restaurant).
Social learning theory also predicts indirect transmission pathways. Specifically, the IG transfer of
harsh and negative parenting may occur via coercive relationship dynamics such as parents’ and chil-
dren’s mutual reinforcement and escalation of each other’s aversive behaviors (Snyder, 2016). These
experiences socialize children to use aggressive methods to get their way in a variety of situations
outside the home and may lead them in adulthood to recreate high-conflict family contexts (Roth-
enberg, Hussong, and Chassin, 2016) and repeat coercive processes with their own children (Dishion
and Patterson, 2016; Thornberry, Freeman-Gallant, Lizotte, Krohn, and Smith, 2003). Thus, tests of
social learning models of IG parenting transmission often consider the development of stable G2
characteristics that are negative (e.g., antisocial behavior, depression) or positive (e.g., social compe-
tence, educational attainment) as conduits linking negative or positive parenting across generations
(Neppl et al., 2009; Patterson, 1998; Rothenberg, Hussong, and Chassin, 2017).
Contextual Stability
Stability in contextual factors across generations also contributes to stability in parenting. Fam-
ily Transitions Project researchers (Conger and Donnellan, 2007; Neppl, Senia, and Donnellan,
2016; Schofield et al., 2011) have elucidated how stressors related to socioeconomic status (SES)
are contextual factors that impact family functioning and perpetuate parenting across generations.
They posit a dynamic, interactionist model of SES influences on development (social causation)
and individual characteristics affecting SES (social selection). For example, Schofield and colleagues
(2011) found that positive characteristics (e.g., social competence) of G2 in adolescence predicted
their later SES, parenting, and family characteristics that were related to the positive development
of G3. Similarly, Bailey et al. (2009) found IG associations between G1-G2 and G2-G3 families’
447
sociodemographic risks (unmarried parent, low education, high neighborhood disorganization, and
poverty), even accounting for IG stability in harsh parenting and externalizing. Such models high-
light how IG stability in social context, individual adjustment, and parenting are intertwined.
Integrating Theories of IG Transmission: Dynamic

Developmental Systems Approach
An overarching theoretical approach, the Dynamic Developmental Systems (DDS) model is based in
a life‑course perspective and focuses particularly on social influences across the life span—including
parental influences—but encompasses the interplay and continuous feedback of influences at mul-
tiple system levels—including individual characteristics (e.g., temperament/personality; Ganiban,
Ulbricht, Saudino, Reiss, and Neiderhiser, 2011), contextual factors, and biological as well as social
influences (Capaldi, Kim, and Pears, 2009; Dishion, Andrews, and Crosby, 1995; Dishion and Owen,
2002; Poulin, Kiesner, Pedersen, and Dishion, 2011). The DDS approach (Capaldi, Kerr, and Tiberio,
in press) builds on developmental-contextual and life-span approaches that emphasize the interac-
tion between the individual’s prior dispositions and learning and the environments that she or her
selects or in which she or he is placed (Cairns and Cairns, 1995; Capaldi, Dishion, Stoolmiller, and
Yoerger, 2001; Caspi and Elder, 1988; Coie et al., 1993; Dishion and Patterson, 1997; Hetherington
and Baltes, 1988; Rutter, 1989). Building on the tradition of life-span theories, the DDS approach
accounts for (1) systems (including intraindividual) and their interfaces; (2) social interaction units of
critical importance at differing developmental stages, including parent-child, child-peer, and roman-
tic-partner dyads; (3) the importance of social influence on behavioral outcomes, including (a) the
developmental risk that each member of the dyad (or group) brings to the interaction and their
developmental stage and (b) social influence specific to the outcome behavior of interest (e.g., the
influence of a partner’s parenting and risk behaviors on a parent’s behaviors); and (4) the importance
of stability and change in risk contexts at all developmental stages. The DDS model also encom-
passes biologic systems, although assessment of these factors in most IG studies is indirect (e.g., tem-
perament, neurocognitive testing, pubertal timing). Further integration of biological hypotheses and
measurement in IG studies is needed.
A key aspect of the DDS approach that has been applied to IG studies of interrelated adolescent
problem behaviors (delinquency, substance abuse, school failure, and health-risking sexual behaviors)
is the importance of both general and outcome-specific systems and risks (Capaldi, Stoolmiller, Kim,
and Yoerger, 2009; Kendler, Gardner, and Dick, 2011; Zucker, Boyd, and Howard, 1995)—for exam-
ple, deviant peer affiliation is a general risk factor for a range of problem behavior outcomes, whereas
parental tobacco use may confer some risk that is specific to child tobacco use. This framework also
can be applied to IG parenting transmission. For example, stabilities in a host of negative parenting
behaviors from G1 to G2 may occur through impacts on G2 adolescent behavioral maladjustment (a
general pathway involving a general outcome and mediator), whereas the IG transmission of physi-
cal discipline practices may occur, in part, through the transfer of beliefs about spanking (a specific
pathway).
Central Issues in Intergenerational Parenting Transmission

These theoretical foundations inform work on three primary issues regarding IG associations in
parenting. First, a major research focus concerns a descriptive understanding of IG transmission of
parenting and answers: (1) To what extent are there IG similarities in parenting behaviors? and (2)
Through what processes or mechanisms is parenting transmitted? A second focus considers fac-
tors that strengthen, nullify, or even reverse associations between the parenting enacted in adjacent
generations. This interest in moderation emerged because initial findings from prospective studies
448
indicated IG associations were relatively modest and likely subject to considerable moderation, and
because identifying moderators of IG parenting transmission should have implications for health pro-
motion (sustaining positive parenting) and prevention (disrupting negative parenting). Third, identi-
fying differences between mothers and fathers in terms of the previous questions is a central focus of
IG research. That is, what experiences in the families of origin and procreation (including partners’
parenting) influence their parenting?
Descriptive Understanding of Intergenerational Parenting Transmission

A number of rigorous studies using diverse samples and measurement strategies (see Conger, Belsky,
and Capaldi, 2009) support significant associations between the parenting enacted by G1 toward G2
and that shown later by G2 parents toward G3. Before reviewing the domains of parenting for which
there is evidence of IG stability and the mechanisms by which it occurs, we briefly discuss transmis-
sion pathways IG parenting researchers typically consider.
Types of Transmission Pathways
SPURIOUS ASSOCIATIONS SECONDARY TO OTHER TRANSMITTED FACTORS
As shown in Figure 13.1 path A, parenting behaviors may be an expression of G1 traits that are her-
itable or otherwise transmitted to G2 parents, who, in turn, express these traits in similar parenting
behaviors. For example, if poor parenting is primarily a reflection of depression within each genera-
tion and depression is heritable, then parenting in each generation may not be causally connected.
Similarly, as depicted in Figure 13.1 path B, child characteristics (e.g., poor inhibitory control) that
are partially heritable may elicit similar parenting behaviors (e.g., harsh and coercive) in each gen-
eration. Furthermore, these paths are not mutually exclusive and could work in concert (e.g., fussy
toddlers may be more likely to evoke harsh parenting from depressed parents). Thus, it is reasonable
to ask whether the apparent transmission of parenting may simply reflect the transmission of other
conditions. As such, IG parenting studies routinely include controls such as antisocial behavior in
each generation (Kerr, Capaldi, et al., 2009), child IQ, and family SES (Kovan, Chung, and Sroufe,
2009; Shaffer, Burt, Obradovic, Herbers, and Masten, 2009), and positive and negative child disposi-
tional characteristics (Neppl et al., 2009).
G1 G2
Adult A Adult
Characteristics Characteristics
G1 G2
Parenting Parenting
G2 G3
Child Child
Characteristics B Characteristics
Figure 13.1 Spurious correlations between parenting in two generations
449
DIRECT TRANSMISSION MECHANISMS INCLUDING SPECIFIC AND GENERAL ASPECTS OF PARENTING
As shown in Figure 13.2 path A, direct IG transmission routes may apply to specific aspects of
parents’ behaviors, knowledge, or beliefs that are learned and modeled. For example, a father may
recall being spanked as a boy when he told a lie, and may spank his child in a similar situation. Much
transmission, however, is expected to involve learning general approaches or styles of parenting that
are applied in various parent-child interactions that transcend context and developmental stage.
Thus, G1 positive affect and interest during a discussion with a G2 adolescent may stem from stable
parent-child relationship qualities that for G2 adults become manifest in their warm responsiveness
with a G3 toddler during a challenging clean-up task. Similarly, G1 parental monitoring of their G2
teens’ physical whereabouts might be expected to be associated with G2 parents’ monitoring of G3’s
social behavior online. Many IG studies have examined the transmission of a cluster (e.g., a latent
factor) of related parenting behaviors (Figure 13.2, path B) such as the warm-responsive-stimulating
parenting considered by Belsky, Jaffee, Sligo, Woodward, and Silva (2005). Some parenting behaviors
(e.g., spanking) may be partially transmitted via a general pattern of parenting (e.g., mood-dependent
discipline) and partly via more specific transmission pathway (e.g., explicit memories, cultural beliefs).
A relevant concept here is the degree to which IG parenting associations show homotypic or
heterotypic stability. The concept has been applied to the expectation that G1 antisocial behavior
might be associated with G2 antisocial behavior (homotypic) as well as G2 harsh parenting (hetero-
typic) outcomes (Thornberry, 2016). The idea can also be applied to the IG transfer of particular
forms of parenting. For example, if G1 spanking is associated with G2 spanking (homotypic) and
poor G2 monitoring (heterotypic), this latter pathway would be suggestive of indirect rather than
direct (modeled or recollected) mechanisms. Relatedly, Neppl et al. (2009) found G1-G2 stabilities in
harsh and positive parenting that were distinct from one another (i.e., homotypic). They did not find
evidence that, for example, G1 harsh parenting was negatively associated with G2 positive parenting,
which might have indicated stability across heterotypic behaviors. Such findings suggest differential
mechanisms of IG transmission in addition to supporting the validity of the measures and constructs
in question (i.e., harsh parenting is not just the absence or reverse of positive parenting).
INDIRECT OR MEDIATED TRANSMISSION MECHANISMS
The parenting that adults experienced in childhood influences their adjustment (e.g., social com-
petence, depression, conduct problems), life course histories (e.g., arrest, premature transition to
parenthood, advanced education), and contextual stress and support (e.g., socioeconomic status, peer
relationships, intimate relationship conflict). As shown in Panel A of Figure 13.3, these biopsycho-
social consequences of parenting experienced in the family of origin may be potent determinants
of the parenting they enact in the family of procreation. Thus, an important thrust of IG trans-
mission research has concerned indirect transmission mechanisms by which G2 characteristics and
experiences—typically measured in adolescence—partially or fully mediate the link between their
A
X X
G1 B G2
Y Y
Parenting Parenting
Z Z
Figure 13.2 Transmission of specific (A) and general (B) parenting behaviors
450
G2
Positive
Adjustment
G1 G2
Parenting Parenting
G2
Maladjustment
3a: Mediation:
G1 G2
Parenting Parenting
G1 G2 G3
Moderators Moderators Moderators
3b: Moderation:
Figure 13.3 Mediation and moderation of intergenerational transmission of parenting
parents’ behavior toward them and their later parenting of G3. In the next section, findings on the
IG transmission of aspects of parenting are reviewed, followed by consideration of mechanisms of
stability.
Research Findings on Intergenerational Transmission of Parenting
INTERGENERATIONAL TRANSMISSION OF NEGATIVE PARENTING
Studies of IG transmission of negative aspects of parenting have ranged from examining family con-
flict and harsh and inconsistent discipline to clearly abusive and destructive behaviors. The opera-
tional definitions or assessments of family conflict and poor or harsh discipline tend to be similar
(e.g., anger and shouting, although conflict is assessed for “family members” and discipline is assessed
for parents); thus, findings from these studies are reviewed within the same section. Studies of harsh
discipline also have similarities to studies of abusive parenting, particularly as practical difficulties in
collecting information on abuse—which typically must be reported to authorities—has led some
researchers to focus on behaviors below thresholds considered abusive to minors. Overall, there is
evidence for transmission of the many forms of negative parenting.
Several studies have used multi-informant and multi-method designs to study negative parenting.
Bailey et al. (2009) found modest IG stability in harsh parenting based on G1 behaviors with G2
early teens (mean age of 13 years) and G2 parenting of G3 (mean age of 9 years). Capaldi, Pears, Kerr,
and Owen (2008) examined IG transmission of poor discipline (e.g., mood-dependent discipline,
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poor follow-through, spanking). They found that G1 mothers’ and fathers’ poor discipline of G2 boys
during late childhood showed a modest association with G2 men’s poor and harsh discipline of G3
at ages 2–3 years. A direct effect remained even after accounting for several risks in the G2 family of
procreation (G2 substance use and antisocial behavior, early fatherhood, lower SES, and G2 mothers’
poor and harsh discipline), many of which were predicted by G1 poor parenting.
A small number of studies have examined observed rather than reported parental behavior. In one
study, angry aggressive parenting during structured parent-child interactions was assessed in two gen-
erations (Conger, Schofield, and Neppl, 2012), and a moderate association of such parental behavior
was found between G1 behavior toward G2 (during G2 adolescence) and G2 behavior toward G3
(when G3 was preschool age). Similarly, Hops, Davis, Leve, and Sheeber (2003) found a prospective
IG association between observed G1 (in late adolescence for G2) and G2 (in early childhood for G3)
aggressive parenting (defined as disapproving, threatening, argumentative statements, and aversive
affect during discussion, play, and clean-up tasks).
Work on family conflict also is relevant to IG transmission of negative parenting. Rothenberg
et al. (2016) examined IG stability in high-conflict family environments (including parent-child
conflict), using a prospective design, where G1-G2 conflict was assessed when G2 was age 14 years
on average and G2-G3 conflict when G3 was age 12 years on average. Both parents and children at
each time point completed a family conflict scale (e.g., We fought a lot in our family). Conflict was
associated across generations overall, but was stronger for G2 women and not significant for G2 men.
The IG transmission of the most extreme, negative forms of parental disengagement (neglect) or
of angry and punitive parenting (physical and emotional maltreatment) has been studied in several
prospective studies (Thornberry and Henry, 2013). Pears and Capaldi (2001) found that if one or
both G1 parents self-reported a childhood physical maltreatment history (e.g., injuries from disci-
pline), then the G2 men were in early adulthood more likely to report having experienced physical
maltreatment from their parents in childhood. The authors ruled out a number of mechanisms, as the
IG association was not fully mediated by G2 difficult characteristics in early childhood or childhood
SES, or G1 early transition to motherhood, psychopathology, or consistent discipline. Additionally,
G1 parents who were most severely maltreated (physical acts and multiple injuries) showed the high-
est level of maltreatment of G2, whereas moderately severely maltreated G1 parents (physical acts
and one injury) did not differ from less severely maltreated or non-maltreated G1 parents in their
physical maltreatment of G2.
Widom (1989) did not find support for the IG cycle of abusive violence hypothesis in their study
of adults who, according to official records, had been physically maltreated or neglected prior to age
11 years; these individuals were no more likely to be arrested for child abuse or neglect in adulthood
than were other adults. However, Thornberry et al. (2012) noted that arrests have limitations as an
indicator for testing IG continuity in maltreatment because child maltreatment is typically man-
aged through child welfare referral rather than through arrest. Their later study (Thornberry and
Henry, 2013) utilized records of substantiated incidents of maltreatment and found that such abuse
and neglect of G2 through age 17 years indeed predicted G2 perpetration by early adulthood (age
33 years). In general, however, it is rather difficult to draw specific conclusions about IG associations
in parenting from the cycle of maltreatment literature that focuses on official incidents of maltreat-
ment. Such studies often collapse across neglect and different forms of abuse, including sexual abuse,
because they co-occur and are too infrequently observed in community-based, cross-generational
samples of a moderate size to be examined separately. Also, whereas neglect and physical maltreat-
ment may be considered as the extreme ends of parenting continua (e.g., that “neglect” includes
inadequate supervision and less than fully conscientious care), sexual abuse is qualitatively different
and not considered parenting.
In a study that distinguished among types of maltreatment, Widom, Czaja, and DuMont
(2015) examined documented maltreatment that the G2 individuals in their long-term study had
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experienced in childhood and later perpetrated against their children (G3). Neglected G2 children
were more likely in adulthood than controls to have a child protective service reported case for
neglect of G3 (17.8% versus 9.5%), failure to provide (8.8% versus 3.6%), or lack of supervision
(14.7% versus 8.2%) and to self-report neglect (42.7% versus 29%). In contrast, physically maltreated
G2 were not significantly more likely than controls to have a physical-abuse report toward G3 (5.6%
versus 5.4%) or to self-report this behavior (31.7% versus 23.9%). Additionally, there were not sig-
nificant differences between these G2 physically maltreated or neglect groups relative to controls on
G3 reported physical maltreatment or neglect.
Overall, there is substantial evidence of cross-generation transmission of negative parenting, from
conflictual to abusive or maltreating. As discussed by Thornberry et al. (2012) in their review, most
studies of IG transmission of maltreatment have significant design flaws, many of which would be
remedied using prospective data. In addition, further work is needed on the role of mothers and fathers
in IG transmission of negative parenting and maltreatment—as well as on specific forms of maltreat-
ment, including physical maltreatment, neglect, and emotional and psychological maltreatment.
MEDIATORS OF IG TRANSMISSION OF NEGATIVE PARENTING
Several IG studies began by examining social learning pathways linking antisocial behavior across
generations via poor parenting (Patterson, 1998). These examinations provided groundwork for IG
parenting research on whether the development of antisocial behavior at least partially mediates the
association of experiencing harsh or poor parenting in the family of origin and using such parental
tactics toward offspring in the family of procreation. Most studies support this model (Belsky et al.,
2009; Thornberry et al., 2003), with some important exceptions (Bailey et al., 2009).
After finding evidence of IG transmission of harsh and positive parenting, Neppl et al. (2009)
considered whether the transmission might be explained by the tendencies of children with positive
or negative dispositional characteristics to elicit supportive or harsh parenting practices, respectively.
Although there were effects of G3 characteristics on G2 parenting, Neppl et al. found these charac-
teristics did not fully account for the G1-G2 parenting associations. Similarly, Bailey and colleagues
(2009) did not find G1-G2 stability in harsh parenting to be better explained by G1 contextual vari-
ables such as parental violence or sociodemographic risk that co-occurred with their harsh parenting.
In Hops and colleagues’ (2003) study of observed aggressive parenting, G1 to G2 associations
were fully mediated by G2 aggressive behavior in adolescence. Similarly, Capaldi, Pears, Patterson,
and Owen (2003) found that associations between G1 poor parenting when G2 boys were ages
9–12 years and G2 fathers’ poor parenting of G3 during early childhood (mean of 22 months) were
partially mediated through higher levels of G2 antisocial behavior during adolescence, although a
direct parenting path remained. Extending this model, Capaldi et al. (2008) examined factors in G2
men’s families of procreation that were associated with their antisocial behavior and that might have
influences on their poor and harsh parenting. In addition to the persistence of a direct influence
from G1 poor and harsh parenting, it was G2 partners who had clear and independent influences on
G2 men’s parenting. Specifically, G2 mothers’ antisocial behavior and poor parenting were uniquely
associated with G2 men’s parenting. Although mediation was not explicitly tested, the study high-
lights the potential importance of assortative partnering in the perpetuation of poor parenting across
generations.
Rothenberg and colleagues (2016) also examined adolescent problem behavior as a mechanism of
IG stability in family conflict as well as partner influences. G2 adolescent girls’ externalizing behav-
iors mediated associations between high-conflict family environments in G1 and G2. In addition,
G2 externalizing at older ages (20 and 26 years) did not contribute to the indirect effects linking
the two generations. However, in a separate model, adult G2 externalizing symptoms of either the
target G2 parent (followed since childhood) or their G2 partner were found to perpetuate family
453
conflict across generations. Thus, even though the childhood histories of G2 partners are not directly
observed in most IG studies, the life course consequences of these experiences for the G2-G3 family
of procreation may be evident.
Substance use and depression are further individual risk mechanisms that may contribute to simi-
larities in parenting across generations. With regard to the former, Bailey et al. (2013) tested three
alternative hypotheses regarding the association of adult drug use disorder and poor parenting: First,
that early adult substance use disrupts the transition to adulthood, resulting in poor adult functioning
and parenting practices; second, that relatively stable individual characteristics predict both substance
use and poor parenting; and, third, that experience of poor parenting during adolescence may predict
both later substance use problems and poor parenting. Findings supported the second hypothesis,
namely, that parent negative emotionality accounts for the association between early adult drug use
disorder and poor parenting. Limited support was found for the disrupted transition to adulthood
hypothesis, and the adolescent family process model was not supported. The findings suggest that
the contextual factor of substance use may not be causal of IG associations in parenting, but rather
an additional outcome of antisocial traits. However, further tests of such well-defined competing
hypotheses regarding the origins of IG associations in parenting are needed.
Regarding depression as an IG parenting transmission mechanism, associations in symptoms across
three generations have been documented (Pettit, Olino, Roberts, Seeley, and Lewinsohn, 2008), and
both mothers’ and fathers’ symptoms are associated with more negative and less positive parenting
(Wilson and Durbin, 2010). In particular, parents’ capacities for warmth, responsiveness, and involve-
ment may be undermined by depression, whereas irritability and withdrawal may be modeled as
behavioral responses to conflict. Thus, there are good reasons to expect (although little research on
whether) depression is a mechanism of IG parenting transmission. In one of the only prospective
IG studies of this issue, Rothenberg, Hussong, et al. (2017) found that associations of G1-G2 family
conflict with G2-G3 conflict were partially mediated by G2’s intervening depressive symptoms (and
independent of the externalizing pathway they reported in Rothenberg et al., 2016). More specifi-
cally, G1-G2 family conflict predicted G2 depressive symptoms in adolescence and young adulthood
that, in turn, predicted conflict in the G2-G3 family of procreation. In contrast, Pears and Capaldi
(2001) found that G1 parents who recollected they had been abused and who had the highest levels
of depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) scores were less likely to be abusive toward
G2 boys than were other G1 parents. The authors speculated that parents who are more affected by
depression and PTSD may be more withdrawn and, therefore, less likely to repeat the behaviors their
own parents had directed toward them. Taken together, these two studies raise the possibility that the
mediating (or moderating) role of depression may depend on its developmental timing and severity.
In models pertinent to both antisocial behavior and depression, Berlin, Appleyard, and Dodge
(2011) reported that mothers’ reports of being physically abused in childhood were associated with
increased risk to offspring of being maltreated (according to county records). The association from
mothers’ abuse histories was not explained by their histories of neglect or controls for maternal eth-
nicity, education, age, and income. Instead, it was fully mediated by mothers’ aggressive responses to
hypothetical vignettes about ambiguous/provocative interpersonal events. In a separate model, the
association was partially mediated by mothers’ social isolation. Thus, Berlin and colleagues’ (2011)
work suggested experiencing childhood physical abuse may put mothers at risk for seriously abusing
their own children by contributing to mothers’ social isolation and a tendency toward hostile attribu-
tions and aggressive behavior in general.
Finally, another process linking poor parenting across generations may be the cumulative contex-
tual risks individuals bring to the family of procreation. For example, in a study of multiple potential
mediators, Capaldi and colleagues (2008) found that G1 poor parenting of G2 fathers during late
childhood was associated with a number of family risks to G3 development—including G2 par-
ents’ premature transition to parenthood, low SES, and higher rates of antisocial and substance use
454
behaviors among G2 men and their partners. Some of these risks were associated with G2 fathers’
poor and harsh parenting during G3 early childhood but did not mediate the significant associations
between G1 and G2 in these negative parenting behaviors. In summary, most studies are consistent
with the pattern that negative parenting experiences in the family of origin contribute to the devel-
opment of broad forms of behavioral and emotional maladjustment by adolescence and associated
contextual risks into adulthood that, in turn, lead to the repetition of negative parenting in the family
of formation.
INTERGENERATIONAL TRANSMISSION OF POSITIVE PARENTING
A number of studies have documented G1-G2 stability in positive aspects of parenting and also
examined the positive aspects of G2 development and adjustment that might help explain IG trans-
mission (Chen and Kaplan, 2001; Kerr, Capaldi, et al., 2009; Shaffer et al., 2009). Specific forms of
positive parenting such as warmth and monitoring have been examined separately (Bailey et al.,
2009) or in the aggregate (Chen and Kaplan, 2001; Kovan et al., 2009). Additionally, some stud-
ies have modeled positive parenting separately from negative parenting (Bailey et al., 2009; Kerr,
Capaldi, et al., 2009), and other studies have examined both aspects simultaneously (Belsky et al.,
2005; Neppl et al., 2009).
In an early prospective study of positive parenting, Chen and Kaplan (2001) found associations
between seventh graders’ perceptions of being parented well (e.g., parental acceptance, consistent
discipline) and their enactment of constructive parenting (e.g., monitoring, communication, affec-
tion, positive discipline) with their own children approximately 20 years later. Next, examining
relationship-centered parenting constructs in a large Finnish sample, Savelieva, Pulkki-Råback, et al.
(2017) found that G1 parents’ reports of warmth, enjoyment, and acceptance of their G2 children
were associated with similar G2 reports 32 years later regarding G3. Shaffer and colleagues (2009)
found IG associations in parenting quality, which included positive expressed emotion, closeness,
consistent rules in G1 parenting of G2 adolescents, and parental involvement, efficacy, and compe-
tence in G2 parenting of G3.
A potential limitation of the previous studies was the examination of parenting of G2 or G3
individuals whose ages ranged quite broadly (e.g., ages 1–31 years in Savelieva, Pulkki-Råback,
et al., 2017). Bailey et al. (2009) narrowed this age range in their focus on the critical construct of
parental monitoring and found significant IG associations. Still, however, whereas monitoring of
G2 was measured at ages 13–14 years, their monitoring of G3 was measured at ages 6–14 years, a
developmental span across which monitoring may have very different meanings and consequences
(e.g., direct supervision of children at home versus tracking and awareness of teens’ associates and
whereabouts).
Other studies examined IG associations in aggregate measures of positive parenting of G2 and G3
at narrower child age ranges. First, Belsky and colleagues (Belsky et al., 2005; Belsky, Hancox, Sligo,
and Poulton, 2012) were perhaps most developmentally specific when they examined influences on
positive (warm-sensitive-stimulating) parenting by G2 parents toward their G3 3-year-olds. A num-
ber of G1 parenting behaviors when G2 children were in early childhood, middle childhood, and
early adolescence were considered as predictors of G2 parenting during observed structured interac-
tions with their G3 children. Accounting for G3 positive and negative behaviors, they found that G2
mothers’—but not fathers’—positive parenting was associated with similar parenting that they had
received at different developmental periods in childhood. For example, lower G1 authoritarianism
in early childhood, a more positive family climate in middle childhood, and stronger attachment in
early adolescence each uniquely predicted G2 warm-sensitive-stimulating parenting. Second, despite
a small sample size, Kovan et al. (2009) reported a robust association between G1 and G2 positive
parenting when G2 and G3 were ages 24 months. They observed parenting including parental
455
support, structure, positivity, and low hostility during a challenging laboratory task. Of note, and in
contrast to Belsky and colleagues’ (2012) work, G2 parenting of G3 was predicted by G1’s parenting
of G2 in early childhood but not in G2’s early adolescence even at the univariate level. Third, Kerr,
Capaldi, et al. (2009) found that interrelated forms of G1 “constructive” parenting—including con-
sistent, confident, warm, involved parenting and monitoring—experienced by G2 boys at the ages
of 9–12 years predicted their use of the developmentally analogous dimensions of parenting with
G3 at ages 2–3 years and also at 5–7 years. Fourth, Neppl et al. (2009) examined IG associations in
observed positive parenting behaviors (communication skills, active listening, and confident positiv-
ity) during structured parent—child interactions for G1 to G2 during adolescence and for G2 to G3
at preschool age. The IG association was significant, albeit low in magnitude.
In contrast, Chassin, Presson, Todd, Rose, and Sherman (1998) found limited evidence of IG
influences on positive parenting. G2 mothers’ (as adolescents) reports of G1 support were associated
with G2 mothers’ consistent discipline according to self- and G3 children’s reports and, in adjusted
models, to G2 mothers’ self-reported support with G3. Additionally, G1 strictness did not predict G2
support or consistent discipline. Overall, however, prospective studies using a variety of designs have
generally supported IG associations in positive parenting.
MEDIATORS OF POSITIVE PARENTING TRANSMISSION
With few exceptions (Raby, Lawler, et al., 2015; Savelieva, Pulkki-Råback, et al., 2017), IG associa-
tions in positive parenting have been found to be partially mediated by the intervening development
of G2 education and social competence in adolescence (Chen and Kaplan, 2001; Kerr, Capaldi, et al.,
2009; Neppl et al., 2009; Raby, Lawler, et al., 2015). Specifically, Chen and Kaplan (2001) found
support for a model by which good parenting experiences in the family of origin predicted the
enactment of constructive parenting in the family of procreation directly—perhaps via role-specific
learning—as well as indirectly by engendering in early adulthood good interpersonal relationships
with friends and family and engagement in conventional social institutions (e.g., education, profes-
sional, civic). Of note, positive adjustment pathways were not better explained by negative ones as
young adult psychological disturbances did not mediate IG transfer of positive parenting.
Kerr, Capaldi, et al. (2009) measured G1 positive parenting during late childhood for G2 and G2
parenting at two points in the early and middle childhood of G3. They found that the influence
of G1 positive parenting on G2 fathers’ early parenting of G3 was largely explained by G2 posi-
tive adjustment during adolescence, including their academic skills, positive peer relationships, and
self-esteem. This route to IG transmission also was independent of an adolescent problem behavior
pathway. That is, although G1 positive parenting discouraged G2 antisocial behavior in adolescence,
such G2 behaviors did not contribute to predictions of G2 men’s later positive parenting and did
not mediate IG transfer of positive parenting. Thus, positive parenting promotes healthy adolescent
adjustment, and it is these qualities—rather than simply the absence of behavior problems—that
appear to be linked with positive parenting of the next generation. Another important finding from
Kerr, Capaldi, et al. (2009) was that after accounting for effects of G1 positive parenting on G2 posi-
tive adolescent adjustment and parenting in early childhood for G3, G1 parenting had direct effects
on G2 parenting during middle childhood for G3. Thus, parenting experiences in the family of
origin may influence early parenting indirectly by setting the stage for adults’ successful launch into
the parent role (e.g., education, interpersonal skill, self-efficacy), but then again during later phases of
offspring development through additional mechanisms.
In contrast to tests of broad positive adjustment mechanisms of IG transmission, several studies
have considered more specific factors. Three of these concerned the formation of positive social
relationships as a bridge between positive parenting in the families of origin and procreation. Chen,
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Liu, and Kaplan (2008) highlighted G2 marital satisfaction as a mediating factor linking G2 construc-
tive parenting experiences in early adolescence and enactment of similar behaviors during middle
adulthood with G3. Next, Raby, Lawler, et al. (2015) found that G1 mothers’ observed sensitive
parenting of G2 across ages 3–42 months predicted age-32-years reports by G2 of their positive par-
enting beliefs and behaviors with G3 (range of ages). They then found support for a developmental
sequence by which social competence first with peers and then with romantic partners mediated
these IG associations. Next, Shaffer et al. (2009) found that the G1 parenting quality experienced
by G2 in adolescence predicted G2 parenting quality with G3 (across broad ages), in part by engen-
dering greater G2 social competence in emerging adulthood. Thus, Shaffer and colleagues’ (2009)
findings are consistent with the notion that G1 parenting quality improves the general interpersonal
functioning of adolescents and emerging adults. These pathways may reflect social learning mecha-
nisms: For example, parents model and reinforce prosocial and reciprocal relationships behaviors with
their child in the home that generalize to other contexts (e.g., peer relationships), are elaborated
across development and in intimate and other relationships (Chen et al., 2008; Raby, Lawler, et al.,
2015), and eventually extend to parenting of the next generation.
Another study specified education-related mediational processes, rather than aggregating educa-
tion with other factors. Neppl et al. (2009) found that G2 adult academic attainment partially medi-
ated IG stability in positive parenting, thus isolating education as an important social adjustment
pathway through which the IG transfer of positive parenting may occur. Raby, Lawler, et al. (2015)
did not present formal analyses of G2 educational attainment as a mediator of links between G1
maternal sensitivity and G2 positive parenting. However, the primary IG association and the indirect
pathways via social competence with peers and partners remained significant when it was controlled,
suggesting education was not a powerful mediator in this study.
G2 personality factors also have been tested as mediators of IG associations in positive parenting.
Shaffer and colleagues (2009) ruled out a mediation pathway involving “conduct and constraint”
and the possibility that general rule following and conscientiousness, rather than social competence,
might be the stronger explanation for IG stability in parenting quality. Shaffer and colleagues’ find-
ings dovetail with Kerr and colleagues’ (2009) conclusion that an antisocial behavior pathway did
not mediate G1-G2 positive parenting transmission. Savelieva, Pulkki-Råback, et al. (2017) also
tested G2 character and temperamental traits as mechanisms by which positive parenting may be
transferred across generations. They found that G2 character traits of self-directedness and coopera-
tiveness mediated associations between G1 and G2 parents’ warmth toward their child, whereas G2
temperament traits (e.g., harm avoidance) did not.
Many of the previous studies also tested whether G1-G2 associations in positive parenting might
be explained by other factors that would suggest spurious rather than causal associations. However,
the predictive path from G1 to G2 parenting of 2-year-olds reported by Kovan and colleagues
(2009), for example, was not better explained by various controls, such as G1 and G2 IQ, life stress,
and SES. Likewise, several IG studies have considered child characteristics as drivers rather than
outcomes of parenting. For example, Belsky et al. (2005) controlled for the significant effects of G3
positive and negative behaviors on G2 positive parenting during structured tasks when examining
effects from G1 parenting. In Neppl and colleagues’ (2009) study of G1-G2 positive parenting and
mediation by G2 academic attainment, they controlled both for significant effects of adolescent G2
academic achievement on G1 parenting and of G3 positive behaviors on G2 parenting. Kerr, Capaldi,
et al. (2009) did not find G3 early difficult temperament to predict later G2 parenting beyond stabil-
ity from G1 to G2 parenting, whereas earlier G2 parenting did predict later G3 behavior. Similarly,
Shaffer et al. (2009) found G1 parenting of G2 during emerging or early adulthood predicted G2
parenting of G3, and G1 parenting was not found to be driven by G2 social competence at earlier
stages (i.e., adolescence or emerging adulthood).
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ISSUE-SPECIFIC PARENTING
Few studies have considered parenting that pertains to a particular issue as opposed to general par-
enting styles. Chassin and colleagues (1998) examined G2 girls’ reports of G1’s general parenting
practices (strictness and support) in relation to the G2 girls’ later smoking-specific parenting practices
to deter their own G3 children’s smoking (e.g., use of induction/discussion or punishment). They
found no direct effects, but there was indirect evidence for the transmission of smoking-specific
parenting practices, as G2 adolescent girls who perceived G1 opposition to their smoking were more
likely as mothers to discourage smoking by G3 through discussion and punishment. To date, there
are few examples of issue-specific socialization from prospective IG studies. However, several stud-
ies have continued for long enough to now include sizeable G3 cohorts of adolescents, and current
funding sources for these projects prioritize understanding of drug abuse and sexual health risks
(Bailey et al., 2016; Capaldi et al., 2017). Thus, the IG literature on parenting behaviors related to
substance use and sexual health is expected to grow.
This concludes the review of the first set of critical issues in IG research, namely, that there is con-
sistent evidence from multiple prospective IG studies for modest stability between the positive and
negative parenting individuals experienced in childhood and those similar behaviors they enact with
their own children. The transmission of harsh, abusive, and otherwise negative parenting is partially
explained by significant behavioral and emotional maladjustment including delinquent behavior and
depressive symptoms during adolescence; this maladjustment is likely to put the individual at risk
for premature transition to parenthood, selection of a compromised partner, and the perpetuation of
problematic interpersonal behaviors (e.g., coercive processes) that generalize to relationships with inti-
mate partners, coparents, and children. In contrast to and largely independent of the problem behavior
pathways, positive parenting also shows modest stability across generations. These linkages, in contrast,
are partially explained by the tendency of positive parenting to engender educational involvement and
success, social competence and positive relationships, and a sense of self-efficacy that, in turn, support
successful transition to adulthood, family formation, and the challenging job of parenting.
Instability or Moderation of Intergenerational Transmission

A second central issue in descriptive research on the IG transmission of parenting concerns the char-
acteristics, contexts, or other conditions under which transfer is consistent, stronger, weaker, absent,
or even reversed; that is, what are the moderators of IG parenting transmission? As noted earlier, IG
associations in parenting have been modest—perhaps surprisingly so, given the prevailing popular
view that the question of similarity in parenting across generations is a foregone conclusion. This
observation led to both speculation that IG associations may be stronger for some people and cir-
cumstances than for others and a hope that identification of such moderating factors could inform
health promotion and problem prevention. In the following section, we identify domains of modera-
tion that have been studied most often. As shown in Panel B of Figure 13.3, these factors may be
characteristics of family members or contexts in any of the three generations (e.g., G1 gender; G3
temperament). More difficult to depict is that some factors could involve additive or synergistic qual-
ities of multiple people; for example, interactions involving both G2 and G3 gender. Readers may
notice that some factors that were examined as mediators in the studies reviewed previously have
also been considered as moderators. For example, Chen and colleagues (2008) examined whether
G1 positive parenting leads to G2 similar behaviors, in part by enhancing the likelihood of adult
marital satisfaction (mediation), whereas Thornberry, Henry, Smith, and Ireland (2013) posited that
the association between a child victimization history and the later perpetration of child maltreatment
may be disrupted for those with a satisfying intimate relationship (moderation). These distinctions
stem from different theoretical models and may have different implications.
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MODERATION BY G3 CHARACTERISTICS AND G2-G3 PARENT-CHILD RELATIONSHIP FACTORS
Consistent with gene-environment interaction models, children’s early behaviors may provoke cer-
tain reactions in parents (Ganiban et al., 2011). The IG parenting literature builds on this idea by
suggesting child behavioral difficulties may activate poor parenting based on extant learning histories
from childhood, rather than provoking such behaviors de novo. Consistent with this view, Scaramella
and Conger (2003) found G1-G2 stability in hostile parenting behaviors when G3 were more emo-
tionally reactive and negative but not when they were less so. Given that G1 hostile parenting was
not associated with G3 reactivity, these findings are convincing regarding the potential importance of
child characteristics in perpetuating or severing IG links in poor parenting. One might speculate that
child characteristics interfere with the development of a secure attachment that otherwise protects
parents from repeating negative parenting tactics learned in childhood. Thornberry and colleagues
(2013) found that among G2 participants maltreated as children or adolescents, G2’s attachment to
G3 and satisfaction with the parenting role protected against G2 maltreatment perpetration. How-
ever, attachment and satisfaction did not break the cycle of maltreatment, as these factors did not
moderate the association between maltreatment victimization and later perpetration.
MODERATION BY G2 PARTNER OR COPARENT BEHAVIORS AND QUALITIES
In addition to research suggesting G2 parenting is associated with that of their partners’ parenting
and antisocial behavior (Capaldi et al., 2008), partner behaviors and qualities appear to moderate IG
stability in parenting. In a meta-analysis of five studies using retro- and prospective designs, Schof-
ield, Lee, and Merrick (2013) found not only IG associations in child maltreatment risk, but also a
critical factor that could break the link—a safe, stable, nurturing relationship in the lives of G2. Such
relationships, which included, but were not limited to, support from an intimate partner, generally
reduced the association between G2 experience and perpetration of maltreatment. For example,
Conger, Schofield, Neppl, and Merrick (2013) found that IG stability in G2 harsh parenting was
moderated by their spouse’s relationship with them. In contrast, among G2 adults who had a sub-
stantiated record of maltreatment in childhood or adolescence, better intimate partner relationship
satisfaction decreased the likelihood of perpetration but—unlike Conger and colleagues’ (2013)
study—did not moderate between prior experience of victimization and later perpetration (Thorn-
berry et al., 2013). Regarding positive parenting, Bouchard (2012) found that G2 men’s marital status
strengthened IG stability between the G1 physical affection they recalled receiving and their own
parental engagement with G3.
Apart from relationship factors, characteristics of G2 partners or coparents have been found
to attenuate IG parenting stability. Rothenberg and colleagues (2016; Rothenberg, Hussong, et al.,
2017) considered partners’ problems when testing G2 externalizing behaviors and depressive symp-
toms as mechanisms linking conflict in the families of origin and procreation. They found that family
conflict was perpetuated across generations if either the focal G2 parent (initial target followed since
childhood) or their G2 partner had significant externalizing symptoms (Rothenberg et al., 2016). In
contrast, they did not find that IG stability in family conflict was contingent on partners’ depressive
symptoms (Rothenberg, Hussong, et al., 2017).
G2 spouse’s observed relationship quality, warmth, and positivity with the G3 child also has been
found to moderate IG stability in G1-G2 harsh parenting (Conger et al., 2012). Specifically, high
levels of these G2 partner parenting behaviors reduced the IG association, indicating an ameliorating
effect of positive parenting by the partner on IG transmission of conflict or harsh parenting.
Taken together, being in a partnership is associated with the amelioration or instability of nega-
tive parenting across generations particularly if the partnership is satisfying, the partner provides
warmth to the coparent, and the child and is not behaviorally maladjusted. In terms of preventive
459
implications, resources directed at enhancing parents’ intimate relationships may have multiple posi-
tive and protective effects, such as directly influencing positive parenting, thus enhancing its IG
stability and interfering with the re-enactment of negative tactics learned in the family of origin.
Additionally, positively altering the life course of adolescents has the potential to improve their future
functioning as parents, their partner’s functioning as a parent even if they were mistreated and, ulti-
mately, their offspring’s adjustment.
MODERATION BY G2 PARENTS’ AGE
Older G2 age may confer a greater capacity for self-reflection, psychological maturity, and readiness
to assume adult roles (e.g., putting children’s needs ahead of one’s own, value of generativity; Dol-
lahite and Hawkins, 1998) that may disrupt IG stability in negative parenting. However, older age
also may be confounded with contextual advantages that come from delaying childbearing in favor
of educational and professional investment. Relatedly, younger G2 age may reflect a premature transi-
tion to parenthood, which is confounded with antisocial behavior and related contextual risks (Pears,
Pierce, Kim, Capaldi, and Owen, 2005) that may impact parenting. For example, important differ-
ences were reported between adolescent mothers and adult mothers (i.e., different families) on infant
and dyadic attachment characteristics (Bailey, Tarabulsy, Moran, Pederson, and Bento, 2017). Specifi-
cally, most (61%) adolescent mother-infant dyads included unresolved maternal trauma, insensitive
interactive behavior, and disorganized infant attachment, whereas most (59%) adult mother-infant
dyads were characterized by maternal autonomy and sensitive behavior and secure infant attachment.
The authors concluded that maternal age is an important influence on the perpetuation of maladap-
tive attachment patterns across generations. Regarding fathers, Capaldi and colleagues (2003) did not
examine age at first fatherhood as a moderator of IG stability in poor parenting via G2 adolescents’
antisocial behavior, yet noted that G2 men who had become fathers at a younger age had higher
levels of antisocial behavior than other G2 participants. Thus, G2 parents’ age must be carefully con-
ceptualized and modeled using proper controls to guard against spurious effects.
At least three IG parenting studies have directly examined moderation by G2 age. Belsky et al.
(2012) did not find G2 age to moderate IG associations in positive parenting, but recommended it
be examined as a moderator in other prospective studies. In Shaffer and colleagues’ (2009) study,
G2 parents who were older when G3 were born had experienced higher quality G1 parenting in
adolescence, had higher social competence in emerging adulthood, and later enacted higher quality
parenting with G3 relative to younger G2 parents. Still, the mediating pathways (of G1-G2 parent-
ing associations via G2 social competence) remained similar regardless of G2 age at the birth of G3.
Finally, Raby, Lawler, et al. (2015) did not find G2 age at the birth of their first child to moderate
a mediational model involving the IG transmission of positive parenting through the formation of
social competence with peers and romantic partners.
MODERATION BY G2 PARENTING BELIEFS, COPING, AND SELF-CONTROL
Several studies have examined whether IG stability in parenting depends on parents’ characteristics
in adulthood. Reporting null findings, Schofield, Conger, and Conger (2017) did not find G2 beliefs
about parenting, problem-solving, and active coping to moderate stability in harsh parenting. Also,
Savelieva, Pulkki-Råback, et al. (2017) did not find G2 character or temperament traits—such as
persistence, harm avoidance, novelty seeking, cooperativeness—to moderate associations between G1
and G2 warmth and acceptance toward their offspring.
Other studies have supported such moderation, however. Schofield, Conger, and Neppl (2014)
found G1 mothers’ positive parenting (observed warmth, positive assertiveness, and prosocial behav-
ior during a discussion task) of G2 in early adolescence predicted G2 parenting (parallel constructs
460
observed during a puzzle task) of G3 in early childhood. Furthermore, the association was weaker
and nonsignificant for G2 parents with stronger parenting beliefs or higher levels of active coping
and was larger for G2 parents low on such factors. The authors reasoned that stronger beliefs about
the efficacy and importance of parenting for shaping child development may substantially influence
whether parents emulate the parenting they experienced in childhood. Furthermore, they concluded
that parents who were better able to cope with stress and negative affect would be more likely than
others to continue to enact strategic and reasoned parenting in trying times rather than reactive or
harsh parenting strategies. The authors also offered an alternative interpretation that positive parent-
ing experiences can “make up for” weaker beliefs about the importance of parenting or reduced
coping abilities, such that parenting experiences moderate associations between personal beliefs/
capacities and positive parenting.
In a subsequent study with a similar premise but a focus on negative parenting, Schofield et al.
(2017) examined moderators of the associations G1 maternal harsh parenting (including observed
criticism, rejection, hostility, physical attack) during G2 late adolescence had with G2 tendencies to
engage in similarly deleterious behavior with G3 in early childhood, including analogous harshness
observed during a puzzle task. The authors found that stability in harsh parenting was substantially
weakened for G2 who 1) had more self-control in adolescence (parent reported) and who, in adult-
hood, had a partner who 2) communicated with her or him more positively and 3) had a warmer
relationship with G3. Their innovative follow-up analysis identified the simultaneous effect for par-
ents with high levels of all three protective factors. The authors discovered not just instability but a
reversal of the association between G1 and G2 harsh parenting; that is, a negative correlation. Taken
together, these two studies have clear prevention implications as they identify modifiable individual
and relationship characteristics that may permit parents to make productive use of the positive par-
enting abilities they acquired in childhood and to shed destructive ones.
MODERATION BY PARENTS’ CHILDHOOD HISTORIES
Rothenberg, Solis, Hussong, and Chassin (2017) found that family conflict in G2 adults’ families of
procreation may be especially deleterious to adult and G3 child functioning if G2 experienced con-
flict in the family of origin. They speculated that in such cases, G2 adults may not be able to turn to
G1 for support in managing current conflict. G1 parents may have never modeled adaptive coping
or may exacerbate G2-G3 struggles by continuing to engage in high-conflict behaviors themselves
(i.e., as grandparents in the present). The study by Kerr, Capaldi, et al. (2009) may provide the flip
side of this finding for family conflict by showing that G1 parenting may contribute to G2 parenting
success initially and be a source of continued support. Specifically, G1 constructive parenting had
unique impacts on G2 parenting beyond many other salient proximal influences, including beyond
the stability in G2 parenting from early to middle childhood. The authors surmised that these find-
ings could reflect prior learning and positive life course outcomes that support constructive parent-
ing and also continued support from G1 (i.e., as a grandparent). Indeed, a different study found that
G1-G2 relationship quality in adolescence predicts G1 supportive involvement as a grandparent in
the family life of G3 (assistance in rearing G3 and frequency of contact with G2; Barnett, Scaramella,
Neppl, Ontai, and Conger, 2010).
Pears and Capaldi (2001) found evidence for three kinds of moderation of associations between
G1 parents’ and G2 men’s recollected childhood abuse histories. First, G1 parents who had been seri-
ously abused and exhibited poor discipline were more likely to be abusive toward G2 than those who
were not seriously abused or did not show poor discipline. The authors suggested that being abusive
may be indicative of being an especially unskilled and ineffective parent (Burgess and Youngblade,
1988; Greenwald, Bank, Reid, and Knutson, 1997; Knutson and Bower, 1994; Zaidi, Knutson, and
Mehm, 1989). Furthermore, Pears and Capaldi argued that the stress and frustration of parenting may
461
be especially likely to culminate in maltreatment of the next generation if a parent has both weak
discipline skills and a childhood history of maltreatment. Second, G1 parents who had been abused
and who had the highest levels of depression and PTSD scores actually were less likely to maltreat G2
boys than were other G1 parents (G2 girls were not studied in this sample). The authors speculated
that parents who are more affected by depression and PTSD may be more withdrawn and, therefore,
less likely to repeat the confrontational negative behaviors their own parents had directed toward
them. Third, the severity of parents’ histories of maltreatment appeared to moderate the association.
Specifically, only the most severely physically maltreated G1 parents showed greater maltreatment of
G2; less severely maltreated G1 parents did not differ from one another or from non-maltreated G1
parents in their physical maltreatment of G2.
ETHNIC GROUP MODERATION
Few studies have examined ethnicity as a moderator of IG associations, even though parenting
beliefs, practices, and styles differ across countries and cultures, and the need to develop and test
cultural adaptations of parenting interventions is recognized (Baumann et al., 2015; Lansford and
Deater-Deckard, 2012). Shaffer et al. (2009) found that IG associations in parenting quality were
invariant across G2 ethnic minority status. Rothenberg et al. (2016) included only families with a
Latino or European American G1 parent and did not find group differences in family conflict, but
did not compare the groups on the IG pathways. As cultural homogeneity is an important limitation
of several IG studies’ samples (Capaldi et al., 2017; Scaramella and Conger, 2003; Savelieva, Pulkki-
Råback et al., 2017), considering ethnic differences in parenting transmission is a promising direction
for cross-study collaborations.
DIFFERENCES IN IG STABILITY BY G2 AND G3 DEVELOPMENTAL STAGE
Although IG associations between G1 and G2 parenting certainly depend on G3 age, this idea has
rarely been explicitly evaluated. Logically, some parenting behaviors simply cannot be manifest until
children are old enough to elicit or require them. For example, monitoring of children’s whereabouts
and peer associates is centrally important to protect against antisocial behavior and associated health-
risking behaviors (substance abuse and unprotected sex) in adolescence, but is not a relevant parent-
ing construct until children are old enough to have a degree of agency and independence. Thus,
researchers cannot begin to observe whether G1 parenting is associated with such G2 monitoring
until perhaps late childhood for G3.
The influences of G1 parenting behaviors on G2 parenting also may be evident at different
times in G3 development because they occurred for G2 through different formative and learning
pathways. For example, some parental influences on G2 parenting with G3 may have begun when
G1-G2 formed a strong attachment in infancy, whereas others are explained because G1 modeled or
communicated beliefs about good parenting during G2’s early adolescence. Another perspective on
this issue is that adults develop and adapt in the parental role in parallel with their children’s devel-
opment (see Bornstein, 2015). As children mature, their developmental tasks and struggles present
new challenges to the skills and relational capacities of parents for which their own family of origin
experiences may or may not have prepared them.
Methodologically, we might expect models to reveal whether G1 parenting behaviors that
occurred in different G2 developmental stages were equally predictive of G2 parenting of G3. Belsky
and colleagues (2005, 2012) found effects of parenting experiences during multiple periods of G2
girls’ development (e.g., lower G1 authoritarianism in early childhood, positive family climate in
middle childhood, stronger attachment in early adolescence) on G2 mothers’ positive parenting of
G3. Some aspects of G1 parenting may show IG stability only from G1 to G2, if G2 experienced
462
them within a particular developmental window. For example, Thornberry and Henry (2013) found
that IG associations between G2 maltreatment victimization and later perpetration (again, includ-
ing not just the extremes of harsh or disengaged parenting but also sexual abuse) only held for G2
maltreatment experiences that occurred in adolescence (age 12 years and older) and not when these
experiences were limited to childhood. In contrast, Kovan et al. (2009) found that G2 parenting of
G3 was predicted by G1’s parenting of G2 in early childhood but not in early adolescence even at
the univariate level. Shaffer et al. (2009) examined G1 parenting into far later stages of G2 develop-
ment than is typical, including emerging adulthood and early adulthood. Although they did not test
the unique effects of parenting experienced at these different stages on G2 parenting, their models
appeared more consistent with stability in G1 parenting quality from childhood and had a cumula-
tive positive influence on G2 as they matured, which culminated in G2’s parenting quality with G3.
Consistent with the notion that G2 parenting experiences come to bear at different times in G3
development would be models of whether G1 parenting behaviors predict G2 parenting both earlier
in G3 development and again later in development, independent of stability in G2 parenting over
time. This is one interpretation for Kerr and colleagues’ (2009) finding that G1 constructive parent-
ing of G2 at ages 9–12 years uniquely predicted G2 parenting of G3 at ages 5–7 years after account-
ing for prediction to G2 parenting at ages 2–3 years. Of note, G1 influences on G2 positive parenting
of G3 at ages 2–3 years were explained by G2 positive adjustment in adolescence, whereas the G1
associations with G2 parenting at later ages (when G3 were ages 5–7 years) were not. In general, fur-
ther understanding is needed of how IG stability in parenting depends on the developmental timing
of G2 experiences and the developmental stage of G3. These questions of developmental moderation
of IG transmission require further study, as the answers may be informative regarding the optimal
timing of prevention and promotion efforts.
SUMMARY OF MODERATING INFLUENCES
It is encouraging that a number of IG studies have identified moderating influences on IG transmis-

sion of parenting. However, considerably more work needs to be done in this area to understand
such influences adequately. Also notable is that although several studies have identified factors that
attenuate IG transmission, only one research group (Schofield et al., 2017) of which we are aware
has actually demonstrated reversals of IG stability—that is, circumstances under which parents who
experienced relatively higher levels of harsh parenting in childhood actually enact relatively lower
harsh parenting with their own children. The theoretical models reviewed earlier and by Schofield
et al. (2017) may guide further discovery of the mechanisms for such reversals.
Intergenerational Stability in Parenting for Mothers and Fathers

A third central issue in IG parenting transmission theory and research concerns differences between
mothers and fathers in the processes described earlier (associations, mechanisms, and attenuating fac-
tors). It should be acknowledged that there is a diverse array of parenting and coparenting arrange-
ments (e.g., parent and grandparent, single parent, same-sex coparents) that unfortunately have not
been examined in prospective IG studies.
Overall, despite some historical change, mothers and fathers often show different levels of involve-
ment and of specific parenting behaviors. For example, mothers usually take a larger share of daily
care than do fathers (Raley, Bianchi, and Wang, 2012). Men and women may view mothers as the
parenting experts in families and consider fathers’ parenting role to be primarily a supportive one
(Patterson, 1980). This set of beliefs and modeled behaviors that reflect parental gender roles may
influence the gender socialization of children. Relatedly, fathers’ parenting also may be more sensi-
tive to the opinions and behaviors of partners compared with mothers’ parenting (Simons, Beaman,
463
Conger, and Chao, 1993). Simons, Whitbeck, Conger, and Melby (1990) reported that mothers’
beliefs about the impact of parenting were associated with fathers’ parenting behaviors, whereas his
beliefs did not relate to her parenting. Capaldi et al. (2008) found that G2 mothers’ poor and harsh
discipline practices directly affected those of the father. Thus, if fathers’ parenting is more open to
influence than that of mothers, it may be less likely to show IG stability.
In addition, there are clear gender differences in the rates of behavioral and emotional problems.
For example, beginning in adolescence, women show higher levels of depressive symptoms than men
(Dekker et al., 2007) and men show higher levels of antisocial behavior than women (Eaton et al.,
2012). As already discussed, these problems and symptoms are important mechanisms of IG parenting
transmission in adolescence and may moderate transmission in adulthood. As mothers more often
play a primary role in caregiving than fathers (Raley et al., 2012), their problem behaviors such as
depression and substance use during their child’s development may have a larger impact on their
parenting and their children’s risk behaviors than that of fathers (Capaldi, Tiberio, Kerr, and Pears,
2016). Conversely, given the negative life course consequences of early delinquency and substance
use (Thornberry, Krohn, and Freeman-Gallant, 2006) and boys’ higher rates of such behaviors (Bail-
largeon et al., 2007; Casper, Belanolf, and Offer, 1996; Johnston, O’Malley, Miech, Bachman, and
Schulenberg, 2014; Keenan and Shaw, 1997; Loeber and Hay, 1994), fathers’ problem behavior during
their own adolescence may contribute more to poor parenting and family risk than that of mothers.
Attachment researchers also have indicated that the role of fathers needs to be better understood—
including the weaker association between their attachment representation in adulthood and their
children’s attachment, and how attachment experiences with multiple people (e.g., mother and
father) are integrated in a “uniform attachment representation” (van IJzendoorn, 1995).
Given the number of individuals potentially involved in prospective IG studies (e.g., G1 and G2
mothers and fathers, and G3 sons and daughters), there is a rather dizzying array of gender-related
research questions that could be asked. For example, are some aspects of G2 fathers’ parenting of their
sons (such as involvement) more influenced by G1 fathers’ parenting of them, whereas other aspects
(such as warmth) are more influenced by G2 partners’ behaviors? To date, however, most research on
IG parenting transmission and its mechanisms concerns moderation by G2 parent gender and ignores
gender in G1 and G3, often due to sampling constraints or statistical power.
Despite some convincing theoretical reasons to expect G2 parent gender differences in the extent
of IG parenting transmission, findings on the presence or extent of such differences have been mixed.
For example, model invariance or lack of moderation by G2 gender has been reported for parent-
ing quality (Shaffer et al., 2009), observed angry and aggressive parenting (Conger et al., 2012), and
positive parenting (Raby, Lawler, et al., 2015). However, other studies support that IG transmission
of diverse forms of parenting is contingent on G2 gender—and primarily find stronger effects for
mothers. Specifically, Belsky et al. (2009, 2012) found evidence for IG parenting stability in warm-
sensitive-stimulating parenting only for G2 mothers, not fathers. Likewise, Thornberry et al. (2003)
reported that G1 emotional closeness and consistent discipline of G2 was only likely to be repeated
with G3 for G2 mothers, not fathers. In terms of negative parenting, Rothenberg et al. (2016) found
associations between G1-G2 and G2-G3 high-conflict family environments (which probably include
parent-child conflict, although measures did not isolate this feature), but only for G2 women. Not
all studies indicate IG transfer is specific to mothers, however. Savelieva, Keltikangas-Järvinen, et al.
(2017) reported stronger transmission of G1 mothers’ to G2 parents’ warmth toward their child for
G2 fathers than for G2 mothers. Furthermore, IG associations in harsh and positive parenting have
been supported for G2 fathers in OYS-3GS (Capaldi et al., 2003, 2008; Kerr, Capaldi, et al., 2009).
There also is no consensus on whether the mechanisms of IG parenting transmission differ for
mother and fathers. Thornberry et al. (2003) speculated that IG stability in parenting occurs directly
for women but occur because of (or are mediated by) delinquency in men. However, OYS-3GS
findings for constructive parenting (Kerr, Capaldi, et al., 2009) did not support this pattern for
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fathers; rather, there was a direct transmission of constructive parenting and no significant additive or
mediating effect from adolescent antisocial behavior. Reports by Rothenberg and colleagues (2016;
Rothenberg, Hussong, et al., 2017) are seemingly at odds with both studies. That is, in contrast
to Thornberry’s prediction, G2 mothers’ externalizing symptoms in adolescence—and, in another
paper, their depressive symptoms in adolescence through young adulthood—mediated IG stability
in family conflict; and in contrast to OYS-3GS findings, Rothenberg found no significant stability
for G2 fathers. Finally, in the Raby, Lawler, et al. (2015) study of positive parenting, there were not
G2 gender differences in the mediating links involving social competence with peers and romantic
partners. Overall, the apparent contradictions in this literature likely reflect methodological differ-
ences (different outcomes, measures, and developmental timing) rather than inconsistent findings.
Replications will be especially valuable.
Classical and Modern Research on Intergenerational

Parenting Transmission
Classical research on IG parenting issues was very limited, mainly focusing on IG associations in mal-
treatment, and primarily via retrospective reports or prospectively via court records (Widom, 1989).
In this section, a number of design characteristics are discussed that are either required or desirable to
meet fully contemporary criteria of an IG study (see also Thornberry, 2016; Thornberry et al., 2012).
Strengths and Characteristics of Contemporary IG Studies

Rigorous IG parenting studies share a number of design features. In particular, they require strong
measurement of parent behavior (in both G1 and G2) toward the child by parents who have some
meaningful contact with them (unless only genetic main effects are of interest). Strong IG parenting
studies also require a prospective design for G2 (since childhood and/or adolescence) and G3, and
reports from different agents in the two generations.
The first criterion is that measurement of parenting behavior should be sensitive to a number
of key considerations, including the parenting behavior of interest (e.g., warmth and support versus
maltreatment) and the child’s developmental stage—both throughout G2’s and G3’s assessment. Ide-
ally, measures of parenting that do not also tap other constructs will permit stronger conclusions. For
example, family conflict may include harsh parenting of a child but also a number of dimensions
including interparental conflict or children’s irritability, rather than parenting per se. Measures also
need to change with child age to be developmentally appropriate and relevant. For example, parental
warmth may be assessed by observations of parental behavior during a play task or a simple learn-
ing task in early childhood, but could include child reports of parental warmth during adolescence.
Ideally, measures selected will allow for testing alternative hypotheses regarding direct, mediated, and
moderated transmission. As is true for other longitudinal work, multi-method (e.g., direct observa-
tion, parent report) and multi-agent (e.g., parent, child, peer, teacher) assessments (Patterson and
Bank, 1986) enhance validity and permit IG and mediator analyses that rule out some methodologi-
cal confounds. Achieving and maintaining this methodological rigor is challenging while keeping
assessments manageable for the participants.
The second criterion is having prospective rather than retrospective measurement of parenting.
Having parents report on their recent behavior, rather than the parenting they enacted (for G1) or
experienced (for G2) 10–20 years ago, will minimize a number of errors related to memory and
bias. For example, G1 recollections of how they parented G2 in childhood may be tainted by G2
antisocial behavior in adulthood (Hardt and Rutter, 2004; e.g., “I was too permissive with him.”).
Likewise, G2 parents’ current depression may contribute to selective recall of negative and unsup-
portive parenting they received from G1. As such, prospective measurement of parenting, as well as
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of antecedent factors (e.g., G1 SES) that rule out spurious IG associations, allows greater confidence
with regard to the temporal ordering of G1 predictors and G2 outcomes and can address mediators
and moderators (e.g., G2 education) that illuminate mechanisms and conditions of transmission. This
confidence, in turn, permits researchers to make inferences about temporal sequences of events, a
condition of causation.
The third desirable design feature for IG studies of parenting is the use of different agents or
methods to report on parenting in each generation. This approach prevents informant bias from
inflating IG associations in parenting. For example, a correlation would be overestimated if ongo-
ing depressive symptoms negatively biased both G2 boys’ self-reported parenting experiences and
in adulthood their reports of their own parenting of G3. IG researchers use many approaches to
minimize this problem. For example, in Capaldi et al. (2003), G1’s reported harsh parenting of G2
was examined in relation to G2’s reports of similar parenting with G3; Chassin and colleagues (1998)
tested G2 adolescents’ reports of G1 parenting in relation to G3 children’s reports of G2 parenting;
and in Shofield et al. (2014), observers rated G1 parenting on a puzzle task with G2 youth and then
different observers rated G2 adults’ parenting with G3 youth on an analogous task. Another research
group (Berlin et al., 2011) related G2 mothers’ retrospective reports of being physically abused or
neglected by G1 parents to county records of alleged or substantiated neglect or abuse of G3. Given
that the perpetrator was unknown, the researchers noted that they could only infer IG stability in the
likelihood of childhood maltreatment, rather than parental transmission. It might appear that exam-
ining official records of maltreatment might be a strong and unbiased approach for testing stability
in the most severe forms of harsh or disengaged parenting. However, Widom et al. (2015) raised the
issue that a “surveillance or detection bias” may impact parents if their own childhood maltreatment
histories were reported and documented, thus inflating such IG associations. Incidentally, whereas
multi-method and multi-informant measurement designs are advantageous for most studies, there
are special advantages to incorporating reports by other G3 caregivers in studies of IG parenting
(Thornberry, 2016). In addition to the use of other caregivers’ reports to avoid informant bias, other
parents or caregivers of G3 may contribute to genetically informed analyses, are important concur-
rent influences on G2 parents, and, as corroborated by Schofield et al. (2013), are a likely source of
IG resilience.
Although not necessary for testing IG associations in parenting, other methodological charac-
teristics are valuable for answering critical questions in this field or opening up fruitful directions
for inquiry. Some or all of these characteristics are shared by most IG studies that meet the previous
criteria.
First, studies that measure the same parenting constructs in each generation and use the same
measures to do so will more accurately estimate some IG associations. Using different methods or
measures with each generation can indicate an association that is robust to different measurement
but also can complicate interpretation—for example, Berlin and colleagues (2011) found associations
between mothers’ and children’s maltreatment experiences but noted that they risked “comparing
apples to oranges,” given their measurement of severe parental discipline and abuse in one generation
versus maltreatment or suspicion significant enough to trigger a report to child welfare in the other,
and use of different methods (self-report versus official records; adult retrospection versus contem-
poraneous documentation). Relatedly, using different measures of parenting in each generation may
permit testing of IG stability (correlation; similarity in rank ordering) but may preclude examination
of continuity (i.e., means, counts, or other indices may not be comparable).
Second, estimates of stability and continuity are enhanced if parenting is measured at the same
points in development for G2 and G3 (Conger et al., 2009), because genetic expression and social
context differ by children’s developmental stage as do the demands of parenting and the relevance of
certain features of parenting to child adjustment (e.g., warmth with an infant; monitoring with an
adolescent). In many studies, the G3 were not yet old enough to have reached the age G2 was at the
466
parenting assessment (Kerr, Capaldi, et al., 2009), and in other studies G3 offspring were recruited
and assessed according to calendar year rather than age, resulting in wide variability in G3 age at a
given assessment (Shaffer et al., 2009).
A third valuable methodological feature of IG studies is repeated measurements of parenting over
the development of G2 and G3. Having such data permits tests of critical issues such as whether IG
associations in parenting generalize beyond specific developmental periods, tests of developmentally
sensitive moderators (e.g., G3 toddlers’ inhibitory control) or mediators, and examination of bidirec-
tional parent-child effects over time.
Fourth, following multiple G3 children can be advantageous in terms of generalizability and
capacity to examine differential associations across generations related to child and contextual char-
acteristics. A problem with including only firstborn children is that they may differ in important ways
from later born children (Fergusson, Horwood, and Boden, 2006), and thus may not be representa-
tive of the third generation. Additionally, among parents with multiple children, a significant propor-
tion are by different partners—on the basis of estimates of Americans in their 40s, approximately 23%
of fathers and 28% of mothers have offspring with different partners (Guzzo, 2014)—and this is more
common among more disadvantaged parents (e.g., more often unintended pregnancies by younger,
unmarried parents). Thus, including such families will contribute to representativeness.
Finally, an incidental advantage of studies that began by following a cohort that included boys
and then recruited their offspring is that such samples have greater father participation than is typical
in the field (Phares, Fields, Kamboukos, and Lopez, 2005), perhaps particularly among fathers who
are less involved in their children’s lives and who have children with multiple partners. Thornberry
(2016) noted that there is a tradeoff to investing resources in retaining uninvolved parents (who are
more often fathers), as they do not contribute to parenting measures and are dropped from most
analyses. However, including uninvolved parents permits analysis of parent-child contact as a mod-
erator of IG effects. In some cases, an involved coparent may be a critical source of support or an
alternative parenting model (Schofield et al., 2017). In other cases, such as with highly antisocial
fathers ( Jaffee, Moffitt, Caspi, and Taylor, 2003), their absence may be beneficial, although the ben-
efits could vary by child and father age. For example, absence may be beneficial in early childhood if
fathers are still involved in higher levels of substance use and criminal activity. However, their pres-
ence could be advantageous during G3 adolescence, when fathers’ problem behaviors are more likely
to have desisted and they may become instrumental in parenting and family financial support. Such
questions remain to be tested.
Limitations and Challenges of Intergenerational Studies

Although IG studies have great potential for unbiased testing of questions of stability and continu-
ity in parenting, there also are a number of design and inferential challenges. An overarching chal-
lenge noted by Thornberry (2016) is that most IG studies began as longitudinal studies that were
innovative for their time, but may have involved a set of design decisions that may not be optimal
for addressing current questions. Several limitations are discussed, using the OYS-3GS study as an
example when appropriate. To that end, the study’s design is summarized next.
The Three-Generational Study (3GS) originated from the Oregon Youth Study (OYS) of G2
boys (n = 206, or 74% of those eligible) recruited in 1983–1985 at ages 9–10 years from entire
fourth grade classes in school districts with higher than average delinquency rates in a midsized
Pacific Northwestern metropolitan area (Capaldi and Patterson, 1989). Families were representa-
tive of the area at the time; boys were primarily European American (90%) and families generally
had low SES (e.g., median annual income of $15,000; Hollingshead, 1975). G2 boys were followed
to middle adulthood with retention rates (excluding five who have died) of 89% or higher at each
assessment from age 9 to 40 years. The ongoing 3GS began with recruitment of the OYS men’s G3
467
children and the children’s G2 mothers. Originally, all G3 biological and stepchildren were eligible
for the study, but due to budget limitations, recruitment was limited to the first two biological G3
children per G2 partner of G2 fathers (thus, some G2 fathers have multiple G3 children born to dif-
ferent G2 mothers). G2 fathers’ and mothers’ mean age at the birth of their first biological child was
23.9 and 22.6 years, respectively. Most (93%) G3 who were eligible enrolled; nonparticipants were
primarily children with whom the G2 father had no contact and could not locate. Sample retention
is strong (90% of invited G3 on 3GS); the 22 children who no longer participate were adopted out
of the family or cannot be located due to moving, parent study withdrawal, or parent death. Data
have been collected from 305 biological offspring (and 27 stepchildren) of G2 OYS men to date, and
retrospective data were collected on G2 mothers’ families of origin. The G3 sample is 74% Euro-
pean American, and <10% any other specific ethnic group. G2 and G3 are assessed at G3 ages 3, 5,
7, 11–12, 13–14, 15–16, and 17–18 years. The design focuses on congruence between G3 measures
and those used with G2 fathers during their youth. Each wave involves an assessment with the G2
father and mother and, in some cases, an additional assessment (e.g., with a peer). Observational data
are collected with parents through G3 mid-adolescence, focusing on parental teaching and messag-
ing regarding substance use issues, and parent-child problem-solving, and peer interaction tasks in
which deviant talk (e.g., regarding alcohol, tobacco, other drugs) and reinforcement can be observed.
Prospective Data on Only One of Two G2 Parents

IG studies typically are limited by having prospective data from only one G2 parent that significantly
predates the birth of G3. For example, in OYS-3GS, G2 mothers all joined the study following the
birth of G3 (unless they participated previously in the Couples Study; Capaldi, Kim, and Owen,
2008) and, therefore, can contribute only retrospective accounts of their childhood experiences. This
is problematic for many reasons. Mothers’ and fathers’ characteristics are associated and influence
each other. There is evidence of assortative partnering on factors related to parenting (e.g., antisocial
behavior; Kim and Capaldi, 2004; Smith and Farrington, 2004), and partners show similarities in
terms of many parenting behaviors and attitudes across diverse samples (Denham et al., 2000; Flor-
sheim and Smith, 2005; Florsheim et al., 2003; Kerr, Lopez, Olson, and Sameroff, 2004; Mahoney,
Donnelly, Lewis, and Maynard, 2000; Nobes and Smith, 1997; Simons et al., 1990; Smith and Far-
rington, 2004; Tamis-LeMonda, Shannon, Cabrera, and Lamb, 2004). Furthermore, mothers’ psy-
chological characteristics, behaviors toward their partners, and attitudes about fathers’ roles appear to
influence various aspects of fathering, such as involvement, role satisfaction, and negative parenting
(De Luccie, 1996; Florsheim and Smith, 2005; Grossman, Pollack, and Golding, 1988; McBride et al.,
2005; Simons et al., 1990), and notably, such influences are independent of IG influences (Capaldi
et al., 2008). Thus, the lack of prospective information on one half of the parenting dyad represents
a key omission of potentially overlapping, mediating, or moderating influences from models of IG
parenting transmission. This problem is mitigated to some degree by involving the other parent in
the study early in the G3 child’s life and collecting information on the individual’s characteristics
(e.g., depressive symptoms, substance use) and background (e.g., childhood SES, family of origin).
Representativeness
Many IG studies are continuations of other longitudinal and relatively intensive studies that typically
do not involve large probability samples, but rather are community samples based on some original
selection criteria for G2 (Capaldi, Pears, and Kerr, 2012). This leads to generalizability concerns. IG
study samples also may have other characteristics that enhance or limit their implications for parent-
ing in some contexts or for some populations. For example, Chassin et al.’s (1998) study began as
an investigation of children of alcoholics and matched controls. They later expanded the study to
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address IG questions as they followed these G2 targets to adulthood and family formation. The sam-
pling design potentially complicates some analyses (e.g., comparability of G2 of children of alcoholics
and controls) and may limit generalizability (e.g., to ethnic minority families), but permits examina-
tion of mediators and moderators (e.g., parent substance use, adolescent externalizing) that might
show restricted variability in a community sample. As another example, the G2 OYS-3GS sample is
all male, due to the original focus on delinquency and the prevailing view at the time that antisocial
behavior was primarily a male problem. Additionally, the G2 samples from the OYS-3GS and the
Family Transitions Project (Neppl et al., 2009) were primarily or exclusively European American
and were reared in a context of major economic collapse. Other rigorous IG study samples are more
ethnically diverse; for example, the G3 sample from the Seattle Social Development Project (Bailey
et al., 2009) is 40% European American, 26% Biracial/mixed ethnicity, and 18% African American,
and the G3 sample from the Rochester Youth Development Study (Thornberry and Henry, 2013)
is 68% African American, 17% Latin American, and 15% European American. Thus, replication and
integrative data analyses are promising strategies for enhancing the external validity of IG studies.
Attrition
As is true of all longitudinal studies, initial refusal to participate in and attrition from IG studies are
assumed to be nonrandom and can bias results by overrepresenting more advantaged and prosocial
members of the population (see Thornberry et al., 2012). As attrition compounds over time and
affects the identification and recruitment of G3, it is a special concern for prospective IG studies, all
of which are very long in duration.
Development and Time

Time presents a major challenge to IG studies for two interacting reasons: G2 targets have long
reproductive spans and G3 children take many years to mature. Thus, IG studies are a very long-term
investment of time and resources that are challenging to maintain with current funding cycles and
sources. The OYS-3GS study illustrates this problem: In 1996, a G2 man had a G3 child who was
eligible for the first 22-month-old assessment, and in 2017 (21 years later) new G3 children were
being born to that man’s same-age G2 peers and becoming eligible for that first assessment. This fact
explains why some IG study investigators have based assessments on calendar year (e.g., assessing all
G3 ages 3–18 years in 2008) rather than G3 age. This is also why most IG studies have only recently
attained large enough G3 samples to examine parenting experiences at comparable ages in G2 and
G3 and are still patiently waiting to examine G3 adolescent risk outcomes (e.g., drug use, sexual risk
behaviors). The long spans of G2 reproduction and G3 development also mean that developmentally
sensitive G3 assessments are less “nimble” or responsive to innovations in the field (e.g., a new meas-
urement technique cannot be quickly introduced to G3 children of a specific age range).
Another design and inferential challenge with the ongoing nature of enrollment and assessment
of G3 in IG studies is that the oldest participants’ data are typically the first to be analyzed. How-
ever, given that the oldest G3 were necessarily born to the youngest G2 parents (e.g., births to teen
fathers) who also tend to have the highest risk characteristics (Bailey et al., 2009), these G2-G3
families may not be representative of what the “final” cohort will be. As reviewed earlier, Belsky et al.
(2012) raised this excellent point and reanalyzed IG data published earlier, but found similar results
in the larger sample and did not find that parent age moderated the previously reported associations.
Another challenge is that older and later born G3 children are developing in different cohorts—for
example, with respect to national changes in drug use norms and state marijuana legalization trends.
Similar to the prior point, G3 secular cohort and G2 parent age are partially confounded as the earli-
est cohorts were born to the youngest (and perhaps higher risk) G2 parents.
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Limited Ability to Address IG Stability in Early Parenting Experiences

A limitation of most IG studies currently under way is that, with only a few exceptions (Belsky et al.,
2005; Kovan et al., 2009), the G2 samples were recruited in late childhood or early adolescence. Thus,
most IG study designs preclude any examination of whether the very earliest parenting experiences
(e.g., warmth and promotion of attachment during infancy) show IG stability. At the other end of
development, no IG studies have sufficiently mature G3 samples, to date, to permit examination of
stability in parenting of late adolescents or early adults.
Future Directions of Theory and Research

on Intergenerational Parenting
This section highlights future directions for IG parenting transmission research. It is notable how
little IG parenting research has occurred since the collection of papers in the 2009 Developmental
Psychology issue (with notable exceptions, of course; Rothenberg, Solis, et al., 2017; Schofield et al.,
2017). In part, the relative paucity of recent IG parenting research from the study teams that con-
tributed to that journal issue reflects funding priorities that emphasize IG stability and continuity
in substance abuse and other problem outcomes. Thus, IG researchers have been productive, but
primarily in areas other than parenting. Given changes in funding priorities (e.g., larger multisite
longitudinal studies of adolescents; focus on brain imaging and molecular genetics), it seems unlikely
that new IG studies will be initiated, at least in the United States. However, as in the past (e.g., OYS-
3GS), other long-term longitudinal studies of youth started for other purposes may become fertile
ground for a future IG study. Additionally, a new priority is to capitalize on both the convergence
and divergence of existing IG studies in terms of sampling (e.g., ethnicity, gender, numbers of chil-
dren per family), G2-G3 assessment design, and measurement by study. First, through integrative data
analysis using convergent measures that can be harmonized across measures and assessment timelines,
IG studies can answer new questions that require greater statistical power (e.g., low frequency abusive
behaviors; parent-child gender × gender interactions) or participant heterogeneity (e.g., differences
by ethnicity) that are not possible for any single IG study. Second, coordinated efforts (e.g., through
special journal issues) can capitalize on divergence among existing IG studies by making full use of
site‑specific measurement and design strengths to offer the strongest replications.
Another future direction for the IG field concerns its emphasis on IG stability (e.g., children
who were treated relatively harshly by their parents are apt to treat their own children more harshly)
rather than continuity (e.g., Do parents treat their children just as harshly as their parents treated
them? See Bornstein and colleagues, 2017). By focusing on questions of stability and instability, IG
researchers have been able to reap the rewards of multi-method designs and the strengths of prevail-
ing analytic models (e.g., latent variable modeling). On the other hand, questions about continuity
and discontinuity—such as whether rates of spanking remain similar across generations or change
more abruptly for some groups—are more challenging to approach. Specifically, models of narrowly
defined continuity may be challenging given heterogeneity in G2 and G3 samples (e.g., spanking at
a range of G2 and G3 ages; different parent behavior toward their different offspring), the need to
control for factors (e.g., SES, G3 gender) that render mean levels less interpretable, and the limited
array of variables that were measured identically across generations. Still, continuity and discontinuity
questions are at the heart of IG studies and deserve further attention.
Next, as noted earlier, there are two developmental blind spots in this literature that suggest future
research directions. The first pertains to the limited understanding of the implications that G2 indi-
viduals’ earliest parenting experiences have for G3. Parenting is supremely important to development
across infancy and early childhood. Given that parenting shows stability into later years, it is possible
that many of the effects observed from, for example, G2 early adolescence to parenting of G3 in early
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childhood (Capaldi et al., 2008) stem from foundations laid much earlier in G2 development. Very
early parenting is unlikely to be transmitted through direct social learning mechanisms (i.e., infants
do not directly observe and imitate the caregiving behaviors modeled by their parents). Rather,
attachment experiences and indirect social learning mechanisms such as the beginnings of parent-
toddler coercive exchanges may be primary. As individuals cannot retrospectively recall their early
childhood parenting experiences, answer to these questions must usually rely on G1 retrospection of
early parenting of G2 (a flawed approach). There are only two extant studies of which we are aware
that have early G2 data (Belsky et al., 2012; Raby, Lawler, et al., 2015). Thus, new IG studies may be
needed to answer questions about the earliest roots of IG parenting transmission.
The second developmental blind spot for IG studies is that there is almost no research on IG
stability in the parenting of older adolescent or adult children. Shaffer et al. (2009) found that G1
parenting quality of G2 during emerging adulthood and early adulthood was associated with G2
parenting quality with G3; however, they did not address the question of parenting older G3 children,
who ranged in age from 7 months to 17 years. Such research is critical given the developmental tasks
and transitions unique to these periods (e.g., greater autonomy, advanced education or job training,
economic independence, romantic partnership). Additionally, these developmental periods are rife
with potential threats to long-term adjustment. Specifically, crime rates peak in late adolescence
before declining in early adulthood (Laub and Sampson, 2003; Thornberry, 2005), substance use rates
peak in early adulthood ( Johnston et al., 2017), and 50% of use disorder cases show onset from ages
18–27 years (Kessler et al., 2005). Additionally, parents may provide their children with key support
during pregnancy and family formation. This may be especially needed for teenage or unpartnered
young parents, as early or culturally “off-time” parenthood can disrupt educational and occupational
trajectories and is more prevalent among young people already at psychosocial disadvantage ( Jaffee
et al., 2001; Pears et al., 2005). Thus, the roots of parenting that pertain to these later developmental
tasks and challenges is of interest. Given that the contemporary wave of prospective IG studies began
with G2 samples born in the 1970s–1980s, scientists and funding agencies have only to be patient for
the G3 children to sufficiently mature for such questions to be answered.
A related set of IG questions pertains to how parents and their adult children will adapt to eco-
nomic, educational, and other secular changes affecting the timing of “adulthood.” That is, in contrast
to prior generations, the ability to achieve residential and financial independence from the family of
origin, which is often viewed as a successful transition to adulthood, no longer coincides with the
end of the teenage years (Furstenberg, Kennedy, McCloyd, Rumbaut, and Settersten, 2003). Indeed,
in the United States, there are increasing trends toward delayed assumption of adult roles. For exam-
ple, the proportions of 25-year-olds who lived with their parents in 1970 versus 2007 were 13%
versus 26% for European American men and 14% versus 30% for African American men (rates are
approximately 5% lower among women; Settersten and Ray, 2010). In modern times, delaying the
traditional adult milestones of marriage and parenthood and continuing to receive substantial sup-
port from parents are likely to confer distinct advantages to adults’ education, employment, and the
health of their eventual families of procreation. In contrast, young adults who are too quickly ushered
into independence are more vulnerable to begin with, and may become more so during adulthood
(Settersten and Ray, 2010). Young adults who remain living with their parents may involve a mix of
individuals who have become parents at a young age and cannot afford their own accommodation
and need help with the infant versus individuals who are not yet parents but are extending their
education and are thus not yet self-supporting. IG studies of parenting are well poised to examine
how the parent-child relationships and parenting beliefs and behaviors in one generation influence
those in the subsequent one in the context of these secular changes.
As noted earlier, a number of historical and secular changes have affected parenting, including
changes in the acceptability and prevalence of substance use and contraceptive use. However, as is
evident in the review, few IG parenting studies have addressed issue-specific parenting questions.
471
Additionally, although technology-related issues such as screen time, social media, and mobile phone
use are a very prominent focus of contemporary parenting (Barr, 2019), IG research has not yet
examined the extent to which parents’ childhood experiences (e.g., with G1 involvement and moni-
toring) shape these modern dimensions of their parenting (e.g., G2 use of technology to enhance
monitoring).
Another focus for future theory and research is how the evidence of IG parenting transmission
can shape preventive intervention development. For example, IG research can be used to identify
which factors (e.g., warmth, attitudes, substance abuse) will be most fruitfully targeted and when in
development this should occur. Following their review of animal research on genetic, epigenetic, and
behavioral transmission of risk for psychopathology, Klengel, Dias, and Ressler (2016) pointed to
the implications for humans; specifically, they highlighted that earlier intervention on environments
(e.g., prenatal and early childhood, not adulthood) is critical to the disruption of intergenerational
and even trans-generational (i.e., across 2+ generations) risk transmission. Likewise, research on IG
parenting and psychopathology transmission has implications for the evaluation of preventive inter-
ventions that deserves further attention. For example, interventions focused on adolescent problem
behavior (an IG parenting mediator) can have collateral benefits for other outcomes and individu-
als who were not the initial intervention focus. For example, a delinquency-focused intervention
prevented pregnancy in very high-risk girls (Kerr, Leve, and Chamberlain, 2009), which could have
implications for the health of the next generation given that early pregnancy among such girls pre-
dicted their child welfare involvement 7 years later (Leve, Kerr, and Harold, 2013). Similarly, effective
treatments for maternal depression have been shown to improve not only the lives of women but
also their parenting quality and the behavioral/emotional health of their offspring (Cuijpers, Weitz,
Karyotaki, Garber, and Andersson, 2015). Using IG research findings and insights to demonstrate
such cascading effects may convince clinicians and policy makers of net public health impact and
cost effectiveness.
IG parenting research also has the potential to generate novel hypotheses for prevention approaches
and population targets. For example, Mahrer, Winslow, Wolchik, Tein, and Sandler (2014) found that
a brief parenting intervention for divorced G1 mothers of 9- to 12-year-old G2 children signifi-
cantly disrupted associations between the G1 parenting risk and G2 parenting attitudes about warm
or harsh practices 15 years later. Consistent with the models and findings discussed in this chapter,
Cheng, Johnson, and Goodman (2016) contrasted two prevention approaches to tackling economic,
physical, and socioemotional disadvantage: The two-generational approach of supporting G1 parents
in work and parenting and G2 children’s development versus a three-generation perspective that
recognizes the need to support G2 in anticipation of their eventual role in parenting G3. This three-
generational approach includes enhanced physical health, economic opportunity, and parenting skills
and capacities long before G2 make the transition to parenthood as well as reproductive planning to
delay first parenthood. Models such as Cheng and colleagues’ (2016) three-generation perspective
can make use of IG parenting research and initiate a more expansive viewpoint on the importance
of positive parenting and the social conditions and interventions that enhance it.
Conclusion
Despite some limitations, the long-term prospective three-generational studies reviewed have amassed
a substantial body of work in recent decades addressing IG transmission of parenting. As is typical
of research findings compared with popular notions of cause and effect of behaviors as complex as
parenting, the findings do not indicate that parenting experienced in the family of origin is repeated
more or less exactly in the family of procreation. The weight of evidence indicates that there is trans-
mission for parenting ranging from positive through harsh and abusive, but the association is generally
low to moderate. Researchers in the area have made good progress in understanding such stability
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as well as some mechanisms by which stability and instability occur, using systematic examination of
mediators and moderators of IG effects. Hopefully, this comprehensive review will stimulate further
model tests to help resolve ambiguities and address some issues that have as yet been little considered.
Overall, an IG perspective on parenting that incorporates dynamic systems and life-span develop-
mental theories invites optimism about the broad and long-term legacies of high-quality parenting.
Apart from the IG stability in parenting the reviewed studies have shown, several have demonstrated
truly trans-generational (i.e., G1 effects on G3) implications of this work. Specifically, both Scara-
mella and Conger (2003) and Bailey et al. (2009) found that G1 harsh or hostile parenting of G2
predicted G3 externalizing behaviors via a number of mediated paths. Similarly, Capaldi et al. (2003)
and Kerr, Capaldi, et al. (2009) found that the poor parenting G2 boys experienced in late child-
hood predicted their G3 children’s temperamental risks at ages 16–30 months, whereas the positive
parenting G2 experienced predicted lower G3 externalizing behaviors at ages 5–7 years. Researchers
and practitioners are typically impressed enough by evidence that parenting supported the healthy
development of a child reared in an adverse context, or that a prevention program was beneficial to
its proximal targets (e.g., a father and his daughter). Yet the telescoping lens of IG research demon-
strates the potential for parenting influences to ripple across the life span, spread to coparents and
other close relationships, and cascade across subsequent generations.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. PHS: The National
Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) (grant numbers R01 DA015485 and 2 R01 DA015485-16A1);
the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) (grant number R01 AA018669);
and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) (grant number
R01 HD46364). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily
represent the official views of the NIH, NIDA, NIAAA, or NICHD. The authors thank Jane Wilson,
Shivan Tucci, Karen Yoerger, and Lee Owen for data collection and management efforts, and Sally
Schwader for editorial assistance.
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14
PARENTING AND
CONTEMPORARY
REPRODUCTIVE
TECHNOLOGIES
Susan Golombok
Introduction
The reproductive technology that resulted in the birth in 1978 of Louise Brown, the first “test-tube”
baby (Steptoe and Edwards, 1978), has led to the creation of families that would not otherwise have
existed. This procedure, more appropriately described as in vitro fertilization (IVF), has not only
allowed many people who would have remained childless to become parents but also has had a fun-
damental impact on the way in which parents may be related to their children.
With IVF using the mother’s egg and the father’s sperm, both parents are genetically related to the
child. When a donated egg is used, the father is genetically related to the child but not the mother,
and when donated sperm are used, the mother is genetically related to the child but not the father.
When both egg and sperm are donated, both parents are genetically unrelated to the child, a situa-
tion that is like adoption except that the parents experience the pregnancy and the child’s birth. In
the case of surrogacy, where one woman hosts a pregnancy for another woman, neither, one, or both
parents may lack a genetic connection with the child depending on the use of a donated egg and/or
sperm. As Einwohner (1989) pointed out, it is now possible for a child to have five parents: an egg
donor, a sperm donor, a birth mother who hosts the pregnancy, and the two social parents whom the
child knows as mom and dad.
In addition, an increasing number of people are turning to assisted reproduction for social rather
than medical reasons. Lesbian and single heterosexual women are opting for donor insemination to
enable them to conceive a child without the involvement of a male partner (Patterson, this volume).
Although only one mother is the genetic parent, sometimes one mother provides the egg and the
other mother carries the pregnancy, so that both have a biological connection to the child. In addi-
tion, a small but increasing number of gay and single heterosexual men are having children through
surrogacy, often in combination with egg donation from a different woman.
This chapter examines families created by the different types of contemporary reproductive tech-
nology with particular attention to the issues and concerns that have been raised by these procedures
and to the findings of research on parenting in these new family forms. Although there is a growing
body of empirical research on families created by assisted reproduction, many investigations have
focused on children and not on parents. Only those studies that have addressed parenting are dis-
cussed in this chapter. The chapter is organized according to the three major types of contemporary
reproductive technology; in vitro fertilization (IVF) and intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI),
donor conception, and surrogacy. Within each section the concerns that have been raised regarding
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Parenting and Contemporary Reproductive Technologies
parenting are discussed, followed by an examination of the empirical evidence. The chapter ends
with a consideration of future directions in the development of contemporary reproductive tech-
nologies and general conclusions about parenting in these new family forms.
Parenting in IVF and ICSI Families

In vitro fertilization (IVF) involves the fertilization of an egg with sperm in the laboratory and the
transfer of the resulting embryo to the mother’s womb (Steptoe and Edwards, 1978). In the related
procedure of intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI), developed in the early 1990s, a single sperm
is injected directly into the egg to fertilize it (Palermo, Joris, Devroey, and Van Steirteghem, 1992).
This was the first treatment for male infertility, and it has since enabled men with abnormal sperm or
a low sperm count to become fathers. Although IVF and ICSI may be carried out with donated eggs
and/or sperm, in the majority of cases, the gametes of the prospective parents are used. The following
discussion of IVF and ICSI families focuses on parents who have a genetic connection to their child.
Concerns About Parenting in IVF and ICSI Families

It may seem that having a genetically related child by IVF or ICSI is just the same as having a child
by natural conception; all that is different is the process of conception. However, there are a number
reasons why having a child using these reproductive technologies may result in a rather different
experience for parents from having a child in the usual way. It has been suggested that the stresses
associated with infertility and its treatment, often lasting for many years, may result in parenting
difficulties when a baby is eventually born (Burns, 1990; Hammarberg, Fisher, and Wynter, 2008;
McMahon and Gibson, 2002). Certainly it is the case that infertility can be deeply upsetting. In an
investigation by van Balen, Trimbos-Kemper, Van Hall, and Weeda (1989), infertility was viewed by
more than 40% of women as the worst experience of their life. The negative impact of infertility on
psychological functioning is also evident from studies showing raised levels of anxiety among cou-
ples, particularly women, undergoing infertility treatment, and of clinical depression among women
whose treatment was unsuccessful (Eugster and Vingerhoets, 1999; Golombok, 1992; Leiblum, 1997;
Leiblum, Kemmann, and Lane, 1987). Kopitzke and Wilson (2000) concluded that the physical
discomfort caused by infertility treatment faded into insignificance compared with the emotional
agonies involved. Women at their clinic reported that their lives were diminished and that it was hard
to visualize the future. Social relationships were dramatically affected due to feelings of alienation
from friends and relatives with children, and family get-togethers and even trips to shopping centers
full of mothers with pushchairs could be sources of pain.
Infertility may also constitute a threat to a woman’s sense of identity (Miall, 1986, 1989) Evidence
from Miall’s research showed that the large majority of infertile women saw infertility as a personal
failure. Among the 71 infertile women studied, 89% reported that motherhood was either important
or very important to their notion of themselves as persons, and 78% had always wanted to have chil-
dren. Although studies that have included men have shown them to be less emotionally distressed
than women about their failure to have a child, many men who cannot have children are also upset
about their inability to become fathers (Eugster and Vingerhoets, 1999; Golombok, 1992; Leiblum,
1997; Leiblum, Kemmann, and Lane, 1987).
According to Burns (1990), the stresses produced by infertility may result in dysfunctional patterns
of parenting. She argued that parents who had difficulty in conceiving may be overprotective of,
and emotionally over invested in, their much longed-for children. Other authors have also suggested
that those who become parents after a period of infertility may be overprotective of their children,
or may have unrealistic expectations of them, or of themselves as parents, due to the difficulties they
experienced in their attempt to give birth (Colpin, Demyttenaere, and Vandemeulebroecke, 1995;
483
Susan Golombok
Hahn and DiPietro, 2001; McMahon, Ungerer, Beaurepaire, Tennant, and Saunders, 1995; Mushin,
Spensley, and Barreda-Hanson, 1985; van Balen, 1998). Psychological disorder and marital difficul-
ties have also been predicted for those who become parents following IVF (McMahon et al., 1995)
Although concerns about ICSI families have centered on the effects on children rather than on
parents, the same concerns that have been expressed in relation to IVF parents, such as the possibility
of their over-protecting their children, also apply to ICSI parents (Barnes et al., 2004).
One important reason why having a child by IVF or ICSI may result in a rather different experi-
ence for parents is the high incidence of twin and triplet births that arise from these procedures—a
consequence of the use of multiple embryos in an IVF or ICSI cycle. The high multiple-birth rate
contrasts sharply with the multiple-birth rate for naturally conceived pregnancies of around 1%
(Bergh, Ericson, Hillensjo, Nygren, and Wennerholm, 1999). The problem of multiple births has
been greatest in developing and newly industrialized regions such as Latin America, where the mul-
tiple-birth rate for assisted reproduction pregnancies in 2000 was 50%, and over 13.5% of IVF and
ICSI births involved triplets or quadruplets (Zegers-Hochschild, 2002). The most extreme example
occurred in California in 2009, when Nadya Suleman, a 33-year-old single woman nicknamed by
the media as “Octomom,” gave birth to IVF octuplets, all of whom survived.
Due to the physical risks associated with multiple births, including perinatal mortality, preterm
deliveries, low birth weight and neonatal problems and disability, some countries have introduced
regulations to limit the number of embryos used in an IVF or ICSI cycle. As a consequence, by
2009, the multiple-birth rate resulting from IVF and ICSI in Europe had declined to 20% (Ferraretti
et al., 2013). However, in the United States, the incidence of multiple births following IVF and
ICSI remained above 30% (Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology, 2012; Zegers-Hochschild
et al., 2013).
Parents who have multiple births have to cope with not only two or more infants born at once,
but also infants who may have greater needs as a result of prematurity and low birth weight. Studies
of families with naturally conceived twins and triplets have shown that parents are faced with many
stressors that can negatively impact family relationships (Lytton and Gallagher, 2002; Neiderheiser,
this volume). Rearing two or three children of the same age places enormous demands on parents,
often resulting in exhaustion, lack of personal time, depression, and financial difficulties. Although
studies of families with naturally conceived multiples are informative because they tell us about the
additional stressors that result from twin or triplet births, families with twins or triplets who have
been conceived through IVF or ICSI may differ in ways that influence parenting. Parents may find
coping with twins or triplets to be particularly stressful following their experience of infertility and
its treatment. However, these parents may be more accepting of a multiple birth. Those undergoing
assisted reproduction will almost certainly have considered this outcome and will have made the
decision to proceed. Indeed, for a high proportion of those who embark on assisted reproduction,
the idea of a multiple birth seems preferable to childlessness, and the prospect of twins is viewed posi-
tively as a way of completing the family without the need for further stressful, risky, and expensive
medical treatment (Gleicher et al., 1995; Goldfarb, Kinzer, Boyle, and Kurit, 1996; Murdoch, 1997).
Studies of families with assisted reproduction twins (Cook, Bradley, and Golombok, 1998; Colpin, De
Munter, Nys, and Vandemeulebroecke, 1999; Glazebrook, Sheard, Cox, Oates, and Ndukwe, 2004;
Olivennes, Golombok, Ramogida, Rust, and the Follow-Up Team, 2005) and triplets (Garel, Salo-
bir, and Blondel, 1997; Garel, Salobir, Lelong, and Blondel, 2001; Golombok, Olivennes, Ramogida,
Rust, and Freeman, 2007) have revealed higher levels of anxiety and depression among these parents
than among parents of singleton children, in spite of the fact that parents of twins and triplets born
through reproductive technologies have generally shown greater openness to multiple births.
The impact of multiple births on parenting must be considered separately from the impact of IVF
and ICSI, per se. The investigations described ahead focus on families with singleton children born
as a result of IVF or ICSI, to avoid the potentially confounding effects of multiple births.
484
Research on Parenting in IVF and ICSI Families
IVF Parents
Do mothers and fathers who become parents through IVF behave differently toward their children
than do mothers and fathers of naturally conceived children? A number of studies have been carried
out to address this question, focusing on children of different ages. Research on infants has been con-
ducted in Greece. Although the samples were small, detailed micro-analytic assessments of mother-
infant interaction were conducted on four occasions when the infants were between 4 and 21 weeks
of age (Papaligoura and Trevarthen, 2001). Few differences were identified between IVF and natural
conception families. However, at 21 weeks, mothers whose children had been born through fertility
treatment showed greater attention to their infants’ physical state and spent longer trying to calm
their infants when their infants were distressed.
In an Australian study, IVF families and a comparison group of natural conception families, each
with a singleton child, were recruited during pregnancy and followed up when the infants were 4
months old and 1 year old (McMahon and Gibson, 2002). At the 4-month and 1-year assessments,
mothers and fathers completed questionnaires designed to assess their feelings of competence as
parents and their satisfaction with parenting. An observational measure of mother-child interaction
was also administered when the babies were 4 months old, to assess maternal sensitivity. At 4 months,
the IVF mothers felt less able than the natural conception mothers to understand their infants’ sig-
nals and to soothe them (McMahon, Ungerer, Tennant, and Saunders, 1997), and at 1 year the IVF
mothers saw their children as more vulnerable and “special” (Gibson, Ungerer, Tennant, and Saun-
ders, 2000). Nevertheless, the IVF mothers did not differ from the natural conception mothers in
sensitivity toward their infants at either 4 months or 1 year (Gibson, Ungerer, McMahon, Leslie, and
Saunders, 2000). For fathers, no differences were identified between those with IVF and naturally
conceived children in perceptions of parenting competency at 4 months (McMahon et al., 1997)
or 1 year (Gibson, Ungerer, Tennant, et al., 2000). The IVF parents and natural conception parents
were followed up when the children were 5 years old. No differences were found between the IVF
and natural conception parents with respect to psychiatric disorder, anxiety, marital satisfaction, self-
esteem, or parenting stress. However, the IVF mothers reported a more external locus of control than
did the natural conception mothers.
Families with 2-year-old children were investigated in Belgium (Colpin et al., 1995), where
IVF families were compared with natural conception families through observational assessments
of mother-child interaction and questionnaire assessments of attitudes and feelings toward their
children completed by mothers and fathers. No differences were found between family types with
respect to the children’s behavior toward their mothers or the mothers’ behavior toward their chil-
dren in the interaction task, or for mothers’ and fathers’ thoughts and emotions regarding their chil-
dren. In a follow-up when the children were 8–9 years old, the IVF families did not differ from the
natural conception families in mothers’ or fathers’ reports of parenting behavior or parenting stress
(Colpin and Soenen, 2002). At 15–16 years, a standardized questionnaire assessment of the parenting
style constructs of responsiveness, behavioral control, psychological control, and autonomy support
was completed by mothers, fathers, and adolescents, separately for each parent. There were no differ-
ences in parenting style between IVF and natural conception families as rated by mothers, fathers, or
adolescents (Colpin and Bossaert, 2008).
IVF families with 4- to 8-year-old children were the focus of the first phase of the European
Study of Assisted Reproduction Families conducted in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands,
Spain, and Italy (Cook, Golombok, Bish, and Murray, 1995; Golombok et al., 1996). The study
recruited families with children conceived by IVF and comparison groups of families with children
adopted in infancy and families with naturally conceived children. A group of families with children
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Susan Golombok
conceived by donor insemination was also recruited (see ahead). An in-depth, semi-structured inter-
view designed to assess quality of parenting and the Parenting Stress Index, a questionnaire measure
of stress associated with parenting, were separately administered to mothers and fathers. Information
obtained from the interview was coded according to a standardized coding scheme. The IVF moth-
ers were found to show greater warmth toward their children, to be more emotionally involved with
them, to interact more with them, and to report less stress associated with parenting than were the
natural conception mothers. IVF fathers were reported by mothers to interact with their children
more than were natural conception fathers, and the fathers themselves reported less parenting stress.
The adoptive parents fell between the IVF and natural conception parents on these measures.
To examine the functioning of IVF families when the children were approaching adolescence,
the families were reassessed using standardized interview and questionnaire assessments of parent-
child relationships when the children reached age 12. The IVF mothers and fathers were generally
found to have positive relationships with their early adolescent children, involving a combination of
affection and age-appropriate control (Golombok et al., 2002; Golombok, MacCallum, and Good-
man, 2001). The few differences that were identified reflected more positive functioning among
the IVF than among the adopted and natural conception families, with the exception of the over-
involvement with their children of a small proportion of IVF parents.
The U.K. families were followed up once again when the children were 18 years old (Owen and
Golombok, 2009). The IVF mothers and fathers did not differ from the other mothers and fathers
on any of the variables relating to warmth or conflict, apart from disciplinary indulgence, which
was shown more by IVF mothers. The 18-year-olds were, themselves, administered a standardized
interview and questionnaires to assess the quality of their relationship with their parents (Golom-
bok, Owen, Blake, Murray, and Jadva, 2009). The IVF young adults were found to have warm and
engaged relationships with their parents.
In the first study to be conducted in a non-Western culture, Hahn and Dipietro (2001) examined
IVF families with preschool and early school age children in Taiwan. The quality of parenting was
generally found to be high, although IVF mothers showed greater protectiveness over their children.
The children’s teachers, who were unaware of the nature of the children’s conception, rated the IVF
mothers as more affectionate toward their children, but not more protective or intrusive, than the
natural conception parents.
ICSI Parents
With respect to ICSI, a large-scale, multisite study of 540 ICSI, 439 IVF, and 542 natural conception
families with 5-year-old children was conducted in Belgium, Denmark, Greece, Sweden, and the
United Kingdom (Barnes et al., 2004). Mothers and fathers completed the Parent-Child Dysfunc-
tional Interaction subscale of the Parenting Stress Index and the Parental Acceptance-Rejection
Questionnaire. Few differences in parenting were identified between family types, although ICSI
mothers reported fewer hostile or aggressive feelings toward their children and higher levels of
commitment to parenting than did the mothers of naturally conceived children. The children were
administered the Bene-Anthony Family Relations Test to provide an assessment of parent-child
relationships from the perspective of the children. This involved the children attributing feelings
and behaviors to their fathers and mothers through a play task, whereby they posted positive and
negative statements to them. No differences were identified according to family type for children’s
positive or negative feelings toward their mothers or fathers or their involvement with their mothers
or their fathers.
Similar findings were reported from a study in the Netherlands of ICSI families, IVF families, and
natural conception families with 5- to 8-year-old children (Knoester, Helmerhorst, van der West-
erlaken, Walther, and Veen, 2007). There were no differences between family types on the Dutch
486
version of the Parenting Stress Index, apart from higher scores for the ICSI and IVF parents relat-
ing to children’s hyperactivity. In a study of 8-year-olds in Belgium (Leunens, Celestin-Westreich,
Bonduelle, Liebaers, and Ponjaert-Kristoffersen, 2006), there were no differences in parenting stress
reported by mothers and fathers on the Dutch version of the Parenting Stress Index.
So is it the case that the mothers and fathers of children born through IVF and ICSI experience
difficulties in parenting their long-awaited children? It seems that IVF mothers may be less confident
in the children’s early months of infancy than are mothers who have not undergone fertility treat-
ment. However, this difference seems short lived. No studies have been conducted on the parents
of ICSI infants. In children’s preschool and early school years, the differences that were identified
reflected more positive parenting by IVF and ICSI parents than by natural conception parents,
although there may be a tendency toward over-involvement and overprotection among a minority
of IVF mothers. By the time children reach adolescence, IVF mothers and fathers seem very similar
to those who have conceived their children naturally in both their approach to parenting and in the
quality of their relationships with their children. Studies of parents of ICSI adolescents have yet to
be carried out.
Parenting in Donor-Conception Families
Concerns About Parenting in Donor-Conception Families

It has often been suggested that the creation of families using donated sperm, eggs, or embryos may
have negative consequences for parenting (Baran and Pannor, 1993; Blyth, 2004; Daniels, Gillett, and
Grace, 2009; Daniels and Taylor, 1993; McGee, Brakman, and Gurmankin, 2001). Two key mecha-
nisms have been proposed: Secrecy about the child’s genetic origins and the absence of a genetic
relationship between one or both parents and the child.
Secrecy
The use of donated eggs, sperm, and embryos to conceive a child was, in the past, surrounded by
secrecy. Those who have become parents in this way have tended not to tell their children about
their donor conception. The issue of whether parents should disclose donor conception to their
children remains one of the most controversial in the practice of assisted reproduction (Golombok,
2017; Nuffield Council on Bioethics, 2013; Pennings, 2017). Although it is argued by some that
children have a right to know their biological origins for both medical and psychological reasons,
others believe that this is a private family matter that should be left to parents to decide. Fertility
doctors used to advise parents not to tell their children about the nature of their conception, with
some doctors suggesting that the couple have sexual intercourse at the time of the insemination to
create the possibility that the child would be genetically their own. However, attention has been
drawn to the potentially negative effects of secrecy (Baran and Pannor, 1993; Daniels and Taylor,
1993; Turner and Coyle, 2000). As a result, parents have been encouraged to be open with their
children about the nature of their conception (Blyth, 2002; Daniels and Thorn, 2001; Nuffield
Council on Bioethics, 2013).
The concern over secrecy in donor-conception families arose partly from research on adoption,
which has shown that adopted children benefit from information about their biological parents. It
is now generally accepted that open communication between adoptive parents and their children,
such that children are given developmentally appropriate information about their adoption and feel
free to discuss adoption-related issues as they arise, is important for positive parent-child relationships
(Brodzinsky, 2006, 2011; Pinderhughes and Brodzinsky, 2019; Rueter and Koerner, 2008; Wrobel,
Grotevant, Berge, and Mendenhall, 2003).
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Susan Golombok
The family therapy literature also points to potentially negative psychological consequences of
keeping children’s origins secret (Imber-Black, 1998; Papp, 1993). From a family therapy perspective,
secrets are believed to be detrimental to family functioning because they create boundaries between
those who are party to the secret and those who are not (Bok, 1982; Karpel, 1980; Vangelisti and
Caughlin, 1997) and cause anxiety for the secret-holders when topics related to the secret are dis-
cussed (Lane and Wegner, 1995). In relation to donor conception, it has been argued that keeping
children’s genetic origins secret interferes with communication between the parents who know the
secret and the children who do not (Clamar, 1989).
The change in attitude toward greater openness has resulted in the removal of donor anonymity
in some countries so that children born following the introduction of such legislation, and who are
aware of their donor conception, may request the identity of their donor on reaching adulthood
(Glennon, 2016). In addition, professional guidelines in several countries including the United States
and the United Kingdom support the early disclosure of biological origins to children born through
reproductive donation (American Society for Reproductive Medicine, 2013; Nuffield Council on
Bioethics, 2013).
Absence of Genetic Relationships

The idea that the absence of genetic connections between parents and children may be detrimental
to positive family functioning also arises from studies of adoptive families, in which both parents are
genetically unrelated to their adopted children. Adopted children are at greater risk for psychologi-
cal problems than are non-adopted children ( Juffer and van Ijzendoorn, 2005, 2007; Palacios and
Brodzinsky, 2010; Pinderhughes and Brodzinsky, 2019), and, in addition to the demands of rearing
children who may have psychological problems, adoptive parents are confronted by parenting tasks,
such as communicating with their children about their children, that biological parents do not have
to tackle (Brodzinsky, 2011). Children conceived by gamete donation differ from adopted children
in that they have a genetic link to one parent (their father in egg donation families and their mother
in donor insemination families) and are born into the families in which they are reared; they are not
relinquished by, or removed from, their biological parents. However, the absence of a genetic connec-
tion to one parent is thought to create significant similarities between donor-conceived and adopted
children (Cahn, 2009; Crawshaw, 2002; Feast, 2003), which may have implications for children’s
relationships with their parents.
Research on Parenting in Donor-Conception Families
Rates of Disclosure by Donor-Conception Parents

Until recently, the majority of parents who gave birth to donor-conceived children did not tell their
children about their genetic origins. In the European Study of Assisted Reproduction Families,
not one set of the participating 111 donor insemination parents from Italy, Spain, the Netherlands,
and the United Kingdom had disclosed the donor conception to their children by the time their
children were at early school age (Golombok et al., 1996; Golombok, Cook, Bish, and Murray,
1995), fewer than 10% of parents had done so by the time their children were in early adolescence
(Golombok et al., 2002; Golombok, MacCallum, Goodman, and Rutter, 2002), and a follow-up of
the U.K. sample found that no further children had been told by the time they were 18 years old
(Owen and Golombok, 2009). A similar pattern was found for egg donation families in the United
Kingdom (Golombok, Murray, Brinsden, and Abdalla, 1999; Murray, MacCallum, and Golombok,
2006) and in Finland (Söderström-Anttila, Sajaniemi, Tiitinen, and Hovatta, 1998). With respect to
embryo donation, MacCallum and Golombok (2007) found that only 9% of parents of preschool
488
children born through embryo donation had begun to talk to their children about their biological
origins, rising to only 18% by the time the children were in middle childhood (MacCallum and
Keeley, 2008). This was in stark contrast to comparison groups of adoptive parents (all of whom
had disclosed the adoption to their children) and IVF parents (almost half of whom had told their
children about their conception by IVF; MacCallum and Keeley, 2012). Even in Sweden, where
legislation giving donor offspring the right to obtain information about the donor’s identity came
into force in 1985, more than a decade later, only 11% of parents informed their children of their
donor conception (Gottlieb, Lalos, and Lindblad, 2000; Lindblad, Gottlieb, and Lalos, 2000). Investi-
gations in the United States have produced comparable findings, with rates of disclosure to children
reported to range between 14% and 30% (Amuzu, Laxova, and Shapiro, 1990; Klock and Maier,
1991; Leiblum and Aviv, 1997; Nachtigall, Pitcher, Tschann, Becker, and Szupinski Quiroga, 1997;
Schover, Collins, and Richards, 1992).
When asked about their reasons for secrecy, parents of children born through egg, sperm, and
embryo donation said they were worried that their children would be upset, shocked, and confused
by the knowledge that they were not genetically related to one or both parents (Cook et al., 1995;
Golombok et al., 1999; MacCallum, Golombok, and Brinsden, 2007; Readings, Blake, Casey, Jadva,
and Golombok, 2011). Parents were also concerned about jeopardizing the positive relationship that
existed between the nongenetic parent(s) and the child, fearing that children would no longer love
the nongenetic parent(s) if they were to find out. Some parents felt that they had left it too late to tell
their children about their donor conception. In addition, they did not know how to tell them and,
as the donors were anonymous, they were concerned about not being able to answer their child’s
inevitable question: “If you are not my biological parent, then who is?”
Rates of disclosure to children appear to be higher among parents who feel able to be open with
other family members about the involvement of a donor in the conception of their child (Shehab
et al., 2008). However, many parents who share this information with family or friends at the time of
fertility treatment do not go on to tell their children, which creates the possibility that their children
will find out by accident through the indiscretion of a family member or friend (Golombok et al.,
1996; Golombok, Murray, et al., 2006; Lalos, Gottlieb, and Lalos, 2007; Readings et al., 2011).
The number of parents intending to tell their children that they were born through donated
gametes is rising (Daniels et al., 2009; Godman, Sanders, Rosenberg, and Burton, 2006; Hahn and
Craft-Rosenberg, 2002; Hargreaves and Daniels, 2007; Lalos et al., 2007). However, in spite of these
intentions, many parents do not actually disclose this information. In the U.K. Longitudinal Study
of Assisted Reproduction Families, 46% of parents of infants conceived by donor insemination and
56% of parents of infants conceived by egg donation planned to tell their children about their donor
conception. However, only 28% of donor insemination parents and 41% of egg donation parents
actually did so by the time their children were 7 years old (Readings et al., 2011), the age by which
most adopted children are told about their adoption. Moreover, some parents who reported that they
had told their children had discussed the use of fertility treatment, but not the more fundamental
issue of the use of donated eggs or sperm (Readings et al., 2011). Many parents of children conceived
by embryo donation have been found to similarly give only partial information about the nature of
the conception to their children (MacCallum and Keeley, 2012).
There is anecdotal evidence that the removal of donor anonymity in some countries has resulted
in an increase in the proportion of parents who tell their children about their donor conception.
However, there are few systematic data on the removal of donor anonymity on disclosure rates. In a
5-year follow-up of the Swedish sample mentioned earlier, 61% of parents were found to have dis-
closed the donor insemination to their children (Lalos et al., 2007). However, the participation rate in
this study was very low and likely to have been biased toward families in which parents had disclosed.
A larger Swedish study of both egg and sperm recipients found that 90% were in favor of disclo-
sure (Isaksson et al., 2011), which suggests a shift toward greater openness; nonetheless, only 16% of
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Susan Golombok
parents had begun the process of disclosure by the time their children were 4 years old (Isaksson,
Sydsjö, Skoog Svanberg, and Lampic, 2012). In New Zealand, where disclosure has been encouraged
since 1985 and legislated since 2004, only 35% of young adults who had been conceived by donor
insemination had been told about the nature of their conception (Daniels et al., 2009). However, a
study of New Zealand families with younger children found that one third of the parents had told
their children about their donor conception, and of the parents who had not told, three quarters
intended to do so (Rumball and Adair, 1999). In an investigation of parents whose 4- to 8-year-old
children were born after the removal of donor anonymity in the United Kingdom, almost two thirds
of the parents in two-parent families, and almost one half of the single mothers, had not disclosed
(Freeman, Zadeh, Smith, and Golombok, 2016). It seems that social and legislative changes may have
resulted in parents’ greater openness with their donor-conceived children about their biological ori-
gins, but it remains the case that a substantial proportion of parents still choose not to tell (Tallandini,
Zanchettin, Gronchi, and Morsan, 2016).
Nondisclosing Parents
In spite of the growing number of families formed through donor conception and the concerns that
have been raised regarding the potentially negative consequences for parent-child relationships, few
studies have investigated parenting in these families. The European Study of Assisted Reproduction
Families (see earlier) included a group of families with 4- to 8-year-old children who had been
conceived through donor insemination, and found the quality of parenting in these donor insemina-
tion families to be similar to that of IVF families and superior to that of natural conception families
(Golombok et al., 1996; Golombok et al., 1995). The couples who conceived children through
donor insemination became highly effective parents, and the absence of a genetic connection did not
prevent the development of positive relationships between fathers and their children. The families
were followed up when the children approached adolescence (Golombok et al., 2002; Golombok
et al., 2002). Although the donor insemination families no longer showed higher levels of parenting
quality relative to the natural conception families, they were characterized by high levels of warmth
between parents and children, accompanied by appropriate levels of discipline and control. In a
follow-up of the U.K. families at the children’s age of 18, higher levels of warmth and discipline were
shown by donor insemination mothers than by IVF mothers, which suggests greater engagement
with their children as they reached early adulthood; no differences were found between fathers in
the two groups (Owen and Golombok, 2009).
A sample of egg donation families was also recruited in the United Kingdom and compared
with the donor insemination families in terms of parenting quality (Golombok et al., 1999). The
only difference to emerge was that mothers and fathers of young children who had been conceived
by egg donation reported lower levels of stress associated with parenting than did parents of donor
insemination children. The egg donation families, like the donor insemination families, showed posi-
tive parent-child relationships. Again, few differences in parenting were identified when the children
reached adolescence, although the egg donation mothers showed lower levels of sensitive respond-
ing and were less likely to be emotionally over-involved with their children than were the donor
insemination mothers (Murray et al., 2006). It is conceivable that these differences stemmed from the
absence of a genetic relationship between the egg donation mothers and their children.
In the only study of parenting in families formed through embryo donation, the families were
assessed when the children were of preschool age (MacCallum et al., 2007) and in middle childhood
(MacCallum and Keeley, 2008). The parents differed from comparison groups of adoptive and IVF
parents only in terms of greater emotional over-involvement with their children. Although emo-
tional over-involvement is sometimes associated with emotional difficulties in children, the degree of
over-involvement shown by parents represented moderate, rather than pathological, levels.
490
In a questionnaire-based study, donor insemination families were compared with naturally con-
ceived two-parent families, single-mother families, and stepfather families in terms of parental psy-
chological distress, parental relationship quality, general family functioning, parenting quality and
quality of parent-child relationships (Kovacs, Wise, and Finch, 2013). The children ranged in age
from 5 to 13 years. Where differences were identified between the donor insemination families and
the other family types, they reflected more positive functioning in the donor insemination families.
Of particular interest are the more positive findings for donor insemination fathers than for stepfa-
thers, which suggests that the intention to become nongenetic parents, and the age of children at the
time at which these fathers become nongenetic parents, may be important factors in the quality of
the relationship between fathers—and possibly mothers—and their genetically unrelated children.
Further support for this possibility comes from the finding of Dunn, Deater-Deckard, Pickering,
O’Connor, and Golding (1998) that many stepparents do not view their stepchildren as their “own”
children. Although one third of the parents in the Kovacs et al. (2013) study reported having dis-
closed the donor conception to their children, the impact of disclosure was not explored.
Disclosing Parents
Parents who talk to their young children about their donor conception generally begin to do so by
the time their children are 4 years old. These parents tend to tell their children stories about need-
ing help to have a baby, rather than giving detailed explanations of the reproductive process (Blake,
Casey, Readings, Jadva, and Golombok, 2010; Mac Dougall, Becker, Scheib, and Nachtigall, 2007).
Contrary to parents’ concerns, it appears that children who are told about their donor conception
in their preschool years respond neutrally, or with curiosity, rather than distress (Blake et al., 2010;
Leeb-Lundberg, Kjellberg, and Sydsjö, 2006; Lindblad et al., 2000; Mac Dougall et al., 2007; Rumball
and Adair, 1999).
The U.K. Longitudinal Study of Assisted Reproduction Families created by donor insemination
and egg donation was initiated at the millennium to investigate the consequences of parents’ open-
ness with children about their donor conception. Phase 1 was conducted when the children were
at age 1 (Golombok, Lycett, et al., 2004), Phase 2 was conducted at age 2 (Golombok, Jadva, Lycett,
Murray, and MacCallum, 2005), Phase 3 was conducted at age 3 (Golombok, Murray, et al., 2006),
Phase 4 was conducted at age 7 (Casey, Jadva, Blake, and Golombok, 2013; Golombok et al., 2011),
Phase 5 was conducted at age 10 (Golombok, Blake, Casey, Roman, and Jadva, 2013), and Phase 6
was conducted at age 14 (Golombok, Ilioi, Blake, Roman, and Jadva, 2017; Ilioi, Blake, Jadva, Roman, and
Golombok, 2017). In the preschool years, the differences identified between family types pointed
to more positive parenting in families created by gamete donation than in the comparison group of
natural conception families, with no differences in the quality of parent-child relationships according
to whether the children lacked genetic connections to their fathers in the case of donor insemina-
tion or mothers in the case of egg donation (Golombok et al., 2005; Golombok, Lycett, et al., 2004;
Golombok, Murray, et al., 2006). These findings replicated those obtained in the European Study of
Assisted Reproduction Families conducted 15 years earlier (Golombok et al., 1995, 1996).
In contrast to the more positive outcomes for the donor-conception families in the preschool
years, difficulties emerged when the children were 7 years old (Golombok et al., 2011), the age by
which children show an understanding of biological inheritance (Richards, 2000; Solomon, John-
son, Zaitchik, and Carey, 1996; Williams and Smith, 2010) and the meaning and implications of
the absence of a biological connection to parents (Pinderhughes and Brodzinsky, 2019; Brodzin-
sky, Schechter, and Brodzinsky, 1986; Brodzinsky, Singer, and Braff, 1984; Brodzinsky, 2011). The
donor-conception mothers who had kept their children’s origins secret showed higher levels of
emotional distress than did those who had been open with their children about their origins. With
respect to the relationship between parents and children, interview and observational assessments
491
Susan Golombok
of mother-child interaction revealed less positive interaction in the donor-conceived families in

which parents had not disclosed the method of conception to the children than in the natural
conception families. There were no differences for fathers, apart from higher negativity shown by
donor insemination children during an observational assessment of interaction with their fathers.
The differences identified when the children were 7 years old were not indicative of dysfunctional
family relationships but, instead, reflected variation within the normal range. These findings do not
necessarily mean that keeping the children’s genetic origins secret caused the less positive outcomes
for the nondisclosing families; these families may have shown less open communication generally. In
spite of predictions to the contrary, the divorce rate among the parents of donor-conceived children
did not differ from that of parents who conceived their children naturally and was lower than the
divorce rate for parents with children of a similar age in the United Kingdom (Blake, Casey, Jadva,
and Golombok, 2013). At age 10, the children were interviewed about their relationships with their
parents (Blake et al., 2013). The large majority in all three family types perceived their relationships
with their mothers and fathers as warm and involved; the absence of genetic relationships did not
appear to affect children’s feelings of closeness to their parents.
When the children were 14 years old, standardized interviews and questionnaires designed to
assess parenting quality and observational assessments of parent-child interaction were adminis-
tered to the mothers and the adolescents. The donor conception families as a whole did not differ
from the natural conception families with respect to the quality of mother-adolescent relationships
(Golombok et al., 2017). The interview and observational ratings, as well as scores on the ques-
tionnaires, were characteristic of positive mother-adolescent relationships. However, differences
were identified between the egg donation families and the donor insemination families. These
differences indicated less positive relationships between mothers and adolescents in egg dona-
tion families than in donor insemination families both in terms of mothers’ acceptance of their
adolescents and the functioning of the family as a whole. These differences were identified from
the mothers’ reports and from the adolescents’ reports which gave greater weight to the findings.
Although the scores for both mothers and adolescents in egg donation families were indicative of
high levels of maternal acceptance and family functioning, inspection of the mean scores showed
the donor insemination families to be similar to the natural conception families, whereas the egg
donation families showed less positive scores. This finding suggested that the absence of a genetic
link between mothers and their children presented greater difficulties for mother-child relation-
ships at adolescence than did the absence of a genetic link between children and their fathers.
Although there was no significant difference in the rates of divorce or separation between family
types, only 7.4% of egg donation families had separated or divorced. This percentage is very low
compared with the national divorce rate in the United Kingdom, which was 28% for couples with
children of this age, and suggests that mothers who did not have a genetic tie to their children were
more likely to remain with their children’s father. Regarding the consequences of disclosure of
children’s donor conception, more positive family relationships, as reported by both mothers and
adolescents, were found in families where parents had told their children about their biological
origins before age 7 (Ilioi et al., 2017).
Lesbian Mothers Through Donor Insemination

The growth of assisted reproductive technologies in the 1980s and 1990s resulted in donor insemina-
tion becoming a more accessible route to parenthood for lesbian women. For the first time, rather
than fighting for custody of their children following an acrimonious divorce, lesbian couples began
to plan their family together after coming out. The rapid increase in openly lesbian women having
children at that time became known as “the lesbian baby boom” (Patterson, 1995).
492
A number of studies of planned lesbian mother families with young children were carried out.
In the United States, Chan, Raboy, and Patterson (1998) investigated lesbian mother families and
heterosexual parent families, some headed by couples and others headed by single parents. All had
conceived their children through donor insemination and the average age of the children was 7 years.
No differences were found between the lesbian and heterosexual families in terms of parental well-
being, as assessed by standardized measures of stress associated with parenting, depression, self-esteem,
and for two-parent families the couple’s relationship quality.
Also in the United States, Flaks, Ficher, Masterpasqua, and Joseph (1995) compared lesbian cou-
ples with children 3–9 years old who had been conceived by donor insemination with a demo-
graphically matched group of heterosexual couples with children of the same age. Parents were
administered an interview assessment of parenting awareness skills and a questionnaire measure of
their relationship quality. The lesbian and heterosexual couples did not differ from each other with
respect to relationship quality. Moreover, the lesbian couples’ scores did not differ from norms for
married heterosexual couples on this measure. Although the lesbian mothers showed greater par-
enting awareness skills than did the heterosexual parents, this appears to have related to the parents’
gender, rather than their sexual orientation, as both the lesbian and heterosexual mothers showed
greater awareness of parenting skills than did the heterosexual fathers.
In Belgium and the Netherlands, lesbian mother families with a child conceived by donor insemi-
nation were compared with heterosexual families with a child conceived by donor insemination and
heterosexual families with a naturally conceived child. The children were between 4 and 8 years old
(Brewaeys, Ponjaert, Van Hall, and Golombok, 1997). All lesbian couples who had given birth to a
child through donor insemination in a major fertility center during a 6-year period took part in the
study; thus, the sample was representative of lesbian mothers who had conceived their children by
donor insemination at a clinic. In both the lesbian and heterosexual families, an anonymous sperm
donor had been used. The quality of the couple’s relationship was assessed by questionnaire, and the
quality of the parent-child relationship was evaluated through a standardized interview with the
parents and a standardized measure, the Bene-Anthony Family Relations test, with the child. The
quality of the couples’ relationships and the quality of interaction between the biological mother and
the child did not differ between the lesbian mother families and either of the heterosexual parent
groups. However, co-mothers in lesbian families were found to interact more with their children
than did fathers.
Longitudinal studies in Europe and the United States examined parenting in planned lesbian
mother families when the children reached adolescence. In the United Kingdom, lesbian mother
families were first compared with families headed by single heterosexual mothers and two-parent
heterosexual families when the children were 6 years old (Golombok, Tasker, and Murray, 1997).
Mothers in female-headed families, irrespective of their sexual orientation, showed greater warmth
toward their children, interacted more with them, and had more serious disputes with them than did
mothers in father-present families. When followed up in early adolescence, the mothers in female-
headed families continued to engage in more interaction with their children and had more serious
disputes with them than did mothers from father-present homes (MacCallum and Golombok, 2004).
The children also perceived their mothers as more available and dependable, but did not experience
greater maternal warmth. When the adolescents reached age 18, the female-headed families were
similar to the heterosexual two-parent families on a range of measures of parenting quality, with
scores on these measures reflecting positive family relationships (Golombok and Badger, 2010). Dif-
ferences that were identified pointed to more positive family relationships in female-headed homes.
Although the lesbian and single heterosexual mothers continued to show very similar patterns of
parenting, the lesbian mothers experienced greater conflict with their young adult children and were
similar to the heterosexual two-parent families in that respect.
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A qualitative longitudinal study, the U.S. National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study, was initi-
ated in 1986 to provide in-depth data on lesbian families with children conceived by donor insemi-
nation (see Gartrell, Peyser, and Bos, 2012, for a review). This study is ongoing and has maintained
a remarkably low level of sample attrition. Eighty-four families were recruited to the study during
insemination or pregnancy, of which 73 were headed by a couple and 11 were headed by a single
mother at the time of the child’s birth. Subsequent data collection took place when the children
were 2, 5, 10, and 17 years old, by which time 93% of the families were still participating in the study.
Thus, the sample has not been biased by the attrition of those who have not functioned well. At age
2, the majority of birth mothers and co-mothers shared caregiving equally, with the birth mother as
primary parent in all but one of the remaining families. Two thirds of the mothers acknowledged
some jealousy and competitiveness around bonding issues (Gartrell et al., 1999). By age 5 years, two
thirds of couples who were still together shared childrearing equally, with most, but not all, of the
other couples having allocated more responsibilities to the birth mother. Two thirds reported that
that child was equally bonded to both mothers. Where this was not the case, the child was thought
to be more bonded to the birth mother (Gartrell et al., 2000). Despite a preponderance of shared
parenting at age 10, some co-mothers continued to experience jealousy or competitiveness regard-
ing bonding with the child. Half of the couples who had remained together since the child’s birth
reported that the child was equally bonded to both mothers (Gartrell, Rodas, Deck, Peyser, and
Banks, 2006). Close, positive relationships with their mothers were found to protect the children at
age 17 from the adverse effects of homophobic stigmatization (Bos and Gartrell, 2010).
In the Netherlands, 100 two-parent lesbian mother families formed through donor insemination
were compared with a demographically matched sample of 100 two-parent heterosexual families with-
out a history of infertility when the children were 4–8 years old (Bos, van Balen, and van den Boom,
2004, 2007) and again at 8–12 years old (Bos and van Balen, 2008). The lesbian biological mothers
reported higher levels of emotional involvement with, and concern about, their children than did
the heterosexual mothers. The same was true of co-mothers, compared with fathers in heterosexual
families. The co-mothers also showed less power assertion than did the fathers; however, this finding is
more likely to be associated with the gender of the parent rather than the parent’s sexual orientation.
Single Mothers by Choice

The term “single mother by choice” or “solo mother” refers to a woman who actively chooses to
parent a child without a partner (Bock, 2000; Hertz, 2006; Weinraub and Kaufmann, this volume).
The number of such families has risen sharply since the millennium and is likely to grow given the
demographic shift toward older first-time motherhood (Graham, 2012). Women who decide to par-
ent alone have a range of possibilities available to them for becoming pregnant, the most common of
which is donor insemination (Bock, 2000; Hertz, 2006; Graham and Braverman, 2012; Jadva, Badger,
Morrissette, and Golombok, 2009; Weinraub and Kaufmann, 2019). Indeed, a significant propor-
tion of women who now seek fertility treatment with donated gametes are women without a male
partner (De Wert et al., 2014). Donor insemination is favored over adoption by those who wish to
experience pregnancy and have a genetically related child, and is favored over sexual intercourse by
women who do not wish to have casual sex or to deceive a man to become pregnant (Hertz, 2006;
Jadva, Badger, et al., 2009). Many single mothers by choice prefer to use an anonymous or identity-
release donor (a donor whose identity can be requested by the child on reaching adulthood) rather
than a known donor, to avoid potential complications of the donor’s involvement with the family as
the child grows up. Many also prefer to attend a fertility clinic in countries where this is permissible,
rather than to embark on self-insemination. Clinics offer single women greater legal protection than
is possible with self-insemination, as sperm donors have no parental rights over children conceived at
a clinic. Clinics also offer greater medical protection, due to the stringent screening process required
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of sperm donors. However, some women find sperm donors independently of clinics, either through
personal contacts, advertising, or connection websites which connect men who wish to donate
sperm with women looking for sperm donors. Whereas single lesbian women and single hetero-
sexual women may become single mothers by choice, the term is most commonly used in relation
to single heterosexual women.
Studies have shown that single mothers by choice are generally, but not always, well educated
and financially secure in professional occupations who become mothers in their late 30s or early
40s (Bock, 2000; Graham, 2014; Graham and Braverman, 2012; Jadva, Badger, et al., 2009; Weinraub
and Kaufmann, 2019). Contrary to popular belief, these women have thought long and hard about
having a child alone, have consulted with friends and family and have ensured that they have the
financial resources and social support they need. They are also concerned about the absence of a
father from their children’s lives and many have actively sought out relatives or friends to be male role
models ( Jadva, Freeman et al., 2009; Murray and Golombok, 2005a). In spite of the way in which
they are portrayed, the majority of women who decide to go it alone as mothers do so not from
choice, but because they do not have a current partner and feel that time is running out for them
to have a child (Graham and Braverman, 2012; Hertz, 2006; Jadva, Freeman, et al., 2009; Murray
and Golombok, 2005a). Indeed, many single mothers by choice report that they would have rather
had their children within a traditional family setting, but could not wait any longer because of their
increasing age and associated fertility decline; because they wanted to be mothers, they did not actu-
ally have a choice (Graham, 2014; Murray and Golombok, 2005a).
In an in-depth, qualitative study of women thinking about and embarking on single motherhood
through the use of donor sperm, Graham (2014) found that the decision to pursue single mother-
hood was based on a deep-seated desire to become a mother, and that the potential child’s well-being
was at the forefront of women’s minds as they decided whether to proceed, what route to take to
achieve motherhood, and what process they should use to select a sperm donor. Many, but certainly
not all, hoped to have a relationship with a man in the future, not just for themselves, but also for
their child to have a father.
Unlike divorced or unmarried single mothers, single mothers by choice have not generally
experienced the socioeconomic disadvantage, depression, and lack of social support that commonly
accompany marital breakdown or unplanned single parenthood (Hertz, 2006; Jadva, Badger, et al.,
2009; Murray and Golombok, 2005a). However, they do not usually know the identity of their
child’s biological father. There is, as yet, little research on parenting by single mothers by choice. In a
study carried out in the United Kingdom, a comparison was conducted between single heterosexual
mother families and married heterosexual parent families, all with a 6- to 12-month-old infant who
had been conceived by donor insemination (Murray and Golombok, 2005a). The mothers were
administered an interview designed to assess their quality of parenting, which produced standardized
ratings of expressed warmth toward the infant, emotional over-involvement with the infant, interac-
tion with the infant, sensitive responding to the infant’s signals, enjoyment of motherhood, and social
support. They also completed questionnaire assessments of anxiety, depression, feelings of attachment
to the infant, and stress associated with parenting. No differences were identified between the two
family types in terms of mothers’ psychological well-being, adaptation to motherhood, expressed
warmth, emotional involvement or bonding with their infants. However, the single mothers showed
lower levels of interaction and sensitive responding to their infants than did the married mothers,
possibly because the presence of a partner allowed the married mothers more time with their babies.
The differences between the two family types did not indicate parenting problems in the single-
mother families but, instead, reflected a difference between “moderate” and “good” mother-child
interaction and “average” and “above average” sensitive responding for the single families and two-
parent families, respectively. In the child’s first year of life, the single-mother families were generally
functioning well.
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The families were followed up at the child’s second birthday. The mothers were administered
the Parent Development Interview (Slade, Belsky, Aber, and Phelps, 1999), an in-depth interview
assessment of the emotional bond between parents and their children that produces ratings on vari-
ables such as joy, anger, guilt, over-protectiveness, and disappointment in the child. Mothers also
completed questionnaire assessments of anxiety, depression, and stress associated with parenting. The
families continued to function well as the children reached 2 years old (Murray and Golombok,
2005b). The single mothers were no more likely to be experiencing parenting stress, anxiety or
depression than were the married mothers. Although mothers from both types of family showed
positive relationships with their children, the differences that were identified between the single and
the married mothers indicated greater joy among the single mothers and less anger toward their
children, accompanied by a perception of their children as less clingy. Thus, in direct contrast to
the concerns raised about the quality of parenting of single mothers by choice, the findings showed
more positive and less negative maternal feelings toward their children. A possible explanation for
this finding is that the absence of a partner may have had a positive impact on single mothers’ feel-
ings toward their children.
In another study, solo mother families were compared with two-parent families all with a 4- to
9-year-old child conceived by donor insemination (Golombok, Zadeh, Imrie, Smith, and Freeman,
2016). The mothers were again administered an interview designed to assess quality of parenting, and
completed questionnaire measures of anxiety, depression, and parenting stress. In addition, mothers
and their children participated in an observational assessment of parent-child interaction. There were
no differences in maternal well-being or parenting quality between family types, apart from lower
mother-child conflict in solo mother families, and no differences in the quality of mother-child
interaction. However, how best to respond to children’s questions about their father was a concern of
the single mothers by choice. The mothers reported that their children had begun to ask about their
father from the age of about 2–3 years (Zadeh, Freeman, and Golombok, 2016).
Single mothers have been found to be more likely than heterosexual couples to be open with
their children about their use of donor insemination (Murray and Golombok, 2005a, b). Their
openness is not surprising, as single mothers must explain the absence of a father to their children.
They are also more likely to tell their children about their donor conception at an earlier age. In a
study of 791 parents who were members of the Donor Sibling Registry, a website designed to help
donor-conceived people find their donor and donor siblings (Freeman, Jadva, Kramer, and Golom-
bok, 2009), single mothers formed the largest group of parents and wished to search for donor
relations to enhance their child’s sense of identity. Of the 165 adolescents in the study, 87% of those
from single-mother families had been told about their donor conception by age 7, compared with
only 25% of those from two-parent heterosexual families ( Jadva, Freeman et al., 2009). Moreover, all
of those who had not found out about their donor conception until adulthood were from families
headed by heterosexual couples. In a later study of 741 donor-conceived adolescents and adults who
were members of the Donor Sibling Registry, disclosure was again found to have occurred earlier
in single-parent than in two-parent heterosexual families, with 75% of respondents from the for-
mer stating that they had always known they had been donor conceived, compared with only 24%
from the latter (Beeson, Jennings, and Kramer, 2011). In addition, Scheib and Ruby (2008) found
that single mothers were more interested than lesbian and heterosexual couples in contacting other
families with children who had been conceived with the same identity-release donor, and wished
to do so to create a sense of family for their child. Thus, from the evidence available so far, single
mothers by choice show positive relationships with their children and tend to be open with them
about their origins. No information is yet available on the quality of mother-child relationships, or
on how children feel about not knowing the identity of their biological father, as the children reach
adolescence and beyond.
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Parenting in Surrogacy Families
Concerns About Parenting in Surrogacy Families

Although donor-conceived children lack a genetic relationship with one or both parents, these chil-
dren are born to the parents who will rear them. With gestational surrogacy, the mother who rears
the child, and the mother who gives birth to the child, are not the same. Furthermore, in the case of
genetic surrogacy, in which the surrogate’s egg is used in the child’s conception, the surrogate mother
is not only the gestational mother, but also the genetic mother of the child.
Surrogacy differs from other types of assisted reproduction in ways that may result in greater
problems for surrogacy families than for families created by egg, sperm, or embryo donation. First,
the intended parents must live through the 9 months of pregnancy with the uncertainty of whether
the surrogate will relinquish the child. Furthermore, as the intended mother is not herself pregnant,
prenatal bonding with the child may be absent or diminished. Second, the intended parents must
establish a mutually acceptable relationship with the surrogate during the pregnancy and ensure that
this relationship does not break down. This situation is likely to produce anxiety in the intended par-
ents, and it may put strain on their relationship, especially if one partner is more in favor of the sur-
rogacy arrangement than the other. From the perspective of the intended mother, who is unable to
give birth herself, the relationship with the fertile, and often younger, surrogate mother, to whom she
is indebted, may result in feelings of inadequacy, depression, and low self-esteem. Third, surrogacy is
the most controversial form of assisted reproduction, and parents of children born through surrogacy
are likely to experience disapproval from family, friends, and their wider social world. Unlike other
forms of assisted reproduction, in which the mother experiences pregnancy, and thus is not required
to be open about the circumstances of her child’s conception, couples who become parents through
surrogacy are repeatedly required to explain the arrival of their newborn baby.
All of these factors have the potential to negatively impact on the psychological well-being of
the intended parents and the way in which they parent their children. Moreover, the need to resort
to surrogacy, in itself, may interfere with the intended parents’ quality of parenting. Couples whose
children are born through surrogacy may view the process as an inferior route to parenthood or
may feel less confident as parents. Specific aspects of the surrogacy arrangement may also influ-
ence intended couples’ psychological well-being and parenting quality. Greater difficulties may arise
in situations in which the surrogate mother is the genetic mother of the baby, because intended
mothers, who are neither the genetic nor the gestational mother of their children, may feel greater
insecurity in their mothering role. This insecurity is sometimes the experience of adoptive mothers
(Grotevant and Kohler, 1999). Whether the surrogate mother is known or unknown to the com-
missioning parents prior to embarking on the surrogacy arrangement may also impact on parenting.
Better outcomes may be expected when the surrogate mother is a relative or a friend, because of
the longevity and closeness of the relationship. However, the use of a known surrogate may blur
relationships within the family, such that a sister who becomes a surrogate may become unduly
involved with the child, and thus weaken the status of the intended mother. A further factor that
may influence parenting is whether the surrogate remains in contact with the family as the child
grows up. Contact with the surrogate mother may benefit children by providing them with a greater
understanding of their origins; however, the ongoing involvement of the surrogate with the family
may have an undermining effect on parenting, for example, by causing mothers to feel a lack of
entitlement in their mothering role.
In the studies described ahead, the term “surrogacy parents” refers to the parents who rear a child
born through surrogacy, irrespective of whether they are the genetic parents of that child. The term
“surrogate mother” refers to the woman who hosts the pregnancy whether or not she has a genetic
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Susan Golombok
link to the child. Children born as a result of surrogacy are referred to as “surrogacy children,” and
the surrogate mothers’ own children are referred to as “surrogates’ children.”
Research on Parenting in Surrogacy Families
Surrogacy Parents
In spite of the contentious nature of surrogacy and the adverse publicity it has attracted around the
world, surprisingly little empirical research has been conducted to determine its impact on the par-
ents of children born through surrogacy and on surrogates.
In the only in-depth investigation, a group of families created by surrogacy was included in the
U.K. Longitudinal Study of Assisted Reproduction Families. The surrogacy families were recruited
when the children were around 1 year of age through the General Register Office of the United
Kingdom Office for National Statistics, which keeps a record of all families formed through sur-
rogacy when legal parentage is granted to the intended parents. To reach families in which legal
parentage had not yet been granted, those families with children of the same age who were mem-
bers of the only U.K. surrogacy agency in existence at the time (known as Childlessness Overcome
Through Surrogacy [COTS]) were also asked to take part. Although it was not possible to calculate
an exact participation rate, it was estimated that more than 60% of the eligible surrogacy families
with 1-year-old children throughout the United Kingdom were recruited to the research. Approxi-
mately two thirds of the families had used a genetic surrogate, with the remaining one third having
used a gestational surrogate. Around 70% of the surrogates had been unknown to the intended par-
ents prior to the surrogacy arrangement, whereas the other surrogates had been relatives or friends.
The surrogacy families were compared with a matched group of egg donation families (who had
been recruited through fertility clinics) and a matched group of natural conception families (who
had been recruited through maternity wards), all of whom had had planned pregnancies. For both
of these family types, all eligible families were asked to take part, and more than 70% agreed. The
inclusion of egg donation families as a comparison group (in addition to the natural conception
families) controlled for the experience of female infertility and the involvement of a third party in
the birth of the child.
The first assessment was carried out at around the time of the child’s first birthday and focused
on the parents’ psychological well-being, marital satisfaction, and quality of parenting using in-
depth, standardized interviews and questionnaires (Golombok, Murray, Jadva, MacCallum, and Lyc-
ett, 2004). Both mothers and fathers took part in the research. Contrary to the concerns that have
been expressed about the potentially negative consequences of surrogacy for family functioning, the
differences identified between the surrogacy families and the other family types indicated greater
psychological well-being and adaption to parenthood by the mothers and fathers of children born
through surrogacy than by the comparison group of natural conception parents. Both mothers and
fathers in surrogacy families reported lower levels of stress associated with parenting than did those
with naturally conceived children, and mothers also showed lower levels of depression. With respect
to parent-child relationships, the findings were again more positive for the surrogacy parents than for
the natural conception parents. Mothers and fathers in surrogacy families showed greater warmth
and attachment-related behaviors toward their infants, and greater enjoyment of parenthood, than
did natural conception parents. The surrogacy fathers were also more satisfied with the parental
role. The only exception to this positive pattern of findings was that the surrogacy mothers and
fathers showed higher levels of emotional over-involvement with their infants. However, this over-
involvement reflected only a slight degree of over-involvement with their infants rather than a path-
ological level. The egg donation parents were similar to the surrogacy parents in terms of the quality
of their relationships with their children. The egg donation mothers, like the natural conception
498
mothers, showed higher levels of depression than did the surrogacy mothers, possibly due to physical
consequences of the pregnancy.
Aspects of the surrogacy arrangement were also examined. An important question is whether it
makes a difference if the surrogate mother is also the genetic mother of the child. It appears not, as
no differences were found in the quality of the surrogacy parents’ parenting according to whether
the surrogate was the genetic mother of the child. However, the nature of the relationship between
the surrogacy parents and the surrogate mother seemed to make a difference. When the surrogate
mother was a relative or a friend, as opposed to someone who was unknown to the intended parents
prior to the surrogacy arrangement, the surrogacy mothers showed more positive parenting.
The families were revisited when the children were 2 years old (Golombok, MacCallum, Murray,
Lycett, and Jadva, 2006). Once again, a major foci of the research were on the psychological well-
being of the parents and the quality of the parent-child relationships. At this phase of the study, the
quality of parent-child relationships was examined using the Parent Development Interview (Slade
et al., 1999), an interview technique designed to assess the nature of the emotional bond between
a parent and the child. In line with the findings when the children were 1 year old, the surrogacy
mothers appeared to have more positive thoughts and feelings about their toddlers than did the
natural conception mothers. They showed higher levels of pleasure in their children, greater feelings
of competence as parents, and lower levels of anger, guilt, and disappointment with their children.
No differences were found between the surrogacy and natural conception fathers in terms of their
relationships with their children. However, the surrogacy fathers reported lower levels of parenting
stress. The egg donation mothers and fathers were similar to the mothers and fathers in surrogacy
families in terms of their thoughts and feelings about their children, although the surrogacy fathers
again showed lower levels of parenting stress.
The families were followed up for a third time when the children were 3 years old (Golombok,
MacCallum, et al., 2006). The findings were consistent with those of the earlier phases of the study.
Where differences in parent-child relationships were identified, they showed more positive relation-
ships in terms of both warmth and interaction among mothers in surrogacy families than among
their counterparts in natural conception families. Once again, the egg donation mothers were similar
to the surrogacy mothers with respect to the quality of their relationships with their children.
The next phase of the study took place when the children were 7 years old (Golombok et al.,
2011), the age by which children develop a more sophisticated understanding of the absence of
a genetic or gestational link to their parents (Richards, 2000; Solomon et al., 1996; Williams and
Smith, 2010). In the earlier phases of the study, the children were too young to be fully aware of the
circumstances of their birth. In addition to an interview assessment of mother-child relationships,
an observational assessment of mother-child interaction was carried out at this phase of the research
to examine the quality of dynamic interactions between mothers and children that could not be
captured by interview or self-report. No differences were found in the quality of mother-child
relationships between the surrogacy families and either the natural conception or the egg donation
families, as assessed by interview. However, the surrogacy mothers showed less positive interaction
with their children in the observational assessment than did the natural conception mothers. Once
again, the egg donation mothers were similar to the surrogacy mothers on this measure. Thus, the
more positive parent-child relationships shown by the surrogacy mothers, than by the natural con-
ception mothers when the children were in their preschool years was no longer apparent when the
children were 7 years old. Nevertheless, the surrogacy families were not experiencing difficulties.
They did not show more negative parent-child relationships than did the natural conception fami-
lies. Instead, the differences identified reflected more subtle differences in patterns of mother-child
interaction. When the children reached adolescence, the mothers in surrogacy families showed less
negative parenting and reported greater acceptance of their adolescent children and fewer problems
in family relationships as a whole compared to gamete donation mothers (Golombok et al., 2017).
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Susan Golombok
The sample sizes in this study were relatively small and may have been biased toward the inclu-
sion of well-functioning families. Furthermore, some families were lost over time. However, the
study also had a number of advantages, including an in-depth, multimethod approach involving
interview, observational, and questionnaire measures as well as data collection from mothers and
fathers. Moreover, almost 80% of the surrogacy families who enrolled in the research were still tak-
ing part 10 years later. As the first study worldwide to investigate parenting and child development
in surrogacy families, the results must be replicated—ideally in other countries and cultures—before
general conclusions can be drawn. Nevertheless, the findings of this initial study are reassuring and
indicate that some of the fears that have been expressed about surrogacy are based on speculation,
rather than fact.
A question that often arises when surrogacy is discussed is whether surrogacy parents and sur-
rogate mothers maintain a positive relationship with each other during the pregnancy and after the
child is born. The most commonly voiced concern is that the surrogate mother will refuse to hand
over the baby. In fact, this rarely occurs. The cases that have appear in the headlines have given a false
impression of the frequency with which surrogate mothers change their minds. As part of the U.K.
Longitudinal Study of Assisted Reproduction Families, surrogacy parents were interviewed about
the nature of their relationship with the surrogate mother at all five phases of the research, that is,
when their children were age 1 (MacCallum, Lycett, Murray, Jadva, and Golombok, 2003) until
their children were age 10 ( Jadva, Blake, Casey, and Golombok, 2012). When the children were
age 1, the 42 sets of parents were asked to report on their relationship with the surrogate mother
both during the pregnancy and after their children were born. During the pregnancy, the large
majority of intended mothers saw the surrogate mother at least once per month, often accompany-
ing her to medical appointments, with intended fathers having less contact. This is in line with the
findings of Ragoné (1994), who found, in a study in the United States, that the role of the father
during pregnancy was de-emphasized, whereas the intended mother formed a strong bond with
the surrogate mother and was very involved in the pregnancy. For the most part, intended parents
reported harmonious relationships with surrogate mothers. Where this was not the case, there was
minor conflict or a lack of communication, rather than major conflict or hostility. Most intended
mothers (but only one third of the intended fathers) were present at the birth. In spite of concerns
to the contrary, all surrogate mothers relinquished the baby to the intended parents without dif-
ficulty, with the exception of one woman who only did so after some hesitation. Likewise, all of
the intended mothers had no difficulty accepting the baby, although one woman reported minor
problems in bonding initially.
In the year following the birth, almost all of the surrogacy mothers and fathers met with the sur-
rogate mother at least once, and most described their relationship with her in positive terms. How-
ever, the frequency of contact between the surrogacy parents and the surrogate mothers decreased
over time, particularly in cases in which they had not known each other prior to the surrogacy
arrangement and the surrogate’s egg had been used to conceive the child. By the time the children
were 10 years old, 60% of the surrogacy parents were still in contact with the surrogate mother and,
for the large majority, this relationship remained positive. Thus, fears were allayed that difficulties
would develop between the surrogacy parents and the surrogate as the child grew up, or that the
involvement of the surrogate would interfere with the surrogacy mother’s confidence as a parent.
However, those who had lost contact may have done so intentionally due to difficulties between the
surrogate and the family.
The nature of the relationship between surrogates and their surrogacy children was of particular
interest, especially in cases in which the surrogate was the genetic mother or a friend or relative of
the family. In the year following the birth, three quarters of the surrogates saw the baby. Although
most of the surrogacy parents were happy about this, a few had mixed feelings. Where there was no
contact between the surrogate and the baby, this was usually by mutual agreement or because the
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surrogate did not want contact. There were no reported cases of contact being denied by the sur-
rogacy parents.
Surrogacy parents are much more open with their children about the circumstances of their birth
than are parents of children conceived by egg, sperm, or embryo donation. All of the parents in the
U.K. Longitudinal Study of Assisted Reproduction Families planned to tell their children about the
surrogacy (MacCallum et al., 2003), and almost all did so by the time their children reached 7 years of
age ( Jadva et al., 2012). However, by the child’s age of 7, the majority of parents whose children had
been born through genetic surrogacy had told their children that they had been carried by another
woman, but had not disclosed the use of the surrogate’s egg (Readings et al., 2011); almost half of
these parents had still not disclosed this information by the time their children turned 10 ( Jadva et al.,
2012). Thus, these children were unaware that their surrogate mother was also their genetic mother.
Surrogate Mothers
Some of the most contested ethical questions regarding surrogacy relate to the surrogate mother. Is
the surrogate in a position to give truly informed consent if she has never experienced surrogacy
in the past and is, therefore, unaware of what it feels like to relinquish a baby she has carried for 9
months and who may also be her genetic child? Do surrogate mothers feel regret once they have
handed over the baby? Do they experience psychological distress or long-term psychological prob-
lems? What is the impact of surrogacy on the surrogate’s own family?
To examine the psychological consequences of surrogacy for surrogate mothers, women who had
given birth to a surrogacy child in the United Kingdom were administered a standardized interview
1 year after the birth of the child and completed a questionnaire assessment of postnatal depression
( Jadva, Murray, Lycett, MacCallum, and Golombok, 2003). More than 70% of those who were asked
to participate agreed to do so. None of the women reported experiencing any doubts about hand-
ing over the baby to the intended parents. When asked to recollect their feelings and experiences,
approximately one third of the women reported feeling upset in the weeks following the hand-over,
although only one woman described feeling very depressed. One year later, only two women (6%)
reported psychological difficulties arising from their experiences of surrogacy, and none obtained a
score on the postnatal depression questionnaire that was indicative of clinical depression. Neither
was there a difference in depression scores between the genetic and gestational surrogates, which
suggests that the surrogate mothers did not experience long-term psychological problems, even in
cases in which they were genetically related to the surrogacy child. Thus, the psychological difficul-
ties experienced by surrogate mothers were not severe and tended to dissipate with time; this finding
lends little support to the expectation that surrogate mothers will experience psychological problems
following the relinquishment of the child. The study found a great deal of variation in the frequency
of contact between the surrogate mother and the baby following the hand-over. Whereas one third
of surrogate mothers had seen the baby at least once a month, one quarter had not had any contact.
Not one of the surrogate mothers felt as if the surrogacy child was her own, a factor that might have
helped them to relinquish the baby to the intended parents. For almost two thirds of the surrogates,
information was also available from the surrogacy parents, as they were participants in the U.K.
Longitudinal Study of Assisted Reproduction Families. The accounts of the surrogates were almost
identical to those of the surrogacy parents, thus validating the surrogacy parents’ reports of positive
relationships with the surrogate mothers.
In the only investigation of the long-term outcomes of surrogacy for surrogate mothers, surrogate
mothers (many of whom had taken part in the previous study 1 year after the birth of the surrogacy
child) were interviewed between 5 and 15 years after the mother had given birth to a surrogacy child
(Imrie and Jadva, 2014; Jadva and Imrie, 2014). The findings challenged the widespread expecta-
tion that difficulties would arise in the relationship between the surrogate mother and the intended
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Susan Golombok
parents as time went on, and instead painted a largely positive picture of the relationships formed
between surrogates and the families they helped to create. Three quarters of the surrogate mothers
had stayed in touch with the children they had carried for another couple, and generally saw them
once or twice a year.
Gay Father Surrogacy Families

Of all the new family forms discussed in this chapter, gay father families with children born through
surrogacy and egg donation differ most from the traditional nuclear family. They differ with respect
to the sexual orientation of the parents and the gender of the parents as well as the children’s concep-
tion through assisted reproduction, involving both surrogacy and egg donation. Children growing up
in gay father families formed through surrogacy may have two fathers and two “mothers”—a genetic
father, a social father, a genetic mother, and a gestational mother—but no mother in the family home.
A question often asked about gay parents who have children through surrogacy is how they decide
who will be the biological father. In a study of gay couples who attended a fertility clinic in Canada,
three quarters had used the sperm of both partners to fertilize the donated eggs, and one embryo
from each man had been transferred to the surrogate (Grover, Shmorgun, Moskovstev, Baratz, and
Librach, 2013). Thus, the majority of prospective fathers decided to leave this decision to chance. In
the majority of cases, only one child resulted from the pregnancy; however, when twins were born,
they were genetic half-siblings. In contrast, in an investigation of gay couples seeking gestational
surrogacy at a clinic in the United States, 80% chose one partner to provide the sperm (Greenfeld
and Seli, 2011). In some of these couples it was agreed that the older partner should donate, in some
couples the man who did not already have children was chosen, some couples selected the partner
who had the greater desire for biological parenthood, and some opted for the partner with “better
genes.” The remaining couples used one embryo created from the sperm of each partner.
In their analysis of how egg donors were chosen, Greenfeld and Seli (2011) found that the most
commonly requested characteristics were that the donor be tall, attractive, and educated, and physi-
cally resemble the nongenetic father. Grover, Shmorgun, Moskovtsev, Baratz, and Librach (2013)
examined whether the gay couples in their study preferred a known or an anonymous egg donor.
The majority chose an anonymous donor who was open to being contacted by the child after the
age of 18.
There has been a dramatic rise in the number of gay men having children through surrogacy
(Berkowitz, 2013). However, the creation of gay father families through assisted reproductive tech-
nologies is such a recent phenomenon that little research has been carried out on the quality of
parenting in families formed in this way. Although research on fathering has shown that the processes
through which heterosexual fathers influence their children are similar to that of mothers (Fagan,
Day, Lamb, and Cabrera, 2014), it is widely assumed that fathers are less suited to parenting than are
mothers (Biblarz and Stacey, 2010). Moreover, gay fathers may be exposed to greater stigmatization
than are lesbian mothers because gay father families possess the additional nontraditional feature of
being headed solely by men (Goldberg and Smith, 2011; Golombok and Tasker, 2010).
Couples who had become fathers through gestational surrogacy in the United States were inter-
viewed about their experiences of parenthood (Bergman, Rubio, Green, and Padron, 2010). The
fathers were financially wealthy, although many had experienced a drop in income after becoming
parents due to giving up work or working fewer hours. Their children ranged in age from 2 months
to 8 years. The fathers reported parenting to be a very positive experience. They felt proud to be
parents and valued themselves more. One of the most striking findings was that having children had
brought them closer to their own, as well as to their partner’s, parents, many of whom were excited
to become grandparents. Most had lost friendships with their gay friends who were not parents.
502
However, they had built new friendship with other parents, both heterosexual and gay. In a question-
naire-based study in Italy, gay father families formed through surrogacy did not differ from lesbian
mother families formed through donor insemination or heterosexual parent families with naturally
conceived children with respect to family functioning (Baiocco et al., 2015).
In an in-depth study conducted in the United States, two-parent gay father families created
through surrogacy were compared with two-parent lesbian mother families created through donor
insemination, all with children 3–9 years old (Golombok, Blake, Slutsky, Raffanello, and Ehrhardt,
2017). There were no differences between the gay father families and the lesbian mother families
in terms of perceived stigma, quality of parenting, or parent-child interaction, with scores on these
measures reflecting low levels of perceived stigma, high levels of positive parenting, low levels of
negative parenting, and average levels of parent-child interaction. The fathers were more likely to
maintain a relationship with the surrogate than the egg donor, and most fathers reported a positive
relationship with the surrogate (Blake et al., 2016).
Conclusion
What can be concluded about parenting in families created through contemporary reproductive tech-
nologies? Is it the case, as is widely assumed, that optimal parenting occurs in traditional two-parent
families with naturally conceived children? And that dysfunctional patterns of parenting may be a fea-
ture of assisted reproduction families due to the difficulties experienced by these mothers and fathers
in their quest for a child? It seems from the evidence available so far that such concerns are unfounded.
The research presented in this chapter suggests that the quality of parenting experienced by children
born through contemporary reproductive technologies—whether through “high-tech” procedures
such as IVF and ICSI, donated gametes and embryos, or surrogacy—is similar to that of naturally
conceived children. Indeed, identified differences reflected more positive parenting by the assisted
reproduction parents. This remains the case in families formed by assisted reproduction for social
rather than medical reasons—families with lesbian mothers, gay fathers, and single mothers by choice.
How can these findings be explained? The answer seems to lie in the different circumstances of
assisted reproduction and natural conception families. Parents who have children through assisted
reproduction are highly motivated to have children; couples who are less motivated are more likely
to have given up along the way. Many of them have experienced years of infertility and infertility
treatment before achieving parenthood, others become parents in the face of significant social disap-
proval, and still others overcome both hurdles to have a child. It seems that those who are successful
in surmounting these obstacles become particularly committed parents when their much-wanted
children eventually arrive. It may also be relevant that children in assisted reproduction families are,
by necessity, planned. Unlike children in traditional families, they cannot be conceived unintention-
ally, and there is evidence to show that planned pregnancies are associated with more positive out-
comes for all concerned (Carson et al., 2013; Hayatbakhsh et al., 2011).
Research on families formed through contemporary reproductive technologies is of interest in
itself, as it provides empirical data on the parenting of mothers and fathers who have children in this
way. However, it is also of broader theoretical interest, as it increases understanding of parenting more
generally. Assisted reproduction families act as “natural experiments” (Rutter, 2007; Rutter, Pickles,
Murray, and Eaves, 2001) in that they separate factors that in natural conception families occur
together. In particular, comparisons of families created by sperm donation, egg donation, embryo
donation, surrogacy, and natural conception or IVF/ICSI using the parents’ own gametes enable the
impact of the absence of a genetic and/or gestational relationship between parents and their children
to be explored. The findings suggest that biological relatedness is not essential for the development
of positive parent-child relationships. It seems that parents who conceived by assisted reproduction
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Susan Golombok
have good relationships with their children, even in families where one or both parents lack a genetic
and/or gestational connection to their child.
There are limitations to this growing body of research on parenting in families formed through
contemporary reproductive technologies that must be borne in mind. With some exceptions, the
samples studied have tended to be small, and this factor has limited their statistical power and ability
to detect small effects, should these exist. In addition, response rates have sometimes been low, result-
ing in potentially biased samples. In particular, parents who have not disclosed their children’s donor
conception may decline to participate due to the concern that taking part in research might jeopard-
ize their secrecy. Moreover, those who do participate may play down difficulties, as they may wish
to present their families in a favorable light because they feel they must live up to high expectations
of themselves as parents, given the difficulties they had to overcome to have children. Much of the
research has been conducted on parents with preschool and early school-age children. Less is known
about parenting in adolescence and beyond.
Family forms that are currently emerging or are still on the horizon will generate new questions
about parenting in assisted reproduction families. A new phenomenon involves men and women
who were previously unknown to each other using the internet to create families. Instead of meeting
online with the aim of dating, they are meeting online to embark on parenthood. A survey con-
ducted in 2014 of more than 1,000 members of the Pride Angel website shed some light on who
the members are and why they wish to have children in this way (Freeman, Jadva, Tranfield, and
Golombok, 2016). The majority of respondents were women wishing to obtain sperm (45%) or men
wishing to donate sperm (39%). However, 6% of the men and 4% of the women wished to create a
family through a coparenting arrangement; that is, they wanted to rear a child jointly but separately.
Coparenting is a radical departure from the family types that are the focus of this chapter, and it
potentially lacks a key element of effective parenting—a close, committed relationship between the
parents. As yet, little is known about the relationship between coparents over time, the nature and
quality of each coparent’s relationship with the child, and crucially how children feel about being
parented in this way.
Scientific advances in reproductive technologies are leading to new types of parent. In 2017,
through developments in the use of mitochondrial DNA from the egg of a healthy woman to replace
that of a woman who is at risk of giving birth to a child with mitochondrial disease, the first child
was born with genetic material from three “parents”; a mother, a father, and a woman who donated
her mitochondrial DNA (Zhang et al., 2017). In addition, artificial gametes might soon make it
possible for women to produce sperm and for men to produce eggs (Hayashi, Ohta, Kurimoto, Ara-
maki, and Saitou, 2011). Although intended as an infertility treatment, this procedure would allow
both parents in same-sex couples to be genetically related to their children. Research is also being
conducted on “artificial wombs,” which are essentially machines that would simulate the uterus and
enable gestation to take place outside the mother’s body (Gosden, 2000). Furthermore, the Nobel
Prize–winning scientist, Sir John Gurdon, predicted in 2012 that human cloning would be possible
within 50 years (Gurdon, 2012).
In 1978, when the first IVF baby was born, it was unimaginable that, within 40 years, more
than 6.5 million babies would be born using assisted reproductive technologies; that a woman
would be able to give birth to the genetic child of another woman; that by freezing embryos
parents could give birth to twins years apart; that women would be freezing their eggs until they
were ready to become mothers; and that children would be born to gay couples through sur-
rogacy and egg donation. These are just some of the ways in which parenting has been changed
by contemporary reproductive technologies. In spite of the concerns that have been raised about
the potentially negative consequences for family functioning, the research conducted so far has
failed to support the view that creating families through assisted reproduction has an adverse
effect on parenting.
504
Acknowledgments
This chapter has drawn upon material from within Susan Golombok, Modern Families, Parents and
Children in New Family Forms © Susan Golombok 2015, published by Cambridge University Press,
reproduced with permission.
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15
TRANSITION TO PARENTHOOD
Introduction
From the perspective of evolutionary psychology, becoming a parent fulfills the most important
human psychological need and, thus, for the vast majority of people should occupy a central role in
life and provide a fundamental sense of satisfaction (Kenrick, Griskevicius, Neuberg, and Schaller,
2010). Indeed, there is empirical evidence that parents, as a group, are more satisfied with their lives,
find life more meaningful, and experience more positive emotions than their childless counterparts
(Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014; Nelson-Coffey and Stewart, 2019), at least after the early
years of intensive caregiving are complete (McLanahan and Adams, 1987). Much of the psychologi-
cal literature on the transition to parenthood (TtP), however, stresses the decline in parental relation-
ship quality and socioemotional well-being and increase in daily life strains, typically associated with
the initial TtP. Some even argue that the negative effects of the TtP on family relationships and par-
ent well-being are tantamount to a psychological crisis (Dyer, 1963; LeMasters, 1957). Others, how-
ever, characterize the TtP as a period of adaptation rather than crisis, one that most parents weather
without long-term negative psychological effects (Nelson et al., 2014). The literature reviewed in
this chapter suggests that while the TtP is challenging for all parents, whether that transition causes
a crisis or merely adaptation depends on the context and timing of the TtP and the characteristics
of parents and infants themselves.
Although the characterization of the TtP as a period of crisis for some and adaptation for others
has been accurate since social scientists began studying the TtP in the 1950s (see LeMasters, 1957),
the context of the TtP has shifted greatly since that time. Most notably, the average age at which
women and men undergo the TtP has increased steadily (Mathews and Hamilton, 2002), as more
parents begin families later in life and fewer young women become parents as teenagers (Ventura,
Brady, Hamilton, and Mathews, 2014). At the same time, the proportion of parents undergoing the
TtP outside the context of marriage has risen precipitously, along with the proportion of new par-
ents who are unmarried but cohabiting (Hamilton, Martin, Osterman, Curtin, and Mathews, 2015).
Other nontraditional family structures have also proliferated, or become more socially accepted,
including same-sex couple parents (Lofquist, 2011; Patterson, 2019), couples who become pregnant
via surrogacy (Golombok, 2019; Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology, 2017), and cou-
ples who adopt their first child (Child Welfare Information Gateway, 2016). For all these new and
increasing family types, the tasks of the TtP remained the same; however, the contexts for executing
them have changed.
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The topical foci of the TtP literature have shifted in ways that reflect these and other demo-
graphic shifts in parenthood. Most notably, in the past 15 years research has focused more on fathers’
experiences during the TtP (Barry, Smith, Deutsch, and Perry-Jenkins, 2011). The literature on
fathers’ transition has always stressed that they play an important role in child development (Lamb,
2010) and in the success of mothers’ transition to parenthood (Cox, Paley, Burchinal, and Payne,
1999). The salience of fathers’ experiences has risen, however, because of the increase in mater-
nal employment during children’s infancy and toddlerhood (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2012) and
cultural shifts in expectations for and definitions of father involvement, both of which have led
men to take more active roles in early caregiving than ever before (Pleck, 2010; Sayer, Bianchi, and
Robinson, 2004). Another notable addition to the literature on the TtP has been the proliferation
of studies describing neurobiological changes that women—and men—experience during the TtP,
changes that undergird many of the psychological and behavioral effects the literature has long
reported. Largely because of the growth in fMRI technology and expertise during the 1990s, we
now know more than ever before about how the hormonal changes women (and their partners)
experience during pregnancy and after childbirth are associated with changes in the functioning and
even structure of new parents’ brains. This emerging subfield has greatly illuminated how women’s
physiological and psychological experiences during pregnancy can shape their experiences during
the TtP as well as how women’s physiological and psychological experiences during the TtP relate
to the nature of parenting behaviors and parent-child relationships thereafter.
This chapter synthesizes what we know about the effect of the TtP on three overarching aspects
of adult adjustment: Family relationships, psychosocial well-being, and neurobiological changes. In
each case, the review focuses on both positive and negative changes that accompany the TtP as
well as the contextual and personal strengths and vulnerabilities that predict variation in parents’
adjustment in each area. Before reviewing this literature, however, the chapter begins with a sum-
mary of the demographic changes in the TtP that have characterized parenting in the United States.
Next, we overview the theories typically guiding research on the TtP, which include family systems
theory (Cox and Paley, 2003; Kerig, 2019), the ecological model of development (Bronfenbrenner,
1977), and the perspective of evolutionary psychology (Kenrick et al., 2010). The final sections of
the chapter summarize the literature on the TtP under conditions of ecological and biological risk,
including single and unwed parenthood and poor infant health. This section will also explicate the
unique—and common—experiences of the TtP for relatively new family types, including same-sex
couples and couples welcoming babies via surrogacy or adoption. Finally, we offer examples of pub-
licly funded programs and policies designed to support parents through the TtP, and a cross-national
comparison between the United States and the Scandinavian countries, which offer very different
models of public support for new parents. Throughout, we describe the TtP as a period of interper-
sonal, psychological, and biological change for mothers, fathers, and families, one that sets the stage
for the development of parenting behavior and parent-child relationships for years to come.
Before proceeding, we define the key terms of interest in this review. First, the period of life con-
sidered the TtP varies across studies, but it typically spans the point of conception through the first
months of the first child’s life (Michaels and Goldberg, 1988). In this chapter, we also discuss studies
that address the period just before conception, when the issue of pregnancy planning is covered, as
well as multiple years after the child’s birth, when discussing the longevity of TtP effects on adult
well-being and relationships. Our key outcomes of interest are family relationships, psychosocial
well-being, and neurobiological changes. Family relationships encompass the mother-father roman-
tic relationship as well as parents’ coparenting relationship, defined as the support and coordination
(or lack thereof ) that parental figures exhibit in childrearing (Feinberg, 2002; Feinberg et al., 2019).
The quality of parents’ romantic relationships is typically measured as the degree of conflict between
parents and overall happiness in the relationship (Spanier, 1976), whereas the quality of the coparent-
ing relationship is typically assessed with measures of conflict and cohesion with regard to parenting
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(Feinberg, 2019). In terms of parents’ psychosocial well-being, we focus on the effects of the TtP
on parents’ cognitive well-being—defined as their parenting satisfaction (Costigan, Cox, and Cauce,
2003) and overall subjective well-being (Lucas, Diener, and Suh, 1996)—as well as their affective
well-being—measured in terms of happiness or absence of depression (e.g., Edinburgh Postnatal
Depression Scale; Cox, Holden, and Sagovsky, 1987), anxiety, and their symptoms. Finally, we discuss
the neurobiological changes parents experience across the TtP by discussing research on how neural
activity in and structure of specific brain regions change across the TtP, using data made available by
fMRI technology (for more detail on measurement of neurobiology, see Feldman, 2019).
The Demography of the Transition to Parenthood

The demographic conditions under which women and men undergo the TtP are more diverse today
than at any other time in U.S. history. With regard to parent age, mothers—and fathers—are mak-
ing the transition to parenthood at older ages today than ever before. Women’s average age at first
childbirth began increasing in the mid-twentieth century, rising from 22.1 in 1970 to 24.6 in 2000
(Mathews and Hamilton, 2016). The mean age at first birth has increased from 24.6 in 2000 to 26.3
for women in 2014. Women are making the transition to parenthood at older ages for two reasons:
more women than ever before are having their first child after age 30 (23.9% of all first births in
2000, which rose to 30.2 in 2014), and fewer women are having children as teenagers. The rate of
teen births has fallen continuously, with a slight uptick in late 1980s, since its peak in 1957, and it
fell notably from 23.1% of all first births in 2000 to 13.4% in 2014. Demographers attribute this shift
variously to the increased availability of effective contraception, increasing rates of maternal employ-
ment, and rising age at first marriage, particularly for women and men with college degrees (Casper
and Bianchi, 2002). Making the transition to parenthood at older ages carries both benefits and
risks to parents: older parents tend to have higher education and income levels (McLanahan, 2004),
and possibly greater emotional maturity, and the stability these strengths bring may allow parents
to weather the TtP more smoothly; at particularly high ages, however, the risk of maternal health
problems during pregnancy and infant health problems neonatally increase (Aldous and Edmonson,
1993), which can add significant stress to the TtP.
An increasingly high percentage of women—and men—are also making the transition to parent-
hood outside of marriage. The percentage of births to unmarried mothers has been relatively stable
since 2005—at about 40% of all births—however, that percentage reflects a sharp increase since
research on the TtP began. Specifically, the percentages of first births to unmarried women were
5% in 1960 and 18% in 1980 (Martin, Hamilton, Ventura et al., 2013). Although on average making
the TtP outside of marriage carries more risks, as unwed parents tend to have lower education and
income levels and fewer psychosocial resources than married parents (Ryan, Claessens, and Markow-
itz, 2015; Wilson and Brooks-Gunn, 2001), unmarried first-time parents are older today than they
were in previous decades and more likely to be in cohabiting relationships, both shifts that reflect
increased stability among unwed parents (Martinez, 2015).
Alongside the growth in unmarried and cohabiting families has been growth in other nontra-
ditional family structures. Specifically, the number of same-sex parents who become parents in the
context of a same-sex relationship has risen in the past 20 years (Patterson and Riskind, 2010). Using
data from the 2010 American Community Survey, Lofquist (2011) found that although only 1% of
couple households were same sex, 20% of those households had their own children. A minority of
these parents was married in 2010, but this percentage will most likely increase with the legalization
of same-sex marriage nationally. Same-sex couples are more likely to adopt their first child than
opposite-sex couples. For example, of same-sex couples with children, 27% have all or some adopted
children compared with only 10% of opposite-sex couples (Lofquist, 2011). The experiences of
adoptive parents, and same-sex parents, are unique in ways that will be discussed later in the chapter.
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All of the aforementioned trends vary meaningfully by socioeconomic status. Parents who have
a first child after age 35 have higher education and income levels than younger parents (Livingston,
2015), whereas unmarried first-time parents have lower education and income levels than their
married counterparts, and are also more likely to be ethnic minorities (McLanahan, 2004). Both
unmarried and young parents are also far more likely to have an unintended birth than older, mar-
ried parents (Finer and Zolna, 2011), and intendedness itself can impact the nature of the TtP as it
relates to parents’ economic, social, and psychological preparedness for parenthood (Lachance-Grzela
and Bouchard, 2009a). Taken together, the changing nature of the TtP reflects what McLanahan
(2004) has called the “diverging destinies” of children in the United States, a dynamic by which
children born to married parents are increasingly born to older parents with higher levels of educa-
tion, income, and time to devote to childrearing, whereas children born to unwed parents are born
to relatively younger parents with fewer time and money resources to invest in children. These
sociodemographic differences impact the nature of the TtP in ways discussed in succeeding sections
of this chapter.
Theoretical Perspectives on the Transition to Parenthood

There are three key theories guiding our understanding of why and how the TtP affects parents’
relationships, adjustment, and neurobiology. One of the most influential, particularly with regard to
the TtP’s effects on relationships, is family systems theory (FST; Kerig, 2019). FST views individuals
in families as existing within a system of relationships that influence each other and are influenced
by the characteristics of all members of a family (Kerig, 2019; Minuchin, 1985). According to FST,
because families are open, living systems, they must adapt to any change or challenge faced by a per-
son or relationship in the system (Cox and Paley, 2003). From this perspective, the TtP is an important
moment in family definition because it requires changes in multiple aspects of the system—parental
relationship, household roles, and relationships with extended family—changes that require the entire
system to adapt and reorganize. Thus, how mothers and fathers fare in terms of their own psycho-
logical adjustment to parenthood will theoretically depend on how their relationship quality fares
during the transition, and vice versa, and how parents’ coparenting relationship develops will depend
on their psychological adjustment along with the quality of the parental relationship (McHale et al.,
2019). The literature summarized ahead on how parents’ romantic and coparenting relationship qual-
ity changes and develops across the TtP will draw heavily from this perspective.
Bronfenbrenner’s process-person-context perspective within the broader ecological model
(Bronfenbrenner, 1977) also sees individuals in families as situated within a hierarchical set of sub-
systems, each influencing the other, but emphasizes the effect that families’ ecological context has on
those processes. Thus, it is not only parents’ skills, beliefs, and personality that influence the nature
of the TtP, but also the resources available in the neighborhood and extended family, the parents’
work environment, and the broader economic and public policy context (Levy-Shiff, 1994). From
this perspective, parents’ pre-birth psychological and personality characteristics should influence the
way they adjust to the TtP, but so should their employment status, their financial resources, and
the level of social support they receive from family and friends. This perspective along with the
related Vulnerability-Stress-Adaptation (VSA) model, proposed by Karney and Bradbury (1995),
will inform our understanding of the literature on how parents’ weather the TtP in terms of their
psychosocial adjustment.
The perspective of evolutionary psychology and evolutionary biology (Bjorklund and Myers,
2019) helps to explain why, despite the stresses and strains typically associated with the TtP, the vast
majority of adults become parents in their lifetimes (Bjorklund and Myers, 2019). It holds that most
people become parents because we evolved to view mating, reproduction, and parenting as the most
important psychological goals in life (Kenrick et al., 2010). Evolutionary psychology presumes that
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all typical human behavior has evolved to promote our inclusive fitness, which means our relative suc-
cess at passing genes into future generations via either direct reproduction or helping kin reproduce.
Inclusive fitness is presumed to underlie all evolved mechanisms, including any innate systems that
contribute to an animal’s survival and ultimate reproductive success. This perspective illuminates
the possible reasons why mothers—and fathers—experience predictable psychobiological changes
across the TtP, including shifts in reproductive hormones and related changes in the function and
even structure of parents’ brains, that facilitate the optimal caregiving of infants and young children
(Feldman, 2015, 2019). This perspective will be incorporated into the description of those psycho-
biological changes ahead.
Considered together, these three key theories frame the research, and our understanding, of how
the TtP influences parents’ family relationships, cognitive and affective well-being, and their neuro-
biological functioning. These theories also, therefore, contextualize the specific ways in which the
TtP sets parents on relational, emotional, and biological trajectories that shape their parenting behav-
ior and parent-child relationships for years to come.
Effects of the Transition to Parenthood on Family Relationships

One of the earliest questions asked in research on the TtP was how the introduction of an infant
into a family affected family relationships and, specifically, the quality of the mother-father relation-
ship (LeMasters, 1957). Ahead, we consider recent research on whether and how parents’ personal
and coparenting relationships shift across the TtP, and the individual and contextual factors that help
determine the nature of those changes.
Parents’ Relationship Quality

The introduction of a child into a couple’s life requires change in couples’ roles and responsibilities
as a dyadic relationship becomes a triadic system. According to family systems theory, it is reason-
able to expect that this shift will affect the functioning of both parents and their relationship. Indeed,
one of the most consistent findings from the TtP literature is that the quality of parents’ romantic
relationship declines after the birth of a first child. Specifically, couples’ self-reported satisfaction
with their relationships declines steadily from the time of the child’s birth over the first 6 months of
life (Bower, Jia, Schoppe-Sullivan, Mangelsdorf, and Brown, 2012; Cox et al., 1999; Doss, Rhoades,
Stanley, and Markman, 2009; Elek, Hudson, and Bouffard, 2003; Kluwer, 2010; Mitnick, Heyman,
and Smith-Slep, 2009; Wallace and Gotlib, 1990), just as couples’ reported interpersonal conflict
increases (Doss et al., 2009; Gottman, 1994; Nomaguchi and Milkie, 2003). For example, Condon,
Boyce, and Corkindale (2004) found that although fathers’ general mental health did not decline
during the TtP, their relationship satisfaction decreased, with men reporting decreasing levels of
consensus, cohesion, and affection with their partners during latter half of first year. This stylized fact
is true for both mothers and fathers (Cox et al., 1999; Doss et al., 2009), when comparing couples
longitudinally across the TtP (Luhman, Hofmann, Eid, and Lucas, 2012), when comparing parents of
infants to comparable nonparents (Twenge, Campbell, and Foster, 2003), and when examining both
self-report of marital satisfaction and observed couple interactions (Cox et al., 1999). Researchers
stress, however, that these effects are small on average and that couples tend to have steady relation-
ship quality relative to other couples across the transition (Belsky, Spanier, and Rovine, 1983). That is,
the literature does not suggest that highly satisfied couples become highly unsatisfied after they have
a child, nor do relatively unhappy couples before the baby become average after. Rather, for many
new parents, the TtP challenges and strains their romantic relationship somewhat.
The reasons why the TtP strains couples’ relationships may seem obvious to anyone who has
cared for a newborn; however, understanding the specific stressors illuminates why some couples
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suffer more than others. Most immediately, the demands of caring for a newborn reduce the amount
of time couples spend together. Dew and Wilcox (2011) found that declines in the amount of time
mothers reported spending with their spouses explained a large proportion of the decline in marital
satisfaction during the first year of parenthood. With less time for themselves, couples report fewer
leisure activities together and decreases in sexual intimacy, a dissatisfaction that may have a stronger
impact on men’s relationship satisfaction than women’s (Blumstein and Schwartz, 1983; Twenge
et al., 2003). Condon et al. (2004) found that fathers report substantial declines in sexual satisfaction
from before pregnancy to 3 months post-birth. Because sexual satisfaction, and frequency of sexual
intimacy, are strong predictors of marital satisfaction (Yeh, Lorenz, Wickrama, Conger, and Elder,
2006), it follows that reduction in sexual frequency would erode overall relationship quality.
Another obvious yet important contributor to relationship quality decline during the TtP is lack
of sleep. New parents’ sleep can be disturbed for weeks or months after a baby is born in terms of
the quantity, quality, and consistency of sleep they get each night (Bayer, Hiscock, Hampton, and
Wake, 2007; Gay, Lee, and Lee, 2004; Hiscock and Wake, 2001; Lee, Zaffke, and McEnany, 2000). Not
surprisingly, new mothers’ sleep is more disrupted on average than fathers,’ when compared with pre-
pregnancy sleep, as mothers typically wake to feed and soothe babies more often (Elek et al., 2003;
Gay et al., 2004; Yamazaki, Lee, Kennedy, and Weiss, 2005). Moreover, this effect may be worse dur-
ing the TtP than after subsequent births (Lee et al., 2000). Sleep deprivation and disruption, in turn,
predict greater negative mood and less positive mood (Medina, Lederhos, and Lillis, 2009) and can
undermine cognitive functioning in ways that could undermine marital quality. That is, an overtired
parent likely reacts more negatively to minor problems and brings weaker problem-solving skills and
more blaming responses to those problems than a well-rested parent (Kahn-Greene, Lipizzi, Conrad,
Kamimori, and Killgore, 2006). Indeed, numerous studies have found a significant link between sleep
disruption and fatigue and lower relationship satisfaction in men and women during the TtP (Con-
don et al., 2004; Meijer and van den Wittenboer, 2007).
Another source of conflict new parents often cite is disagreement over or dissatisfaction
with household roles and responsibilities. The introduction of a child into a family adds a new
responsibility—childcare—into a household that previously only managed paid work and house-
hold chores. For many couples, this new responsibility creates role conflict, as one or both parents
feel overwhelmed at managing more demands on their time (Cowan and Cowan, 2000; Twenge
et al., 2003). Lachance-Grzela and Bouchard (2009a) found that for men, their sense of “role
overload”—too many demands at work and home—in the first year predicted both fathers’ and
mothers’ satisfaction with parenting. Most often, the TtP shifts roles toward more gender-traditional
arrangements, with women increasing work at home and men increasing or not changing work
outside home (Katz-Wise, Priess, and Hyde, 2010; Yavorsky, Kamp Dush, and Schoppe-Sullivan,
2015). Not surprisingly, mothers with less traditional gender role beliefs report being more dissatis-
fied with this shift than those with more traditional gender ideals (Belsky, Lang, and Huston, 1986).
A perhaps related finding is that new parents, both mothers and fathers, report greater declines in
relationship satisfaction and greater increases in conflict when their pre-birth expectations for divi-
sion of labor are violated (Grote and Clark, 2001; Holmes, Saski, and Hazen, 2013). Researchers
hypothesize that women report greater declines in relationship satisfaction than men during the
TtP, in part, because of the perceived unfairness of post-birth household responsibilities (Dew and
Wilcox, 2011; Nomaguchi and Milkie, 2003). Indeed, when women’s expectations about fathers’
role in caregiving are not met, relationship satisfaction tends to decline far more than when they are
(Hackel and Ruble, 1992; Kalmuss, Davidson, and Cushman, 1992). Given these findings, it is not
surprising that greater father involvement in the baby’s daily care is associated with greater maternal
marital satisfaction after birth, with the exception of women who hold highly traditional gender
role beliefs (Hackel and Ruble, 1992).
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This impact of role conflict on parents’ relationship quality might be particularly relevant today,
when more mothers than ever before are employed before and after childbirth. With the increase in
dual-earner households, men and women are doing more work overall—across household chores,
childcare, and paid work—creating more opportunities for both parents to feel a sense or role conflict
or overload. For example, Yavorsky et al., (2015) found using time diary data that women increased
overall work (across all three categories) by 21 hours and men by 11 hours after the first baby was
born. Women tended to reduce their paid work hours after baby more than men, but they tended
to pick up even more hours in childcare and housework than men (Nomaguchi and Milkie, 2003),
thus overall doing more work (Gjerdingen and Center, 2005; Sanchez and Thomson, 1997; Yavorksy
et al., 2015). Although the risk of role conflict may be more acute today than a generation ago, there
is evidence that parents who negotiate their work-family balance to their mutual satisfaction weather
the transition particularly well in terms of relationship quality (Kohn et al., 2012). Moreover, the suc-
cessful negotiation of work-family balance is more likely on average when fathers are more involved
in caregiving in the first year, even when mothers do more childcare than fathers (Barry et al., 2011).
Relationship quality declines on average during the TtP for the foregoing reasons, among others,
but that average effect masks meaningful heterogeneity in relationship quality across new parents.
A substantial proportion of parents do not report significant declines in relationship satisfaction
across the TtP (Belsky and Hsieh, 1998; Belsky and Rovine, 1990), and even a minority of parents
report increases in marital satisfaction after the baby is born (Holmes, Sasaki, and Hazen, 2013).
Karney and Bradbury (1995)’s vulnerability-stress-adaptation (VSA) model posits that this variation
in the TtP experience reflects the fact that adaption to any life event depends on the vulnerabilities,
stressors, and adaptive processes individuals bring to the transition. For example, Don and Mick-
elson (2014) found that parents with high and stable relationship satisfaction throughout the TtP
had distinct personality strengths prenatally, including low anxiety in fathers and higher self-esteem
in mothers. The corollary risks—high paternal anxiety and low maternal self-esteem—predicted
moderate or high pre-birth relationship satisfaction that declined steeply across the TtP. Similarly,
lower neuroticism in men (Bouchard and Poirier, 2011), higher emotional self-regulation in women
(Levy-Shiff, 1994), and higher levels of the personality trait agreeableness in both (Belsky and Hsieh,
1998) are associated with lower declines in relationship quality over the transition. Likewise, parents
whose partners have higher depressive symptoms, and parents who have higher pre-birth depres-
sive symptoms themselves, report greater declines in marital satisfaction in the first year in terms of
both self-reported and observed couple interactions (Cox et al., 1999). Finally, parents’ expectations
about the parenting experience and their parental self-efficacy plays a role. Although many parents’
parenting expectations are matched or exceeded by their parenting experiences, when experiences
are negative relative to expectations, relationship adjustment tends to suffer (Harwood, McLean,
and Durkin, 2007; Lawrence, Nylen, and Cobb, 2007), and negative expectations themselves predict
lower warmth between partners (McHale et al., 2004). In summary, parental relationships tend to fare
better across the TtP when parents go into the transition with stronger interpersonal and socioemo-
tional resources and when they have realistic expectations about the parenting experience.
Other strengths—and vulnerabilities—parents bring to the transition process lie within the cou-
ple relationship itself, rather than either parent individually. Unsurprisingly, parents who report lower
quality relationships before the TtP also report greater declines in relationship quality in this first
year (Cowan and Cowan, 2000). The level of emotional support mothers feel fathers provide before
the child’s birth also predicts stable relationship satisfaction across the transition (Don and Mickelson,
2014). Finally, parents who did not plan the birth of their first child also report greater declines in
marital satisfaction in first year in terms of both self-report and observed interactions (Cox et al.,
1999; Lachance-Grzela and Bouchard, 2009b), a suggestion that both preparedness and mutual agree-
ment protect new parents from experiencing acute strain during the TtP.
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Characteristics of the infant may also influence parents’ relationship quality in the transitioning
family system. Cox et al. (1999) found that parents of girl infants reported greater declines in marital
satisfaction in first year in term of both self-report and observed interactions, a trend others have
found (Easterbrooks and Emde, 1988). The male child “advantage” may stem from a preference for
sons over daughters among parents (Belsky, 1990) or from the fact that fathers tend to spend more
time with sons than daughters, at least in terms of play activities, on average (Yeung, Sandberg, Davis-
Kean, and Hofferth, 2001). An infant’s temperament can also influence parents’ relationship. Infants
who are temperamentally difficult—high in negative emotionality and low in sociability—are more
difficult to care for and can place additional strain on new parents (Bates et al., 2019; Putnam, Sanson,
and Rothbart, 2002). That strain, in turn, is associated with higher reported levels of conflict between
parents in the first year of life (Belsky and Rovine, 1990; Holmes et al., 2013). Overall, any child
characteristic that adds stress to the caregiving role or increases perceived inequities in parents’ roles
tends to strain parents’ relationships during the TtP.
In summary, the TtP puts strains on couples’ relationships as they adapt to new roles, responsibili-
ties, and relationships in their family system. On average, however, couples experience only small
declines in relationship satisfaction and increases in conflict. Factors that protect couples from even
these modest declines include personal strengths, including low neuroticism, high agreeableness, low
anxiety and depression, and good problem-solving skills, as well as relationship strengths, including
mutual support and advanced planning. Fathers taking a more active role in caregiving facilitates
relationship stability over the transition as well, which suggests that couples today—who share car-
egiving more than ever before—should weather the transition more smoothly than couples in the
past (Casper and Bianchi, 2002). The link between the TtP and declines in relationship quality are
stronger, however, in more recent cohorts, not weaker. Twenge and colleagues (2003) hypothesized
that this increase reflects the fact that couples today—who are older and more likely to be dual
earners—place greater importance on autonomy and personal freedom, which can intensify conflicts
over roles in the household. The tasks of the TtP have remained the same since the research on the
TtP began; however, the contexts for executing them have changed in ways that could both facilitate
but also strain couples’ relationships as they adapt to their new roles.
Coparenting Quality
The TtP is a crucial period for the development of parents’ coparenting relationship, as it is when the
patterns that characterize the coparenting relationship are first defined. Coparenting is distinct from
the parental relationship because it characterizes the support and coordination that parental figures
exhibit in childrearing (Feinberg, 2002; Feinberg et al., 2019). Although the coparenting relation-
ship begins to develop during pregnancy, and even before, as coparents plan for and coordinate (or
not) the coming transition, the TtP is fundamental to development of this relationship. According to
family systems theory, the nature of the initial quality of the coparenting relationship should predict
the later quality, as the initial coparenting quality impacts the parental relationship, which, in turn,
impacts the developing coparenting subsystem. Indeed, McHale and Rotman (2007) found that the
quality of the coparenting relationship at 3 months postpartum predicts the quality of coparenting
at 12 and even 30 months postpartum, suggesting that how the coparenting relationship is defined
initially carries long-term implications for the family system.
Consistent with the VSA model, many of the same personal and relationship strengths that pre-
dict higher relationship satisfaction during the TtP predict higher coparenting quality postpartum.
For example, fathers’ negative emotionality (although not mothers’) predicts greater undermin-
ing behavior among couples (Schoppe-Sullivan and Mangelsdorf, 2012), and fathers’ and mothers’
negative predictions about family life predict lower warmth and cooperation in the coparenting
relationship (McHale et al., 2004). Likewise, fathers’ flexibility and mothers’ self-control both predict
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better coparenting quality at 12 months net of marital satisfaction (Talbot and McHale, 2004). Child
characteristics also influence the developing coparenting relationship. Having an infant with a dif-
ficult temperament is associated with lower coparenting solidarity, regardless of prenatal expecta-
tions or marital quality (McHale and Rotman, 2007). The link between parent characteristics, such
as maternal pessimism, and coparenting cohesion are also much stronger when infants are high in
negative reactivity (McHale and Rotman, 2007). Thus, as the VSA model would predict, the nature
of the individuals in the family system define, in part, the quality of the relationships with the system.
An important lesson of the coparenting literature, however, is that the quality of other relation-
ships in the family system also strongly influences the coparenting alliance. Chief among these other
relationships is the parental relationship. The quality of the parents’ relationship before and after birth
predicts the quality of the coparenting relationship during the first year of life. For example, Chris-
topher, Umemura, Mann, Jacobvitz, and Hazen (2015) found that increased conflict as reported by
fathers during the early months post-birth predicted lower coparenting cooperation, whereas lower
marital satisfaction as reported by mothers predicted lower support for fathers’ parenting. Van Egeren
(2004) found that higher relationship quality pre-birth predicted better coparenting experiences
post-birth, a finding consistent with other similar studies (McHale et al., 2004; Schoppe-Sullivan and
Mangelsdorf, 2012). Specifically, Schoppe-Sullivan and Mangelsdorf (2012) found that higher marital
satisfaction during transition to parenthood predicted greater coparenting 3.5 months postpartum.
Finally, as with parental relationship quality, violations of expectations about division of labor predict
coparenting quality for mothers and fathers, with parents who perceived themselves doing more
childcare than expected reporting lower coparenting (Van Egeren, 2004). In summary, as family sys-
tems theory would predict, the nature of the other relationships in the family system define, in part,
the quality of the parents’ coparenting relationship both as it is first defined and as it develops over
the early years of the child’s life.
Taken together, the literatures on both parents’ relationship quality and coparenting relationship
across the TtP suggests this period is a time of both change and key formation in family relationships.
For both types of relationships, the TtP is a challenge, however, the nature of the transition depends
on the personal and interpersonal resources parents possess and the sources of contextual strain and
support their environments provide, as the ecological model would suggest. Finally, in line with fam-
ily systems theory, the quality of parents’ personal relationship helps shape the quality of their initial
coparenting relationship, which can influence parents’ relationship quality in turn.
Effects of the Transition to Parenthood on Parent Adjustment

The TtP is a major life event that, like other major life events, can impact parents’ adjustment in vari-
ous ways. In a meta-analytic review, Luhmann and colleagues (2012) characterize the literature on
life events, including the TtP, and adult adjustment as taking two perspectives. One is that all events,
even nominally happy ones, can be stressful because they require changes to one’s behavior, routines,
and relationships (Luhmann, Hoffman, Eid, and Lucas, et al., 2012; Filipp and Aymanns, 2009). The
other, a developmental perspective, views life events like the TtP as transitions that requires adjust-
ment to new behaviors but is not, by definition, stressful (Hopson and Adams, 1976). The perspec-
tives predict either decline—or relative stability—in parents’ subjective well-being and mental health
depending on the extent of change the TtP requires of parents and the personal and interpersonal
resources they bring to managing those changes.
Subjective Well-Being
The perspective of evolutionary psychology suggests that because becoming a parent fulfills the most
important human psychological need, it should provide most parents with a fundamental sense of
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life satisfaction (Kenrick et al., 2010). The family stress model, and the VSA model, however, posit
that the TtP could lower parents’ subjective well-being (SWB), at least temporarily, because parents
are adjusting to major changes in their daily lives, roles, and relationships, and with change comes
stress. Longitudinal studies that examine parents’ subjective well-being, or overall life satisfaction,
across the TtP find that on average parents report particularly high life satisfaction just after the birth
of their first child, but that their life satisfaction declines in the succeeding months (Luhman et al.,
2012). Using the large German Socio-Economic Panel Data Set, Clark, Diener, Georgellis, and Lucas
(2008) found that parents—both mothers and fathers—declined significantly in life satisfaction after
the birth of their first child, to below their pre-pregnancy level, and that this decline was sustained
at least 4 years after the transition. However, Galatzer-Levy, Mazursky, Mancini, and Bonanno (2011)
found with the same data that only a small subset of the sample declined significantly (7%), whereas
that vast majority (84%) remained relatively stable, with small groups either increasing their SWB
substantially (4%) or starting off low and declining further (4%). Another study found an increase
in life satisfaction during pregnancy, as did Clark et al. (2008), but then a return to pre-pregnancy
levels of well-being within 2 years rather than a sustained decline (Dyrdal and Lucas, 2013). Whether
parents experience declines or stability in SWB across the TtP, it should be noted that few studies
find that parents, as a group, experience higher levels of subjective well-being than nonparents dur-
ing the intensive childrearing years. Thus, parenthood may represent a fundamental psychological
need according to evolutionary theory; however, fulfilling that need does not unequivocally benefit
parents’ psychological adjustment, at least not in the short term.
Consistent with the ecological model, most studies find that the conditions under which parents
enter parenthood meaningfully influence the effect of the TtP on their well-being. Generally, being
married, and of higher income and education, predicted membership in a high SWB and stable
group, relative to those groups that decreased substantially (Galatzer-Levy et al., 2011). This trend
also appears in research comparing parents to nonparents in terms of life satisfaction and happiness:
Married parents fare similarly to married nonparents in terms of life satisfaction and happiness, but
unmarried parents fare worse relative to unmarried nonparents (Nelson et al., 2014), suggesting the
TtP is particularly stressful for unwed parents (see ahead for details). The impact of childbirth on
SWB is also more pronounced, and more negative, for parents undergoing the transition at younger
ages (Luhmann et al., 2012). Lachance-Grzela and Bouchard (2009b) found that couples who had a
first unplanned childbirth reported lower levels of life satisfaction in the year after childbirth. Because
unmarried and younger parents are both more likely to have an unplanned childbirth (Finer and
Henshaw, 2006), it is possible these findings are connected, such that younger and unmarried parents
experience greater declines in SWB as the result of childbirth, in part, because on average they are
less able to prepare thoroughly for it.
Depression and Mental Health

The effect of the TtP on parents’ life satisfaction or SWB typically focuses on its effect on parents’
cognitive adjustment to parenthood, but a large literature also documents the effect of the TtP on
parents’ affective adjustment, measured in terms of depression, anxiety, and negative mood. These
effects, particularly on women, begin during pregnancy as hormonal changes associated with preg-
nancy can increase the risk for affective disorders for some (Wisner et al., 1999). In a meta-analytic
review, Bennett and colleagues (2004) estimate the rate of major depressive disorder increases from
8% to 12% during pregnancy. Nationally, about 10% of mothers develop clinical levels of depres-
sion after childbirth, or postpartum depression (PPD), which is at or below the rates of depression
during pregnancy (Ko, Rockhill, Tong, Morrow, and Farr, 2017), suggesting that mothers are not
necessarily at higher risk of developing affective disorders after childbirth than during pregnancy. It
is also noteworthy that mothers undergoing the TtP are not at greater risk of developing PPD than
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mothers experiencing second or higher order births, suggesting that despite the unique stressors of
the TtP, most mothers weather the transition without heightened risk of developing clinical levels
of depression. Rates of depressive disorder during the TtP are much lower for men than women,
at approximately 4% in the first 3 months (Deater-Deckard, Pickering, Dunn, and Golding, 1998),
versus women’s 10–12% at a similar point (Bennett, Einarson, Taddio, Koren, and Einarson, 2004;
Matthey, Barnett, Ungerer, and Waters, 2000). Moreover, to the extent that mental health changes for
men over the TtP, men report higher depression and anxiety levels during pregnancy than they do
after pregnancy and those levels further reduce over the first 6 months after the baby is born (Con-
don et al., 2004). Although rates of depression during the perinatal period are much lower for men
than women, the likelihood of men reporting depression increases substantially when the mother is
experiencing PPD (Matthey et al., 2000), an association that supports the notion of families—and
family well-being—as a system.
It is a common assumption that new mothers experience slight elevations in depressive symptoms
just after childbirth, sometimes called the “baby blues,” and that this phenomenon is far more com-
mon than clinical depression. This phenomenon is attributed variously to the hormonal changes
that accompany childbirth and lactation (Brummelte and Galea, 2016) as well as the stress and strain
of caring for a newborn, including loss of sleep and role strain (Nomaguchi and Milkie, 2003).
However, there is substantial variability in findings on depressive symptoms and negative mood in
perinatal mothers. Some studies that look at average depressive symptoms across the TtP find no
increase from pregnancy through the first year for women (Cox et al., 1999), whereas other stud-
ies find a decrease from pregnancy to 3 months postpartum (Evans, Heron, Francomb, Oke, and
Golding, 2001; Harwood et al., 2007; Heron et al., 2004; Ross, Gilbert Evans, Sellers, and Romach,
2003), with few studies finding that depressive symptoms meaningfully increase after childbirth on
average. Fewer studies have examined depressive symptoms or mood changes in men, but those
that have find no change for men in terms of depressive or anxious symptoms on average across the
TtP (Nomaguchi and Milkie, 2003; Condon et al., 2004; Cox et al., 1999). Finally, one longitudinal
study found that fathers and mothers reported increases in positive mood after the birth of their first
child, even though they reported declines in overall life satisfaction, suggesting the TtP brings more
positive affective than cognitive changes for new parents (Luhmann et al., 2012). In summary, on
average, mothers and fathers weather the stresses and strains of the TtP without substantial increases
in depression, anxiety, or negative mood.
These average effects, however, mask substantial variation in the effect of the TtP on parents’
adjustment across key sociodemographic characteristics. As the ecological model would predict, par-
ents with relatively fewer social, emotional and economic resources respond more negatively to the
TtP in terms of emotional well-being. Specifically, younger parents (Cowan and Cowan, 2000; Luh-
mann et al., 2012), unmarried parents (Nomaguchi and Milkie, 2003), and parents living at or near
the poverty line (Wilson and Brooks-Gunn, 2001) all suffer greater elevations in negative mood, and
are at far greater risk of developing PPD, than their older, married, and more affluent counterparts.
For example, the rates of PPD among mothers on average is 10%; however, that rate of PPD in some
low-income samples can be as high as 33% (Gress-Smith, Luecken, Lemery-Chalfant, and Howe,
2012). These sociodemographic risks may also compound one another, for younger mothers are also
more likely than older mothers to be unwed, and unwed mothers have lower average incomes that
married mothers, which means that each of these groups has fewer emotional, social, and financial
resources to bring to the TtP. That is, without the emotional maturity, social and caregiving sup-
port, and financial resources that being older, married, and relatively affluent typically bring, the role
strain, daily stresses, and sleeplessness that typically accompany a new baby could overwhelm a new
mother—or father—bringing higher levels of depression and anxiety with them.
New parents’ socioemotional well-being during the TtP also depends, not surprisingly, on the
socioemotional resources, both personal and interpersonal, parents bring to the transition. Women
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with a greater sense of parenting self-efficacy (Schuengel and Oosterman, 2019)—defined as expecta-
tions about one’s ability to parent well—cope more effectively with the challenges of early parent-
hood (Cutrona and Troutman, 1986; Jones and Prinz, 2005; Teti and Gelfand, 1991). For example,
Kunseler, Willemen, Oosterman, and Schuengel (2014) found that higher perceived parenting self-
efficacy during pregnancy predicted lower depression and anxiety at 3 and 12 months postpartum
among mothers. This relation was also bidirectional, however, such that lower depression and anxiety
during pregnancy also predicted higher self-efficacy by 3 and 12 months. Mothers with higher par-
enting efficacy also report greater confidence in parenting, greater satisfaction with their infants, and
less dysphoria than women with lower perceived parenting efficacy (Olioff and Aboud, 1991; Reece
and Harkless, 1998). In general, mothers report increasing levels of self-efficacy over the first year of
child’s life in tandem with decreasing depressive and anxiety symptoms (Elek et al., 2003; Harwood
et al., 2007; Kunseler et al., 2014; Porter and Hsu, 2003), and those who do not experience this
general trend tend to fare worse both in terms of mood and parenting satisfaction (Elek et al., 2003).
Fathers report lower levels of self-efficacy before and after the birth than mothers (Elek et al., 2003);
however, whereas prenatal self-efficacy predicts postnatal self-efficacy for mothers (Elek et al., 2003;
Porter and Hsu, 2003), for fathers, only level of caregiving involvement and perceived social support
predict self-efficacy (Leerkes and Burney, 2007). In summary, high self-efficacy is a protective factor
for parents’ socioemotional well-being during the TtP, but perhaps more so for mothers.
An important interpersonal resource that can protect parents’ socioemotional well-being during
the TtP is strong social support. Generally, research finds that social support, in terms of both the
quality and quantity of connections, can buffer adults against the negative psychological effects of
a range of stressful life events (Crnic and Greenberg, 1990; Koeske and Koeske, 1991) and predicts
better outcomes in terms of mental health, physical health, and social adjustment in their wake
(Sarason, Sarason, and Gurung, 1997). The TtP is no exception. Women who report less supportive
networks both prenatally (Collins, Dunkel-Schetter, Lobel, and Scrimshaw, 1993; Cutrona, 1984) and
postnatally (O’Hara, Rehm, and Campbell, 1983) have a higher likelihood of developing PPD and
have higher depressive symptoms post-birth than those with stronger networks (Priel and Besser,
2002). The density of family networks, in particular, is positively related to psychological adjustment,
even though the frequency of contact with relatives is negatively related to adjustment for mothers
(Bost, Cox, Burchinal, and Payne, 2002), most likely because more depressed or anxious new mothers
call on their resources more often. Overall, mothers’ parents and spouses serve as the most consist-
ent sources of support during the TtP (Crnic, Greenberg, Ragozin, Robinson, and Basham, 1983;
Hopkins, Marcus, and Campbell, 1984; Levitt, Weber, and Clark, 1986; Tinsley and Parke, 1984),
although spousal support is a better predictor of psychological well-being during TtP than family
support (Cox, Owen, Lewis, and Henderson, 1989; Goldstein, Diener, and Mangelsdorf, 1996). It is
important to note that patterns of social support tend to change during the TtP such that parents’
social networks get smaller in number, whereas ties with close family and friends with children get
stronger (Bost et al., 2002; Wellman, Yuk-Lin Wong, Tindall, and Nazer, 1997). Taken together, this
research suggests that parents adapt their social networks across the TtP in ways that optimize the
effectiveness of available social support during this unique transition.
Finally, the extent to which mothers, and fathers, suffer socioemotionally during the TtP depends
on the extent to which they feel—and likely are—prepared for the change. This hypothesis stems,
in part, from research finding that having an unplanned pregnancy is associated with higher levels
of stress and depression, as well as lower levels of perceived self-efficacy, in new parents. For exam-
ple, Lachance-Grzela and Bouchard (2009b) followed a sample of pregnant mothers and found that
having an unplanned pregnancy predicted higher anxiety and depression as well as lower subjec-
tive well-being. Similarly, Delmore-Ko, Pancer, Hunsberger, and Pratt (2000) found that parents’
preparedness—defined as realistic expectations that are neither too negative nor complacent about
changes to come—predicted lower levels of stress and higher levels of self-esteem than either fear or
524
complacency alone among mothers. It is important to note that negative expectations about parent-
hood also predict lower levels of warmth between partners and weaker coparenting relationships
(McHale et al., 2004; McHale and Rotman, 2007) in the first year, both of which also predict parents’
socioemotional well-being. Taken together, this literature suggests that high levels of preparedness for
and realistic expectations about parenthood help parents more effectively contend with the stresses
of the TtP.
In summary, the TtP is a major life event to which parents must adjust cognitively and emotion-
ally, but one that on average initiates only modest changes in subjective well-being and mental health.
These modest cognitive changes typically initiate after the child’s birth whereas emotional changes
typically begin during pregnancy. Average changes in adult adjustment to the TtP, however, mask
variation across parents with different personal, interpersonal, and contextual resources. Despite this
variation, most parents weather the TtP reasonably well and return—after a period of months or
years—to their initial levels of cognitive and affective well-being.
Neurobiological Effects of the Transition to Parenthood

For mothers, the TtP is most fundamentally a biological transition during which the body undergoes
enormous changes as it creates, grows, and then sustains a new life. It is thus somewhat unsurprising
that the newest addition to the literature on the TtP focuses on the incredible biological—both hor-
monal and neurological—changes that accompany the TtP for mothers, and, even more recently, for
fathers. There is a growing related literature on associations among reproductive hormones and brain
functioning in the quality of maternal and paternal parenting of infants and young children, which
is reviewed comprehensively in the chapter in this volume by Feldman (2019) and by Kringelbach
and colleagues (2019). Ahead, we focus on the aspects of that literature that specifically address the
hormonal and neurological changes that occur pre- and postnatally, and the role those changes likely
play in mothers’ and fathers’ adaptation to parenthood.
Hormonal Changes
The biological changes associated with the TtP begin during pregnancy when women experi-
ence increases or alterations in the levels of specific hormones, neuropeptides, and neurotransmitters
involved in the reproduction process. The hormones implicated are those that facilitate lactation
postnatally, including estrogen, progesterone, and prolactin, as well as hormones implicated in emo-
tional responses to pregnancy and childbirth, including dopamine and cortisol; the neuropeptides
implicated are those that subserve childbirth, lactation, and a suite of parental behaviors, including
oxytocin (OT) and arginine vasopressin (AVP; see Lambert and Kinsley, 2012). Studies that follow
both animals (primarily rodents) and humans throughout the TtP find that individuals vary widely
in both the levels of and changes in these hormones during the TtP; thus, it is difficult to sum-
marize succinctly their average trajectory across the TtP (Lambert, 2012; Levine, Zagoory-Sharon,
Feldman, and Weller, 2007; Pereira and Ferreira, 2016). For example, some studies show increasing
levels of OT across pregnancy, with more pronounced surges when women undergo childbirth and
begin lactating (De Geest, Thiery, Piron-Possuyt, and Vanden Driessche, 1985). However, others
show relative stable OT levels across pregnancy on average (Feldman, Magori-Cohen, Galili, Singer,
and Louzoun, 2011; Levine et al., 2007), with increases only at childbirth (Brunton and Russell,
2008). These mixed findings likely reflect the fact that women show substantial variability in OT
trajectories across the TtP, with some mothers showing stability (about one third) and other showing
increases or decreases across TtP (Brunton and Russell, 2008).
Less is known about the biological changes that fathers undergo during the TtP; however, exist-
ing research suggests that men experience some homologous hormonal changes during the perinatal
525
period if they are cohabiting with the mother. Specifically, men expecting babies exhibit increases
in estradiol and OT throughout the pregnancy, just as some pregnant women do, increases in prol-
actin and cortisol just before the birth, just as mothers do, and post-birth reductions in cortisol, just
as some mothers do (Storey, Walsh, Quinton, and Wynne-Edwards, 2001; Wynne-Edwards, 2001).
Postnatally, hormonal changes that characterize men’s physiology more than women’s include sig-
nificant reductions in testosterone alongside increases in AVP (Storey et al., 2000). These declines in
testosterone are more pronounced among men who spend substantial time with their infants during
the day, suggesting that the TtP in combination with fathers’ involvement alters the hormonal profile
in men (Gettler, McDade, Feranil, and Kuzawa, 2011). These hormone concentrations are not only
similar across mothers and fathers, but also correlated between individual partners, suggesting that
mothers and fathers are influencing each other’s physiological reactions to the pregnancy, childbirth,
and early caregiving or that mothers and fathers have similar physiological systems that respond to
the experience of preparing for parenthood (Gordon, Zagoory-Sharon, Leckman, and Feldman,
2010). Either way, the literature on changes in fathers’ physiology makes clear that hormonal changes
in parents during the TtP do not exclusively reflect the experience of pregnancy.
In support of this perspective, the research on hormonal changes in parents during the TtP sug-
gest they do not simply facilitate biological changes that accompany pregnancy and childbirth, but
also regulate the motivational, affective, and cognitive processes that underlie parents’ adjustment to
parenthood. Studies of both nonhuman animal and human mothers have shown that higher levels
of blood and salivary OT predict a range of parenting behaviors during the TtP among mothers,
including mother-infant affection, mother-infant gaze and joint attention, and a range of other sensi-
tive parenting behaviors (Feldman, 2012). Higher levels of blood and salivary OT during pregnancy
and post-birth are associated with a higher likelihood of secure mother-infant attachment (Atzil,
Hendler, and Feldman, 2011; Feldman, 2012; Feldman et al., 2011). Moreover, experimental studies
indicate the association between OT and parenting behavior is causal, for when parents are randomly
assigned to receive OT administration nasally, parents increase sensitive and engaging interactions
with infants, and infants’ own OT levels rise alongside parents’ (Weisman, Zagoory-Sharon, and
Feldman, 2012). Notably, the association between OT levels and infant caregiving behavior, both
naturally occurring and experimentally induced, also applies to fathers, although OT is associated
with different caregiving behaviors in men (Feldman, 2012; Gordon et al., 2010). These associations
suggest that there exists a biological mechanism underpinning early parenting behavior that is com-
mon to both parents during pregnancy and subserves the psychological changes parents experience
across the TtP.
Indeed, research on individual variation in women’s and men’s hormonal responses to the TtP
suggest that these physiological processes help to explain the socioemotional effects of the TtP for
many parents. For example, pregnant women typically exhibit reduced psychological responses to
stress (Glynn, Wadhwa, Dunkel Schetter, Chicz-DeMet, and Sandman, 2001), a phenomenon that
covaries with a dampened cortisol response to stress and challenge in new mothers (de Weerth and
Buitelaar, 2005). Thus, whereas cortisol levels increase for some women during pregnancy, and typi-
cally decrease after childbirth, the cortisol reaction to stress is blunted among pregnant and perinatal
women on average. This research explains why, despite conventional wisdom that casts the TtP as a
period of stress, women do not exhibit substantial increases in depressive or anxious symptoms across
the TtP on average. From the perspective of evolutionary psychology, it makes sense that the same
physiological processes that allow women to create, grow, and sustain a new life would also equip
mothers emotionally and cognitively to adapt to and manage the changes and stressors associated
with it. Indeed, it is when hormonal and physiological changes do not align with typical trends that
socioemotional difficulties during the TtP more often arise. For example, new mothers diagnosed
with PPD have lower average levels of OT and higher levels of cortisol than nondepressed moth-
ers in first year of the child’s life (Apter-Levy, Feldman, Vakart, Ebstein, and Feldman, 2013). For a
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comprehensive description of associations between hormonal and other physiological changes and
parents’ well-being and behavior during their children’s infancy, see Feldman (2019).
Changes in Brain Functioning

These associations between the hormonal changes and mothers’ and fathers’ socioemotional and
behavioral responses to the TtP do not exist in biological isolation, but rather emerge through inter-
actions among reproductive hormones and both the structure and function of parents’ brains. By
examining brain reactivity using fMRI technology, researchers have recently identified notable differ-
ences in the way parents versus nonparents respond to auditory and visual infant stimuli as well as dif-
ferences in how parents respond to their own versus other infants. These differences in brain reactivity
to infant stimuli emerge in specific brain regions that compose what researchers consider a global
“parental caregiving” network (Lambert and Kinsley, 2012). This network has multiple parts. Three
of these parts are subcortical regions within the limbic system, specifically the amygdala, the medial
pre-optic area (MPOA) in the hypothalamus, and regions within the dopaminergic reward circuit,
including the nucleus accumbens (Nacc) and striatum, all of which are primed during the TtP by the
pregnancy hormones OT and prolactin (Feldman, 2015). The other parts of the caregiving network
are paralimbic and cortical structures that subserve human capacities for empathy, mentalizing or
theory-of-mind, and emotion regulation (Bethlehem, van Hook, Auyeung, and Baron-Cohen, 2013;
Meyer-Lindenberg, Domes, Kirsch, and Heinrichs, 2011; see Feldman, 2015), all skills new parents
require when attempting to understand and care for newborns. Researchers argue that it is the func-
tional interconnectivity among these subcortical and cortical regions that allows parents to feel moti-
vated to care for infants, respond sensitively to their distress, and effectively modulate their emotions
and behavior to optimally address infants’ emotional and physical needs. These cortical regions are
also rich in OT and vasopressin receptors, both hormones associated with pregnancy and childbirth.
Taken together, this complex and growing literature suggests that the potent hormonal cocktail char-
acteristic of pregnancy triggers unique neural pathways and responses during the TtP that subserve
new mothers’ capacities to care successfully for their infants (Lambert and Kinsley, 2012).
Research also finds that very similar biobehavioral interplay applies to fathers during the TtP.
That is, similar brain regions are more reactive among fathers, as with mothers, than among nonpar-
ents when exposed to infant sounds or images, regions including the amygdala and other subcorti-
cal structures, and the cortical and paralimbic networks (Feldman, 2015), suggesting fathers’ early
caregiving behavior is also subserved by neural pathways that emerge or strengthen during the TtP.
When fathers are compared directly with mothers, however, fathers show greater reactivity in the
cortical regions, whereas mothers show greater reactivity in the amygdala and other subcortical
regions (Atzil, Hendler, Zagoory-Sharon, Winetraub, and Feldman, 2012), a difference that research-
ers believe reflects a stronger experience-based, mentalizing caregiving network in fathers and a
more emotion-processing network in mothers (Abraham et al., 2014). Moreover, somewhat different
hormones prime these networks in mothers and fathers, with the amygdala more highly correlated
with OT levels in mothers but with vasopressin levels in fathers (Carter, 2014). One study of fathers’
early caregiving and brain reactivity revealed how fathers’ sex and caregiving experiences shape their
neural responses to the TtP. Abraham and colleagues (2014) compared brain reactivity to infant cues
in first-time heterosexual mothers, first-time heterosexual fathers, and primary caregiving homo-
sexual fathers rearing infants with partners but no maternal involvement. The study replicated the
typical differences found between heterosexual mothers’ and fathers’ brain responses, but also found
that homosexual fathers showed heightened activation in the emotional processing network akin to
mothers’ as well as heightened activation in the mentalizing network akin to fathers.’ This pattern of
findings suggests that mothers and fathers have distinct neural systems that underlie the TtP, but that
fathers’ brains in particular respond highly flexibly to their caregiving experiences.
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The research summarized earlier describes typical changes in neural functioning in mothers and
fathers following the TtP; however, a related literature demonstrates how atypical neural activity dur-
ing the TtP may underlie difficulties in the adaptation to parenthood. For example, one study found
that depressed mothers showed significantly less reactivity in cortical regions in response to fearful
and angry faces than nondepressed mothers (Moses-Kolko et al., Phillips, 2010). Additionally, depres-
sion severity predicted reduced amygdala response to these negative stimuli. This functional differ-
ence suggests that postpartum depression may effectively disconnect the circuit between cortex and
amygdala—despite the importance of such interconnectivity for sensitively responding to infants’
cues and developing secure mother-infant attachment relationships (Feldman, 2012). Another study
found that mothers with low socioeconomic status showed reduced activation in regions of brain
associated with emotional processing and regulation, both subcortical and cortical, when hearing
their own infants cry, and that mothers’ self-reported parenting stress mediated that association (Kim,
Capistrano, and Congleton, 2016). The reduced activation also predicted less positive perceptions of
motherhood, suggesting that environmental stressors, such as those that typically accompany poverty
and low income, can disrupt the typical neural plasticity that supports a healthy TtP.
Changes in Brain Structure

The potent increases and alterations in hormones that accompany the perinatal period for moth-
ers and fathers not only trigger unique neural pathways and responses in new parents but also may
coincide with changes in the structure or architecture of parents’ brains. The literature on how par-
ents’ brains change structurally is somewhat less clear than the literature on brain functioning during
the TtP. Some nonhuman animal and human studies find that gray matter volume in brain regions
implicated in early caregiving increase in mothers during pregnancy, and that those increases sustain
during the postpartum period. Specifically, regions such as the hypothalamus (and the MPOA, in
particular), amygdala, substantia nigra, and prefrontal cortex have been shown to increase during
the early postpartum period among rat mothers spending more time with their pups (Featherstone,
Fleming, and Ivy, 2000; Fleming and Korsmit, 1996; Kinsley et al., 1999). A study by Kim and col-
leagues (2010) demonstrated that first-time human mothers, too, show increases in brain volume,
and specifically gray matter volume in cortical brain regions from the first to fourth months post-
partum. Furthermore, increased volume in the midbrain, a region that drives parenting behavior in
animal models, was correlated with human mothers’ positive perceptions of their babies, suggesting
these changes are linked with the development of maternal behavior. The same team found similar
increases in fathers’ gray matter, in similar regions, across the postpartum period, but decreases in
certain cortical regions that were unique to fathers (Kim et al., 2014), again suggesting that fathers’
caregiving experiences draw on specific mentalizing networks with a unique pattern of neural plas-
ticity. The increase in gray matter volume suggests that as new parents use their caregiving networks
to parent infants, they may develop new synaptic connections in and among these critical regions.
The TtP has been associated not only with increases in brain volume, but also decreases in brain
volume. A study examined women prospectively from before pregnancy to after birth and found
reductions in gray matter volume in some of the same cortical regions that Kim and colleagues
(2010) found increases, notably parts of prefrontal temporal cortex and other brain regions involved
in theory of mind (Hoekzema et al., 2017). They furthermore found that decreases in gray mat-
ter volume predicted scores on the maternal postnatal attachment scale, suggesting these structural
changes facilitated maternal caregiving. These findings align with a related literature on reductions in
gray matter volume that occur during another key period of reproductive and hormonal change—
adolescence—reductions which are thought to reflect synaptic pruning, or increased efficiency, in
key brain regions. It should be noted that these authors examined women from before pregnancy to
just after birth, whereas Kim and colleagues (2010, 2014) examined parents post-birth only; thus, it
528
is possible that reductions in gray matter during pregnancy precede increases in gray matter volume
postpartum as mothers’ brains first consolidate in preparation for and then expand in execution
of caregiving. Additional research is needed to determine the nature of the structural changes in
mothers’ and fathers’ brains during the TtP and the role those changes play in parents’ adjustment
to parenthood.
In summary, the TtP carries with it profound changes in mothers’ and fathers’ hormonal and
neurological systems which subserve the physical, emotional, and behavioral changes that accom-
pany pregnancy and the first months of life. In most cases, those neurobiological changes potentiate
emotional and related behavioral changes that help parents optimally cope with the challenges—and
joys—of new parenthood. When parents suffer emotionally and behaviorally during the TtP, that dif-
ficulty is often associated with atypical neurobiological responses to pregnancy and new parenthood.
Transition to Parenthood Under Conditions of Risk

The TtP is a challenging and stressful time for all parents, with personal, interpersonal, and economic
resources helping to determine how parents will adjust to their parental roles. For certain groups of
parents, however, contextual factors add even more strain to the transition period, making it more
difficult than average. Parents at risk for particularly difficult transitions face many (or all) of the same
issues that the average parent experiences during the TtP in addition to difficulties associated with
their particular context.
This section discusses some notable examples from the TtP literature of groups of parents who
may experience challenges during this period that threaten an optimal transition experience. These
groups can be broken into two categories. The first are parents who face challenges when they
are not able to (or for a small minority, choose not to) conceive—either due to fertility issues or
because they are part of a same-sex relationship. In these situations, prospective parents must turn
to alternative methods to natural conception to become parents; these alternative paths to family
formation have implications for parents’ adjustment and transition. The second category comprises
families who experience specific risks to a smooth TtP due to socioeconomic or other ecological
stressors. Although many groups potentially fall into this category, in the interest of space we discuss
only two—unwed parents and parents who experience a pregnancy or delivery during which either
the infant or mother faces serious biological risk. These examples are by no means exhaustive, but
illustrate how the universal challenges of the TtP are intensified in situations of additional contextual
strain.
Transition to Adoptive Parenthood

The vast majority of the TtP literature has focused on the transition to biological parenting, as this
is the most common and traditional way of becoming a parent (although adoption is by no means
a new method of family formation). Although there is an extensive literature on adoptive parenting
and family functioning in adoptive families in general (Pinderhughes and Brodzinsky, 2019), there has
been far less focus on the TtP period for adoptive parents (Goldberg, 2010). Couples who become
parents through adoption face additional challenges that could complicate the more universal task of
transitioning to parenthood. (Note that we mostly refer to couples, as couples are usually the focus in
TtP literature—including literature focusing on adoptive and same-sex parents—however, much of
what is discussed also applies to individuals who adopt children; Goldberg, 2010.)
Couples who become families via adoption differ in a number of ways from families who con-
ceive. They very often decide to adopt after having spent months or years trying to conceive. Once
they make the decision to adopt, they face a number of complex decisions across a range of domains,
such as what type of adoption they wish to pursue, how much money they are willing to spend on
529
the adoption process, and whether they are willing to adopt a child of a different ethnicity and/or
with special needs (Goldberg, 2010). Decisions surrounding the type of adoption refer to whether
parents wish to adopt internationally, via public domestic adoption (through the foster care or child
welfare system), or via private domestic adoption (through an adoption agency or lawyer). After
making these decisions and undergoing the “home study” (an in-depth examination of the adoptive
parents and the home environment that is required of all adoptive parents which often arouses anxi-
ety in the prospective parents; Brodzinsky and Huffman, 1988), parents hoping to adopt may wait
additional months or years before adopting (Goldberg, 2010). Parents in this stage are unsure about
when or even whether they will become parents. This lack of a clear timeline often makes planning
for the TtP more arduous than in nonadoptive cases (Brodzinsky and Huffman, 1988).
Furthermore, the timing of the adoption itself relative to the child’s age may make it more difficult
for adoptive parents to bond and form attachments with their adoptive children. The scant research
on the TtP for adoptive parents has focused on parents adopting infants. In this situation, most
mothers develop secure attachments with infants at rates similar to nonadoptive mothers (Singer,
Brodzinsky, Ramsay, Ramay, and Writers, 1985), and thus may not experience many difficulties with
regard to bonding or forming attachments once they take the new baby home. However, forming
secure attachments is more difficult when parents adopt older children (Yarrow and Goodwin, 1973;
Yarrow, Goodwin, Manheimer, and Milowe, 1973), and the likelihood of poorer child and family
outcomes increases as the child’s age at adoption increases (Brooks, Simmel, Wind, and Barth, 2005).
Thus, adopting an older child could place further strain on the family during the transition period.
Another complication to the TtP for adoptive parents is that children who are adopted may also
be at increased biological risk depending on the circumstances of the birth parents. Adopted children
are more likely than nonadoptive children to have birth parents with genetically based psychological
conditions (Bohman, 1978; Loehlin, Willerman, and Horn, 1982) and more often experience pre-
natal and birth complications than nonadoptive children (Bohman, 1970; Hoopes, 1982; Losbough,
1965). Both of these biological vulnerabilities could present difficulties to children’s healthy devel-
opment, which could also affect early parent-child relationships and parents’ feelings surrounding
parenthood (Brodzinsky and Huffman, 1988). These factors could further complicate the successful
TtP for adoptive parents.
Furthermore, throughout the entire adoption process, parents who choose to adopt because they
experienced fertility issues often report feelings of inadequacy and diminished self-esteem. There
is a sense for some that because they were not able to conceive, they are somehow not supposed to
become a parent or that they failed in what is “supposed to” be a naturally occurring life event. These
feelings can negatively impact family functioning in terms of marital communication and intimacy
(Abbey, Andrews, and Halman, 1991), which could further threaten the transition period. Adoptive
parents also report feeling isolated from peer groups throughout the process, particularly if peers have
already successfully had biological children (Daly, 1989; Weir, 2003). In this way, adoptive parents
sometimes feel isolated from their peers with nonadoptive children, which could impede their ability
to form a strong support network. This difference in support is important because, as with nonadop-
tive parents who report feeling well supported during the prenatal period, social support measured
preadoption is an important predictor of later family adjustment (Levy-Shiff, Goldshmidt, and Har-
Even, 1991) and lower stress (Bird, Peterson, and Miller, 2002) for adoptive parents.
To summarize, adoptive families face a number of challenges that set them apart from nonadop-
tive families. Many have gone through an already challenging period of being unable to conceive
and face residual feelings of loss and inadequacy, they must make a number of difficult and complex
decisions throughout the adoption process, and they face a great deal of uncertainty with regard to
whether and when they will become parents. However, adoptive parents on average also experience
a number of protective factors that could help them through the transition and perhaps counteract
some of the risk factors they encounter. Most prominently, parents who adopt are generally older
530
than nonadoptive parents by about 6–7 years at the time of the adoption and, therefore, may have
better coping skills on average (Brodzinsky and Huffman, 1988; Levy-Shiff et al., 1991). Relatedly,
couples who adopt have on average been married longer (Brodzinsky and Huffman, 1988), may have
greater mutual understanding and marital adjustment (Humphrey, 1975; Humphrey and Kirkwood,
1982; Levy-Shiff, Bar, and Har-Even, 1990), and are more likely to enjoy greater financial security
(Kadushin, 1980)—all of which, as discussed previously in this chapter—are associated with bet-
ter adjustment during the TtP. It has also been hypothesized that adoptive parents may have more
psychological resources with which to handle the challenges associated with becoming a parent by
virtue of having gone through the adoptive process itself. For instance, it is possible that after having
to wait for a long period of time to become a parent, adoptive parents may be more appreciative of
the rewards of parenthood, and thus less troubled by the challenges (Brodzinsky and Huffman, 1988).
Perhaps in large part due to these protective factors, the few studies to examine the transition to
adoptive parenthood have found that adoptive parents on average experience better than expected
adjustment during the transition. Specifically, Levy-Shiff et al. (1991) found that adoptive parents
expressed more positive expectations about parenthood than nonadoptive parents before the birth/
adoption of their children, and that at 4 months post-birth/adoption, pre-parenthood expectations
matched post-birth experiences for both groups of parents, meaning that adoptive parents reported
having more positive parenting experiences than did nonadoptive parents. Furthermore, although
there has not been not much research done on the narrow period defined as the transition to parent-
hood for adoptive parents, perhaps, in part, because the conception to pregnancy period is ambigu-
ous in this group, there has been attention paid to family adjustment in the early years after a baby is
adopted. This literature suggests that the additional stresses associated with the transition to adoptive
parenthood compared to biological parenthood do not adversely impact family interaction, at least
in the early years (Brodzinsky and Huffman, 1988).
Transition to Parenthood for Same-Sex Couples

Estimates from the 2010 Census suggest that there are about 650,000 same-sex couples (lesbian
women and gay men) living in the United States, and data from the 2011 American Community
Survey indicate that about 20% of same-sex couple households include children under 18 (Gates,
2013). There are currently many pathways for same-sex couples to become parents due to the
increase in acceptance of same-sex parents in adoption proceedings and advancement in reproductive
technology (Golombok, 2019). None of these pathways, however, make it possible for both parents
to be biological parents to the same child (Berkowitz and Marsiglio, 2007; Cao, Mills-Koonce, Wood,
and Fine, 2016; Goldberg and Gartrell, 2014; Moore and Stambolis-Ruhstorfer, 2013; Patterson and
Riskind, 2010). This unavoidable distinction results in asymmetrical biological connectedness to the
child, which could problematize the couple’s successful adjustment to parenthood.
Similar to the general population of adoptive parents, after a same-sex couple makes the decision
to become parents together, they must decide which pathway they will take to try to accomplish
this goal. Same-sex couples may choose to become parents via adoption (female and male couples),
donor insemination (for female couples), or surrogacy (for male couples). Each of these pathways
presents its own challenges. Same-sex couples choosing to become parents via adoption experi-
ence many of the same challenges discussed previously for heterosexual adoptive couples—the pro-
cess takes a considerable amount of time and often female couples come to the adoption process
after having experienced infertility issues, leaving them with feelings of loss and grief (Daniluk
and Hurtig-Mitchell, 2003; Jacob, 1997). They also face additional unique challenges surrounding
heterosexism in the form of legal barriers and agency unwillingness to work with nonheterosexual
couples (Goldberg, 2010). If a couple decides to pursue a private adoption, they often try to find a
gay-friendly adoption agency (Goldberg, Downing, and Sauck, 2007); otherwise, they run the risk of
531
the agency denying them on the basis of their sexual orientation or having to have one of the part-
ners pose as a heterosexual individual looking to adopt. In these cases, the second parent would either
be left without a legal connection to the child or would have to try to pursue a second parent adop-
tion in states that allow it (Goldberg and Smith, 2008). More broadly, in some states, even if couples
were to find a gay-friendly agency, same-sex couples are not allowed to jointly legally adopt, and thus
they too may choose to remain closeted throughout the process (Downs and James, 2006; Mallon,
2004). These factors can make the adoption process even more difficult than the already challenging
process that heterosexual couples experience. Furthermore, as is the case for heterosexual parents,
part of this process involves couples deciding what child-related characteristics they are willing to
take on (e.g., children who have had prenatal drug and alcohol exposure, older children, children
with known emotional or physical handicaps, children with histories of abuse). However, unlike the
majority of heterosexual couples, same-sex adopters have reported feeling that adoption agencies
might push higher risk, and thus harder to place children on them in an attempt to match what some
might perceive as less desirable applicants with less desirable children (Baetens and Brewaeys, 2001;
Goldberg et al., 2007; Matthews and Cramer, 2006).
Alternatively, lesbian couples may choose to become parents via donor insemination (see Golom-
bok, 2019, for more information on parenting and contemporary reproductive technologies). As
with adoption, there are many steps to this process and decisions to be made regarding the insemina-
tion. First, couples must choose which parent will become pregnant. In a study of lesbian women
becoming parents for the first time via insemination, Goldberg (2006) found that for 41% of couples,
the choice of who would be the biological mother depended on who had a greater desire to do
so; for 14% of couples, fertility was the major determining factor, meaning that the nonbiological
mother had tried to become pregnant first and had been unsuccessful. For the remaining 45%, cou-
ples decided who would bear the child based on reasons apart from desire or fertility, such as health,
career, and age—in some cases, both members of the couple wanted to become pregnant so they
chose the older of the two to go first, and in other cases, the younger member of the couple was cho-
sen because they felt she would be more successful in becoming pregnant. Even though couples may
have some discretion in terms of guessing which partner might have more luck becoming pregnant,
as with some heterosexual women—particularly older women—many lesbian women trying to
become pregnant via insemination must wait months or years before they are successful (Goldberg,
2006). Because lesbian mothers who become parents via insemination are often older, once these
women are pregnant, they sometimes have high-risk pregnancies; 50% of Goldberg’s (2006) sample
had their babies by caesarean section.
In addition to deciding who will become pregnant, and thus be the biological mother, couples
pursuing insemination must also decide what type of donor they will choose. In Goldberg’s (2006)
sample, 59% of couples chose an unknown donor or a No-donor, whose identity could never be
known to the child and had waived all legal rights to the child. Reasons that women cited for choos-
ing these types of donors included legal considerations, a desire to rear the child without outside
interference, or not having an acquaintance or friend that they felt comfortable asking. Another 31%
of women chose a known donor—someone who donated the sperm to them personally and who
often wished to maintain some level of contact with the child and family. Women cited reasons like
wanting the child to know the father or wanting to know the child’s health history. The remaining
10% chose an ID-release or a Yes-donor, which is a donor who agrees to be contacted when the
child reaches some specified age (typically, 18 years old). Women who chose Yes-donors reported
doing so because this provided the legal security of an unknown donor (the donor has no legal rights
to the child) but offered the child the possibility of a relationship with the donor at some future date.
Given that Goldberg’s sample was not nationally representative, these breakdowns may or may not
reflect national estimates, but illuminate some of the decisions same-sex parents make and the reasons
many cite for making such decisions.
532
Of course, insemination is not an option for gay male couples. The corresponding alternative to
adoption for gay male couples is surrogacy, a technique where an individual or couple contracts with
a woman to carry a child for the parent(s) (Ciccarelli, 1997; Ragone, 1996). The surrogate may or
may not be biologically related to the child—in genetic surrogacy, the woman is impregnated with
the sperm of one of the male partners using her own egg; in gestational surrogacy, an egg donor’s
ovum is fertilized by one of the male partner’s sperm via in vitro fertilization (IVF), and the result-
ing embryo is transferred to the surrogate’s womb. Surrogacy is well regulated in the United States
(Ragone, 1994). There have been no studies examining the decision-making process surrounding
surrogacy for gay male parents, but theoretically the reasons for pursuing genetic surrogacy versus
gestational surrogacy likely involve a number of considerations, including the financial costs, whether
the parents know the surrogate and would like to have the child be related to her, preferences of
the surrogate, and legal considerations. Regardless of the route taken, the surrogacy process is very
expensive and, therefore, is not a viable option for many couples—in the only study to examine the
transition to parenthood via surrogacy among gay male parents, the mean income of the 37 respond-
ents was $270,000 (range = $100,000 to $1,200,000), which is greatly above the average household
income and reflects the fact that surrogacy involves substantial costs (Bergman, Rubio, Green, and
Padrón, 2010).
A unique challenge for same-sex couples who decide to become pregnant in ways other than
adoption—via donor insemination for lesbian couples or via surrogacy for gay male couples—stems
from asymmetrical biological (and associated legal and social) connectedness to the child (Almack,
2005; Ciano-Boyce and Shelley-Sireci, 2002; Goldberg, Downing, and Sauck, 2008; Moore, 2008;
Wojnar and Katzenmeyer, 2014). For example, in a study of lesbian nonbiological mothers whose
partners had given birth within the past two years, women expressed a number of challenges associ-
ated with their status as the nonbiological parent (Wojnar and Katzenmeyer, 2014). These challenges
included legal concerns, trouble carving out a unique role for themselves as a parent (not being able
to breastfeed, trouble with forming attachment, feeling like the biological mother and the baby were
a stronger dyad, less recognition as an equal parent from family and friends), experiencing postpar-
tum depression, feeling incomplete as a mother, and having few role models to look to in forming
their parental identities. It has been noted that some of these challenges might be similar to those
experienced by new fathers in heterosexual relationships; however, unlike new fathers, nonbiologi-
cal mothers in same-sex couples may also encounter a lack of recognition or even discrimination
in terms of their connection to the child, which could intensify feelings of vulnerability (Goldberg
and Perry-Jenkins, 2007). Although no equivalent research has been done regarding these feelings
for nonbiologically related fathers in male same-sex couples, it is possible that nonbiological fathers
in this context also experience similar issues. However, it is also plausible that nonbiological fathers
might experience these negative feelings to a lesser extent than women, as the mother-infant bond is
more prescribed than that between fathers and infants. Regardless of the extent to which same-sex
male versus female couples experience these feelings, these tensions may place same-sex couples at
greater risk of interparental competition, jealousy, conflicts, and relationship dissolution (Biblarz and
Stacey, 2010; Cao et al., 2016; Gabb, 2004; MacCallum and Golombok, 2004) and could interfere
with parents’ ability to establish their identities as parents (Lynch, 2004a, 2004b; Wojnar and Katzen-
meyer, 2014).
In light of these challenges, some same-sex parents make a conscious effort to employ strategies
to minimize or offset the potential negative effects of asymmetrical biological connectedness to the
child (Cao et al., 2016). These efforts include behavioral adjustments, where, for example, couples
actively establish unique roles for the nonbiological parent (Goldberg, 2006), and symbolic or lin-
guistic adjustments, where couples avoid language or making distinctions that may invoke biological
inequality between partners or use parallel address terms (e.g., “Mommy” for one mother, “Mama”
for the other) to promote equal parental identities, or by giving the child either a hyphenated last
533
name with both parents’ surnames or giving the child the last name of the nonbiological parent
(Bergen, Suter, and Daas, 2006; Goldberg, 2006). Couples also pursue legal strategies (particularly
applicable to the time before the U.S. Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage feder-
ally in June 2015), including second-parent adoption, formal coparenting agreements, listing the
nonbiological parent’s name on the birth certificate, obtaining medical power of attorney for the
nonbiological parent, or stating in a will that the nonbiological parent is to be given custody of the
child in the event of the death of the biological parent (Bergen et al., 2006; Goldberg, 2006).
Finally, some couples choose to use advanced reproductive technologies when conceiving chil-
dren to offset the asymmetrical biological ties to children. For lesbian couples, this includes using
in vitro fertilization to externally fertilize one of the partner’s eggs with donor sperm and then
implanting the embryo into the womb of the other partner so that one partner is the genetic bio-
logical mother and the other is the gestational birth mother, thus creating ties that may symbolize
more biological balance for the parents (Pelka, 2009). Analogously, some gay male couples choose to
blend their individual sperm samples prior to fertilizing the egg of the surrogate, which allows them
to [ostensibly] not know the paternity of the child and rear the child as biological equals (Cao et al.,
2016). Another possibility is using one partner’s genetic material and combining it with the genetic
material of a close relative of the other partner; for example, using the sperm of a close relative (e.g., a
brother or cousin) of one member of a same-sex female couple to inseminate the other partner.
Because it is only relatively recently that same-sex couples became parents in the context of same-
sex unions (rather than in the context of prior a heterosexual couple), it is only relatively recently
that many of the issues outlined earlier have been the focus of research on same-sex parents. An
older and more consistent theme in the literature on the TtP for same-sex couples that still applies
today is that they likely experience more trouble with identity transformations when becoming
parents compared to heterosexual parents (Cao et al., 2016). This possible identity conflict is due to
same-sex couples’ multiple-minority status as both gay men/lesbian women within the heterosexual
parenting community and as parents within the LGBTQ community (Armesto, 2002; Demo and
Allen, 1996; Murphy, 2013; Stacey, 2006). With regard to the first, many gay and lesbian parents
report experiencing rejection from the heterosexual parenting community due to stereotypes and
prejudices resulting from concerns related to largely held heteronormative models of families and
parenthood that question the appropriateness and morality of same-sex coparenting for children’s
development (Bergman et al., 2010; Berkowitz and Marsiglio, 2007; Cao et al., 2016; Goldberg and
Smith, 2011; Mallon, 2004; Patterson and Riskind, 2010; Silverstein and Quartironi, 1996; Warner,
1993). At the same time, same-sex couples experience psychological challenges resulting from fear of
rejection and isolation from within the LGBTQ community due to lingering beliefs that parenthood
is incompatible with homosexuality and that same-sex parents who become parents are somehow
accommodating or assimilating into mainstream heterosexual norms and values, and thus violate
the perceived homonormativity of childlessness (Armesto, 2002; Benson, Silverstein, and Auerbach,
2005; Bergman et al., 2010; Bigner, 1996; Demo and Allen, 1996; Cao et al., 2016; DeBoehr, 2009;
Goldberg, Downing, and Moyer, 2012; Murphy, 2013; Stacey, 2006). As explained by Cao and col-
leagues (2016) in a comprehensive review of the current research on the potential stressors associated
with the identity transformation experiences of same-sex couples during the transition to parent-
hood, new same-sex coparents may thus face considerable tension between their identity as a sexual
minority (who have historically been viewed as childless) and their new parenting identity (histori-
cally regarded as a privilege reserved for heterosexuals). The process of developing a sense of self that
combines these two potentially conflicting identities may involve considerable stress and anxiety, as
same-sex parents are tied to social groups with historically oppositional role expectations, identity
standards, and meanings.
Of course, in addition to these unique risks, same-sex couples also face all of the universal chal-
lenges associated with the transition to new parenthood discussed in the first section of this review.
534
Indeed, studies of same-sex parents indicate that this transition brings with it declines in mari-
tal satisfaction (Goldberg, Kinkler, Moyer, and Weber, 2014; Goldberg and Sayer, 2006; Goldberg,
Smith, and Kashy, 2010), declines in emotional and physical well-being (Goldberg and Smith, 2008),
increases in anxiety (Goldberg and Smith, 2008), increases in depression (Wojnar and Katzenmeyer,
2014), increases in conflict (Goldberg and Sayer, 2006), and increases in sleep deprivation and other
fatigues (Gianino, 2008).
Notwithstanding these unique and shared challenges, many same-sex couples may also enjoy pro-
tective factors that could potentially buffer their unique risks. One theme in the literature with regard
to protective factors for same-sex couples stems from a consistent pattern whereby same-sex parents
“deconstruct” the gendered nature of parenting—referred to as “degendered parenting” (Mitchell,
1995; Silverstein, Auerbach, and Levant, 2002). Heterosexual couples often divide unpaid household
and childcare labor based on gender norms such that men spend more time in paid labor outside the
home and women do more unpaid labor in the home (Coltrane, 2000; Cowan and Cowan, 1987;
Patterson, Sutfin, and Fulcher, 2004). The majority of research on same-sex male and female couples
indicates that same-sex couples are more likely to report dividing paid and unpaid labor in the home
in a more egalitarian manner (Chan, Brooks, Raboy, and Patterson, 1998; Farr and Patterson, 2013;
Goldberg and Perry-Jenkins, 2007; Kurdek, 2007; Patterson et al., 2004; Tornello, Kruczkowski, and
Patterson, 2015). Conversely, some studies have found unequal distributions among lesbian parents
that differ in biological relatedness to the child with regard to childcare specifically (but not overall
household labor), with the biologically related mother doing more childcare than the nonbiological
mother (Goldberg and Perry-Jenkins, 2007; Moore, 2008). Regardless, because inequity in the divi-
sion of labor has been shown to be associated with poorer well-being and relationship quality (Kes-
sler and McRae, 1982; Patterson, 1995; McPherson, 1993; Steil, 1997) and may have implications for
child adjustment (Chan et al., 1998), if same-sex couples are indeed more likely to have more egali-
tarian roles, this equality could be an area of relative strength for families headed by same-sex parents.
Like heterosexual adoptive parents, same-sex couples who become parents via adoption or sur-
rogacy are on average older, more financially stable, and more highly educated than other first-time
parents (Bergman et al., 2010; Goldberg, 2006; Goldberg and Smith, 2008). Although not all same-
sex parents fit this description, those who do are certainly advantaged in ways that may ease the
TtP and benefit family and child functioning. Despite the advancement of research into the TtP for
same-sex couples, there remain some gaps that point to the need for more research. Notably, most of
the available findings have been based on White, middle-class, and highly educated samples of same-
sex couples living in urban areas within the United States (Cao et al., 2016). However, estimates
from the 2011 American Community Survey (ACS) indicate that about 41% of non-White women
in same-sex couples have children under age 18 in the home compared with 23% of their White
counterparts (Gates, 2013). This apparent sampling bias points to the need for more research on
the transition to parenting for same-sex couples with families composed of ethnic minorities, lower
income families, families living in rural areas, families with more complex structures, and families
with an intersectionality of these groups (Cao et al., 2016).
Transition to Parenthood for Unwed Mothers

The shifting demography of adults rearing children in the United States and the increase in non-
marital childbirth mean that many more women today are transitioning to parenthood outside the
context of marriage than in the past (note that although some proportion of parents rearing children
alone are fathers, we focus on unwed mothers, given that they are more prevalent, and thus there
has been more research on them as compared with unwed fathers rearing children). All of the chal-
lenges associated with the transition to parenthood that have previously been discussed apply to
unwed mothers—but these parents face additional unique challenges associated with their status as
535
unwed. Unwed mothers, including adolescent mothers (Easterbrooks, Katz, and Menon, 2019), tend
to have less education and income than married mothers and are more likely to be from an ethnic
minority group (Copeland and Harbaugh, 2005; Florsheim et al., 2003; Ketterlinus, Lamb, and Nitz,
1991). These characteristics alone present risks to smooth transitions to parenting for these mothers.
In addition to demographic risk characteristics, unwed mothers encounter further challenges revolv-
ing around the increased parenting stress that single mothers experience when compared with their
married counterparts (Child Trends, 2004; Compas and Williams, 1990; Copeland and Harbaugh,
2005; Hetherington, Cox, and Cox, 1982; Mercer, 1995; Ryan, Tolani, and Brooks-Gunn, 2009;
Vosler and Proctor, 1991; Weinraub and Wolf, 1983), stress that is most likely due to the added time
and financial responsibilities and burdens associated with being the sole caregiver and breadwinner.
Indeed, in their review of the literature, Copeland and Harbaugh (2005) succinctly summarize prior
comparisons of one- and two-parent families as indicating that single mothers of young children
report more stress and isolation (Cairney, Boyle, Offord, and Racine, 2003), use more coping strate-
gies (Compas and Williams, 1990), experience more episodes of depression (Cariney et al., 2003;
Davies, Avison, and McAlpine, 1997; Targosz et al., 2003), receive less social support from individuals
and organizations (Cairney et al., 2003; Weinraub and Wolf, 1983), and report more use of mental
health services (Cairney and Wade, 2002) than married mothers. During the TtP specifically, the
added stresses and responsibilities, in turn, lead single mothers to experience on average more psy-
chological distress compared with their married counterparts, including distress directly related to
their parenting role (Avison, 1997; Copeland and Harbaugh, 2005), which is likely to impact their
experiences during the TtP.
Importantly, however, not all unwed mothers are rearing children alone. Unwed mothers as a
group fall into a number of categories—they may be divorced from the child’s father or they may
have never been married to the child’s father; in either scenario, they may or may not be rearing the
child with the father’s support. If they are rearing the child with the child’s father, they may either be
involved romantically and/or cohabiting, or they may be in a strictly coparenting relationship. Single
mothers rearing children alone are likely to experience the negative outcomes described earlier, but
mothers who have support from either a romantic or a nonromantic coparent might have a differ-
ent experience during the TtP. For unwed mothers in stable cohabiting or romantic relationships, as
in married partner relationships, fathers may serve as one of the mother’s primary sources of social
support and could thus serve, in part, to lower mothers’ parenting stress (Ryan et al., 2009). However,
relationships between unwed parents are vulnerable to dissolution, especially in the first year after the
baby’s birth (Bumpass and Lu, 2000; Carlson, McLanahan, and England, 2004; Osborne, Manning,
and Smock, 2007). Furthermore, fathers’ support usually declines over the first year of life (Howard
and Brooks-Gunn, 2009), and fathers tend to withdraw their support once a romantic relationship
ends (Cabrera et al., 2004; Ryan, Kalil, and Ziol-Guest, 2008), leaving mothers with less support and
potentially more stress. Indeed, unwed mothers who differ in the residency and romantic relation-
ships with biological fathers and who experience different relationship transitions during the TtP
differ in the extent to which they report experiencing parenting stress. Specifically, in one study,
parenting stress was found to be highest among unwed mothers who broke up with their child’s
biological father during the first year of the child’s life and lowest among those in consistent romantic
relationships, with mothers who were consistently not romantically involved with fathers scoring in
the middle (Ryan et al., 2009). In other words, breaking up with the child’s father during the first
year was worse in terms of parenting stress for unwed mothers than consistently not being in a rela-
tionship with the father, and mothers who were consistently in a relationship with the father fared
best of all. Relationship dissolution in this context likely impacts unwed mothers through the loss of
support received from fathers—in this study, both fathers’ financial and caregiving support mediated
the association between relationship dissolution and higher maternal parenting stress, with fathers’
caregiving support being the most important factor in explaining the relationship (Ryan et al., 2009),
536
meaning that relationship dissolution mattered for these mothers’ parenting stress because it meant
that mothers were receiving less caregiving support from fathers. These findings point to the need to
consider the contexts of unwed mothers’ transitions to parenting and specifically, how much support
unwed mothers are receiving from their children’s fathers. (Also see Jamison, Ganong, and Proulx,
2017; McHale and Sirotkin, 2019, for more information on coparenting, including coparenting
among unmarried couples, and see Weinraub and Bowler, 2019, for more information on single
parenthood.)
Transition to Parenthood Under Conditions of Biological Risk

Another population for whom the TtP might be particularly challenging is parents who experience
biological risk during the transition. This includes high-risk pregnancies (pregnancies with either an
increased risk of fetal anomalies, or significant threat to the fetus, the mother, or both; Lutz and May,
2007) or a risk to the infant due to early labor, such as infants born with low birthweight (LBW)
or very low birthweight (VLBW). These families often experience a more stressful pregnancy and/
or transition period due to health issues of the mother, the infant, or both. More specifically, the
experience of pregnancy itself is different for families with a high-risk pregnancy compared with
those with a more typical pregnancy. For instance, these parents usually must significantly reorganize
their lives at an earlier stage in the transition process than low-risk pregnancy couples to adapt their
routines to include additional doctor’s appointments or instructions (Dulude, Belanger, Wright, and
Sabourin, 2002), and they are often highly mentally preoccupied by the pregnancy, which causes a
higher degree of strain than in non-high-risk pregnancies (Mercer, May, Ferketich, and DeJoseph,
1986). During this time, parents may also need to make a series of stressful decisions with regard to
medical treatment; for example, they may need to decide whether to reduce the number of fetuses
when fertility treatment results in a pregnancy with three or more fetuses (Lutz and May, 2007). In
the context of high-risk pregnancies, the non-primary caregiver (usually the father) may need to take
on additional responsibilities such as housework and care of other children earlier in the transition
than in low-risk couples (Dulude, Wright, and Belanger, 2000).
In addition to experiencing a different type of pregnancy, in the context of biological risk, the
typical period of psychological instability following the child’s birth may last longer than for families
that do not experience such risks. This period may also be more intense and distressing because the
stress from the unexpected life event of experiencing such a biological risk can result in increased
anxiety, depressive feelings, and heightened global distress (Burns, 1990; Conner and Denson, 1990;
Dulude et al., 2002; Easterbrooks, 1988; Miles, Funk, and Kasper, 1992). Furthermore, it may take
longer for parents who have experienced some form of biological risk to settle into their new family
roles for a number of reasons: The mother and/or the infant may need longer term medical atten-
tion as a result of health issues, the infant may have a precarious and uncertain health status, and the
parents may be unable to parent in a perceived typical or expected manner due to the child’s and/
or the mother’s health (Lutz and May, 2007). These situations could all produce significant distress
and worry for the parents and could cause a delay in parents feeling competent in their new family
roles (Mercer and Ferketich, 1994; Pinch, 2002; Thomas, Feeley, and Grier, 2009). In these contexts,
families are forced to develop their new roles and family processes in the context of risk from the
very beginning, which has implications for adjustment during the TtP and to later family function-
ing (Feldman, 2007).
A distinction has been drawn in the literature between high-risk pregnancies that result in healthy
versus unhealthy outcomes (both in terms of the mother’s and the infant’s health). More specifically, a
number of studies examining high-risk pregnancy that have differentiated between healthy and non-
healthy birth outcomes have found no differences between high- and low-risk pregnancy couples
on maternal role competence (Mercer and Ferketich, 1994), adaptation to the parental role (Dulude
537
et al., 2000), psychological distress (Dulude et al., 2002), or marital adjustment (Dulude et al., 2002)
when babies were born healthy and/or mothers did not experience any long-term health complica-
tions. This surprising equality may be because high-risk pregnancy parents have to make significant
changes to their lives earlier than do low-risk parents leading up to the child’s birth and, therefore,
perceive the change in their lives once the child arrives to be less severe (Dulude et al., 2000).
Alternatively, it could be that the birth of a healthy child could represent a resolution of uncertainty
regarding the birth outcome for high-risk parents, alleviating much of the stress experienced dur-
ing pregnancy (Mercer and Ferketich, 1994). Regardless of birth outcome, as with all new parents,
what differentiates families who are able to adapt to the challenges and consequences of high-risk
pregnancies or unhealthy birth outcomes from those who struggle is the level of social, psychological,
and financial resources available to them (Lutz and May, 2007). Undoubtedly, parents who are able to
obtain higher quality medical care and those who feel more supported by their partners, family, and
friends fare better in the face of biological risk during the TtP.
Support for Families at Risk

Of course, we are not able to describe every different family context that might experience unique
challenges in the TtP, and many other contexts present unique challenges to new parents. For
instance, although various aspects of mental health are often considered as the result of the transition
to parenthood, parents with preexisting depression or anxiety experience unique challenges during
the TtP that put them at risk for a range of negative adjustment outcomes (Farber, Vaughn, and Ege-
land, 1981; Feeney, Alexander, Noller, and Hohaus, 2003; Matthey et al., 2000; Raskin, Richman, and
Gaines, 1990). Parents living at or near the poverty line can also experience severe stressors during
the TtP associated with financial hardship and weak social support that can undermine well-being
(Coleman and Karraker, 1997; Raver and Leadbeater, 1999; Zayas, Jankowski, and McKee, 2005).
For a comprehensive review of parenting, more generally, in the context of poverty (Magnuson and
Duncan 2019).
One common theme throughout these contexts is that, by and large, all parents experience more
optimal outcomes related to their new role as parents when they have better support systems. Given
that support systems are so important for the well-being of all parents during the transition to par-
enthood, it is important that parents also have access to more formal sources of support, particularly
when they are at heightened risk of having low levels of informal support. There are many publicly
funded programs that help support parents during the TtP with the goals of offsetting some of
the negative individual and couple outcomes typically experienced during this time (Bryan, 2000;
Doherty, Erikson, and LaRossa, 2006; Doss, Cicila, Hsueh, Morrison, and Carhart, 2014; Feinberg,
Kan, and Goslin, 2009; Hawkins, Fawcett, Carroll, and Gilliland, 2006; Petch, Halford, Creedy, and
Gamble, 2012; Schulz, Cowan, and Cowan, 2006; Shapiro and Gottman, 2005). Given that the TtP
for new parents is the time when families form their childrearing and coparenting habits, and the
roles and relationships within the family system are defined for the first time, many researchers and
practitioners agree that the TtP is an ideal time to intervene; that is, parents may be more open to
change during this period than later on in their children’s development, when relationships and pat-
terns are already established (Duvall, 1977; Feinberg, 2002).
Some of these TtP programs are universally focused, meaning that their application is not lim-
ited to any specific group, whereas others are targeted to specific groups (e.g., low-income parents,
single parents, teen parents). Among the targeted programs is the Nurse-Family Partnership (NFP),
which is the oldest and most well-developed home-visiting program in the United States (Ryan and
Padilla, in press). The program primarily aims to enhance pre- and postnatal health behaviors and is
targeted to low-income first-time mothers. It provides weekly or biweekly home-visits by registered
nurses prenatally through the child’s second birthday (Olds, Henderson, Chamberlin, and Tatelbaum,
538
1986), thus targeting the TtP period. In RCT evaluations of NFP, the program has been shown to
enhance the quality of mothers’ parenting during infancy (Kitzman et al., 2000; Olds et al., 1986)
and in early childhood (Olds, Henderson, Kitzman, and Cole, 1995) and improve children’s cognitive
outcomes—such as higher mental development scores and language and math test scores—up until
age 9 (Kitzman et al., 1997; Olds et al., 1986; Ryan and Padilla, in press, provide a detailed description
of the NFP findings). Family Foundations is an example of program that does not target any particular
population. Rather, the program targets the coparenting relationship and can theoretically be adapted
for use with any population of parents rearing children together—including those who are not
romantically involved (Feinberg, 2002). The Family Foundations program consists of four prenatal
and four postnatal 2-hour group sessions led by male-female teams (Feinberg and Kan, 2015). Over-
all, participation has been shown to promote a number of positive TtP outcomes, including higher
quality coparenting relationships, higher quality parent-child interactions, and better self-regulation
in children years after the intervention has ended. See the chapters by Powell and Garbarino and
Governale in this volume, in addition to Ryan and Padilla (in press) for more information on these
and other parenting interventions as well as parenting and public policy more broadly.
Cross-National Variation in Support for Families During the TtP

The significant challenges associated with the TtP described earlier are relatively similar across indus-
trialized nations and cultures; however, the extent to which nations provide public support for fami-
lies during the TtP to address these challenges varies. In the following section, we briefly compare
significant sources of public support in the United States—a country that is among the least generous
of Western industrialized nations with regard to supporting families during the TtP—to the Scandi-
navian nations—which offer highly generous public supports for families during the TtP.
In the United States, the vast majority of women and men with children under 18 participate in
the labor force (70% of women and 93% of men; U.S. Department of Labor, Women’s Bureau, 2016),
necessitating some period of time where one or both parents can stay home to care for the new
infant and to adapt to new family roles (and to recover, for women who have given birth). Paren-
tal leave policies following the birth or adoption of a child vary substantially between the United
States and Scandinavia (According to Merriam-Webster dictionary, the term “Scandinavia” always
includes the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, and sometimes includes Finland,
Iceland, and the Faroe Islands; Scandinavia, n.d.). Although the details of family leave policies vary
somewhat across Scandinavian nations, in general they are known for their generous family supports
that are aimed at achieving three goals with implications for the TtP: Reconciling work and fam-
ily life conflicts, encouraging gender equity by implementing policies to support men and women
in sharing paid and unpaid work equally, and providing solutions to work-family conflicts that are
in the best interest of all children regardless of family background (Rostgaard, 2014). Parental leave
in these countries ranges from 52 to 69 weeks, with variations in how much parents are paid dur-
ing that period, how much of the leave is reserved exclusively for fathers, and how much of fathers’
leave must be taken with mothers. In Denmark, for example, of 52 total weeks of leave, 18 weeks are
reserved for maternity leave (4 of those weeks are to be taken before the mother’s due date), 2 weeks
are for fathers to take with mothers, and the remaining 32 weeks can be split between parents as they
choose. During this time, Danish parents are paid 100% of the country’s sickness benefit. By contrast,
in Norway, parents can choose between being paid 100% of their former wages for 47 weeks, or
can be paid 80% of their former wages for 57 weeks (though there is a maximum amount families
can collect per week). Of these weeks, 10 weeks are reserved for mothers, 10 weeks are reserved for
fathers, and the rest can be used how families choose (with a maximum amount families can col-
lect per week) (OECD Family Database, 2017; Rostgaard, 2014). The emphasis on reserved time for
fathers to take leave during the TtP ensures that men will take the leave and actively participate in
539
caregiving during the TtP, and the time set for mothers and fathers to take together facilitates the
TtP as a new family unit (Earle, Mokomane, and Heymann, 2011). These aspects of leave policies are
part of Scandinavia’s “dual earner-dual carer” model in which men and women are encouraged to
and supported in spending equal time in paid work in the labor market and unpaid work at home
(Rostgaard, 2014).
Paid leave policies in Scandinavia exist in stark contrast to U.S. parental leave policy, in which new
parents are not guaranteed any amount paid leave, but do have the right to 12 weeks of employment-
protected unpaid leave after the birth or adoption of a child under the 1993 Family and Medical
Leave Act (FMLA) (Heinrich, 2014; OECD Family Database, 2017). Individual states and employers
may provide additional paid and unpaid leave at their discretion, but the lack of a federal paid leave
policy in the United States leaves the most vulnerable new parents, such as low-income families and
unwed mothers, without guaranteed paid support during this challenging transition. Without the
means to stay home and care for a new infant, many mothers are forced to return to work earlier
than they would like (Berger, Hill, and Waldfogel, 2005). Earlier return to work often leads to fewer
months breastfeeding and lower rates of immunization compared with mothers with access to longer
leave periods, which has health consequences for children and mothers (Earle et al., 2011). It is not
just Scandinavia that outpaces the United States with regard to parental leave policies—of the world’s
15 most competitive counties, as defined by indicators gathered by the World Economic Forum, the
United States is the only one that does not guarantee some form of paid leave for new mothers (Earle
et al., 2011). Additionally, all of these countries but the United States and Switzerland also guarantee
paid leave for new fathers.
Once parents do return to work after the birth or adoption of a new baby, they must arrange
for childcare. In Scandinavia, though again there are differences in the details of public provision of
childcare, a commonality among Denmark, Norway, and Sweden is that childcare is considered an
individual right, and thus children are entitled to it regardless of their parents’ work situation. The
cost of this care is heavily subsidized and varies on the basis of parents’ income and the number of
children they have, and often has a cap on parental contributions (Rostgaard, 2014). For example,
in Denmark, parental contributions cannot exceed 25% of income (Rostgaard, 2014). However,
because parental leave is so generous in this region, significantly fewer children in Scandinavia attend
childcare before the age of 1 compared with children living in the United States (Laughlin, 2013;
Rostgaard, 2014), who often must begin nonparental childcare during the first year of life. Childcare
is not considered a right in the United States, and publicly funded care for infants and young children
is generally reserved for the poorest families. For example, children in families making below the
Federal Poverty Line can attend Early Head Start, a federally funded two-generation program that
serves children from birth to age 3 through early care and education and home-visiting services (U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, 2017). Alter-
natively, some low-income families receive childcare subsidies through the Childcare and Develop-
ment Fund (CCDF) that are provided in the form of a childcare slot or a voucher than can be used
to defray the cost of childcare at facilities that meet state requirements (National Center for Children
in Poverty, 2017). CCDF subsidies are funded through a combination of federal and state sources, and
individual states have considerable discretion in deciding income limits; in 2007, for example, annual
applicant income limits for a family of three ranged from $18,216 to $47,200 (National Center for
Children in Poverty, 2017). These supports are vital to families who meet income eligibility require-
ments in facilitating a return to employment during the TtP given the lack of parental leave available
in the United States. However, there is little support for the average family during TtP, as public sup-
ports during this time (and often afterwards) are generally limited to low-income families.
When considering models of support for families during the TtP, it is impossible to ignore the
unique case of Finland. Through a state policy that originated in 1938, all expectant Finnish moth-
ers are given a maternity package in the form of a box filled with about 50 baby items (Rosenberg,
540
2016). The box contains clothes, outdoor gear, sheets, bathing products, and toys, and is fitted with
a small mattress so that it can be used as a baby’s first bed (Lee, 2013). Mothers can choose between
taking the box or a cash grant of 140 euros (about $165 in 2017), though 95% of mothers choose
the box, as it is worth much more than the value of the grant and saves mothers time going shop-
ping and comparing prices (Lee, 2013). When the box was first introduced in 1938, it was available
only to low-income mothers, but became available universally in 1949. The only requirement for
mothers to receive the box is that they must visit a doctor or prenatal clinic before their fourth
month of pregnancy—a change that many believe contributed (along with an instituted national
health insurance system) to Finland’s rapid decline in infant mortality in the following decades (Lee,
2013). There is no such equivalent maternity package for new mothers in the United States, though
individual states such as New Jersey, Ohio, Alabama, Texas, and Colorado have begun programs to
make similar baby boxes available to new mothers (Chandler, 2017; Pao, 2017). These programs have
been implemented with Finnish baby boxes in mind, but as it is impossible to require women in
the United States to get a prenatal checkup, the emphasis in these states is promoting safe sleep and
childcare practices through educational videos (Chandler, 2017; Pao, 2017). As these initiatives gain
in popularity in the United States, they are likely to become more widespread as a helpful source of
support for new families during the TtP.
There is little research directly demonstrating that these types of public supports improve adult
outcomes across the TtP. The broader literature on the stressors and supports that shape the outcomes
of the TtP, however, suggest that offering benefits such as paid maternal and paternal leave and in-
kind goods could improve outcomes like relationship quality, adult adjustment, and even neurobio-
logical functioning for parents. For example, as we described earlier in this chapter, two key stressors
that predict lower parental relationship quality and weaker coparenting relationships during the TtP
are spending less time together as a couple and experiencing greater conflict over household division
of labor (e.g., Cowan and Cowan, 2000; Dew and Wilcox, 2011; Lachance-Grzela and Bouchard,
2009a; Twenge et al., 2003). Generous parental leave policies that also require fathers to participate
could significantly reduce these stressors for new parents, as one parent would have the financial
flexibility to serve as a full-time parent during the first year of life while the other parent also takes
time off to parent for some period of time. To the extent that this policy reduces parental conflict, it
could also improve coparenting relationships, parent mental health and, ultimately, parent-child rela-
tionships. Thus, although much of the variation in outcomes across the TtP depends on individual
characteristics, such as parent personality traits or emotional well-being, or on contexts, such as fam-
ily income and family structure, the kinds of public supports that Scandinavian countries provide
could help facilitate enhanced family functioning and adult well-being across the TtP.
Conclusion
The TtP is justifiably characterized in the academic and popular parenting literature as one of the
most exciting but also most challenging periods in life. For the vast majority of parents, welcoming
a first child brings unique joys, but it also introduces novel stressors, as parents negotiate for the first
time multiple roles of parents, partners and, increasingly, dual earners. This chapter provides an over-
view of the average effects of the TtP on parents’ family relationships, psychological adjustment, and
neurobiological functioning as well as how those effects vary for parents facing unique or particularly
stressful parenting contexts. What the chapter aimed to convey overall was that how parents fare in
these psychological domains across the TtP depends to a large extent on the personal, interpersonal,
and contextual resources parents bring into the transition as well as those they develop with the help
of informal or formal support systems along the way.
One of the most consistently identified protective factors in the literature on the TtP are par-
ents’ individual socioemotional strengths. These include personality traits, such as high agreeableness
541
and low neuroticism, as well as emotional strengths, such as low pre-pregnancy levels of depression
and anxiety, which all predict relative stability in parental relationship quality and mental health
versus declines across the TtP as well as the development of positive coparenting relationships from
pregnancy through the first year of parenthood. According to the VSA model, these strengths are
protective because they allow parents to cope with the typical daily strains associated with the TtP,
including working more total hours across housework and paid work, lack of sleep, and the chal-
lenges of caring for a newborn, without suffering high levels of personal or interpersonal strain.
Interpersonal resources are also key to weathering the transition smoothly. Chief among these are
having a strong parental relationship going into the TtP as well as a strong network of social sup-
port among family and friends outside the parental relationship. Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model
would suggest that lower average levels of these personal and interpersonal resources among unmar-
ried and single parents, as well as parents living in the context of poverty, account for poorer average
TtP outcomes within these populations. The power of these protective factors also helps to explain
why the vast majority of same-sex couples, despite unique contextual risks associated with the TtP
for them, adjust relatively well. That is, interpersonal strengths, such as more egalitarian divisions of
labor, as well as individual resources, such as higher average income and education levels (as least
among adoptive parents), which predict positive adjustment among heterosexual couples, could serve
to protect same-sex couples during their transition to parenthood.
It is important to understand and promote factors that predict a positive TtP among parents
because the manner in which partners adapt to the new role as parents is likely to have a lasting
impact on the quality of their relationships and their individual psychological well-being. However, it
is also important to understand and promote these factors because parents’ adaptation to parenthood
is likely to have a lasting impact on their children’s development and well-being (Schulz et al., 2006).
One key mechanism through which the outcomes of TtP discussed in this chapter would influence
child development is parenting quality and parent-child relationships. Specifically, large literatures
find that both parents’ relationship quality as well as the quality of their coparenting relationship
predict the extent to which both mothers and fathers parent in sensitive and stimulating ways with
infants and toddlers (Erel and Burman, 1995; Feinberg, Kan, and Goslin, 2009; Feinberg, Kan, and
Hetherington, 2007). (See Kerig, 2019; McHale and colleagues, 2019, for comprehensive reviews of
these literatures.) The quality of mother and father parenting during early childhood, in turn, has
been linked to children’s cognitive and socioemotional development both in early childhood and
after in an equally voluminous literature (Cabrera and Tamis-LeMonda, 2013; Martin, Ryan, and
Brooks-Gunn, 2010; Martin, Ryan, and Brooks-Gunn, 2013;). Moreover, the initial quality of parents’
interactions with their infants strongly predicts the quality of parent-child interactions throughout
early childhood (Martin, Ryan, and Brooks-Gunn, 2013). For these reasons, how parents fare during
the initial TtP in terms of their relationships and psychological adjustment will have reverberating
effects on family relationships and family well-being long after the transition is complete.
Future research that aims to illuminate the reasons behind these long-run effects should continue
to explore the neurobiological processes that underlie the TtP. In the last years, we have greatly
increased our understanding of the interconnections between the hormonal changes mothers and
fathers undergo during the TtP, the role those changes play in the functioning and structure of
parents’ brains, and the role brain functioning plays in parents’ emotional, cognitive, and behavioral
adjustment to parenthood. By deepening this research to identify even more specific neural circuits
that underlie early caregiving and parent well-being, and broadening it to include even more policy-
relevant, at-risk populations, we might better understand both why the vast majority of parents
weather the TtP relatively smoothly and why parents facing particular personal or contextual risks
do not. This understanding could help a new generation of parenting interventions better target and
promote positive parental functioning during the TtP. The benefits of such targeted interventions
could improve the quality of parent, child, and family functioning long after the TtP has ended, and
542
could do so at a time when women and men are undergoing the TtP in more diverse and varied
circumstances than ever before.
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16
STAGES OF PARENTAL
DEVELOPMENT
Jack Demick
Introduction
Many years ago, an initial chapter (Demick, 1999) on parent development began with the following:
I have a seven-year-old daughter and a four-year-old son. After recently being instructed
to wear a coat in below freezing temperatures, my daughter informed me that she did not
have to comply with my directive because she was accountable to only two people in the
world: God and Bill Clinton.
During a recent dinner conversation in which my daughter was asking about foreign
languages, my son’s eyes piqued as he asked, “Dad, how do you say ‘vagina’ in Spanish?” Not
usually at a loss for words, I needed several moments to regain cognitive equilibrium before
attempting to respond to these novel and unexpected stimuli.
While numerous life events have the potential to lead to higher stages of development
and, specifically, to foster cognitive development, the experience of parenthood as one such
life event is a relatively unequivocal example. As Berger (1994, p. 478) has noted, “From the
birth of a first child, which tends to make both parents feel more ‘adult’—thinking about
themselves and their responsibilities differently—through the unexpected issues raised by
adolescent children, parenthood is undoubtedly an impetus for cognitive growth.”
(Feldman, Biringen, and Nash, 1981; Flavell, 1970; Galinsky, 1981)
That not only cognitive but also psychosocial development is affected by parenthood has
been supported by several sources of work reported in our (Demick, Bursik, and DiBiase,
1993) recently edited volume on Parental Development . . .
(p. 177)
Since that time, my children have continued to supply unexpected stimuli, although differing in
content and form. In the past, the new unexpected stimuli often revolved around age-appropriate con-
cerns (e.g., after a presentation at her middle school by McGruff the Crime Dog, my then 14-year-old
daughter militantly marched into the house demanding to know whether her parents had ever tried
marijuana; my 11-year-old son meticulously unwrapped and rewrapped packs of Pokémon cards,
the favors for his birthday party, to take out the new and/or valuable cards for himself, only later to
somaticize his guilt into a serious stomachache). Today, the myriad of unanticipated catalysts persist,
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Stages of Parental Development
reinforcing the old adage of “bigger children, bigger problems.” For example, my now 31-year-old,
nontraditional daughter approached us with a guest list of 500 individuals for her upcoming wedding.
Shortly thereafter, my currently 28-year-old son informed us that he would be abandoning a success-
ful career in marketing to begin a graduate degree in his “true passion” of screenwriting.
All of these stimuli, to name only a few, have necessitated the continued reestablishment of
dynamic equilibrium in my self-world relationships, or in what Wapner and Demick (1998) have
alternatively termed my “person-in-environment system,” clearly becoming occasions for my own
cognitive and psychosocial development. As Gutmann (1975, p. 1) stated, “Parenthood is a power-
ful generator of development. It gives us an opportunity to refine and express who we are, to learn
what we can be, to become different.” However, assuming that parenthood is a powerful generator
of growth and change, the question becomes: What is the genesis of parental growth and/or change?
Are there stages of parental development, and, if so, what are their determinants? If there are stages,
what motivates a parent to move from one stage to another?
Thus, the purposes of this chapter are fourfold: (1) to present historical considerations and central
issues surrounding the concept of stages of parental development and related constructs (e.g., family
life cycle stages); (2) to summarize and evaluate classical and contemporary theory and research on
stages of parental development, highlighting a conceptualization based on holistic/systems-devel-
opment theory or HSDT (Demick, 2015, 2016, in press; Wapner and Demick, 1998, 2003, 2005);
(3) to delineate the practical applications of the collective theory and research on stages of parental
development for scientists as well as for parents and clinicians; and (4) to propose directions for future
theory and research on stages of parental development, specifically, and on parental development
more generally. Toward these ends, historical considerations are reviewed first.
Historical Considerations in the Study of Stages of Parental Development

Theory and research on stages of parental development have drawn on several related strands of
classic earlier research: (1) parenthood as a developmental stage (primarily from a psychoanalytic
viewpoint), (2) transition to parenthood (with respect to individual, marital, and family functioning),
and (3) stages of cognitive development in parenthood (stemming primarily from Piaget’s classic
developmental theory). Brief reviews of these lines of inquiry are presented first. Then, following a
discussion of central issues in conceptualizing the construct of general stages of parental development
gleaned from this historical review, three contemporary lines of work on general stages of parental
development are presented. Across all approaches, theoretical and methodological critiques are inte-
grated when relevant.
Parenthood as a Developmental Stage

“Parenthood as a developmental phase” was first conceptualized in the psychoanalytic literature by
Benedek (1959, p. 389). Specifically, parenthood was first seen as a powerful stage in the develop-
ment of women (Benedek, 1959; Chodorow, 1978; Deutsch, 1945) and then of both women and
men more generally (Anthony and Benedek, 1970; Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry, 1975).
With respect to the former, Deutsch (1945) proposed that parenthood (specifically, giving birth)
represents the crucial, positive fulfillment of a woman’s needs. In line with the latter, Benedek (1970,
p. 124) held that
the study of the family as a field of transactional processes . . . is based on the proposition
that the parents’ drive-motivated, emotional investment in the child brings about recip-
rocal intrapsychic processes in the parents, which normally account for changes in their
personalities.
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Jack Demick
Arguing that successful (unsuccessful) relationships with children make for advances (regressions) in
the parent’s personality (e.g., superego, self-esteem), she explained,
In terms of dynamic psychology it means that while the parent consciously tries to help
the child achieve his developmental goal, he cannot help but deal with his own conflicts
unconsciously and by this, normally, achieve a new level of maturation.
(p. 131)
Thus, adults’ conscious and unconscious ways of navigating the world were thought to change
when they became parents, often leading them to relive some of their own psychological vulner-
abilities with their children (Fraiberg, 1996). For example,
when a child enters school, a parent’s own fear and resistance against the authority of the
school may erupt and cause the parent, child or both specific difficulties. When children
reach adolescence, parents have to confront their own sexuality once again.
(Buchholz, 2000, p. 441)
The bulk of this psychoanalytic work on parenthood was based on parents in psychiatric treatment
and may not generalize to parents at large (e.g., it was not until the 1970s that psychoanalytically
oriented investigators turned to the examination of normal, as distinguished from pathological, adult
development; see Levinson, 1978). Nonetheless, Benedek (1959) also made inroads into the general
problem of stages of parental development. Specifically, laying the groundwork for future theory and
research, she suggested three broad stages as follows: (1) stage one, from conception to the child’s
leaving home, this is a period of “total parenthood” during which parents perceive children as com-
pletely their own; (2) stage two, the point in time at which the youngest child reaches adolescence
and parents must deal with the “empty nest” phenomenon; and (3) stage three, beginning when
parents become grandparents and indulge their grandchildren instinctively.
Further support for the notion of parenthood as a developmental stage came from the work
of Erikson (1950, 1968, 1982). Modifying Freudian theory in two major ways, Erikson proposed
the following: (1) in addition to their psychosexual aspects, stages have psychosocial aspects, which
involve major social conflicts that the individual must resolve at each stage (e.g., basic trust versus
mistrust, autonomy versus shame and doubt, and initiative versus guilt in the oral, anal, and phal-
lic stages, respectively), and (2) social development continues postadolescence (even if intellectual
development does not) and leads to consideration of three additional developmental stages (and
social conflicts), namely, young adulthood (intimacy versus isolation), adulthood (generativity versus
stagnation), and maturity (integrity versus despair). The seventh stage, generativity versus stagnation,
corresponds to middle adulthood. Generativity refers to the ability to give of oneself to another
person or persons. Although generativity may be achieved in numerous ways (e.g., transmission of
knowledge through teaching and writing, provision of empathy and/or protection to individuals,
groups, social institutions, or societal activities; see McAdams and de St. Aubin, 1992; McAdams,
2001, 2006, for an elaborated concept of generativity), it is ideally expressed in the context of parent-
hood where parents derive fulfillment by investing in their children’s lives, sharing their life experi-
ences, and guiding and teaching them. According to Erikson, few life experiences provide as much
opportunity as parenting to care for others, to realize our “need to be needed,” and to exercise our
innate wish to teach.
Thus, early psychoanalytic theory and research made important contributions to the study of
stages of parental development (Cohler and Paul, 2019). These contributions included conceptualiza-
tion of parenthood as (1) a major life stage with powerful potential for parents’ reorganization of self
(e.g., mastery of intrapsychic conflicts, increased self-esteem) and of environment (e.g., heightened
558
focus on family relationships, decreased focus on other relationships); (2) a life stage of some duration
with at least a clear beginning, middle, and end (paralleling the child’s development); (3) a stage with
significant current and future developmental implications (e.g., setting the stage for the subsequent
evaluation of one’s life in the context of dealing with integrity versus despair); and (4) a general
framework within which parents might occupy several stages concurrently (e.g., in the middle phase
with some children and in the early phase with others).
Not surprisingly, once parenthood was conceptualized as a developmental stage, interest primarily
in the beginning and secondarily in the end of this period grew and has continued through the
present (see Glade, Bean, and Vira, 2005; Ryan and Padilla, 2019, for more complete discussions
of the transition to parenthood). However, less research to date has focused on the middle phase
of parenthood (see Demick, 2000d). For example, early sociological work (Bibring, Dwyer, Hun-
tington, and Valenstein, 1961; Emmerich, 1969; Hill and Mattessich, 1979; LeMasters, 1965; Leifer,
1980; Rossi, 1971) led to the initial conceptualization of the transition to parenthood as a relatively
time-limited period of “crisis” for new parents (see Fedele, Golding, Grossman, and Pollack, 1988,
on the regressive impact of first-time parenthood as often manifest in the appearance of psychopa-
thology and postpartum depression in parents). However, subsequent psychological research (Doss,
Rhoades, Stanley, and Markman, 2009; Kluwer, 2010) has qualified and/or extended this notion.
For example, some research—focusing on individual functioning, namely, personality and attitude
change over the transition to parenthood—has provided extensive information on, for example,
personality characteristics associated with the parental role (Prinzie, de Haan, and Belsky, 2019),
factors (e.g., infant temperament) mediating the impact of parenthood on personality (Bates,
McQuillan, and Hoyniak, 2019), and areas of change within parents (e.g., affective states, personal
maturity, self-efficacy, self-perception, and values; cf. Leerkes and Augustine, 2019; Schuengel and
Oosterman, 2019).
Other investigators (Cowan and Cowan, 1988, 1992; Schulz, Cowan, and Cowan, 2006) have
treated the impact of the transition to parenthood on the marital relationship and on developmental
change in the family system (Cowan and Hetherington, 1991; McKenry and Price, 2000; Michaels
and Goldberg, 1988). For example, Cowan and Cowan (1992) provided a structural model of marital
and familial adaptation that focused on the developmentally advanced state of balancing individual-
ity and mutuality. Empirical findings documented that couples characterized by positive mutuality
over the transition to parenthood exhibit optimal parenting, which leads to positive child outcomes
at least through the kindergarten years.
Consistent with such work has been the research of Belsky and his colleagues (Belsky, 1978, 1984;
Belsky and Pensky, 1988; Belsky, Bakermans-Kranenburg, and van Ijzendoorn, 2007; Belsky and
Pluess, 2009), who have attempted to document the determinants of parenting. These researchers
have identified as primary factors including child characteristics (e.g., temperament; see Bates et al.,
2019), the personal/psychological well-being of parents (see Nelson-Coffey and Stewart, 2019), and
contextual sources of support and stress (Crnic and Coburn, 2019; cf. Azar and Weinzierl, 2005; Azar,
Reitz, and Goslin, 2008, on determinants of maladaptive parenting in the context of child abuse and
neglect). Moreover, research (Rutherford, Wallace, Laurent, and Mayes, 2015) has revealed that over
the course of the transition to parenthood, there are, in addition to psychological changes, relevant
biological shifts (e.g., changes in brain regions involved in reward and motivation and in the produc-
tion of oxytocin) that may facilitate parents’ emotion regulation in response to their infants’ cues
(Feldman, 2019; Stark et al., 2019).
To date, Bornstein (2016) provided one of the more comprehensive conceptualizations of the
determinants of parenting, many of which are already in, or come into, place during the transition to
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Jack Demick
parenthood. Assuming that determinants condition and/or shape parental functioning in a bidirec-
tional manner (Bell, 1968), he organized determinants into biological and psychological characteristics
of the parent (e.g., genetic endowment, neurohormonal activity, brain structure/function, age/stage,
health status, parental cognitions/experience), biological and psychological characteristics of the child
(e.g., genetic traits, neuronal activation, neurohormonal activation, physical appearance, age/stage,
gender, birth order, cognitive development, temperament/personality, individual/social behavior),
and situational characteristics inherent in proximal (e.g., specific situations, family structure/function,
neighborhoods, support networks, parental employment status), social group (e.g., socioeconomic
status or SES, religion, ethnicity, culture), and distal (e.g., ecology, time/history, evolutionary pro-
cesses) contexts. Furthermore, his view of parenting determinants shares some relations with my own
approach to stages of parental development (see ahead). For example, mutual assumptions include
those pertaining to the holistic/systemic and developmental nature of everyday parental function-
ing and to those integrating complementary aspects (e.g., process versus achievement, theory versus
praxis) of parental functioning into its study.
Summarily, theory and research on the transition to parenthood including parenting determinants
have suggested the following as key to the conceptualization of stages of parental development. First,
the transition to parenthood—beginning at conception and continuing through birth and into the
child’s first years—represents a significant stage that must be incorporated into any stage theory of
parental development (Lipsitt, Demick, and Rovee-Collier, 2015). Second, empirical findings have
generally reinforced the usefulness of comprehensive (holistic) conceptualization (Bornstein, 2016)
as well as the role of individual differences in adaptation (cf. Murray et al., 2019; Parke and Cookston,
2019). Third, comparative research on the determinants of parenting in both adaptive (normal) and
maladaptive (e.g., child abuse) contexts has the potential to advance our understanding of family
processes and their development more generally (Bornstein, 2016; Demick, 2000a, 2000b, Demick
and Wapner, 1988a, 1988b, 1992).
Stage Theories of Cognitive Development in Parenthood

Although some research has addressed aspects of psychosocial development in parenthood (Erikson,
1950, 1968, 1982; Marcia, 1966, 1980; Marcia, Waterman, Matteson, Archer, and Orlofsky, 2011),
stage theories of cognitive development over the course of parenthood have been significantly more
common. With respect to the latter, relevant here is the work of Sameroff (Sameroff, 1975a, 1975b,
1975c; Sameroff and Feil, 1985) and Newberger and her colleagues (Newberger, 1977, 1980, 1987;
Newberger and Cook, 1983; Newberger and White, 1989) on parental conceptions of the child and/
or of the parental role.
Taken together, Sameroff ’s and Newberger’s theories have outlined a descriptive, developmen-
tal continuum of parental social-cognitive awareness, which has been conceptualized in an analo-
gous manner to Piaget’s (1952a, 1952b, 1970a, 1970b) stages of the child’s intellectual development.
According to these theories, parents’ conceptions of their children and/or of their parental role have
been seen as representing the cognitive structures of parenthood. Cognitive structures refer to stable
patterns of thought that define how individuals (here, parents) make sense out of their experience
and organize their responses to it. Related to increased interaction with the environment, the struc-
ture of individuals’ (parents’) thinking both broadens (allowing them to consider a wider array of
information and perspectives) and reflects increased flexibility in thinking. Thus, the development of
the cognitive structure of parenthood has been seen as aiding parents in interpreting their children’s
responses and behavior and in formulating policies to guide their parental actions.
Sameroff and associates ordered parents’ conceptions of their children’s development into four
stages, corresponding to Piaget’s four stages of the child’s intellectual development, namely, symbi-
otic (sensorimotor), categorical (preoperational), compensating (concrete operational), and perspectivistic
560
(formal operational). For example, these researchers characterized the parent’s earliest conceptions of
her or his child as symbiotic whereby she or he
is concerned primarily with the immediate relationship to the child [and] . . . responds in
a here and now fashion to the child’s behavior. . . . The skin to skin contact in breastfeed-
ing . . . [etc.] . . . are interpreted as consequences of the mother’s efforts and serve to produce
a positive affectional bond between mother and child. . . . This lack of differentiation between
oneself and one’s child makes the ability to reflect on the developmental process impossible.
(Sameroff and Feil, 1985, pp. 86–87)
Subsequent stages were seen as reflecting increasing differentiation between parent and child.
For example, once the parent is able to differentiate between self and child as independent entities,
she or he has advanced to the categorical stage in which “the child’s actions can be viewed as being
intrinsic characteristics of the child” (Sameroff and Feil, 1985, p. 87) independent of whether the
parent characterizes the child positively or negatively. The highest level of reasoning has been termed
“perspectivistic” insofar as parents at this stage are capable of thinking hypothetically and interpreting
their child’s behavior in light of the complexity of experience, context, and endowment; further-
more, parents at this stage are able to think constructively about remediation to overcome either
general or selected deficiencies in the child.
Although framed somewhat similarly, the work of Newberger and her colleagues has been devel-
oped more extensively. First, Newberger (1987) distinguished between what she termed “paren-
tal awareness” (as embodied in her stages) and “parental attitudes.” Specifically, she assumed that
parental awareness represents an underlying cognitive structure of concepts of people and of roles,
whereas parental attitudes reflect more superficial points of view about caregiving behaviors and
styles. Thus, parental awareness, which reflects the complexity and flexibility of the underlying cog-
nitive resources available to the parent, is (unlike some attitudes) not a correct or incorrect but deeper
mode of thinking, and thus might be more amenable to intervention. Second, Newberger’s theory
has received some empirical validation; moreover, there have been some attempts to incorporate her
ideas into parent education programs aimed at fostering parental development (see section on practi-
cal information ahead).
Specifically, Newberger’s orientations/levels/stages have been described as follows:
1. Egoistic orientation. Here, a parent is self-focused (considering only her or his own interests and
needs) and perceives the child merely as a projection of her or his own experience (e.g., in terms
of the effect of the child on the parent). An example of a mother who is functioning at this level
may be seen in the following quotation: “I enjoy that she is getting more independent. I can sit
down and read a magazine while she is up and about and it’s kind of nice. A lot of times she
still has to be right there, you know, and I can’t just sit to write a letter or pay the bills because
she wants to do that stuff too, but she is starting. I’m starting to get a little bit of freedom back”
(Thomas, 1996, p. 189).
2. Conventional orientation. At this level, a parent understands her or his child in terms of externally
derived definitions and explanations of children (e.g., culture, tradition, “authority,” age-related
norms for children’s development). Parenting is perceived as reasoning about such issues as the
most correct way to, for example, toilet train or discipline children. Here, fulfilling one’s role as
predetermined by tradition is primary. This may be illustrated as follows: “For my three-year-
old, I have different expectations than for my one-year-old. He is beginning to learn about rules
so that I have expectations of him to be able to follow rules. As he gets older, you give them
more boundaries and privileges. Perhaps use time-outs if necessary to get him to follow rules”
(Thomas, 1996, p. 189).
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Jack Demick
3. Subjective-individualistic orientation. Here, a parent views her or his child as a unique individual
who (differing from external definitions such as those embodied in norms) may now instead
be understood through the parent-child relationship itself. Parents at this level broaden their
reasoning about parenting and organize it around identifying and responding to the needs of a
particular child. For example, one mother stated: “I like to play with her toys and get involved
in some of that imaginative play. She likes me to do that and I have found that a lot of fun. We
sit and have wonderful conversations either in play or during the day. It is more fun now that
she has started to develop her verbal skills more. She is so different from my son who would not
tolerate sitting” (Thomas, 1996, p. 189).
4. Analytic-systems orientation. Here, a parent understands both herself or himself and her or his child
as complex and changing psychological self-systems, which are embedded within interacting
mutual systems that influence family, community, and global relations. The parent sees her or his
own and her or his child’s development through the ongoing process of parenting (where the
parent finds ways to balance her or his own needs as well those of her or his child). For instance,
one mother stated: “Well, I guess it must be playing some role in the development of this human
being. You know, taking responsibility for her is really satisfying, it really is. I think the respon-
sibility of it all is not just food, clothing, and shelter, but all of the other aspects, whether it is
her emotional development or physical development. That seems somehow real freeing to me.
I have that ability to respond to her and for me to develop too. I feel that she is really keyed into
us and we into her. I still wrestle with that part of letting her go though. I think it is kind of a
big picture transformation. It is real satisfying” (Thomas, 1996, p. 189).
Both Newberger’s and others’ research has provided evidence of both the reliability and construct
validity of parental awareness. For example, in developing a scoring manual, Newberger (1977)
reported extremely high rates of inter-rater reliability. Newberger (1980) also demonstrated that
the continuum of parenting awareness levels meets the criteria for a cognitive-developmental stage
sequence. Flick (1985) demonstrated that in a sample of young mothers ranging in age from 15 to
20 years, level of parental awareness increases with age; Newberger (1980) reported similar findings
in children between the ages of 8 and 16 years (e.g., modifying her interview to begin each ques-
tion with “If you were a parent . . .”). Parental awareness has also been shown to be related to years
of experience as a parent and not to be related to gender, ethnicity, or social class (Newberger, 1980;
Newberger and Cook, 1983). Furthermore, preliminary research on small samples suggested rela-
tions between parental awareness and parental behavior. That is, Newberger (1980) reported that,
relative to normal parents who had abused or neglected a child in their care score significantly lower
on parental awareness. Using a rural (preschool program for developmentally delayed children in
Maine) rather than an urban (city hospital) sample, Cook (1979) reported that parents with a history
of protective service involvement scored significantly lower on parental awareness than parents with
no such involvement (see Flick, 1985).
Central Issues in Stage Theory

Both Sameroff ’s and Newberger’s research, based on Piaget’s cognitive-developmental stage the-
ory, made inroads into the more general problem of stages of parental development. That is, these
researchers charted typical sequences in parents’ cognitive development and pointed out relations
between parents’ underlying cognitive processes and aspects of their social behavior. Their work
underpins the now voluminous literature on social cognitive-affective factors in parenting such as
parental knowledge and expectations (Holden and Smith, 2019), beliefs (Sigel, McGillicuddy-DeLisi,
and Goodnow, 2014), and attributions (Bugental and Corpuz, 2019).
562
On a more general level, stage theory—not limited to but with the majority of its variants based
on Piaget’s (1952a, 1952b, 1970a, 1970b) cognitive-developmental stage theory or Freud’s (1935,
1938, 1963) theory of the psychosexual stages of development—has been one of the strongest tra-
ditions in developmental science (e.g., as exemplified in the disparate work of Commons, Erikson,
Fowler, Gesell, Gould, Harris, Havighurst, Kegan, Kohlberg, Levinson, Loevinger, Mahler, Marcia,
Maslow, Montessori, Selman, Werner, and others). Based on the notion that there are universal
sequences of change, stage theories tend to have an underlying organismic root metaphor, which
leads them to attribute change primarily to an innate blueprint that governs development similarly
in all members of a species (with the role of the environment acknowledged but to varying effective
degrees). The stages are viewed as sequential so that successful completion of one stage is necessary
for successful progression to the next and, as a corollary, failure to acquire skills or resolve issues at an
earlier stage undercuts success at later stages.
Although stage theories gained enormous popularity in the 1950s and 1960s and received a
needed boost from Levinson’s (1978) theory of adult life (popularized for the lay public by Sheehy,
1976, 1995), they have been subject to long-standing critiques. Thus, much—but not all—of the
ongoing work on stages of parental development has been, and may likely continue to be, subject to
some of the criticisms typically leveled against cognitive-developmental and/or psychoanalytic stage
theories. For example, these critiques (Gardner, 1982; Kaplan, 1966, 1983) have included the follow-
ing notions: (1) Stage theory assumes that development occurs in a series of distinct stages with cer-
tain high points and qualitatively different kinds of behavior occurring in each stage (discontinuity).
In contrast, other theories assume that development is characterized by a gradual unfolding whereby
earlier behavior serves as the basis for later skills and abilities (continuity). Although the continuity
versus discontinuity question represents a major controversy in developmental science, the issue is
obfuscated because, although some behaviors seem to appear suddenly, it is more likely that they
have been developing gradually for some time; and some theories (cf. Demick, in press) employ both
positions in their conceptualization (e.g., Freud viewed psychological development as a parallel pro-
cess to biological maturation, both with certain high points yet characterized by a gradual unfolding
rather than a series of discrete steps). (2) The construct of stages typically overemphasizes chrono-
logical age, which hides variation in individual lives. (3) There are often no clear age markers for
the beginnings and ends of stages. (4) Stages are usually not well-knit integrated wholes (so that an
open empirical issue remains as to whether parents use the same cognitive structures across different
parenting situations). (5) Progression through stages does not necessarily occur in an invariant and
fixed sequence (e.g., Newberger, 1987, reported that individual parents’ thinking reflects one level
of awareness most frequently and adjacent levels some of the time; she also documented that stress,
unmet needs, and/or other circumstances may cause parents’ thinking in a particular instance or at
a particular time to reflect lower levels of cognitive awareness than they are capable of expressing).
(6) Stages are sometimes used as explanations (e.g., to name stages as causes, theorists must clearly
establish what causes an individual to function at a particular stage, which they have not uniformly
been able to do). (7) Cognitive-developmental stage theories in particular overemphasize intrinsic
sources of motivation (e.g., process of equilibration) and tend largely to ignore both environmen-
tal influences (e.g., parental childrearing practices) and sociohistorical context. (8) If stages lead to
mature end states, then the inevitable and perhaps erroneous conclusion is that one stage is better
than another (leading to the stigmatization of persons and of groups as less developed) or, in other
words, stage theories characteristically offer a blueprint of idealized normality so that deviation from
the ideal is often perceived as abnormality.
Despite these criticisms, stage theories have survived most likely because of their descriptive,
sensitizing, integrative, explanatory, and value functions (Knapp, 2009). At the very least, they have
provided the broad brushstrokes for the study of general stages of parental development as well as for
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intervention efforts aimed at fostering parental development. Thus, they serve as the backdrop for
our discussion of more holistically oriented contemporary theory and research on stages of parent
development.
Modern Theory and Research on Stages of Parental Development

In contrast to theory and research on stage theories of other (e.g., cognitive, psychosocial) aspects
of development, theory and research on stage theories of parental development are relatively newer
and have seen a resurgence of interest. Several factors may account for this phenomenon. From a
practical standpoint, there has been a consistent increase (perhaps related to increased sexual and
economic freedom) in the number of live births to older women 30 years of age and older, with
the birthrates for women between the ages of 35 and 39 years currently its highest since 1962
(Kaplan, 2017). However, this cohort of women characteristically claims that despite recent medi-
cal and psychological research (Barclay and Myrskylä, 2016; Shadyab et al., 2017; Sun et al., 2015;
Trillingsgaard and Sommer, 2016) documenting the benefits of older motherhood (e.g., relative
to younger mothers, older mothers exhibit similar energy levels, have smarter and taller offspring,
employ less verbal and physical punishment, and live longer), the media’s negative discourse about
older mothers (e.g., selfishness for delaying conception, violation of the natural order) demonstrates
its resistance toward unorthodox lifestyles, which makes it harder for older mothers to parent today
(Shaw and Giles, 2009). Thus, there has been a proliferation of positive cultural artifacts reflecting
this societal trend (e.g., newer magazines such as Brain, Child: The Magazine for Thinking Mothers, The
Green Parent, Pediatrics for Parents, and Working Mother aimed at older mothers). Complementing soci-
ety’s practical interest in parental development, the confluence of several current theoretical strands
within academic psychology led developmentalists to embrace parental development as a viable area
of study in and of itself. These theoretical strands include the life-span perspective (Baltes, 1998),
reconceptualization of the adult years (Arnett, 2001) and, perhaps most important, newer models of
parent-child effects (Ambert, 1992; Collins, Maccoby, Steinberg, Hetherington, and Bornstein, 2000;
Demick, 2006, 2011).
In line with the latter, Bornstein and Putnick (2007) and Bornstein, Putnick, Suwalsky, and Gini
(2006) examined relations between chronological age of first-time European American mothers of
infants and relevant variables (e.g., prenatal and perinatal history, social support, parenting cognitions,
parenting practices). Controlling for covariates either statistically (e.g., maternal ethnicity, education
and employment, SES) or by design (infant age), these researchers found that some variables bear
no relation to maternal age (e.g., regardless of age at birth of first child, mothers intuitively, almost
automatically, nurture and take care of their infants to ensure their babies’ health and well-being),
whereas others show nonlinear relations with maternal age (e.g., relative to mothers in the middle
of the age distribution, both younger and older mothers provide fewer exploratory opportunities for
their infants, possibly related to differential developmental life history and/or experience). Further-
more, a significant number of variables demonstrated linear relations with maternal age (e.g., older
mothers perceive more physical stress during delivery and receive less support from their extended
families than younger mothers while they also provide more responsive and abundant talk to their
children than younger mothers).
Generally speaking, however, Bornstein et al. (2006, 2007) reported that maternal age is more
strongly related to parenting cognitions and practices in younger (approximately under 30 years)
versus older (approximately 30+ years) mothers. This led them to speculate that for age-sensitive par-
enting cognitions and practices, there may be a two-phase model of parental development, namely,
a linear phase of growth with age to about 30 years (e.g., related to the stabilization of personality
traits at around this age) followed by a static phase of continuity or constancy after about 30 years
of age. Thus, parenting may not constitute a monolithic experience for all adolescents, given that
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adolescence is currently conceptualized as spanning an increased number of years than previously

(Arnett, 2001). Furthermore, women who delay parenthood beyond 30 years of age might expect
little or no continuing change in many parenting cognitions or practices. Because there is great
variation in the timing of first-time motherhood, maternal chronological age may not ultimately be
integrated into a stage theory of parenthood. Rather, chronological age is likely a proxy variable for
the age-related processes (e.g., life experience, cognitive and psychosocial development) that actu-
ally govern mothers’ development, leading them toward one trajectory or another. At the very least,
however, these findings underscore the importance of considering maternal chronological age as an
individual difference relevant to stages of parental development.
Against this backdrop, Galinsky’s (1981) work on stages of parenthood remains the most well
known although arguably misconceived approach to the study of stages of parental development.
However, Mowder (2005) has strategically positioned parent development theory in the center of the
discussion. Extremely different from Galinsky’s approach, Mowder’s theory both avoids and shares
some of the pitfalls of the former. Demick’s (2002, 2006, 2011) conceptualization of stages of parental
development has continued to be more in line with the complex character of everyday life func-
tioning and, in doing so, has generated novel research while maintaining its strong roots to Werner’s
(1957) classic developmental analysis. Each will be discussed in turn.
Galinsky’s Stages of Parenthood

Galinsky’s (1981) work on stages of parenthood was based on Levinson’s (1978, 1980, 1986, 1990,
1996) theory of adult development, briefly summarized as follows. From psychoanalytically oriented
biographical interviews (10–20 hours per participant) with 40 men (at the time of participation
between 35 and 45 years of age, born between 1923 and 1924) divided among four occupational
subgroups (hourly industry workers, business executives, university biologists, novelists) and comple-
mented by a similar study on women, the key elements of his theory encompassed the following: (1)
Each adult creates at specific ages a series of life structures (stable underlying patterns to individuals’
lives at any given point in time—identified as the pre-adulthood stage, early adulthood stage, mid-
dle adulthood stage, and older adulthood stage—with shorter transitional periods in between during
which old life structures are reexamined and changed in either a calm or tumultuous manner; stage-
crisis view). (2) This orderly pattern, including the basic tasks associated with each era and age (cf.
Havighurst, 1953), is shared by all people in all cultures. (3) Normal adult development includes a
midlife crisis. (4) Men and women essentially progress through the same life cycle with the exception
of their respective “Dreams” (whereas men typically dream about occupation and women are torn
between dreams of occupation and of marriage/family). Proponents of his theory lauded him for
extending the groundbreaking work of Erikson and Neugarten, establishing a more holistic concep-
tualization of the life cycle (with life structures shaped mainly by the physical and social environment
primarily involving family and work and by additional variables such as ethnicity, SES, and religion),
and serving as a harbinger of the positive adult development movement (Demick and Andreoletti,
2003). Critics took issue in particular with the developmental nature of his theory (e.g., each new
life structure is neither better nor more integrated than the previous life structure), his ethnocentrism
(claims of universality of life structures even though, e.g., Aktu and Ilhan, 2017, continued to docu-
ment the theory’s validity in other countries such as Turkey), and his lack of consideration of cohort
effects (e.g., Wethington, 2000, demonstrated that the classic midlife crisis described by Jaques, 1965,
has been neither universal nor stressful in contemporary American society for some time). In Lev-
inson’s defense, however, his theory was generated in the heyday of psychoanalysis and before context
and diversity became buzzwords in developmental science.
Acknowledging the work of psychoanalytically oriented researchers and especially Levinson to
her thinking, Galinsky (1981) interviewed 228 parents with 396 children (from 10 to 40 children
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of each chronological year from in utero to 18 years). The parents included mothers and fathers
from diverse groups (e.g., married, divorced, widowed, stepfamilies, adoptive families, foster families,
guardians) and of all ages (ranging from adolescent to older parents with one or many children), eth-
nicities, religions, income levels, and regions of the country. From data collected through biographi-
cal interviews (cf. Levinson, 1978), she specifically proposed that parenthood progresses through a
series of six stages (with relevant developmental tasks for parents) as follows:
1. Image-making stage. Here, she characterized the image-making stage (pregnancy until birth) as
the time “when prospective parents begin to cull through, to form, and to re-form images of
what’s to come, of birth and parenthood” (p. 9). Parental tasks, for example, involve the parent
preparing for a change in role, forming feelings for the baby, “reconciling the image of the child
with the actual child” (p. 55), and preparing for a change in other important adult relationships.
2. Nurturing stage. From birth until about 2 years of age (when the child begins to say “no”), parents
may experience a conflict between earlier expectations of what the child might be like and the
actuality of parenthood. The major task of this stage is “becoming attached to the baby. . . . It
took a couple of weeks until it wasn’t like having an object in our home” (p. 74). In contrast to
the initial state of symbiosis between mother and child, attachment “implies both emotional and
physical separateness and connectedness” (p. 73). Here, parents assess their priorities, figuring out
how much time they should devote to the baby and how much to other aspects of their lives.
3. Authority stage. The central task of the authority stage (2–5 years) concerns how parents handle
“power,” that is, how they accept the responsibility, communicate effectively, select and enforce
limits, decide on how much to shield and protect the child, cope with conflicts with the child,
and handle or avoid battles of the will. The authority issue is not restricted to children, however,
but is also concerned with working out authority relationships with others (who deal with the
child), including the other parent, grandparents, babysitters, teachers, and neighbors.
4. Interpretive stage. Here (5–12 years) for parents “the major task is to interpret the world to their
children, and that entails not only interpreting themselves to their children and interpreting and
developing their children’s self-concepts, but also answering their questions, providing them
access to the skills and information they need, and helping them form values” (p. 178).
5. Interdependent stage. As the child reaches adolescence, the parent is faced with and must interact
with a “new” child. All aspects of the prior relationship (e.g., communication) must be renegoti-
ated and new issues (e.g., sexuality) addressed.
6. Departure stage. As the adolescent gets older, the central task becomes that “of accepting one’s
grown child’s separateness and individuality, while maintaining the connection” (p. 307). “The
‘old,’ ‘original,’ family has changed, the children have grown, moved away, and the parents’ roles
have changed, and most parents search for new ways to say they are still a family” (p. 304). This
stage is characterized by evaluations. “Parents evaluate their images of departure, when and how
far they thought their child would go. They evaluate whether they’ve achieved the parent/
grown child relationship they wanted as well as taking stock of their overall successes and fail-
ures” (p. 10).
What do these stages say about Galinsky’s views of parenthood and of development? First, similar
to Levinson (1978, 1986), Galinsky has not implied that all parents’ lives are identical but simply that
an orderly pattern, including basic tasks associated with each stage, are shared by all parents at least
within our culture. Second, also like Levinson, Galinsky has proposed that the stages follow one
another and may be interrelated but one stage is not of greater value than another nor does one
represent a more advanced level of development than the others; thus, the stages are assumed simply
to be different. Third, although Galinsky’s theory is inconsistent with other goal-directed theories of
development that claim a higher endpoint (S. Freud, 1935; Piaget, 1970a), she has arguably integrated
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developmental notions within and across each stage. That is, she has assumed that all stages involve
parents’ ability to balance closeness to their child with an appropriate level of distance (or what Wap-
ner and Demick, 1998, 1999, have termed “self-world distancing”; see ahead).
Furthermore, one of Galinsky’s most significant conclusions was that
whenever parents describe a new event in the life of their family (an event as large as
the birth of a child or as small as their child’s reaction to a new toy), they used the words
“should” or “supposed to” or “expected.” I realized that parents had pictures in their minds
of the way things were supposed to go, and of the way that they as parents and their chil-
dren were supposed to act. I came to think of these pictures as images—because they were
often fleeting, not fully conscious. This concept is similar to Bernice Neugarten’s construct
of “the normal, expectable life cycle” and to Daniel Levinson’s “The Dream,” though I see
parents having myriads of images, filtering in and out of their thoughts, as opposed to one
dream.
(pp. 7–8)
She has seen images as the adult legacy of children’s play. That is, as we continue the lifelong process
of imagining what lies ahead, images appear to us at times of transition; we also use them, she has
reasoned, as measures of our success and failure as parents (e.g., “If an image has not been achieved in
reality, it is seen as a loss and can cause anger and depression. If an image is realized, it brings joy,” p. 8).
Thus, Galinsky appears to have acknowledged the possibility of development at points (irrespec-
tive of stage) where parents modify an image to be more consistent with reality or modify their own
behavior to reach toward an image (cf. Riegel, 1975). Such a position is similar to and different from
that of the psychiatrist and adult development researcher Gould (1972). That is, both Galinsky and
Gould have viewed development as potentially arising from conflict between images and actual-
ity. However, whereas Gould stated that the image is usually a childhood one (involving a simple
and beneficent world) that comes into conflict with a more rational, adult view of reality, Galinsky
proposed that images stem not only from childhood but also from adult experiences (particularly
those related to parenthood). Furthermore, she went on to recommend the reconciling images and
reality is almost a self-administered therapeutic technique for the individual, the marital dyad, and
the parent-child relationship alike. For example, as she has stated, “When I find myself caught in a
bind, everything seeming to cave in on me, I look for an underlying image. I ask myself, ‘What am
I expecting that’s not coming true?’ Then, when I uncover the image, I ask myself if it is a realistic
one. If I decide it is, I look for constructive ways to achieve it; if it’s not realistic, I try to replace it
with a goal that’s more workable” (p. 11).
Against this summary, we now turn to an evaluation of this stage theory of parenthood, which
employs a threefold strategy as follows: First, the stages will be reviewed against the backdrop of other
social scientific research that has either supported or refuted Galinsky’s conclusions at each stage.
Second, both theoretical and methodological critiques of the work itself will be provided. Third,
the generality of the theory will be assessed in light of the changing demographics of contemporary
American parents (Cilluffo and Cohn, 2017).
First, both older and newer social scientific contributions to the parenting literature have gener-
ally supported Galinsky’s notion of stages as well as of each particular stage. However, the support has
primarily been theoretical rather than empirical in nature. That is, there have been surprisingly few
empirical demonstrations of either the stages as a whole or of each stage individually. For example,
on the most general level, family sociologists (Aldous, 1978) have amassed a large body of research
on the family life cycle. Specifically, they have argued that we can understand adult life in terms of
movement through family roles (content or job description of social positions). Thus, Duvall (1946,
1962) proposed eight stages of the family life cycle, each of which involves either adding or deleting
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some role or changing the content of a central role. The stages have been described as follows: Stage
1: spousal role is added; Stage 2: parental role is added; Stage 3: oldest child is preschooler, parental
role changes; Stage 4: oldest child enters school, parental role changes; Stage 5: onset of adolescence,
parental role changes; Stage 6: oldest child leaves home, parental role changes; Stage 7: all children
leave home, parental role changes; and Stage 8: one or both spouses retire, role changes. These stages
have been assumed to occur in a particular sequence and, at every stage, each set of roles shapes the
experiences of the individuals within the stage. Furthermore, the theory has been considered ade-
velopmental insofar as no subsequent role or stage is assumed better, more complex, or more mature
than any preceding role or stage (for applications of the classic theory, see Baek and Hong, 2004;
Goldberg, 2010; and Hong, Fan, Palmer, and Bhargava, 2005). This analysis closely paralleled Galin-
sky’s work on stages of parenthood and has been open to some of the same criticisms.
In line with Galinsky’s general sentiment that parenthood is accompanied by profound changes
in parents’ sense of self (e.g., she described the transformative nature of parenthood whereby parents
constantly put their children’s needs first and thereby lose their sense of self only to find it and have
it change again and again), a growing body of literature has reinforced this sentiment (see Krasnow,
1997; Schoen, 1995). With respect to the first of Galinsky’s stages, namely, the image-making stage,
considerable research has documented significant changes in aspects of parents’ images of self at least
over the transition to parenthood. As part of a larger study on changes in parents’ experience of self,
of environment, and of self-environment relations over the course of parenthood, Coltrera (1978)
and Clark (2001) provided data on the powerful impact of first-time parenthood on parents’ self-
representation. Employing a variation of Goodenough’s Draw-a-Person Test (cf. Machover, 1949),
these authors obtained findings such as the following:
That birth of the first child has an impact on the drawings of both husband and wife is
almost self-evident. For the wife, the first spontaneous drawing of a person 3–4 weeks
before birth is an adult male with moustache, etc.; in contrast, just before birth, the mous-
tache is no longer present and the drawing has child-like boyish qualities. Does this repre-
sentation reflect fusion of child-to-be-born and mother? After the birth of the child, the
request to draw-a-person results in a representation where there is a dramatic shift to draw-
ing a baby rather than an adult. The baby—conforming to actuality—is female. The second
set of drawings, which are self-sex in this case, also undergo change, from a woman with a
rounded middle, to a staid figure sitting and “waiting for birth” and finally, after the birth,
to a woman with pronounced breasts and a flat stomach. The husband’s drawings also show
the impact of the transition: here, the major shift is from adult, toward representation of a
child’s body, especially in the third and fourth set of drawings, i.e., following birth. The third
drawings, i.e., of husband, wife, and family also show the impact of the transition reaffirm-
ing the stress. One point worth noting is that the first three drawings by the wife all have
mouths with a smile represented, while the fourth drawing has a mouth half downward in
sadness and half upturned with a smile.
(Wapner, 1978, pp. 11–12)
Galinsky’s nurturing stage gained support from the work of Mahler, Pine, and Bergman (1970,
1975), which considered mother-infant fusion as a prerequisite for the child’s subsequent develop-
ment of self. Theoretical support for the remainder of Galinsky’s stages has come from additional
work within child development. Support for the authority stage can be seen in the extensive body
of research on the need for preschoolers to develop emotional regulation, that is, the ability to
inhibit, enhance, maintain, and modulate emotional arousal to accomplish one’s goals (Eisenberg
et al., 1997; Grolnick, Caruso, and Levitt, 2019). In this context, parents often need to set clear lim-
its on the “appropriate” expression of emotion. Support for the interpretive stage has been seen in
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schoolchildren’s characteristic use of concrete operational thinking (Piaget, 1952a, 1952b) and in the
increase in their self-doubt (Berger, 1994), both of which necessitate parental interpretation and/
or intervention. The existence of the interdependent stage has made sense in light of the myriad
physical, cognitive, and psychosocial changes that the adolescent experiences. Finally, the departure
stage has made sense insofar as there is a voluminous literature on the phenomenon of the “empty
nest syndrome” (Harkins, 1978), which has been called into question for current cohorts of parents
(Harkness, 2008).
Second, Galinsky’s work on stages of parenthood, although widely accepted, has also been subject
to theoretical and methodological criticisms. Methodologically, her use of autobiographical inter-
views (Levinson, 1986) relied primarily on reconstruction and memory, which are not consistently
reliable. The method itself has been considered time consuming, expensive, and vulnerable to bias
(on the part of both the participant and the interviewer) so that findings have often been difficult to
replicate. In defense of the method, Levinson (1986) argued that it is one of the few psychological
methods that allows the investigator to gain a sense of the complexity of a life course in the context
of the everyday life environment; as Wapner and Demick (1998) argued, however, data obtained
from phenomenologically oriented methods (appropriate for the examination of individual experi-
ence) may still be subjected to systematic analysis without violation of any of the method’s underly-
ing assumptions. Furthermore, very few empirical investigations have attempted to verify the overall
concept of stages of parental development as well as of the individual stages themselves. Because
parenthood is assumed to impact profoundly the parent’s sense of self, interview methods might be
more apt to capture changes in self-experience. However, as noted ahead, our theoretical orientation
has led to the development of experimental tasks and measures that capture such relevant concepts
as self-other differentiation (ability of the individual to separate self from other), self-world distanc-
ing (degree to which the person feels close to or remote from the environment), and developmental
regression (degree to which the individual exhibits less developmentally advanced functioning), all
of which represent processes relevant to the study of parental development. At the least, Galinsky’s
work should continue to be verified through questionnaire studies that attempt to assess the roles of
both potential mediator and moderator variables.
Several theoretical issues have also arisen from Galinsky’s work. The concept of stages of parent-
hood implied that the development of parents is of primary import, but the stages have nonetheless
been characterized with respect to children (cf. stages of family life cycle). That is, even though
each stage has been discussed with respect to the nature of the parent’s tasks inherent within it, the
stage itself has often been identified by the child’s age and developmental tasks. In other words, the
adult’s tasks at each stage have almost been intuitive, that is to deal with the child’s developmental
tasks at her or his various ages. Thus, future work on stages of parental development would do well
to focus exclusively on the parent and to delineate her or his tasks and issues in a more precise and
systematic manner. Galinsky distinguished her work on stages of parenthood from family life cycle
research on the basis that many parents have children of different ages, and thus can be going through
several stages concurrently; her conception of stages has also been adevelopmental and not directed
toward a teleology. Under such circumstances, it has not been precisely clear as to how the concept
of stages as applied to parenthood augments our understanding of either parenthood in general or
of parental development more specifically. Moreover, Galinsky identified several common processes
that cut across the various stages, with the most notable instance being that of parents’ ongoing need
to balance closeness with and distance from their children. This notion of self-other, or self-world,
distancing has figured prominently within several grand developmental theories (e.g., psychoanalytic,
organismic-developmental) and might also help capture some of the major tasks and issues involved
in parental development. Thus, reframing parental development around major themes and issues
cutting across stages (e.g., parents’ treatment of sexuality across the child’s development and not just
at her or his adolescence) might advance the work in this area. Finally, the theory failed to consider
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individual differences, such as gender, ethnicity, SES, and family type (e.g., married, divorced, step,
gay/lesbian; see Weinraub and Bowler, 2019; Ganong et al., 2019; Patterson, 2019) in the socio-
cultural context (where, e.g., adult children in the homes of midlife parents have become a more
common occurrence and grandparenthood has typically become an important event in the lives of
parents; see Smith and Wild, 2019).
Third, employing a different argument, Milardo (2001) discussed the ways in which the last mil-
lennium has seen significant advances in family studies, particularly in our understanding of the social
ecology of marriage, families with young children, families in the middle and later years, the nature
and determinants of marital satisfaction, family relationships of lesbians and gay men, marital processes
and parental socialization in families of color, families in poverty, families in urban neighborhoods,
and fatherhood more generally. In addition to addressing these relatively new developments, there
is a need to go even further. For example, Cilluffo and Cohn (2017) identified demographic trends
shaping the United States in 2017, two of which are particularly relevant for the present discus-
sion. First, the largest living generation currently in the United States is the Millennials (alternatively
referred to as the Net Generation or Generation Y ), which consists of individuals who reached adult-
hood around the turn of the twenty first century. Credited with coining the term, Howe and Strauss
(1992) defined the Millennial cohort as consisting of individuals born between 1982 and 2004
(although precise delineation varies among sources). Most recent U.S. estimates have suggested that
relative to approximately 74.1 million Baby Boomers currently between the ages of 52 and 70 years,
there are approximately 79.8 million young adults between the ages of 18 and 35 years in the Mil-
lennial population, which is expected to increase significantly until 2036 because of immigration.
Perhaps coddled by Baby Boomer parents (who wanted their children to have better lives than they
perceived their own to have been), the Millennials have typically not achieved traditional markers of
adulthood. They are more likely to be living in their parents’ home than in any other living arrange-
ment and less likely than previous generations to be married, parents, or h omeowners—all of which
are classic obstacles to moving, making young adult mobility at its lowest level in 50 years. Second,
the home lives of Americans are changing. For example: (1) only about one half of U.S. adults are
married (down from 70% in 1950), (2) cohabitating relationships have increased (by 29% since 2007),
(3) the divorce rate among those 50 years and older has doubled since 1990, and (4) a record number
of Americans are living in multigenerational households (households including two or more adult
generations or grandparents and grandchildren) partly related to growing ethnic diversity among
U.S. Asian and Latin populations.
Thus, considerably fewer adults in the United States today follow the stages of the life cycle as
outlined by Duvall (1962). Not everyone marries or has children; these adults nonetheless may still
fulfill their need for generativity in the contexts of other relationships. Have these trends been cap-
tured in Galinsky’s stages of parenthood? Those who marry frequently divorce, perhaps marrying
again later or spending years as a single parent. Arguably, Duvall’s as well as Galinsky’s models may
simply not be valid. Do parents in nontraditional families broadly defined (e.g., blended families, gay-
and lesbian-headed families, families with children in foster care, families with older parents, mul-
tigenerational families living together) follow the same stages of parenthood as those in traditional
families? Do Galinsky’s stages hold for contemporary families as they once may have for families
in the 1970s and 1980s? For example, what impact does having a child return home after college,
or perhaps not moving out at a younger age, have on the stages of parenthood? What impact have
societal events (e.g., internet explosion, rise in terrorism both in the United States and abroad) had
on these stages? As argued elsewhere (Demick, in press; Demick and Wapner, 1992), answers to these
and related questions have the potential to occupy researchers for some time and to advance our
understanding of parental development within particular family configurations as well as of family
processes more generally.
570
Reviews have documented that marital and parental socialization processes in families of color are
perhaps more complex than in White families (Burton, Bonilla-Silva, Ray, Buckelew, and Freeman,
2010; McLoyd, Cauce, Takeuchi, and Wilson, 2001; see Halgunseth, 2019; McLoyd, 2019). Ethnic
group differences exist in, for example, division of household labor, marital relationships, children’s
adjustment to marital and family conflict, and conceptions of masculinity. Do these pervasive differ-
ences have implications for Galinsky’s stage conceptualization of parenthood? Do parents of color
transit similar or different stages of parental development than typical White, middle-class parents?
Do the issues of parents of color revolve around similar or dissimilar themes than those proposed by
Galinsky? For example, if conceptions of masculinity lead to differing views of the parenting role,
how do such conceptions impact parents’ development? While one might speculate that Galinsky’s
stages need to be reexamined in light of ethnic differences in behavior and experience, virtually no
studies to date have focused on such issues. These and related issues must be investigated in future
research.
Finally, relatively few investigators, including Galinsky herself, have attempted to replicate and/
or extend this particular line of her work from a scientific perspective. This may be related to at
least two notions. First, Galinsky began this work in her role as a developmentally oriented educator
within a laboratory school housed within a college context. She then went on to study work-life
issues. This shift in interests and roles may have contributed to a change in her previous focus on
stages of parenthood and development more broadly defined. Second, when Galinsky’s (1981) work
on stages of parenthood first appeared, some psychologists were already disenchanted with stage
theories of development and were not fully committed to the study of life-span development and
issues of diversity.
Nonetheless, Galinsky’s work on stages of parenthood had and will continue to have much prac-
tical import. Research has demonstrated the potential usefulness of her conceptualization for the
generation of novel problems relevant to contemporary developmental science. For example, Luthar
and her colleagues (Luthar, 2015; Luthar and Cicolla, 2015, 2016) initiated a research program on
mothering mothers. In one study, they addressed the question as to whether mothers’ adjustment
varies systematically by the developmental stages of their children. In a large-scale internet survey of
over 2,000 mothers, they reported a curvilinear pattern with mothers of infants and adult children
faring the best and mothers of middle-school children faring poorly (with few variations by chil-
dren’s gender). This led them to suggest that “there is value in preventive interventions involving
mothers not just in their children’s infancy and preschool years, but also as their children traverse
the developmentally challenging years surrounding puberty” (Luthar and Ciciolla, 2016, p. 143).
Whether this finding might have been predicted through closer examination of Galinsky’s work is
a problem worthy of empirical study. For example, one can see hints of this in her discussion of the
interdependent stage where, only in this stage relative to all others, all aspects of parents’ prior rela-
tionship with their child must be renegotiated and new issues addressed. Against this backdrop, we
now turn to the second of three theories on stages of parental development.
Mowder’s Parent Development Theory (PDT)

Mowder advocated for the scientist-practitioner model of clinical psychology and, as a generalist,
interested in integrating the subfield of developmental science (Widerstrom, Mowder, and Willis,
1989) within the applied domains of school, counseling, and clinical psychology (Beutler, Givner,
Mowder, Fisher, and Reeve, 2004). Beginning with the assertion that previous parenting theories
had neither clearly defined nor operationalized the variable of “parenting,” Mowder (1997, 2005)
defined parents as individuals who recognize, accept, and perform the parent role. This was done, at
least in part, in attempts to provide both parents and professionals with an understanding of what
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parenting behaviors might be expected of parents in their parenting role (Mowder, Harvey, Moy, and
Pedro, 1995; Mowder, Harvey, Pedro, Rossen, and Moy, 1993) and to develop empirically validated
approaches to parent education programs, different types of assessment (e.g., clinical, forensic, pedi-
atric) and individual and family therapy (see Mowder, Rubinson, and Yasik, 2009, for an overview;
Davis-Kean, Tang, and Waters, 2019; Powell, 2019).
Initially employing a social learning approach to parenting, Mowder (1993) asserted that all indi-
viduals, both parents and nonparents, learn about parenting throughout their own childhoods with
their perceptions of parenting largely influenced by their own developmental experiences. Further-
more, parenting cognitions undergo change over the life span because of individuals’ personality,
education, gender (among other demographic characteristics), and unique experiences. However,
when individuals become parents, their perceptions are also influenced by the changing needs of
their developing children, thereby adding a developmental dimension to the theory (Mowder, 2005).
Originally termed the parent role development theory (Mowder, 1991, 1993, 1997), the approach is
referred to as the parent development theory, or PDT (Mowder, 2005).
Based on a systematic review of the early childhood development literature (Mowder, 2006),
PDT posited that parenting encompasses six positive behaviors: (1) bonding (parents exhibit affec-
tionate, loving, and trusting displays toward their children), (2) discipline (parents provide appropriate
limit setting for their children, reflecting the importance of moral values, rules, and training), (3)
education (parents as role models enrich their children’s lives by teaching and guiding them), (4) general
welfare and protection (parents take responsibility for meeting their children’s basic and safety needs),
(5) responsivity (parents are sensitive to attending to, helping, and understanding their children), and
(6) sensitivity (parents pay attention to their children’s communicative, emotional, and social needs,
matching their responses when necessary). PDT was later modified (Mowder and Sanders, 2008) to
include a dimension encompassing (7) negativity (negative parenting behaviors such as not paying
enough attention to and/or having unrealistic expectations for their children). Because parents differ
in terms of how much time, resources, and importance they devote to each dimension and because
previous parenting assessment tasks have focused on problematic parenting behaviors with limited
professional usefulness to facilitate positive parenting, Mowder and Shamah (2011a, 2011b) devel-
oped the Parent Behavior Importance Questionnaire-Revised (PBIQ-R) and the Parent Behavior
Frequency Questionnaire-Revised (PBFQ-R). Based on the relatively long-standing assumption
that parents tend to parent in a way that is consistent with their cognitive views about what is impor-
tant to do as a parent (Fagot, 1995; Fox and Brice, 2001), both scales have exhibited psychometric
strength in terms of their reliability and validity and have provided normative data for parents of
children in different developmental stages, for nonparents, and for professionals (psychologists, educa-
tors) who work with parents.
PDT also attempts to be a developmentally sensitive theory with implications for the problem
of stages of parental development. For example, Mowder, Rubinson, and Yasik (2009) have more
recently discussed the ways in which parenting beliefs (characterized by the seven parent role char-
acteristics) operate in at least five relatively complex contexts, namely, in parents themselves, children
themselves, emerging parent-child relationships, family dynamics, and sociocultural environments (cf. Born-
stein, 2016). Thus, PDT asserts that, on the basis of children’s developmental needs, parents adjust
their parenting perceptions and behaviors, which become increasingly complex and require more
detailed and sophisticated implementation. Interested in early childhood education, Mowder applied
her theory mainly to infancy (Krochek and Mowder, 2012) and early childhood (Mowder, 2006).
However, using the revised instruments, Shamah (2011) provided data that parental importance rat-
ings of the six positive parent role characteristics all increase from infancy to the preschool years;
either increase (discipline, education), decrease (bonding, responsivity, sensitivity), or remain constant
(general welfare and protection) during the school years; and all typically decrease in adolescence
and emerging adulthood; in contrast, parental importance ratings of the behaviors associated with
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the negativity parent role characteristic typically remain consistently low across the developmental
stages as children age.
Mowder’s work has surmountable issues associated with both her theory and methodology. With
respect to theory, her use of the term “role” is often confusing and/or misleading, which most likely
accounts for her subordinating it in later versions of the theory. Role theory (most commonly
associated with the sociological theories of Mead, Moreno, Parsons, and Linton) contends that most
of everyday activity is the acting out of socially defined categories (here, the role of parent). Each
role consists of a set of rights, duties, expectations, norms, and behavior that an individual must face
and fulfill. Substantial debate exists over the precise meaning of the term role and a variety of its
related aspects (Biddle, 1986), but Mowder’s use of the term is problematic simply related to her
inconsistency in usage. That is, across her writing, she refers to the seven dimensions of parenting as
roles, characteristics, factors, perceptions, views, cognitions, cognitive conceptions, cognitive schema,
behaviors, and performances. This potential confusion is consistent with the multidimensional nature
of the role construct, but her primary instrument (PBIQ-R) asks participants to rate the importance
(from 0 = not at all important to 4 = extremely important) of parenting behaviors composing these
dimensions (e.g., smiling at your child for bonding, reading to your child for education), which thus
generates measures of individuals’ priorities in childrearing or, in other words, their parenting values.
Because values and their development are underexplored problems within psychology (Demick, in
press; Wapner and Demick, 1998), reframing her conception from parenting roles to parenting values
might simplify and even advance her work.
There are additional issues with Mowder’s dimensions. First, although acknowledging that her
delineation of these dimensions emerged from the research literature in developmental psychology,
she has not described her strategy for identifying and/or including these dimensions. With the excep-
tion of the negativity dimension, the six positive dimensions were employed from the onset (Mowder
et al., 1995) and continue to be used through the present (Zeng, 2015). However, there has been no
discussion as to how they emerged and why they have not been consistently refined and updated
with emphasis on newer theoretical constructs relevant to child development (Lipsitt and Demick,
2012). It is also unclear why select constructs from previous parenting theories (e.g., those related to
Baumrind’s parenting styles and Galinsky’s stages of parenthood) were not included on the basis that
they lacked “breadth and depth in consideration of increasingly complex developmental research”
(Mowder, 2006, p. 80). Second, it remains unclear as to whether the six positive dimensions overlap.
For example, Turiano’s (2001) research indicated that “caring, in terms of parenting, undoubtedly
represents some combination of parent role characteristics (i.e., bonding, discipline, education, general
welfare and protection, responsivity, and sensitivity) rather than offering a distinct parent distinct par-
enting variable” (Mowder, 2006, p. 96). Third, perhaps related to her theoretical perspective of social
learning theory, Mowder’s assertions about the dimensions have, at times, been equivocal, as when
she proposed that parenting dimensions are environmentally determined (cf. Collins et al., 2000) and
that (parenting) perceptions have a direct correspondence with (parenting) behaviors (Demick and
Langer, 2017; Hartshorne and May, 1928). A final theoretical issue concerns Mowder’s conceptualiza-
tion of the five contexts (parents, children, parent-child interaction, family dynamics, sociocultural
environments) influencing the seven parenting dimensions. Given that she has delineated a myriad of
variables relevant to each context associated with each dimension, the theory at times does not appear
to be a coherent, integrated whole (Wapner and Demick, 1992, on the increasing contexts of context
in environment-behavior research ahead). Coupled with her acknowledgment that each individual’s
unique experiences over the life span enter into the equation, one wonders whether, without neces-
sary pruning and/or systematization of variables, she will ultimately be able to delineate definitive
stages of parental development or even to describe typologies of stages of parental development.
Methodologically, aspects of Mowder’s approach have been adequate. For example, in line with
the evidence-based practice movement of the 1990s in both psychology (American Psychological
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Association, 1995) and medicine (Sox and Woolf, 1993), she committed to collecting extensive
empirical data and to documenting empirically validated intervention strategies based on these data
(Guttman, Mowder, and Yasik, 2006). However, her primary use of self-report tasks is subject to such
measurement issues as subjects’ potential carelessness, (good or bad) faking, and use of response sets
(e.g., extreme responding, social desirability). In the course of her development of the PBIQ-R, it
is curious that she ultimately abandoned subjects’ open-ended verbal descriptions of the parent role
followed by ratings of predetermined parenting behaviors for the use of the predetermined ratings
alone. The scale would be strengthened and the theory advanced were she to complement survey
responses with both phenomenological interviews of parents’ role experience and measures of par-
enting behaviors generated in laboratory, field, and natural experiments.
In line with the previous, Bornstein et al.’s (2015) cross-cultural research on parents’ socially desir-
able responding in nine countries has implications for Mowder’s method and accompanying theory.
For method, these researchers uncovered that parental ratings are subject to a social desirability bias
particularly for self-reports of negative (versus positive) parenting. They also found that although
few country differences differ in parents’ socially desirable responding, Chinese parents are higher
(collectivist nature of culture) and Swedish parents lower (individualistic nature of culture) relative
to the grand means of all countries studied (cf. Demick et al., 1992; Demick, Ishii, and Inoue, 1997;
Demick, Wapner, Yamamoto, and Minami, 2000; Toshima, Demick, Miyatani, Ishii, and Wapner,
1996). These collective findings suggested that studies of self-reported parental behaviors should rou-
tinely assess parent ethnicity toward constructing both a methodologically sound (eliminating social
desirability bias within a given country and across countries) and theoretically sound (integrating
holistic and comparative-developmental constructs) understanding of the comprehensive complexi-
ties of parenting in the United States and across the world.
Mowder’s approach appears different from that of Galinsky. However, the two approaches are sub-
ject to similar critiques. First, both approaches have not focused exclusively on parents’ experience
and action but rather have situated these in parent-child interaction (e.g., although unarticulated in
Galinsky’s work, both assumed that parenting involves two parties—parents and their children—with
each performing role-related activities in interaction). Thus, both have intuitively described parents’
functioning only in terms of their children’s stages, that is, in dealing with their children’s relevant
developmental tasks at the children’s (and not their own) stages and ages. Second, both approaches
employ a conception of (children’s) stages that is adevelopmental, acknowledging that children pass
through different stages that do not appear directed toward a teleology. Third, both approaches
appear committed to only one model of psychological research—Galinsky to the human science
model, and Mowder to the natural science model—rather than attempting to integrate the two for
a more holistic, developmental representation of parents’ functioning necessary for a comprehensive
theory on stages of parental development.
Mowder’s PDT made several important contributions to the study of stages of parental develop-
ment. Theoretically, she suggested that stage theories of parental development need to consider (1)
parents’ roles (or values) along with changes in aspects of parents’ roles (or values) related to their
children’s differing developmental stages, (2) (broadly defined) individual differences in parental func-
tioning and development, (3) (broadly defined) contextual influences on parental functioning and
development (with both individual differences and context broadly defined), and (4) interventions
aimed at guiding parents along a constructive developmental path. PDT has guided empirical research,
which has uncovered a host of findings: (1) School psychologists perceive conducting psychological
assessments as their primary responsibility as a member of a preschool special education team, but
childhood special educators do not give this role high priority, stating instead that their greatest need
is for help with children’s behavior and emotional problems followed by assistance with problems
related to home and family (Widerstrom, Mowder, and Willis, 1989). (2) Mothers rate all six positive
parenting dimensions as more important than do fathers; fathers, however, report a higher frequency
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of behaviors directed at disciplining their children during the preschool years than mothers (Mowder,
Harvey, Moy, and Pedro, 1995). (3) Children generally rate the parenting dimensions of bonding, dis-
cipline, and education as less important and negativity as more important than do parents (Conway,
2011). (4) Parents generally rate all parenting dimensions as more important, especially education,
than do educators (Lawrence, 1995). (5) Parents of preschoolers with special needs consider general
welfare/protection and sensitivity as the most important parenting dimensions, whether parents of
typically developing preschoolers deem education the most important (Sperling and Mowder, 2006).
(6) Positive parenting perceptions are negatively related to parenting stress, and this relation is not
moderated by perceived social support (Respler-Herman, Mowder, Yasik, and Shamah, 2012). and (7)
After 9/11, New York parents working in proximity to the Ground Zero site altered their perceptions
of the parenting role, placing greater importance on bonding, general welfare/protection, and sensitiv-
ity than prior to 9/11 (Mowder, Guttman, Rubinson, and Sossin, 2006). Collectively, Mowder’s theory
and research that focus primarily on positive parenting dimensions have been in line with the posi-
tive psychology movement and positive parenting programs (Thomas and Zimmer-Gembeck, 2007).
Against this backdrop, we now turn to the third conceptualization of stages of parental development.
Demick’s Holistic/Systems-Developmental Theory (HSDT)

The holistic, developmental, systems-oriented approach to person-in-environment functioning across the
life span (Demick, 2015, 2016; Wapner and Demick, 1998)—renamed holistic/systems-developmental
theory (HSDT)—is based on Werner’s (1957; Werner and Kaplan, 1963) comparative-developmental
theory. Both the original theory and our elaborated approach have been termed “organismic” (insofar
as psychological part-processes, e.g., cognition, affect, valuation, and behavior are considered in relation
to the total context of human activity) and “developmental” (in that it provides a systematic principle
governing developmental progression and regression so that living systems may be compared with
respect to their formal, organizational features). This approach has figured prominently in develop-
mental (Wapner and Demick, 1998), clinical (Wapner and Demick, 1999), environmental (Demick and
Wapner, 1990; Wapner and Demick, 2002), and personality psychology (Wapner and Demick, 2000).
Our elaborated approach is composed of a number of theoretical assumptions with powerful heu-
ristic potential for the design and conduct of a wide variety of empirical studies (Dandonoli, Demick,
and Wapner, 1990; Demick, 1993, 2003; Demick and Harkins, 1999; Demick, Hoffman, and Wapner,
1985; Demick et al., 1992; Demick, Ishii, and Inoue, 1997; Demick and Wapner, 1980; Silverstein
and Demick, 1994; Toshima, Demick, Miyatani, Ishii, and Wapner, 1996; Wapner, Demick, and
Redondo, 1990). Certain of these assumptions have definitive implications for the conceptualization
of stages of parental development. On the most general level, our elaborated approach is:
1. Holistic insofar as we assume that the person-in-environment system is an integrated system,
whose parts may be considered in relation to the functioning whole;
2. Developmental insofar as we assume that progression and regression may be assessed against
the ideal of development embodied in the orthogenetic principle (change from dedifferentiated
to differentiated and hierarchically integrated person-in-environment functioning) and that
development encompasses not only ontogenesis, but additional processes such as phylogenesis
(e.g., adaptation manifest by different species), microgenesis (e.g., development of a percept or
idea), pathogenesis (e.g., development of both functional and organic pathology), and ethnogenesis
(e.g., changes during the history of humankind); and
3. Systems-oriented insofar as we assume that the person-in-environment system (cf. Bradley, 2019),
which includes three aspects of the person (biological, e.g., health; intrapersonal, e.g., stress; socio-
cultural, e.g., role) and three analogous aspects of the environment (physical, e.g., natural or built;
inter-organismic, e.g., friends, relatives, pets; sociocultural, e.g., rules, laws of society).
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Corollary notions include the assumptions of:
4. Transactionalism. The person and the environment mutually define, and cannot be considered
independent of, one another: Similarly, the person-in-environment system’s experience (con-
sisting of cognitive, affective, and valuative processes) and action are inseparable and operate
contemporaneously under normal conditions;
5. Multiple modes of analysis including structural analysis (part-whole relations) and dynamic analysis
(means-ends relations);
6. Constructivism. The person-in-environment system actively constructs or construes her or his
experience of the environment;
7. Multiple intentionality. The person-in-environment system adopts different intentions with
respect to self-world relations (i.e., toward self or world-out-there);
8. Directedness and planning. The person-in-environment system is directed toward both long- and
short-term goals related to the capacity to plan;
9. Multiple worlds: The person-in-environment system operates in different spheres of existence
(e.g., home, work, recreation); and
10. Preference for process rather than achievement analysis.
How do these assumptions help us conceptualize parental development across the life span? First,
against the backdrop of our holistic assumptions, we advocate that a complete understanding of the
development of parents-in-environments must include consideration of a wide range of variables
(see Table 16.1) and their interrelations than has typically been the case.
For example, some variables listed (e.g., gender differences in and contextual influences on aspects
of parents’ sociocultural functioning) have already received systematic attention in the literature.
Others, however, still to be explored, have been identified through our holistic analysis. Furthermore,
those previously examined have typically been studied in isolation rather than in relation to one
another. For example, Belsky’s earlier (1984) work on the determinants of parenting (which high-
lighted the personal/psychological well-being of parents, child characteristics, and contextual sources
of stress and support and which have implications for parental development) has been advanced
through consideration of additional variables and their interrelations (e.g., Belsky et al., 2007; Belsky
and Pluess, 2009). Relatively few theories and empirical studies have considered the role of values
in parental functioning (the value of children to parents) and how those values interact with parents’
cognitive, affective, and behavioral functioning (Hoffman and Hoffman, 1973). There have also been
relatively few discussions of reasons why people want to become parents (Wapner, 1993) and the
ways these reasons impact parents’ overall functioning as well as the ways these reasons influence
parents’ development.
Our developmental assumptions have suggested that an analysis of parent-in-environment
functioning might profit from a broader view of development than has typically been the
case. In contrast to most professionals who restrict their view of development to ontogen-
esis, we view development as a mode of analysis of diverse aspects of person-in-environment
functioning. Furthermore, components (person, environment), relations among components
(e.g., means-ends), and part-processes (e.g., cognition) of person-in-environment systems are
assumed to be developmentally orderable in terms of the orthogenetic principle (Kaplan, 1966,
1983; Werner, 1957; Werner and Kaplan, 1963). The orthogenetic principle defines develop-
ment in terms of the degree of organization attained by a system. The more differentiated and
hierarchically integrated a system is, in terms of its parts and of its means and ends, the more
highly developed it is said to be. Optimal development entails a differentiated and hierarchi-
cally integrated person-in-environment system with flexibility, freedom, self-mastery, and the
capacity to shift from one mode of person-in-environment relation to another as required
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Table 16.1 Variables Relevant to the Study of Parents-in-Environments
Person (X Environment) Environment (X Person)
Biological/Physical Physical
Age Environmental Objects*
Sex Physical Locations*
Race*
Physical Health/Stress*
Modes of Conception*
Complications During Pregnancy or Delivery
Psychological/Intrapersonal Interpersonal
Cognitive Processes Children
Decision-making Spouse (e.g., marital quality stability),
Plans and Expectations* Family of Origin
Meaning-making* Extended Family
Cognitive Style* Friends
Affective Processes Coworkers
Motivation for Parenthood Day Care Provider(s)*
Personality* Neighbors*
Mental Health/Stress* Child’s Teachers*
Valuative Processes General Public
General Values (e.g., family versus career; self versus other)* Other Social Support Networks
Life Satisfaction
Sociocultural Sociocultural
SES (e.g., cost of children)* Family Developmental Tasks
Religion* Family History/Themes
Politics* Community*
Parental Role Society (e.g., media)
Spousal Role Legal*
Work Role Educational*
Gender Role Sociohistorical Context
Leisure Roles*
* Not examined extensively in previous research

Source: Demick (1999)
by goals, by the demands of the situation, and by the instrumentalities available (Wapner and
Demick, 1998).
The orthogenetic principle has also been specified with respect to a number of polarities, which
at one extreme represent developmentally less advanced and, at the other, more advanced function-
ing (Kaplan, 1966; Werner, 1957; Werner and Kaplan, 1956, 1963). These polarities, using examples
relevant to parental development, are as follows:
1. Interfused to subordinated. In interfused experience and action, goals and functions are not sharply
differentiated, whereas in subordinated experience and action, goals and functions are differen-
tiated and hierarchized with drives and momentary motives subordinated to more long-term
goals. For example, for the less developmentally advanced parent, always pleasing the child by
granting her or his every wish is not differentiated from preparing the child for a realistic future.
In contrast, the more developmentally advanced parent is able to differentiate and subordinate
the former short-term goal to the latter long-term goal.
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Jack Demick
2. Syncretic to discrete. Syncretic refers to the fusion or merging of multiple non-differentiated men-
tal phenomena, whereas discrete refers to mental contents, acts, meanings, and functions that
represent unambiguous and specific things. For example, syncretic thinking is represented by the
lack of differentiation between a parent’s inner and outer experience, that is, the lack of separa-
tion of one’s own feelings from that of one’s child out-there (e.g., a parent in Newberger’s, 1980,
egoistic or Sameroff ’s, 1975a, symbiotic stage). Discrete is represented by a parent’s accurately
defining and distinguishing his or her own feelings from those of the child.
3. Diffuse to articulate. Diffuse represents a relatively uniform, homogenous structure with little dif-
ferentiation of parts, whereas articulate refers to a structure where differentiation of parts makes
up the whole. For instance, diffuse is a structure represented by the law of pars pro toto (Werner,
1957); that is, the part has the quality of the whole, as is the case when a parent’s judgment about
a child is made on the basis of one brief experience. Articulate is represented by an experience
where distinguishable events make up the parent’s whole impression of one’s child, with each
event contributing to and yet being distinguishable from the whole.
4. Rigid to flexible. Rigid refers to behavior that is not readily flexible, whereas flexible refers to
behavior that is plastic or readily changeable. Rigid is exemplified by a parent’s perseveration,
routine, and unchangeability in handling her or his child. In contrast, flexibility implies a par-
ent’s capacity to modify her or his transactions with the child depending on the context and the
particular demands of a given situation.
5. Labile to stable. Lability refers to the inconsistency and fluidity that accompanies changeability,
whereas stability refers to unambiguity and consistency that co-occur with fixed properties. For
example, lability may be seen in a parent’s rapidly changing, inconsistent, fluid behavior with
her or his child (e.g., use of words with many meanings, stimulus bound shifts of attention). In
contrast, stability is represented by a parent’s consistent action, which is underpinned by thinking
that involves the precise definition of events, terms, or ideas.
Following from this conceptualization of developmental polarities, there has been a major differ-
ence in the concept of individual differences between our approach and many others. Whereas other
approaches (e.g., learning theory, Piagetian theory) interpret individual differences either as manifest
in different psychopathological states or simply as a source of error, we see individual differences as
contributing to a differential developmental psychology that is complementary to a general devel-
opmental psychology (see Wapner and Demick, 1991). Thus, a developmental analysis of self-world
relations using the orthogenetic principle may describe individual differences in a variety of content
areas (here, parental development). For example, least developmentally advanced is the dedifferentiated
person-in-environment system state (e.g., exemplified by the baby who is inseparable from her or his
bottle and/or by the mother who is inseparable from her infant). Next are the differentiated and isolated
person-in-environment system state (e.g., a parent who avoids participating in the activities of her or his
child’s school; knowing the consequences of being an abusive parent yet not being able to refrain
from abusive action toward one’s child) and the differentiated and in conflict person-in-environment system
state (e.g., being in conflict with one’s adolescent; being in conflict with her or his school’s busing
policy). Most advanced developmentally is the differentiated and integrated person-in-environment system
state (e.g., a parent discriminates between being angry at her or his child and wanting to, yet refrain-
ing from, physically hurting her or him; a parent tolerates a grandparent spoiling her or his child
because the parent values the relationships between grandparent and parent and between grandpar-
ent and grandchild).
The preceding discussion has revealed several implications of our approach that are relevant for
the general study of parents-in-environments. However, what have these and related assumptions
suggested about the specific study of stages of parental development? Relevant here is our ongoing
work on critical person-in-environment transitions across the life span (Demick, 1996a; Wapner
578
and Demick, 2005). First, use of the term “critical” is significant. Critical or dramatic transitions
of the person-in-environment system—linked to changes in the person, in the environment, or in
both—occur at all stages of the life cycle. Furthermore, because what is critical for one person is not
necessarily critical for another, we have emphasized that “critical” must be experientially defined.
This distinction foreshadows our need to complement traditional quantitative methodologies with
qualitative ones.
Every moment of life involves change, but our concern has been for those transitions where a
perturbation to the person-in-environment system is experienced as so potent that ongoing modes of
transacting with the environment no longer suffice. A perturbation to the person-in-environment
system may be initiated at the physical, intra-personal, and/or sociocultural level of the person as
well as the physical, inter-organismic, and/or sociocultural aspect of the environment (cf. Wapner
and Demick, 1992, 2005). Such transitions are significant because, reverberating across all aspects of
the system, they represent the occasion for progressive development, regressive change, or stasis (no
change).
In light of the lack of extensive empirical data on the stages of parental development, Galinsky’s
(1981) notion that certain issues cut across all stages of parental development (e.g., self-other dis-
tancing; treatment of sexuality), and our assumptions about the nature of human functioning, we
have preferred to reframe the issue of stages of parenthood as developmental changes in the experience
and action of parents over the course of bearing and rearing children (Demick, 2000c, Demick and Wapner,
1992). We have chosen this reframing for several reasons. First, this conceptualization may be more
in line with the complexity of everyday life. Related to the wide range of criticisms that has been
leveled against stage theories of development, coupled with the notion that developmentally ordered
individual differences in self-world relationships (dedifferentiated, differentiated and isolated, differ-
entiated and in conflict, differentiated and integrated) may characterize person-in-environment sys-
tem states at any given moment in time and are, thus, malleable and potentially remediable, we have
assumed that developmental changes in (cognitive, affective, and valuative) experience and action
occur with greater frequency than stage theories have implied.
Second, relevant to parental stages, it may be that whenever there is a perturbation to the person-
in-environment system (e.g., cognitive disequilibrium in a parent related to a child’s behavior), the
parent must reorganize her or his self-world relationship (e.g., to restore cognitive equilibrium). In
this way, such developmental processes most probably occur with great frequency in transacting with
one’s children on a daily basis. Experiential accounts of parenthood attest to this notion as well as
indicate that although the particular issues posed by one’s children may change from one moment
to the next (even if some appear with great regularity), parental reactions do not necessarily change.
That is, parents are constantly faced with restoring cognitive equilibrium (or equilibrium to the
person-in-environment system) in a dialectical process that may feel similar every time that they
are faced with a novel (or not so novel) stimulus from their children (Holden and Ritchie, 1988).
In our terms, parents are continually faced with attempting to return from their differentiated and
conflicted person-in-environment system state to a more differentiated and integrated one.
Third, our conceptualization has uncovered problems worthy of empirical inquiry that have pre-
viously been unexamined. For example, our approach suggests the following types of questions rel-
evant to parental development. What are relations among parents’ cognitive, affective, valuative, and
behavioral functioning as they bear and rear children? What roles do planning/values play in parental
development? How do parents’ specific experiences translate into action? How does the relation
between parents’ biological (e.g., sleep patterns, energy levels) and psychological functioning change
over the course of parenthood? What impact do complications during pregnancy and/or delivery
have on mothers,’ fathers,’ and children’s subsequent functioning? Are there individual differences
in the ways in which parents negotiate their various roles over the course of parental development?
How do parents deal with the organization of their child’s physical space (e.g., bedroom) over the
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course of parenthood? How do parents’ relationships with their employers impact their relationships
with day care providers? Are there individual differences in the ways in which parents deal with
family developmental tasks and/or family history? These and other questions have been identified
and elaborated in Demick (1999). Such questions—which stand in marked contrast to questions
posed by stage theories of development—appear worthy of future empirical investigation and may
ultimately lead to a more comprehensive understanding of the complexity of parental development
in the everyday life context.
Toward this end, a final word concerning methodology is offered. Because our approach has been
wedded to the complementarity of explication (description) and causal explanation (conditions
under which cause-effect relations occur), our preferred method of research has been to draw flex-
ibly from both quantitative and qualitative methodologies depending on the nature of the problem
and the level of integration under scrutiny. With respect to quantitative methodologies, much of our
empirical work on critical person-in-environment transitions across the life span has been aimed
at documenting conditions facilitating developmental change. Here, we have identified the use of
self-world distancing, anchor points, planning, triggers to action, and the phenomenon of reculer pour
mieux sauter (draw back to leap) as examples of processes that may, in fact, facilitate developmental
progression (Wapner and Demick, 1998, 2005). With respect to qualitative methodologies, the field
has currently experienced a paradigm shift toward the use of, for example, narrative analysis (see
Fiese, Hooker, Kotary, Schwagler, and Rimmer, 1995, on family stories in the early stages of parent-
hood). As we see it, these approaches taken together might profitably be employed to understand
developmental changes in parents’ experience and action over the full course of bearing and rearing
children.
Practical Information on Parent Development Stages

Each of the major approaches to stages of parental development reviewed earlier (Sameroff/New-
berger, Galinsky, Mowder, Demick) provides practical information for parents and the professionals
who may treat them. Briefly, these practical implications are as follow. First, Sameroff ’s and New-
berger’s distinction between parental attitudes (enduring positive or negative evaluations of objects or
events, e.g., caregiving behaviors) and parental awareness (an underlying cognitive structure reflecting
a deeper and more flexible mode of thinking thought amenable to intervention) has led to the devel-
opment of successful intervention programs aimed at increasing parental awareness. For example,
Sandy (1982) reported an increase in parental awareness following a 12-week parent education pro-
gram, which combined didactic presentation of child development information with group discus-
sion of a range of childrearing dilemmas. Employing a similar parent education program, Thomas
(1996) subsequently demonstrated an increase in parental awareness specifically with respect to four
themes of interpersonal interaction shown to influence both child outcomes and parent-child rela-
tionships, namely, sensitivity, responsiveness, reciprocity, and support. Together with aspects of con-
temporary intervention programs aimed at increasing individuals’ executive functioning (Diamond,
2014; Moore and Malinowski, 2009; Reijnders, van Heugten, and van Boxtel, 2013), such relatively
inexpensive programs appear to have the potential to dramatically reduce parents’ cognitive inflex-
ibility, a factor that has been implicated in child abuse and neglect (Azar and Weinzierl, 2005).
Second, Galinsky’s work on stages of parenthood has led others to elaborate alternative stage
theories of parenthood. For example, using a similar method to Galinsky (clinical interviews with
several hundred parents ranging in age from 20 to 90 years), Unell and Wyckoff (2000) concep-
tualized stages of parenthood as consisting of three circles with various substages, indicated by the
child’s age and developmental milestones. For example, the first circle concerns parenting young chil-
dren, which has been divided into the following self-explanatory stages: Celebrity (pregnancy); sponge
(infancy); family manager (preschool years); travel agent (middle years); and volcano dweller (adolescence).
580
The second circle involves parenting adult children, which has been divided into the following stages:
Family remodeler (the child leaves home to become independent) and plateau parent (independence).
The third circle involves being parented by children; the only stage within this circle has been designated
as rebounder (caring for a parent). However, as family therapists, these authors clearly had a very dif-
ferent goal than did Galinsky, namely, to establish for parents (versus the scientific community) that
parenthood is a predictable journey through adulthood and that parents can anticipate the impact
that their children’s development will have on them. In line with this, a computerized search uncov-
ered popular newspaper articles, that espoused—in contrast to Galinsky’s six stages—three (you do it
all, you do it together, guidance and support), four (commander, coach, counselor, consultant), and seven (shock
and denial; pain and guilt; anger and bargaining; depression, reflection, and loneliness; the upward turn; recon-
struction and working through; acceptance and hope) stages of parenthood with the last model drawing on
Kübler-Ross’s stages of grief (Kübler-Ross and Kessler, 2014). These conceptualizations—similar to
that of Galinsky—appear simplistic, but they serve to normalize the experience of parenthood about
which parents feel anxious (Rimehaug and Wallander, 2010). Thus, in line with the Rumpelstiltskin
phenomenon in psychology, being able to name or label a phenomenon may lead parents to experi-
ence perceived control and hence less anxiety.
Third, Mowder’s work on parental role characteristics was developed specifically as a commu-
nication vehicle for professionals (e.g., school psychologists, educators) to talk openly with parents
about positive parenting constructs that facilitate child development outcomes rather than to focus
on more negative developmental factors (e.g., difficulties with emotion regulation). This vehicle was
deemed a more appropriate framework from within which professionals might consult with parents,
toward guiding their parenting behaviors down a facilitative, constructive path that allows them to
perceive themselves and to be perceived by others as accessible, understood, and capable of change.
However, professionals often rate parenting dimensions (especially education) as less important than
do parents, leading Mowder to construct norms for professionals so that they might assess and modify
their own perceptions. Additional data on nonparents opened the avenue for the development of
prevention programs, such as parent education for those likely to find themselves in the parent role
at a later date. As a harbinger of the positive psychology movement, Mowder’s work received increas-
ing attention. Fourth, Demick’s HSDT offers insights for parents. His view of development based
on that of Werner (1957)—“wherever there is life, there is growth and systematic orderly sequence”
(p. 25)—warns parents that cognitive disequilibration inherent in one’s ongoing interactions with
one’s children occurs on a much more frequent basis than they might imagine. Some ways to deal
with the disequilibrating effects of these interactions are to acknowledge that they must put their
children’s needs before their own and/or work on developing their own resilience in these interac-
tions. His person-in-environment as the unit of analysis suggests that parents must realize the impact
of context on the totality of their functioning so that a perturbation at any level of the person or of
the environment will reverberate throughout the person-in-environment system (e.g., a cold will
affect a parent physically and psychologically, likely leading to a negative mood state and less than
optimal interactions with their children).
Future Directions in Research on Stages of Parental Development

Important inroads into the general problem of stages of parental development have been made. However,
it is argued here that toward a more complete understanding of what we have alternatively framed
as developmental changes in parents’ experience and action over the course of bearing and rearing children, addi-
tional research is clearly needed. Galinsky’s, Mowder’s, and Demick’s approaches as well as the earlier
work of those who preceded them may serve as a springboard from which these future attempts
might proceed. Thus, as indicators of consensus and/or importance, what commonalities cut across
these approaches that might be addressed and/or elaborated? First, Galinsky and Mowder attempt to
581
Jack Demick
understand stages of parental development in terms of the ways in which parents modify their expe-
rience and action as a function of children’s developmental stages. Although such a strategy appears
intuitively obvious, these approaches may inform us more about children than about their parents. As
an alternative, we recall Benedek’s (1959) suggestion of three broader stages of parental development
This conceptualization, based solely on parents’ experience, makes sense for at least three reasons.
First, it will become increasingly relevant in future years because more children will have relation-
ships with their grandparents than ever before, given that the lives of grandparents have changed,
related to longer life spans, health advantages, evolving lifestyles, a more mobile society, and changing
views of retirement (MetLife, 2012). Second, it affords us an opportunity to assess similarities and
differences in the experiences and actions of parents versus grandparents, including those grandpar-
ents who live with and rear their grandchildren alone as well as those who live in intergenerational
families. Third, and most important, a broader conception of stages of parental development allows
us to integrate within this framework Demick’s notion of more frequent developmental processes
occurring, perhaps even on a daily basis, whenever parents are faced with disequilibrating stimuli
from their children. Moreover, Benedek’s conceptualization allows for a comparison of the nature
and frequency of as well as individual differences in these processes both within and across her three
stages of parental development.
A second commonality across much of the reviewed work has been that the early psychoanalysts,
Galinsky, and Demick have all referenced the process of self-other differentiation (Werner, 1957) as
parents transact with their children. However, there is some disagreement among them about the
nature of this process. For example, both Galinsky and Demick asserted that all stages (although con-
ceptualized differently) involve parents’ ability to balance closeness to their child with an appropriate
level of distance. However, Galinsky proposed that in the process of self-other differentiation, parents
ultimately lose their sense of self when the child enters a new developmental stage only to find it and
have it change again when the child enters the next stage and so on. In contrast, Demick proposed
that parents come to deal more easily over time with this process (that occurs much more frequently
in his approach) once they realize and accept that they are no longer the most important person in
their children’s lives and that their children’s needs take precedence over their own. Some sources
(Hoffman and Hoffman, 1973) indicated that reduced narcissism is a crucial ingredient in good par-
enting, a change that clinical observations (including my own) suggest is extremely difficult for some
parents to actualize. Also in contrast to Galinsky’s approach, Demick’s approach has advocated the use
of experimental (Wapner and Werner, 1965) and clinical (DesLauriers, 1962) techniques specifically
to measure the degree of parents’ self-other differentiation (e.g., body boundaries).
The self-other differentiation construct has also served as the basis for Wapner and Demick’s
(1998) delineation of self-world relationships and their correlative modes of coping: a de-differenti-
ated person-in-environment (p-in-e) system state is characterized by coping through passive accommo-
dation, a differentiated and isolated p-in-e system state is characterized by withdrawal, a differentiated
and in conflict p-in-e system state by nonconstructive ventilation, and a differentiated and integrated
p-in-e system state by constructive assertion. This conceptualization of individual differences may also
be applied to and/or assessed in children, parents, stepparents, grandparents, and great-grandparents.
For example, Robertson’s (1977) early work on the typologies of grandparenthood touched on the
notion of individual differences with respect to directedness, that is, whether the grandparent is ori-
ented toward the world out there (as evidenced by the social orientation dominant in the symbolic
type of grandparent) or toward self (as evidenced by the personally, self-oriented grandparent in the
individualized type). This (inner versus outer) directedness notion is highly reminiscent of Witkin’s
(1978) notion of field dependence-independence cognitive style, which has also figured prominently
in our approach (cf. Demick, 2014). Collectively, these notions suggest that future research on stages
of parental development routinely needs to consider broadly defined individual differences in parent-
hood and in grandparenthood as part of the analysis of parental development.
582
A third commonality across the work reviewed was seen between Mowder and Demick, who both
clearly believe in comprehensive conceptualization and specifically in an elaborated view of context.
On the general level, our view of the person-in-environment system as the unit of analysis (Wapner
and Demick, 1998, 2002) has suggested six contexts, namely, the physical, psychological (intraper-
sonal) and sociocultural contexts of the person and, analogously, the physical, inter-organismic, and
sociocultural contexts of the environment. On the specific level, our view has proposed that there
are an infinite number of specific situations or contexts within each of the previous six more general
contexts, which include aspects of both the person and the environment. This conceptualization—
standing in marked contrast to many approaches that have equated context with situational modera-
tor variables (supplementary predictor variables drawn only from the immediate situation)—has the
potential to provide Mowder a more systematic means for identifying the wide range of contextual
variables that influence her seven parenting dimensions. Moreover, our elaborated unit of analysis has
provided a means to identify systematically a range of values (identifying both instrumental values or
prioritized means and terminal values or prioritized ends), which Mowder might find useful were
she to reconstrue her parenting role characteristics as parental values toward a more comprehensive
conceptualization. Our conceptualization of values is presented in Table 16.2.
Although Galinsky has not integrated context within her approach, Mowder’s instruments have
made it relatively easy for her to assess a range of contextual factors (e.g., gender of parent and child,
country in which parents and their children are located) in parenting perceptions and behaviors, and
Demick’s consideration of the person-in-environment system state has context built into the analysis
of any psychological problem. Perhaps more so than at any previous point in time, there is a great
need for future research on parenting and its development to keep this issue on the front burner.
For example, much recent work has delineated the effects of nonnormative events, including 9/11
(Mowder et al., 2006), Hurricane Katrina (Rhodes et al., 2010), and even the election of President
Donald J. Trump (Bykowicz, 2017), on the functioning of parents and their children. This has led to
an exacerbation of helicopter parenting and what some experts (Nelson, 2012) have called “parent-
ing out of control: anxious parents in uncertain times.” Thus, given the state of our world, develop-
mental psychology’s heightened focus on context (broadly defined) is most likely here to stay and
needs to be integrated into future research on stages of parental development.
Finally, Galinsky’s and Mowder’s predominant reliance on one type of research (Galinsky on the human
science model and Mowder on the natural science model of psychological research) stands in marked
contrast to our position on research, which is that problem should determine method rather than method
determine problem, a sentiment initially propounded by Maslow (1946). Concerned with describing the
parts (person, environment) that make up the integrated whole (person-in-environment system) as well as
with specifying the conditions that make for changes in the organization of these relations, our approach
has been committed to mixed-methods research. Similarly, both Galinsky and Mowder’s research would
have been strengthened by the complementarity of quantitative and qualitative methodologies. For exam-
ple, Galinsky provided insights into the nature of stages of parental development (e.g., profound changes
in parents’ experience of self and others with development arising from conflict between images and
actuality) that may have been obfuscated by others’ predominant focus on her stages, but her work might
have been more widely accepted had she complemented these insights with quantitative analyses. Simi-
larly, Mowder’s quantitative work on changes in parental behaviors following 9/11 begged for qualitative
comments from her participants to bring her quantitative data to life. To reiterate Gutmann’s (1975) com-
ments that helped to open this chapter,“Parenthood is a powerful generator of development. It gives us an
opportunity to refine and express who we are, to learn what we can be, to become different” (p. 1). Thus,
complex problems such as stages of parental development specifically and parental development more
generally will be understood through the merger of the two research approaches. This understanding
might also be facilitated through the collaboration of academic developmentalists and clinicians and/or by
research teams that include scientist-practitioners and clinical-developmental scientists (Demick, 1996b).
583
Table 16.2 Values Categorized in Terms of Person-in-Environment System
Person Environment
Physical/Biological Physical
Specific Modes of Behavior (Instrumental) Specific Modes of Behavior (Instrumental)
1. Seeking health advice 1. Advocating and acting to preserve natural
2. Engaging in physical exercise resources
3. Using body’s energy in daring deeds (e.g., 2. Putting aspects of the built environment in
mountain climbing, bungee jumping) order (e.g., home)
4. Always being physically active and busy 3. Utilizing new technologies to avoid
5. Being physically graceful and well coordinated environmental disasters
6. Developing physical strength and agility
7. Keeping in good physical shape
End of State Existence (Terminal) End State of Existence (Terminal)
1. Physically strong 1. Maintaining an ideal ecosystem
2. Physically attractive 2. Having a beautiful, effective home,
3. Good in sports neighborhood, city, and so forth
4. Having physical strength and agility 3. Living in a disaster-free environment
5. Good figure or physique
6. Good muscular coordination
7. Being a well-developed outdoor type who
enjoys physical activity
8. Physically clean (e.g., neat, tidy)
9. Being physically healthy
Intra-psychological Inter-organismic
1. Ambitious (e.g., hardworking) 1. Sociability (e.g., gregariousness, friendliness,
2. Broadminded (e.g., open-minded) benevolence)
3. Capable (e.g., competent) 2. Morality (e.g., having a concrete sense of
4. Cheerful (e.g., lighthearted) right and wrong)
5. Courageous (standing up for one’s beliefs) 3. Creating a family
6. Honest (e.g., sincere, truthful) 4. Affection (e.g., concern for another person,
7. Imaginative (e.g., daring, creative) seeking a lover)
8. Independent (e.g., self-sufficient, self-reliant) 5. Seeking friends, pets
9. Intellectual (e.g., intelligent, reflective)
10. Logical (e.g., consistent, rational)
11. Polite (e.g., courteous, well mannered)
12. Responsible (e.g., dependable, reliable)
13. Self-control (e.g., seeking self-discipline)
14. Work ethic (e.g., hardworking)
15. Morality (e.g., striving for correctness)
16. Maintaining one’s own dignity (e.g., retaining
self-respect)
17. Creative (e.g., problem-solving, seeking new
ways of doing things)
18. Self-knowledge (e.g., seeking to understand
self as person)
19. Pursuing knowledge
20. Self-improvement (e.g., striving to be a better
person)
21. Assertiveness (e.g., standing up for one’s beliefs)
Person Environment
End of State Existence (Terminal) End of State Existence (Terminal)

1. A comfortable life (e.g., a prosperous life) 1. Sociability (e.g., gregariousness, friendliness,
2. An exciting life (e.g., stimulating, active life) benevolence)
3. Sense of accomplishment (e.g., lasting 2. Morality (e.g., having a concrete sense of
contribution) right and wrong)
4. Freedom (e.g., independence, free choice) 3. Creating a family
5. Happiness (e.g., contentment) 4. Affection (e.g., concern for another person,
6. Inner harmony (e.g., freedom from inner seeking a lover)
conflict) 5. Seeking friends, pets
7. Pleasure (e.g., an enjoyable leisurely life) End State of Existence (Terminal)
8. Salvation (e.g., eternal life) 1. Having friends
9. Self-respect (e.g., self-esteem) 2. Being moral
10. Wisdom (e.g., mature understanding of life) 3. Having strong family ties
11. Equality 4. Having a strong relationship with another
12. Being well educated (e.g., on one’s own or person
through schooling) 5. Having a strong relationship with a pet
Sociocultural Sociocultural
1. Working 1. Becoming aware of one’s culture
2. Going to school 2. Becoming aware of the culture of others
3. Getting married and striving for a family 3. Adhering to the law, rules, and regulations
4. Religious schooling 4. Adhering to the customs of the country in
5. Striving to achieve a given role which one is located
5. Operating morally
End of State Existence (Terminal) End State of Existence (Terminal)
1. Being employed 1. Understanding one’s culture
2. Educated 2. Understanding the culture of others
3. Having a family 3. Being a law-abiding citizen
4. Being religious 4. Being respectful of all cultures
5. Having a set of moral values consonant with
the culture one identifies as one’s own
Source: Demick (in press)
Thus, there are numerous commonalities across the three major approaches to stages of paren-
tal development presented in this chapter, which might be addressed and/or elaborated in future
research. However, in addition to determining the commonalities across these three approaches, we
might ask whether collectively the three major approaches give short shrift to any important consid-
erations in contemporary developmental science, which might be rectified also in future research. In
sum, research generated from within the three approaches has focused predominantly on European
American parents in the United States with recent attempts (except for Galinsky) to recruit parents
from ethnically diverse groups. However, toward a more comprehensive understanding of parental
development, it is recommended that the approaches presented here and newer approaches that fol-
low place heightened focus on the variables of SES (Bradley and Corwyn, 2002) and sociocultural
context (Bornstein, 2012).
SES, which involves some quantification of family income, parental education, and/or parental occu-
pational status, is one of the most widely studied constructs in the social sciences (Hoff and Laursen, 2019;
585
Jack Demick
Magnuson and Duncan, 2019). In fact, a substantial body of literature both domestically and internation-
ally (Hill, 2006) has documented positive associations between SES and parenting quality (e.g., high SES
parents favor authoritative and permissive parenting styles that employ open-ended questions to encour-
age children’s language development, whereas low SES parents prefer authoritarian styles of address
containing more imperatives and yes/no questions that inhibit children’s linguistic responses), family
dynamics (e.g., high SES is associated with family stability and low SES with family chaos), and chil-
dren’s developmental and mental health outcomes (e.g., low SES is associated with high infant mortality,
childhood obesity, and chronic stress in adolescence as well as ongoing decreased educational success
including lower achievement and higher absence and dropout rates). However, this literature has given
limited consideration to factors explaining or moderating the nature of these relations. This restricted
consideration has led Roubinov and Boyce (2017) to propose that the relations between SES and parent-
ing quality are mediated by parental distress (e.g., mental health issues, marital conflict), parents’ limited
access to resources (e.g., material goods, child enrichment activities), and/or a parental knowledge gap
(concerning childrearing and child development). These authors have also suggested that the relations
between SES and parenting quality are moderated by cultural norms and values, which may be examined
within a given sociocultural context (e.g., by comparing parents from different ethnic groups) or across
sociocultural contexts (e.g., by determining the universals and specifics of parenting as embedded in dif-
ferent cultures). This latter focus has typically constituted the jurisdiction of the subfield of cross-cultural
psychology, which has been somewhat eclipsed by the advent of cultural psychology (Shweder, 1991).
Nonetheless, although the previous research should be lauded for including oft under-examined
variables (SES, sociocultural context) relevant to parenting, the focus has almost exclusively been on the
ways in which these variables influence parenting cognitions and practices that, in turn, impact child
outcomes. Thus, minimal research to date has generated data on the relations between these variables
and parent outcomes. Although the experiences and actions of developing parents most likely dif-
fer depending on their SES, sociocultural context, and/or interaction between the two, this problem
appears worthy of future empirical research. By using both qualitative and quantitative methodologies
respectively to describe parents’ experiences and actions and to assess the conditions under which
cause-effect relations relevant to parental functioning occur, this gold mine of information has the
potential to inform subsequent work on stages of parental development, to augment our understanding
of the complexities inherent in parental development more generally, and to contribute to a psycho-
logical science relevant to not only middle-class Americans but also all of humanity (Arnett, 2008).
Conclusion
Important inroads into the general problem of stages of parental development have been made.
Toward a more complete understanding of the problem, additional research is clearly needed. Inter-
est in parental development has not been lacking among laypersons or professionals who transact
with children and their families on a regular basis. However, some of the surprising lack of empirical
data on these issues may be related to the interest of social scientists in life-span development (Baltes,
1998), adult development (Arnett, 2001), and parenting (Bornstein, 2002; Collins et al., 2000) more
generally. Nonetheless, there has been a proliferation of how-to best sellers (Faber and Mazlish, 2012;
Laditan, 2015) and websites (e.g., caboose.com, scarymommy.com) often generated by nonexperts
aimed at facilitating parental development. Given the unfinished state of theory and research in the
area, such materials need to be reviewed cautiously by parents and professionals alike. This review
hopefully will take one small step toward encouraging researchers to conduct additional systematic
research on stages of parental development and related problems so that the lay public may be prop-
erly informed as to what to expect over the course of their development as parents.
Finally, although partial to HSDT and dynamic systems theories more generally (Lerner and Hilliard,
2019), this chapter ends with a plea for researchers to employ the present perspective, a variation thereof,
586
or their own theoretical perspective that integrates both holistic and developmental considerations (Lip-
sitt and Demick, 2012) toward understanding the development of parents in their everyday life contexts.
Such reframing may also help psychology to see itself and to be seen by others as a unified (differenti-
ated and integrated) science, one concerned with the study of human functioning in isolated contexts
and with the study of problems that cut across the various aspects of persons, environments, systems, and
their multifaceted contexts.This would serve not only to operate as a powerful heuristic device to open
and analyze new significant problems in developmental and other subfields of psychology but also to
integrate, at a very basic level, the field of psychology that is most generally suffering from disruption
and fragmentation. We owe it to ourselves, to our students, and to society (especially to our developing
parents and their children) that the field of psychology never runs the risk of becoming obsolete.
Acknowledgments
I owe a debt of gratitude for this review to two groups of people. First, I thank my teachers for pro-
viding me with a sophisticated understanding of the construct of development and of developmental
science as a discipline. These individuals include George F. Mahl and Roy Schafer of Yale University
(who introduced me to psychoanalysis as a developmental science), Seymour Wapner of Clark Uni-
versity (who shared his enthusiasm for Werner’s organismic-developmental theory with me), Lewis
P. Lipsitt of Brown University (who demonstrated how seemingly disparate theoretical approaches
to development can lead to productive collaboration on novel problems such as resilience), and Edith
F. Kaplan of the Boston University Medical School (who consistently demonstrated the applicability
of developmental theory to all aspects of clinical practice). Second, I thank my family members for
complementing my academic knowledge of development with my experiential learning of parenting
and other family processes. I thus thank Joan Kellerman (my wife, best friend, coparent, and fellow
psychologist), Katie Kellerman-Demick (my daughter and professional dancer par excellence), and
Daniel Kellerman-Demick (my son and burgeoning cinematographer). Bidirectional parent-child
influences were nowhere more apparent than in my children’s career choices. Not only do they con-
tinue to teach me about development, but also they attribute their own career interests in the field
of arts and entertainment in large part to having to attend many of my classroom and professional
lectures during their formative years; through attendance at these lectures, they developed an appre-
ciation for the art and science of communicating to large audiences through a medium they love.
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17
WELL-BEING IN PARENTING
Introduction
Having children is a transformative life experience—heralding changes to parents’ sleep schedules,
social calendars, romantic relationships, and daily responsibilities. Notably, these many changes to
parents’ lives may be joyful and rewarding, frustrating and demanding or, in most cases—all. Psycho-
logical research on parenting has traditionally focused on understanding how parents influence their
children by examining factors such as parenting techniques (Baumrind, 1991, 2012; Darling and
Steinberg, 1993; Smiley et al., 2016), attachment styles (Bowlby, 1969), and parenting competence
(Teti and Candelaria, 2002). Conversely, recent theory and empirical research has begun to study
how children influence their parents, in part by investigating how having children is related to par-
ents’ happiness (Luthar and Ciciolla, 2015; Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014). In this chapter,
we review the state of the literature on the association between parenthood and well-being.
Understanding the association between parenthood and well-being is an important topic for
scientific inquiry. Approximately 85% of adults in the United States have children by the time
they reach age 45 (Child Trends, 2002), and many parents consider their relationships with their
children to be the most positive aspects of their lives (Bernsten, Rubin, and Siegler, 2011). In addi-
tion, classic psychological research suggests that generativity, which is characterized by guiding and
supporting the next generation, is an important aspect of adult development (Erikson, 1963, 1968).
Although adults have many opportunities to guide and support future generations through commu-
nity involvement, career opportunities, and relationships with extended family (among others), one
prominent way in which adults may seek generativity is through their relationships with their own
children (McAdams and de St. Aubin, 1992).
In this chapter, we review current scientific evidence regarding the association between parent-
hood and well-being. In our review, we take a nuanced perspective, considering the ways in which
parenthood may change over the life course as well as individual differences among parents. Moreover,
beliefs about parenting and patterns of childrearing have changed drastically over time; accordingly, we
begin with a discussion of historical considerations in parenting and well-being. Next, we consider
central issues in understanding the association between parenting and well-being, including defini-
tions of happiness and important methodological considerations. Our review of parenthood and well-
being is guided by the Parents’ Well-Being Model (Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014), which
we then use to discuss classical and modern research on parenthood and well-being. We conclude the
chapter with a discussion of practical considerations and suggestions for future research.
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Well-Being in Parenting
Historical Considerations in Parenting

Shifts in cultural norms, employment practices, and parenting beliefs in the last few hundred years
have drastically altered parents’ experiences (Senior, 2014; Stearns, 2003, 2017). In this section, we
focus primarily on changes that occurred in the twentieth century and their implications for parent-
ing, and particularly for parents’ well-being. For example, the advent of oral contraception gave peo-
ple greater control over whether, when, and how many children they would have, and laws restricting
children’s employment (i.e., Child Labor Laws) shifted children’s roles in the family. Similarly, the
women’s rights movement and related changes in employment practices shifted gender beliefs and
practices regarding childrearing. We argue that these and other cultural shifts in the last 150 years
fall into three primary categories with important implications for parents’ well-being: (1) changes in
childrearing decisions, (2) changes in gender roles, and (3) changes in parenting beliefs and behaviors.
Changes in Childrearing Decisions

More than ever before, having children is considered a personal decision rather than an inevitable
aspect of adults’ lives. Prior to the Industrial Revolution, when people primarily lived on farms,
having a large family with many children was advantageous, as more children meant more hands to
contribute to household chores and labor on the farm. Although the Industrial Revolution moved
economic labor from farms to factories, children continued to engage in wage labor. Accordingly,
children were instrumental to their families’ finances, either by contributing directly to a family’s
farm or by receiving monetary compensation for factory work. Coupled with little access to effective
forms of birth control, many couples had relatively large families.
In many Western and industrialized countries, these patterns began to shift in the 1900s. In 1938,
the Fair Labor Standards Act (commonly referred to as the Child Labor Laws) established guidelines
for children’s employment. These guidelines limited the number of hours per week children could
be employed and prevented children from working under hazardous circumstances. As a result, many
children no longer contributed to their families’ finances. Notably, this time period also marked the
beginning of the decline in family size (Willard and Zilibotti, 2005). Indeed, aside from the baby
boom in the 1950s, fertility has been steadily declining in the United States since the early 1900s.
The average number of children per woman in 1911 was approximately 3.5 and fell to 1.9 in 2010
(Mather, 2012). In addition to having smaller families, young adults also began to postpone child-
bearing. In 1970, the average woman had her first child by age 21. In 2015, however, women did
not have their first child, on average, until the age of 26 (Pew Research Center, 2015a). Similarly, the
average age that men tended to have their first child rose from 23 to 27. Thus, fertility patterns have
changed in the last 150 years, with couples having fewer children at relatively older ages.
A major factor that may play a role in both reductions in family size and delayed parenthood is
access to birth control. The United States Food and Drug Administration approved the first oral
contraception in 1960 (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2009), and Supreme Court
ruling Eisenstadt v. Baird legalized birth control for all citizens regardless of marital status in 1972
(Eisenstadt v. Baird, 1972). Prior to the development of birth control, parents had less opportunity
to control when they would have children and how many children they would have. However, oral
contraception gave people the freedom to decide when or whether they wanted to have children.
Indeed, evidence from the World Fertility Survey suggests that the use of contraception explains
nearly 90% of variation in fertility worldwide (Robey, Rutstein, and Morris, 1993). Results from
this study suggest that a 15% increase in contraceptive use is associated with a decline in fertility
equivalent to one child per woman. Thus, the development of oral contraception gave people greater
control over their fertility and may have resulted in people delaying parenthood, having fewer chil-
dren, or foregoing children altogether.
597
Of course, a number of factors could contribute to declining fertility rates and increasing age
of parenthood, such as improvements in labor conditions and changing economic factors as well as
improvements in health care and access to effective contraception. However, the declines in fertil-
ity also represent a cultural shift in how young adults make decisions about their fertility. Moreover,
these laws demonstrated a notable change in children’s roles both in society and in their families—
that is, children shifted from being useful to being protected (Senior, 2014; Stearns, 2003). As a result,
parents’ experiences in the family also shifted toward providing for and protecting their children.
Many factors may explain the delay of parenthood. For instance, young adults spend more years
pursuing higher education and investing in their careers before choosing to start a family. Among
women, delaying parenthood may be related to increased educational and career opportunities. Many
women are dedicated to launching their careers before having children. Indeed, more women pur-
sued higher education in the early 2000s than in the 1950s (U.S. Census Bureau, 2000), and more
women were gainfully employed during this time period as well. Young women began entering
graduate and professional schools in the 1970s, and the majority of women began engaging in paid
employment after marrying and having children. Moreover, as childcare costs and the cost of living
increase, more couples may choose to delay parenthood until they feel financially stable.
Are these changes important for parents’ happiness? First, the shift to smaller families and to the
protection of children has been accompanied by changes in parents’ views of children. In particular,
couples may choose to have children because they expect parenting to be emotionally reward-
ing (Langdridge, Sheeran, and Connolly, 2005). Many adults view children as one of life’s biggest
achievements and decide to have children on the basis of their own needs and to rear them after care-
ful consideration of their childrearing philosophies (Senior, 2014). In addition, having fewer children
allows parents to focus more time and energy on those children they have. Indeed, research suggests
that there has been a cultural shift to more time-intensive and child-centered parenting (Hays, 1996;
Sayer, Bianchi, and Robinson, 2004; Senior, 2014).
In turn, such shifts may have important implications for parents’ happiness. Parenthood is associ-
ated with elevated well-being specifically when people choose to have children (Cetre, Clark, and
Senik, 2016). To the extent that parents’ expectations that parenting will be emotionally rewarding are
fulfilled, then they may experience gains in happiness. Conversely, if those expectations for emotional
fulfillment are violated as they cope with the stresses and sleep deprivation of rearing children, then
they may experience disappointment and declines in happiness. Happiness goals often backfire (Mauss,
Tamir, Anderson, and Savino, 2011), and research on intensive parenting suggests that being overly
focused on one’s child (perhaps in the pursuit of happiness) may backfire as well. Parents who endorse
intensive parenting styles, such as helicopter parenting (a parenting style characterized by over-involve-
ment in children’s lives), report greater depressive symptoms and lower levels of happiness than parents
who do not endorse intensive parenting styles (Rizzo, Schiffrin, and Liss, 2013). Conversely, delayed
parenthood may be associated with emotional benefits. Parents who are relatively older when they
have their first child report relatively greater well-being (Luhmann, Hofmann, Eid, and Lucas, 2012).
Changing Gender Roles

Gender roles are beliefs about the ways in which individual, familial, community, and societal roles
differ for men and women (Ridgeway and Correll, 2004). According to long-held beliefs about gen-
der, femininity is characterized by nurturing and emotional behaviors, whereas masculinity is char-
acterized by independent and aggressive behaviors (Eagly, Wood, and Diekman, 2000). As a result,
such beliefs also shape expectations about men’s and women’s behaviors inside and outside the home.
According to these norms, women are often responsible for household duties, including nurturing
and caring for children as the primary caregiver, whereas men commonly work outside the home to
provide financial support for the family (Eagly et al., 2000).
598
Notably, gender beliefs and patterns of behavior inside and outside the home began to shift in the
twentieth century. By the mid-1980s, a sizeable majority of the population held positive attitudes
toward gender egalitarian decision-making, about the involvement of women in previously male
roles, and regarding the implications of maternal employment for children and families (Thornton
and Young-DeMarco, 2001). Changes in workforce participation mirrored these attitude changes.
In the 1950s, only 19% of mothers worked outside the home. By 2008, more than 60% of mothers
were employed outside the home (Cohn, Livingston, and Wang, 2014). Similarly, fathers’ roles shifted
toward sharing greater responsibility in childrearing. For example, one study found that fathers spent
an average of 1 hour more per day with their children in 1998 than they did in 1965 (Bianchi and
Mattingly, 2003), and the number of stay-at-home fathers increased by 18% between 1994 and
2001 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2002). Mothers’ time with children remained relatively stable during this
period of time, despite the increase in hours worked outside the home (Bianchi and Mattingly, 2003).
Women’s increase in workforce participation also marks a rise in dual-income families. According
to a report by the Pew Research Center, the number of dual-income families rose from roughly 25%
in the 1960s to 60% in 2012 (Pew Research Center, 2015b). A number of factors may account for
the rise in dual-income households. First, the women’s rights movement in the 1960s and 1970s—in
large part inspired by Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique (1963), which argued that many women were
dissatisfied with their narrow role in society—supported broader participation by women beyond
the home. This movement fought to end workplace discrimination on the basis of gender, including
the Equal Pay Act (1963) and the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (1978). Thus, in large part due to
the efforts backed by the women’s rights movement, many women had the opportunity to choose to
be employed outside the home. Second, changing economic pressures necessitated a second income
in many families. The rising cost of living has not been accompanied by similar increases in mini-
mum wage or average salaries for the majority of U.S. workers (Lee, 1999; Mishel, Bivens, Gould,
and Shierholz, 2012). Accordingly, in contrast to previous historical eras, many families in the twenty
first century may not be able to live on one income.
The shifts in gender roles have important implications for parents’ lives and their happiness. For
example, equal divisions of caregiving responsibilities may reduce stress and burden among mothers.
Indeed, research suggests that mothers who perceive fairness in sharing childrearing responsibilities
reported higher levels of relationship satisfaction (Chong and Mickelson, 2016). Furthermore, in
partnered couples in which both members are employed, families may enjoy greater financial secu-
rity, thus reducing the economic burden of rearing children. In turn, these families may feel lower
levels of stress as it relates to their financial situation. Indeed, financial strain has been identified as
one factor that may reduce parents’ well-being (Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014). However,
working mothers may face greater challenges balancing work and family life, as they continue to
carry primary responsibility for caregiving, despite their working status (Bianchi, 2000; Bianchi and
Mattingly, 2003). As a result, working mothers may experience reduced happiness as they try to bal-
ance their work and family responsibilities. Despite changes in patterns of workforce participation,
some mothers who work outside the home may feel guilty that they are not upholding traditionally
prescribed gender norms (Borelli, Nelson, River, Birken, and Moss-Racusin, 2017; Borelli, Nelson-
Coffey, River, Birken, and Moss-Racusin, 2017).
The vast majority of research and statistics previously discussed are based on opposite-sex couples.
However, given the legalization of same-sex marriage in the United States in 2015, investigations of
changing gender norms as they relate to parenting in same-sex couples are needed. Some parent-
ing challenges as they relate to gender may be unique to opposite-sex couples and may not apply as
readily to same-sex couples. For example, opposite-sex couples may be more likely than same-sex
couples to adhere to gender-prescribed norms regarding childrearing. Although same-sex parents
may face other stressors (e.g., social stigma), stress surrounding gendered division of labor may be
less pronounced.
599
Parenting Beliefs and Behaviors

Finally, shifting patterns in family size and gender roles have been accompanied by changes over time
in parenting beliefs and behaviors. In other words, parents may be thinking about their relationships
with their children differently from previous generations, viewing children’s roles in the family dif-
ferently and, as a result, behaving differently toward their children. One of the most striking examples
of this shift involves intensive parenting. In recent decades, parents have demonstrated a cultural shift
to more time intensive and child-centered parenting (Hays, 1996; Sayer et al., 2004; Senior, 2014).
Despite working more hours outside the home, mothers continue to spend many hours per day with
their children (Bianchi, 2000). In 1965, mothers spent an average of 54 minutes daily providing direct
care for their children (e.g., bathing), whereas in 2012 that number nearly doubled, with mothers
averaging around 104 minutes per day with their children. Similarly, in 1965, fathers spent around
16 minutes caring for their children, and today’s fathers spend close to 59 minutes a day caring for
them (Treas and Drobnic, 2010).
These changing patterns in parents’ time with children are reflective of a broader trend toward
intensive, child-centric parenting. Children are considered emotionally precious, and parents are
increasingly concerned with the psychological well-being of their children as well as their physical
health, academic success, and social skills—in summary, parents want their children to be “perfect”
(Gopnik, 2016; Jacukowicz, Potocka, and Merecz-Kot, 2016; Senior, 2014). The tendency for parents
to prioritize their children’s well-being over their own is commonly referred to as child-centrism
(Ashton-James, Kushlev, and Dunn, 2013). As a result of their efforts to promote their children’s hap-
piness and success, many parents may schedule their children for numerous extracurricular activities
(e.g., sports, music lessons) and feel pressured to spend every moment of their free time with or for
their children (Hays, 1996).
Shifts in parents’ beliefs and behaviors toward their children also have important implications for
parents’ happiness. On the one hand, if parents find themselves overly involved and concerned with
their children, they may feel less happy, as they may be overscheduling themselves and their children,
worrying incessantly about their children’s future, and feeling they are not living up to their own
parenting standards (e.g., Rizzo et al., 2013). On the other hand, parents who place the needs of their
children above their own report more happiness and meaning in life when they spend time with
their children (Ashton-James et al., 2013), suggesting a potential benefit of these changing views of
parenting. Ultimately, the happiest parents may be those who find the right balance—the balance
between caring for their children and placing their children’s needs first and not becoming overly
invested and emotionally burnt out.
In summary, many cultural changes in the last century in the United States have resulted in
notable shifts in parents’ experiences, including their decisions about whether or when to have chil-
dren, how they share childrearing responsibilities, and how they shape their relationships with their
children. In turn, these changes have important implications for parents’ happiness. In the remainder
of this chapter, we consider the many factors that may influence parents’ happiness under current
cultural circumstances. The majority of this research has been conducted in the United States and
other Western cultures, and cultural changes regarding child labor, access to contraception, and gen-
der equality are ongoing in many low-income nations. Many people living in low-income countries
have less access to birth control (United Nations, 2016) and experience greater gender disparity
in division of household responsibilities, access to educational and employment opportunities, and
political power (Inglehart and Norris, 2003). In addition, children in low-income countries spend
less time in school and more time in household and paid labor (Larson and Verma, 1999). Accord-
ingly, the information presented in this chapter may be the most applicable to parents from Western,
industrialized cultures, and it remains unclear whether the findings discussed in this chapter will
generalize to parents from other cultures.
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Central Issues in Parenting and Well-Being

Evaluating the association between parenting and well-being relies on a clear definition of well-being
as well as consideration of the primary methodologies used to investigate parenting and well-being. In
this section, we begin with an overview of well-being, including its definition and measurement. Next,
we discuss three methodologies (cross-sectional, longitudinal, and daily experience studies) that have
been implemented in research on parenting and well-being, along with their strengths and limitations.
What Is Well-Being?
Much psychological research in the twentieth century focused on alleviating suffering and curing
mental illness (Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi, 2000). By this standard, researchers often defined
well-being by the absence of symptoms of psychological disorder (e.g., experiencing few symptoms
of depression). However, with increased research in positive psychology since the late 1990s, defi-
nitions of well-being have evolved to consider happiness as a positive state beyond the absence of
mental illness (Slade, 2010).
Drawing on Aristotle’s notions of hedonia (i.e., the pursuit of pleasure) and eudaimonia (i.e.,
living up to one’s full potential), psychological approaches to well-being have distinguished two
types of well-being. Hedonic well-being is often defined by the aspects of well-being that feel
good, such as happiness and positive emotions (Lyubomirsky, Sheldon, and Schkade, 2005; Ryan and
Deci, 2001). Most commonly, researchers define happiness with the construct of subjective well-
being—as consisting of a cognitive component (i.e., life satisfaction) and an affective component
(i.e., frequent positive emotions and infrequent negative emotions; Diener, 1984; Diener, Suh, Lucas,
and Smith, 1999). By this definition, a happy person would be one who is highly satisfied with life
and experiences frequent positive emotions, such as love, joy, and gratitude, and infrequent negative
emotions, such as sadness, anger, or frustration. By contrast, eudaimonic well-being is often defined
by the extent to which a person is fully functioning (Ryan and Deci, 2001), with a focus on indica-
tors such as meaning in life. Like subjective well-being, meaning in life is thought to include three
components—coherence (i.e., the feeling that life makes sense), purpose (i.e., that one is pursuing
important goals), and significance (i.e., feeling that one’s life is valuable and important; King, Heint-
zelman, and Ward, 2016).
One unfortunate consequence of distinguishing the constructs of hedonic and eudaimonic well-
being has been drawing a similar distinction between happy lives and meaningful lives. In other
words, people might assume that happy lives are devoid of meaning and meaningful lives are not joy-
ful. However, hedonic and eudaimonic well-being have considerable overlap, and most commonly,
lives that are experienced as meaningful are also experienced as joyful (Kashdan, Biswas-Diener, and
King, 2008). Indeed, happiness predicts a number of indicators of success, including positive social
relationships, physical health, and workplace success (for a review, see Lyubomirsky, King, and Diener,
2005), suggesting that happy people are also fully functioning. Additionally, meaningful pursuits
elicit happiness. For example, being kind to others (an arguably eudaimonic pursuit) leads to greater
increases in positive emotions and happiness than being kind to oneself (an arguably hedonic pursuit;
Nelson, Layous, Cole, and Lyubomirsky, 2016).
Other approaches to well-being suggest that happiness is multidimensional (Coffey, Wray-Lake,
Mashek, and Branand, 2016; Ryff, 1989; Seligman, 2011). For example, psychological well-being
includes six components: self-acceptance, positive relations with others, autonomy, environmental
mastery, purpose in life, and personal growth (Ryff, 1989). Additionally, flourishing entails a sense of
psychological well-being (including the six previous components), social well-being, and emotional
well-being (Keyes, 2007). Rather than separating hedonic and eudaimonic well-being, these multi-
dimensional approaches encompass both hedonic and eudaimonic aspects of well-being.
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Regardless of its many definitions, happiness is largely considered to be a subjective experience

(Lyubomirsky, Sheldon et al., 2005). In other words, happiness is best understood or defined from
the perspective of the individual. For this reason, happiness is most commonly measured using self-
report questionnaires assessing individual’s feelings of happiness, life satisfaction, meaning in life,
or flourishing. Research on the psychometric properties of well-being measurements suggest that
self-report well-being measures demonstrate adequate validity, reliability, and sensitivity to change
(Diener, 1994; Sandvik, Diener, and Siedlitz, 1993), and that the facets of subjective well-being (life
satisfaction, positive affect, negative affect) are unique and discriminable from each other and from
related constructs, such as optimism and self-esteem (Lucas, Diener, and Suh, 1996). To provide a
comprehensive overview of the literature on parenting and well-being, in the current chapter, we
draw on research using these many different approaches to well-being, including the many constructs
we describe here. In addition, we also consider studies investigating parenting as it relates to symp-
toms of anxiety and depression in nonclinical populations. We use the term “well-being” to broadly
encompass these many different approaches, and we rely on the more specific terms when discussing
the findings from individual studies.
Methodological Approaches to Investigating Parenting and Well-Being

Studies investigating parents’ well-being have primarily used three methodological approaches:
cross-sectional, longitudinal, and daily experience methods (see Nelson, Kushlev and Lyubomirsky,
2014, for a review). First, several studies have investigated how parents compare with nonparents in
global measures of well-being, such as happiness, stress, or depressive symptoms. These studies inform
our understanding of whether happiness and parenthood can coexist, but are limited by selection
biases—that happy people are more likely to become parents (Cetre et al., 2016; Kim and Hicks,
2016). Another challenge to interpreting findings across these studies involves the variety of statisti-
cal approaches used. In an effort to minimize selection and other biases in comparing parents and
nonparents, many researchers include a long list of covariates in their analyses, such as age, gender,
marital status, income, employment, and so on. Unfortunately, no two studies include the same list
of covariates, making it difficult to compare across studies. In addition, one assumption of including
covariates in these analyses is that the experience of parenthood is similar across different groups (see
Nelson, Kushlev, Dunn, and Lyubomirsky, 2014); however, several studies have found that parents’
happiness differs depending on their age, gender, marital status, income, and many other factors often
included as covariates (for a review of these and other moderators of parents’ happiness, see Nelson,
Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014).
Second, some researchers have used longitudinal designs to examine changes in well-being across
the transition to parenthood (i.e., before and after having children). The strength of this design
includes the use of within-person comparisons, which minimizes potential selection biases. These
studies are limited, however, by the timing of well-being assessments before and after childbirth. For
example, in one meta-analysis of longitudinal studies investigating the transition to parenthood, the
average timing of the baseline well-being assessment was roughly 2.5 months prior to childbirth
(Luhmann et al., 2012). Given that well-being often begins to change prior to the experience of
a major life event—a phenomenon referred to as an “anticipatory effect”—evaluating expectant
parents’ happiness just 2 months before the birth of their child may be an overestimation of their
baseline well-being, rendering subsequent changes in happiness difficult to interpret. Furthermore,
given that most couples have their first child within a few years of marriage, which is also associated
with a boost in well-being (Luhmann et al., 2012), parents’ pre-birth well-being assessments may be
inflated due to this “honeymoon” effect. Finally, readers of transition-to-parenthood studies should
interpret any subsequent changes in happiness with a life course perspective. Parenthood is a notably
dynamic life event, as children are constantly growing and changing, presenting new challenges at
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each stage. For example, changes in happiness in the 5 years after childbirth might be more appro-
priately interpreted as changes in happiness associated with having an infant, a toddler, or a preschooler,
rather than changes solely associated with being a parent.
Third, research has investigated parents’ feelings during their time spent with children, typi-
cally using daily diary or experience sampling methodologies. In these studies, participants typically
provide multiple reports of their emotions and activities, affording the opportunity to understand
how participants’ emotions differ across these activities. Using the Day Reconstruction Method,
for example, participants provide a detailed, retrospective account of their days, episode by episode,
including information about who they were with, what they were doing, and how they were feeling
during each episode (Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, Schwarz, and Stone, 2004). Experience sampling
studies, by contrast, typically contact participants a few times a day over the course of several days
and ask them to provide in-the-moment reports of who they are with, what they are doing, and how
they are feeling (Hektner, Schmidt, and Csikszentmihalyi, 2007). Using either approach, researchers
can then ascertain how participants were feeling when they were engaged in caregiving relative to
other activities.
These studies typically rely on reports of momentary emotion rather than global well-being and
inform understanding of parents’ feelings specifically when they are engaged in caregiving. As with
studies examining the transition to parenthood, one strength of this approach is the opportunity
for within-person comparisons, thus avoiding possible selection biases. Notably, however, different
studies using this method have relied on different analytic approaches. Some studies provide a rank-
ordered list of daily activities by positivity (e.g., Kahneman et al., 2004). This approach is limited,
however, because it does not directly compare participants’ emotions across the various activities,
and it includes activities (e.g., having sex) that might be relatively rare on any given day. To better
understand specifically how parenting is associated with positive or negative emotions, other studies
conducted within-person comparisons of participants’ emotions when they were engaged in car-
egiving relative to their other daily activities (e.g., Nelson, Kushlev, English, Dunn, and Lyubomirsky,
2013; Nelson-Coffey, Borelli, and River, 2017). This analytic approach better captures parents’ feel-
ings while caregiving relative to other activities they actually engage in on a given day.
In summary, because we cannot randomly assign people to have or to forego children, understand-
ing whether having children causes people to be more or less happy is difficult to discern. Research-
ers have relied on a variety of methodological and statistical approaches in efforts to understand the
association between parenthood and well-being—each approach with unique strengths and limita-
tions. In the remainder of this chapter, we review research using each of these approaches to evaluate
the literature on parenthood and happiness. Furthermore, we believe the strongest claims regarding
parenthood and happiness rely on evidence from two or more of these methodological approaches.
Theory in Parenting and Well-Being

The primary theory in parenting and well-being aims to explain the diversity of parents’ experiences
and suggests psychological mechanisms explaining when parenthood will be associated with greater
well-being and, conversely, when parenthood will be associated with lower well-being (Nelson,
Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014). In this section, we provide an overview of this theory and discuss
empirical support for the theory.
Parents’ Well-Being Model

Drawing on theory and empirical evidence from psychology, sociology, and economics, we devel-
oped a model to understand when, why, and how parenthood is associated with more or less well-
being (see Figure 17.1; Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014). According to this theory, parents
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Purpose/Meaning in Life
Human Needs
Positive Emotions +
Social Roles
Negative Emotions
Financial Strain
Sleep Disturbance
-
Strained Partner Relationships
Parenthood Well-Being
Figure 17.1 Parents’ well-being model

Source: Reprinted with permission from Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky (2014), p. 847.
experience greater well-being when they feel that their lives are meaningful, when they experience
satisfaction of their basic psychological needs, when they experience positive emotions, and when
they feel fulfilled in their social roles. By contrast, parents will experience lower well-being when
they experience greater negative emotions, financial strain, sleep disturbance and fatigue, and strained
romantic relationships.
Parents’ Paths to Greater Happiness

Why do parents experience relatively greater happiness? Ahead, we describe theory and research
suggesting potential mechanisms explaining the link between parenthood and greater well-being.
Meaning in Life
Parents may experience greater overall well-being to the extent that becoming a parent elicits greater
meaning in life, which is, in turn, related to greater overall well-being. Parenting likely elicits mean-
ing in life via each of the three components: purpose, coherence, and significance. For example,
parenting may engender purpose by eliciting important goals, such as cultivating kindness and inde-
pendence in one’s children, parenting may engender coherence by imposing a set of routines on
daily life, and parenting may engender significance by providing parents with a sense that their life
is important. Indeed, parents experience greater meaning in life relative to their counterparts with-
out children, in their daily lives, and specifically when they are spending time with their children
(Baumeister, 1991; Nelson et al., 2013; Nelson-Coffey, Borelli et al., 2017). Finally, meaning in life is
related to greater overall well-being (Ryff, 1989; Steger, 2009).
Positive Emotions
Having children may offer parents many opportunities to experience positive emotions, such as
pride in witnessing a child’s first steps, love when given a warm hug after a long day, and amusement
in experiencing a child’s budding sense of humor. In turn, experiencing frequent positive emotions
is critical to overall feelings of well-being (Fredrickson, 1998, 2013; Fredrickson and Joiner, 2002;
Lyubomirsky, King et al., 2005). Parents experience a small increase in positive emotions after child-
birth (Luhmann et al., 2012), parents report more positive emotions in their day-to-day lives than
nonparents (Deaton and Stone, 2014; Nelson et al., 2013), and parents experience more positive
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emotions specifically when they are spending time with their children than their other daily activities
(Musick, Meier, and Flood, 2016; Nelson et al., 2013; Nelson-Coffey, Borelli et al., 2017).
Psychological Need Satisfaction

Self-determination theory suggests that for humans the need to fulfill three basic psychological
needs—autonomy (i.e., feeling in control of important outcomes), competence (i.e., feeling effective
and skilled), and connectedness (i.e., feeling close to important people)—is essential to psychologi-
cal functioning and well-being (Ryan and Deci, 2001). Drawing on this theory, parenting may offer
parents opportunities to fulfill these three needs, which would, in turn, be related to greater overall
well-being (Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014). For example, becoming a parent may mark an
adult’s status in making important decisions (eliciting autonomy), parenting may provide parents with
countless tasks to accomplish as children grow into adults (eliciting competence), and parenting may
offer parents opportunities to develop a close relationship with their children (eliciting connectedness).
Relatively few studies have directly tested this piece of the Parents’ Well-Being Model; however,
some evidence provides preliminary support for the idea that parenting may provide opportunities
to fulfill these psychological needs. First, autonomy and sense of control during pregnancy and across
the transition to parenthood are related to greater well-being and fewer symptoms of depression
and anxiety (Grossman, Pollack, Golding, and Fedele, 1987; Keeton, Perry-Jenkins, and Sayer, 2008).
Second, research on family efficacy, parent confidence, and parenting sense of competence suggests
that these constructs are related to greater family satisfaction and emotional well-being, along with
fewer depressive symptoms (Bandura, Caprara, Barbaranelli, Regalia, and Scabini, 2011; O’Neil, Wil-
son, Shaw, and Dishion, 2009; Williams et al., 1987). Third, parent-child closeness is associated with
greater positive emotions (Aber, Belsky, Slade, and Crnic, 1999), whereas conflict with children (indi-
cating low levels of connectedness) is associated with lower levels of well-being (Birditt et al., 2009;
Kiecolt, Blieszner, and Savla, 2011). Notably, however, becoming a parent is associated with a decline
in relationship satisfaction (Luhmann et al., 2012; Twenge, Campbell, and Foster, 2003), which may
compromise parents’ feelings of connectedness.
Social Roles
Finally, parents may experience greater happiness to the extent that they feel fulfilled in their social
roles. Research on social complexity suggests that people enjoy greater overall well-being when they
participate in a greater number of social roles, in part by bolstering their sense of identity (Barnett
and Hyde, 2001; Thoits, 1992). When one’s identity is based on multiple relevant domains and expe-
riences (e.g., parent, friend, partner, worker), then a negative experience in one role may be offset
by positive experiences in another role. To the extent that becoming a parent increases the number
of social roles with which a person identifies, then parents may enjoy greater overall well-being.
Notably, this argument rests on the assumption that parents do not give up other aspects of their
identities—for example, by quitting a job—when they become parents. Few studies have directly
evaluated the social complexity hypothesis in regards to parenthood, but one study suggests that
experiencing positive relationships with one’s family minimizes the effects of stressful experiences at
work (Barnett, Marshall, and Pleck, 1992).
Parents’ Paths to Lower Happiness

Not all parents will enjoy greater happiness, nor will happiness or unhappiness be consistent across
the course of child development. Many parents may find parenting to be stressful, demanding, and
exhausting, and as a result they experience lower levels of well-being—either temporarily or over
605
longer periods of time. Ahead, we describe four psychological mechanisms explaining why parent-
hood might be related to lower levels of happiness.
Negative Emotions
One reason why parents may experience lower levels of well-being may be in part due to their expe-
rience of relatively greater negative emotions, such as anxiety, stress, and frustration. For example, par-
ents worry a great deal about their children’s health and safety (Stickler, Salter, Broughton, and Alario,
1991), and may feel angry and frustrated when dealing with defiant toddlers or rebellious teenagers
(Ross and Van Willingen, 1996; Simon and Nath, 2004). Some evidence supports these propositions.
For example, one study found that parents experience more daily stress than nonparents (Deaton and
Stone, 2014); however, another study found that parents reported similar levels of negative emotion
when they were caring for their young children relative to other activities in their days (Nelson-
Coffey, Borelli et al., 2017). Together, these findings might suggest that parents experience greater
overall negative emotions, but that those negative emotions are not restricted to the time parents
spend with their children. One possibility might be that parents experience elevated anger and frus-
tration when caring for their children and guilt and worry when they are apart. In turn, such elevated
negative emotions may reduce parents’ overall well-being (Schiffrin, Rezendes, and Nelson, 2010).
Financial Strain
Paying for children’s housing, childcare, food, and medical care may place a financial burden on fami-
lies, which could reduce parents’ overall well-being. Indeed, the costs of rearing a child are not insig-
nificant. In a report from the United States Department of Agriculture using information from the
Consumer Expenditures Survey, middle-income families spent approximately $13,000 annually per
child and may expect to spend up to $285,000 by the child’s 18th birthday (Lino, Kuczynski, Rodri-
guez, and Schap, 2017). According to this report, top expenses included housing (29% of total costs),
food (18%), and childcare/education (16%). Furthermore, evidence suggests that parents report greater
financial strain and reduced financial satisfaction than nonparents (McLanahan and Adams, 1987; Ross
and Van Willingen, 1996; Umberson and Gove, 1989; Zimmermann and Easterlin, 2006). In addition,
economic hardship mediates the link between parenthood and psychological distress (Bird, 1997).
Thus, existing evidence suggests that financial strain may reduce parents’ overall well-being.
Sleep Disturbance and Fatigue

In addition to being expensive, rearing children is exhausting. Many parents report sleep disturbances
and fatigue after welcoming a child into their families—a pattern that does not necessarily dissipate
after infancy. The presence of children (of any age) in the home predicts insufficient sleep (less than
6 hours in a 24-hour period) and feeling unrested for women, but not men (Sullivan, 2017). Other
studies have suggested that insufficient sleep is a common problem for parents—especially new par-
ents (Chalmers and Meyer, 1996; Gay, Lee, and Lee, 2004; Lee, Zaffke, and McEnany, 2000; Yamazaki,
Lee, Kennedy, and Weiss, 2005). Furthermore, sleep is central to mental and physical well-being. In
one experiment, participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: (1) to experience
interrupted sleep, in which they were awakened several times throughout the night, (2) to experience
uninterrupted, but restricted sleep, or (3) to experience uninterrupted, unrestricted sleep. Participants
whose sleep was interrupted throughout the night (a proxy for parenting an infant) experienced less
slow wave sleep, which, in turn, predicted reduced positive mood after two nights (Finan, Quartana,
and Smith, 2015). Other evidence has linked good sleep quality to cheerfulness and positive moods
(Totterdell, Reynolds, Parkinson, and Briner, 1994), whereas poor sleep quality is linked to anger
606
and hostility (Selvi, Gulec, Agargun, and Besiroglu, 2007) and depressive symptoms during preg-
nancy (Skouteris, Germano, Wertheim, Paxton, and Milgrom, 2008), along with reduced friendliness
and positive mood (Acheson, Richards, and de Wit, 2007). Thus, parents may experience reduced
positive emotions in their day-to-day lives, as well as impairments in their overall well-being, to the
extent that they experience interrupted, restricted, and insufficient sleep.
Strained Romantic Relationships

Finally, couples report a drop in marital satisfaction after childbirth (Luhmann et al., 2012; Twenge
et al., 2003). In one meta-analysis of studies comparing marital satisfaction of parents and nonparents,
parents reported significantly lower levels of marital satisfaction (Twenge et al., 2003). In addition,
this difference was larger among women and couples with relatively more children. Another meta-
analysis reviewed how relationship satisfaction changes across the transition to parenthood (Luhmann
et al., 2012). Similarly, this meta-analysis found that relationship satisfaction decreases in the months
after a child is born. Finally, another study indicated that marital satisfaction improves when children
leave the home (Gorchoff, John, and Helson, 2008), suggesting that the stresses and restrictions of
childrearing may contribute to reduced relationship satisfaction. In turn, evidence indicates that rela-
tionship satisfaction is positively correlated with overall well-being (Kamp Dush and Amato, 2005;
Kamp Dush, Taylor, and Kroeger, 2008; Schwarz, Strack, and Mai, 1991), suggesting a final path by
which parenting may reduce happiness.
In summary, the Parents’ Well-Being Model offers one theoretical lens by which to consider the
association between parenting and well-being. Furthermore, this approach may clarify previously
discrepant findings by suggesting psychological mechanisms that may predict both greater (meaning
in life, positive emotions, psychological need satisfaction, and social roles) and lower (negative emo-
tions, financial strain, sleep disturbance, and strained partner relationships) well-being among parents.
Classical and Modern Research in Parenting and Well-Being

Classical and modern research in parenting and well-being has focused on two slightly different
questions. Classical research has primarily addressed the relative happiness of parents and nonparents.
Modern research has extended this work to investigate parents’ well-being from a more detailed
approach, including a greater focus on parents’ emotions and experiences, along with moderators of
parents’ happiness.
Classical Research: Is Parenthood Associated With Well-Being?

The majority of research investigating parents’ well-being has aimed to answer this question: Is
parenthood associated with increases or decreases in well-being? Notably, however, findings address-
ing this question are mixed (for a comprehensive review, see Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky,
2014). For example, studies comparing parents with nonparents in their overall well-being levels have
found that parents are happier than nonparents (Nelson et al., 2013), that parents are less happy than
nonparents (Evenson and Simon, 2005; McLanahan and Adams, 1987, 1989), and that parents and
nonparents experience similar happiness levels (Rothrauff and Cooney, 2008). Studies investigating
the transition to parenthood indicate that parents experience a boost in well-being, as well as in stress
and marital discord, in the years surrounding childbirth (Clark, Diener, Georgellis, and Lucas, 2008;
Dyrdal and Lucas, 2013; Miller and Sollie, 1980). Furthermore, the rise in well-being associated with
childbirth typically dissipates by the child’s first or second birthday (Dyrdal and Lucas, 2013; Luh-
mann et al., 2012). Finally, studies investigating parents’ emotions while they are spending time with
their children suggest that such moments are marked by greater positive emotions and meaning in
607
life relative to other daily activities (Musick et al., 2016; Nelson et al., 2013; Nelson-Coffey, Borelli
et al., 2017).
Thus, the answer to the question “Is parenthood associated with greater or lower levels of well-
being?” is relatively murky. The conflicting findings described earlier suggest that parents experi-
ence greater happiness in some (but not all) circumstances, or that some parents experience greater
happiness whereas other parents experience lower levels of happiness. Accordingly, modern research
has taken a more nuanced approach focused on uncovering when, why, and how parents experience
greater or lessened well-being.
Modern Research on Parenthood and Well-Being: A Detailed Approach

Building on earlier research investigating the association between parenthood and well-being, con-
temporary studies have taken a more comprehensive approach to the topic by examining parents’
experiences in greater detail. First, this research more thoroughly investigates parents’ well-being by
exploring parents’ emotions in their day-to-day lives as a complement to measures of global well-
being. Second, rather than focusing broadly on whether parents are happy, these studies focus on
understanding differences among parents’ experiences and their well-being (Galatzer-Levy, Mazursky,
Mancini, and Bonanno, 2011; Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014). For example, several factors
(e.g., age, gender, attachment style) moderate the association between parenthood and well-being.
Parenting and Emotion

Understanding parents’ emotions in their day-to-day lives provides an important complement to
studies investigating parents’ global well-being. First, positive and negative emotions are important
predictors of global well-being (Busseri and Sadava, 2011; Fredrickson and Joiner, 2002). Thus,
investigations of parents’ day-to-day emotions may also provide insight into their global well-being.
Second, measures of global well-being may be susceptible to response biases (e.g., Eibach and Mock,
2011), whereas measures of daily emotion may not. For example, one study found that reminding
parents of the financial cost of rearing children is associated with idealization of parenthood—likely
in an effort to reduce cognitive dissonance—which may bias reports of global well-being (Eibach
and Mock, 2011). Finally, parents’ emotions are central to effective parenting (Dix, 1991; Ruther-
ford, Wallace, Laurent, and Mayes, 2015). For example, mothers exhibit more supportive parenting
behaviors in interactions with their children when they experience relatively higher levels of positive
emotions and lower levels of negative emotions (Dix, Gershoff, Meunier, and Miller, 2004).
Parents’ emotions are most commonly investigated in studies employing experience sampling
methodology (in which participants are contacted several times per day and asked about their activi-
ties and emotions; Hektner et al., 2007), the Day Reconstruction Method (in which participants
reconstruct one day from start to finish, including their activities and emotions; Kahneman et al.,
2004), or other daily diary procedures (in which participants typically record information about their
emotions and experiences at the end of each day over the course of several days). In studies using
these approaches, parents have reported more positive emotions and meaningful moments through-
out their days compared with nonparents (Nelson et al., 2013) and specifically when they spent time
with their children compared with their other daily activities (Musick et al., 2016; Nelson et al.,
2013; Nelson-Coffey, Borelli et al., 2017).
Moderators of Parents’ Well-Being

A second way in which modern research has explored parents’ well-being in greater detail has
been by investigating moderating factors that may alter parents’ experiences and overall well-being
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(Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014). Notably, research has suggested that both psychologi-
cal and demographic factors moderate the association between parenthood and well-being. For
example, in one study of the transition to parenthood, parents reported an overall rise in well-being
surrounding the birth of their child, followed by a decline in the first years to pre-childbirth levels;
however, trajectories of well-being differed depending on parents’ age (Myrskyla and Margolis, 2014).
Although a complete review of all moderating factors is outside the scope of this chapter, ahead we
provide a brief review of the evidence for three demographic factors (i.e., parent age, parent gender,
and socioeconomic status) and two psychological factors (i.e., attachment and social support; for a
review of many additional moderating factors, see Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014).
First, several studies indicate that parenthood is more strongly associated with well-being improve-
ments among relatively older parents. In one study drawing on a nationally representative sample of
adults from the United States, young parents (ages 17–25) were less satisfied with their lives relative
to their childless peers, but parents between the ages of 26–62 were relatively more satisfied (Nel-
son et al., 2013). Of course, in cross-sectional samples such as this one, parent age is intertwined
with child age, making it difficult to disentangle whether young parents are less satisfied because
they are younger or because their children are younger. Other studies have dealt with this limita-
tion by investigating how parent age is related to changes in well-being during the transition to
parenthood. Research using this approach has consistently found that the transition to parenthood
is more strongly related to positive well-being among relatively older parents (Luhmann et al., 2012;
Myrskyla and Margolis, 2014). For example, one study found that, on average, the transition to par-
enthood was associated with a boost in life satisfaction during the year surrounding childbirth, but
that well-being returns to pre-birth baseline levels within 1–2 years (Myrskyla and Margolis, 2014).
Notably, however, these trajectories differed depending on parents’ age. In this study, parents who
were 35 or older when they had their first child reported an increase in life satisfaction the year their
child was born, followed by a slight decline, but that their satisfaction levels remained above their
pre-birth baseline. Conversely, relatively younger parents (ages 18–22) reported declining satisfaction
levels with no boost during the year their child was born.
Why do relatively older parents report greater well-being? Using the Parents’ Well-Being Model
as a guide, it appears that, as compared with their younger counterparts, older parents experience
fewer negatives in parenting (particularly negative emotions, financial strain, and strained partner
relationships; bottom path in Figure 17.1). For example, older parents may be more established in
their careers and secure in their relationships, thus providing greater financial and relationship sta-
bility. Indeed, older parents report lower levels of financial stress (Frankel and Wise, 1982). Other
evidence suggests that older parents report feeling more competent and less stressed, depressed, and
lonely (Cowan and Cowan, 1992; Frankel and Wise, 1982; Garrison, Blalock, Zarski, and Merritt,
1997; Mirowsky and Ross, 2002), further indicating the role of negative emotions in understanding
the link between parent age and well-being.
A second demographic factor that has been strongly linked to parents’ well-being is parent gen-
der. Evidence suggests that fathers report relatively greater well-being than men without children
(Nelson et al., 2013). Conversely, studies have found either no association between motherhood and
well-being, or a negative association (Musick et al., 2016; Nelson et al., 2013; Nelson-Coffey, Kill-
ingsworth, Layous, Cole, and Lyubomirsky, 2017). For example, in one cross-sectional study, fathers
reported greater well-being than men without children, whereas mothers and women without chil-
dren did not differ in well-being (Nelson et al., 2013). Other work has found that mothers report
less positive affect than fathers when engaged in child-related activities (Larson, Richards, and Perry-
Jenkins, 1994; Nelson-Coffey, Killingsworth et al., 2017).
Gender differences in caregiving responsibilities and social norms regarding mothers’ and fathers’
time spent in work and family may explain the variation in mothers’ and fathers’ well-being. Research
indicates that mothers spend more time with their children than fathers (Bianchi and Mattingly,
609
2003; Nelson-Coffey, Borelli et al., 2017). Additionally, mothers spent more time with their children
providing basic care, as well as cooking, cleaning, and solo parenting, whereas most of fathers’ time
spent with children was in play and leisure (Musick et al., 2016; Nelson-Coffey, Killingsworth et al.,
2017). Furthermore, these differences in how parents spent time with their children explained differ-
ences in how they felt during these activities. Mothers reported more stress and fatigue in parenting
than did fathers (Musick et al., 2016). Finally, in addition to gender differences in parenting activi-
ties, working mothers may also experience relatively lower levels of well-being as they combine the
competing roles of being a mother and maintaining a career. Indeed working mothers report more
feelings of guilt about working than do working fathers (Borelli, Nelson et al., 2017; Borelli, Nelson-
Coffey et al., 2017). Drawing on the Parents’ Well-Being Model, this evidence suggests that mothers
experience lower levels of well-being in part due to elevated negative emotions, whereas fathers
experience greater well-being in part due to their experience of more positive emotions.
Third, the association between parenthood and well-being may also depend on parents’ socio-
economic status (SES). Low-SES has been linked to greater risk for depression and poor health out-
comes (Barefoot et al., 1991; Lynch, Kaplan, and Salonen, 1997). Few studies have directly examined
whether and how SES moderates the association between parenthood and well-being; however,
existing research suggests that parents of high SES experience relatively lower well-being. For exam-
ple, high educational attainment is associated with finding less value and fulfillment in parenthood
(Veroff, Douvan, and Kulka, 1981), and high-SES parents reported less meaning and purpose dur-
ing childcare relative to low-SES parents (Kushlev, Dunn, and Ashton-James, 2012). Furthermore,
reminders of wealth led parents to report less meaning while spending time with their child at a
festival (Kushlev et al., 2012). Thus, evidence suggests that relatively high SES may be associated with
decreased well-being, in part due to reduced levels of meaning in life.
Low-SES parenting may also be associated with reduced well-being. Low-SES parents are at
increased risk for experiencing negative life events, for having limited coping skills, and for devel-
oping anxiety and depression (McLoyd, 1990). In addition, low-SES parents experience greater
parenting stress (Steele et al., 2016). In a sample of low-income parents of young children, anxiety,
intimate partner violence, and perceptions of financial hardship predicted reports of daily parenting
hassles (Finegood, Raver, DeJoseph, and Blair, 2017). Furthermore, to the extent that parents with
low socioeconomic status suffer greater financial strain, they may experience reduced life satisfaction
(Kostouli, Xanthopoulou, and Athanasiades, 2016; Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014). Thus,
low-SES parents likely experience reduced well-being in part due to elevated stress, negative emo-
tion, and financial strain; however, more work is needed to further investigate psychological mecha-
nisms that may limit the well-being of low-SES parents.
In addition to these demographic factors, several psychological factors moderate the association
between parenthood and well-being. First, parents’ attachment orientation—which characterizes
an individual’s comfort or discomfort in close relationships (Bowlby, 1969; Mikulincer and Shaver,
2007)—is an important predictor of parents’ well-being. Attachment styles are thought to develop
based on the pattern of care people receive starting during infancy and continuing through child-
hood, which then shapes how comfortable they feel giving and receiving care in other relationships
across the life span (Bowlby, 1969; Mikulincer and Shaver, 2007). Infants who receive consistent,
sensitive responses from their caregivers develop a secure attachment style, in which they are com-
fortable giving and receiving care in other relationships over the course of their lives. Conversely,
infants who receive inconsistent or unreliable care may develop an insecure attachment style, often
characterized by anxiety or avoidance. Attachment orientations are thought to shape not only how
people respond in relationships, but also how they regulate their emotions (Shaver and Mikulincer,
2007).
A few studies have begun to investigate how parents’ attachment styles predict their well-being.
Attachment avoidance (which is characterized by discomfort with closeness, emotional deactivation
610
in close relationships, and a need for self-reliance; Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, and Wall, 1978; Main,
1981; Mikulincer and Shaver, 2003) predicts poorer well-being among parents. For example, parents
high in attachment avoidance reported lower levels of positive emotions during caregiving compared
with their other daily activities on the Day Reconstruction Method (Nelson-Coffey, Borelli et al.,
2017). Similarly, in another 7-day daily diary study, middle-age parents high in attachment avoidance
reported lower levels of love, joy, and pride when they were spending time with their adult children
(Impett, English, and John, 2011). Few studies have investigated how parents’ attachment style is
related to reports of their global well-being; however, drawing on the Parents’ Well-Being Model
and the research described here, parents high in attachment avoidance may report lower levels of
well-being in part due to their experience of relatively few positive emotions.
A second important psychological factor that predicts parents’ well-being is social support. Given
the many tasks, stresses, and responsibilities associated with rearing children, it is not surprising that
parents with stronger social support systems report higher levels of well-being—whether that sup-
port is from a spouse or partner, extended family, or friends (Koeske and Koeske, 1990; Luthar and
Ciciolla, 2015; Pittman and Lloyd, 1988; Rizzo et al., 2013; Wandersman, Wandersman, and Kahn,
1980). In one study, for example, new parents reported an increase in contact with close family mem-
bers, which was, in turn, related to improvements in psychological adjustment and fewer symptoms
of depression (Bost, Cox, and Payne, 2002). In another investigation, support received from their hus-
bands predicted new mothers’ life satisfaction (Levitt, Weber, and Clark, 1986). Finally, another study
found that social support was related to greater self-efficacy and fewer depressive symptoms among
new mothers 6 weeks post-childbirth (Leahy-Warren, McCarthy, and Corcoran, 2012). Thus, social
support appears to be related parents’ well-being by boosting confidence and positive emotions, and
by reducing stress and strain.
In summary, although early research on parenthood and well-being focused on whether parents
were happy or unhappy, research since has noted the complexity and diversity of parents’ experiences
(e.g., Galatzer-Levy et al., 2011) and has aimed to uncover why or how parents are happy or unhappy.
In particular, a number of demographic and psychological factors moderate the association between
parenthood and well-being and partially explain the diversity of parents’ experiences. Furthermore,
we argue that the Parents’ Well-Being Model (Nelson, Kushlev, and Lyubomirsky, 2014) can help
to explain how and why these demographic and psychological factors moderate the association
between parenthood and well-being.
Practical Information About Parenting and Well-Being

Gaining insight into the factors that predict parents’ happiness has many practical applications. Hap-
piness is a major goal for people around the world (Diener, 2000) and predicts a number of important
outcomes, such as physical health, improved social relationships, and job security (Lyubomirsky, King
et al., 2005). Furthermore, understanding aspects of parenthood that predict happiness or unhappi-
ness may better help therapists, medical professionals, and loved ones advise parents on the best ways
to improve their well-being.
Given the many benefits of happiness for individuals and society (Lyubomirsky, King et al., 2005),
parents’ happiness likely influences children as well (e.g., Coffey, in press; Dix, 1991). For example,
parents’ happiness, stress, and negative moods predict important parenting behaviors, such as greater
efforts to be supportive, to speak positively, and to cognitively stimulate children (Belsky, Crnic, and
Woodworth, 1995; Bornstein, Putnick, and Suwalsky, 2018; Dix et al., 2004; Jouriles and O’Leary,
1991; Pett, Vaughan-Cole, and Wampold, 1994), and less detachment, negative affect, and irritability
expressed toward children (Belsky et al., 1995; Dumas, 1986; Patterson, 1983). In turn, these positive
parenting behaviors may confer long-term benefits to children (Bornstein et al., 2018). For exam-
ple, in one study, mothers’ life satisfaction was related to having children with fewer socioemotional
611
problems and higher verbal skills (Berger and Spiess, 2011), and another study found that parents’
positive emotional expression toward adolescent children was related to more positive peer relation-
ships 2 years later (Paley, Conger, and Harold, 2000). Thus, parents—who make many sacrifices for
their children—may actually benefit their children by improving their own happiness.
Future Directions in Parenting and Well-Being

Although research on parenthood and well-being has provided many insights in recent years, sev-
eral questions remain. First, the Parents’ Well-Being Model (Figure 17.1; Nelson, Kushlev, and
Lyubomirsky, 2014) integrated research on parents’ well-being across psychology, sociology, and eco-
nomics, and although each piece of the model is strongly supported by theory or empirical evidence,
little research has investigated mechanisms in the model simultaneously. Future studies examining all
of the proposed mechanisms in the Parents’ Well-Being Model together would be informative. Such
studies would illuminate whether some mechanisms in the model are more important for parents’
well-being than others. For example, previous research found that positive emotions are stronger
predictors of long-term well-being than negative emotions (Coffey, Warren, and Gottfried, 2015;
Cohn, Fredrickson, Broen, Mikels, and Conway, 2009; Kuppens, Realo, and Diener, 2008; Nelson
et al., 2016). Thus, investigating the predictive validity of the mechanisms in the Parents’ Well-Being
Model would be informative.
Second, although studies are beginning to highlight the diversity of parents’ experiences by inves-
tigating moderators of the association between parenthood and well-being, more work in this area
is needed. We envision research on the moderators of parents’ well-being to occur in two stages,
moving from broad descriptions of patterns of individual differences in parents’ well-being to under-
standing the underlying mechanisms of such patterns. Using parent gender as an example, such
studies might begin by describing how parent gender is related to well-being (e.g., “Fatherhood is
associated with relatively greater well-being, but motherhood is not.”). An important second step in
this line of research would then involve understanding why fathers are relatively happier and why
mothers are not. The Parents’ Well-Being Model may provide a starting place for potential mecha-
nisms explaining differences among parents.
Third, understanding parents’ happiness would also benefit from future work employing a greater
variety of methodological approaches. Because parenthood cannot be randomly assigned, under-
standing the causal association between parenthood and well-being is not possible. In the absence of
experimental methods, studies using multiple methodologies to triangulate on parents’ experiences
are informative. For example, a series of studies using both daily diary and cross-sectional methods
to examine gender differences in parents’ well-being would be more informative than studies rely-
ing on only one approach. Furthermore, although parenthood itself cannot be randomly assigned,
experiments could be employed to better understand the underlying mechanisms predicting parents’
happiness and to better understand how and why some parents are happier than others. For exam-
ple, if a cross-sectional study identifies that fathers are happier than mothers (Nelson et al., 2013;
Nelson-Coffey, Killingsworth et al., 2017) and that fathers and mothers differ in how they spend
time with their children (Musick et al., 2016), an experimental study could randomly assign mothers
and fathers to make small changes to how they spend time with their children (e.g., by spending an
additional 30 minutes per week in play) to better understand the causal relation between parents’
time with children and well-being.
Finally, studies could build on prior work on parenthood and well-being to develop methods
to improve parents’ happiness. A large body of literature suggests that happiness is attainable via
simple, self-directed activities, such as practicing gratitude, kindness, or optimism (for a review, see
Lyubomirsky and Layous, 2013). Coupled with a greater understanding of factors that predict par-
ents’ happiness, such activities could be tailored to help parents manage the stresses of parenthood
612
and improve their happiness levels. For example, evidence suggests that savoring positive experiences
shared with one’s children boosts positive affect among parents (Burkhart, Borelli, Rasmussen, and
Sbarra, 2015). In turn, this experimental work could also be applied to investigate the effects of par-
ents’ happiness on other parenting behaviors and child outcomes.
Conclusion
The association between parenthood and well-being is remarkably complex, depending on a number
of factors ranging from parents’ attachment orientations and parenting style to their age and gender.
Research investigating parents’ happiness has moved beyond the question of whether parents are
happy to gaining a deeper understanding of the circumstances that promote parents’ happiness, along
with the underlying psychological mechanisms explaining differences among parents. The Parents’
Well-Being Model provides insight into these differences, suggesting that such differences hang in
balancing the benefits (i.e., meaning in life, positive emotions, psychological need satisfaction, ful-
filled social roles) with the costs (i.e., negative emotions, financial strain, sleep disturbance, strained
partner relationships) of parenthood.
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18
PARENTING AND EMOTIONS
Introduction
Parenting is an inherently emotional task. For example, child behaviors and parents’ responses to
child behaviors routinely elicit feelings of pride, joy, and love but also embarrassment, anger, and sad-
ness. Individual differences in the nature and intensity of parents’ emotions and their ability to regu-
late emotions are highly likely to influence the quality of parenting and parent-child relationships via
several mechanisms. Parents’ global emotion-related traits, such as the personality dimension neuroti-
cism, which is characterized by heightened negative affect, and mood disorders such as depression
predict individual differences in parental sensitivity, warmth, discipline, and child maltreatment (Dix
and Moed, 2019; Prinzie, de Haan, and Belsky, 2019). The focus of this chapter, however, is parenting-
related emotion, defined as emotions experienced while interacting with one’s child (e.g., irritation
during a discipline encounter), when exposed to parenting-relevant stimuli (e.g., empathy when
listening to audio recordings of infant crying), or in response to prior child behavior or parent-child
interaction (e.g., embarrassment when reflecting on an earlier encounter) as well as the regulation of
parenting-related emotions.
In this chapter, various conceptual perspectives on the role of emotions in parenting are sum-
marized and integrated into a single model, and various pathways by which parental emotions may
influence child outcomes are described. Then, relevant literature is summarized. After establishing
the central role of parental emotions in predicting individual differences in parental behavior and
child outcomes, factors that may contribute to individual differences in parenting-related emotions
and emotion regulation are reviewed. The chapter ends with a discussion of applied implications of
this work and suggest directions for future research.
Conceptual Perspectives About Parental Emotions
Dix and the Affective Organization of Parenting

Dix (1991) reviewed existing literature about the role of emotions in parenting and drew four con-
clusions: (1) strong emotions, both positive and negative, occur routinely in the course of parenting/
family interaction; (2) parents’ stable, emotional traits are consistently linked with individual differ-
ences in the quality of parenting; (3) parental emotions operate as a mediator between other stressors
(e.g., work stress, marital conflict) and parenting quality; and (4) chronic and intense negative parental
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Parenting and Emotions
emotion is linked with compromised parenting and family dysfunction. On the basis of this review,
he concluded “perhaps more than any other single variable, parents’ emotions reflect the health of
the parent-child relationship” (p. 4). Then, drawing from emotion theorists, Dix asserted that paren-
tal emotions regulate parental behavior via three processes: Activation, engagement, and regulation.
Activation refers to the precipitators of parental emotion which may include child behavior and
other nonparenting events (e.g., contextual stressors) and appraisals of those events with respect to
parental concerns or goals. Notably, parental concerns can be self-oriented (e.g., get child dressed
quickly or else I will be late) or child-oriented (e.g., teach child to dress self to promote autonomy),
immediate (e.g., prevent a child from touching a hot stove) or long term (e.g., instill a value), and
conscious (often elicited when encountering a new setting or interaction with the child) or uncon-
scious (based on typical, repeated interactions with the child). Which specific parental emotion is
activated and its intensity depend on the parent’s concerns or goals at that time, their perception of
whether the child’s behavior supports or undermines that goal, and their assessment of available sup-
ports or barriers to achieve the goal. Thus, cognitive processes play a central role in the activation of
parenting-related emotion.
Once emotions are activated, they lead to engagement processes. That is, parental emotions oper-
ate as a motivator of goal-directed behavior, and both positive and negative emotions can be adap-
tive in this regard. For example, parental joy in a child’s accomplishments may promote affection
and praise, parental empathy may promote comforting behavior when a child is sad, and parental
anger may promote the use of discipline when a child breaks a rule. Later, Dix, Gershoff, Meunier,
and Miller (2004) further clarified that the same discrete emotion can vary with the nature of the
underlying concern, which has important implications for emotion-behavior linkages. For example,
a parent can be angry on behalf of her child, which may promote helping or comforting her child
or angry at her child for breaking a rule, which may promote discipline. However, simply knowing
the target of the emotion may not fully capture the underlying concern. That is, a mother may be
angry her child broke the rules because it makes her look bad as a mother or it inconveniences
her, clearly mother-oriented concerns. Alternatively, she may be angry at the child for breaking
the rules because it indicates her child has not internalized a value she believes is important for her
child’s well-being, a child-oriented concern. Essentially, child-oriented emotions (i.e., focused on
the child’s interests, development, or well-being) should be linked with more optimal parenting,
whereas parent-oriented emotions (i.e., focused on the parent’s interests, needs, or state) should be
linked with less optimal parenting. Furthermore, the nature of suboptimal parenting may depend
on the specific parent-oriented emotion such that parent-oriented anger may promote parent-child
conflict, whereas parent-oriented sadness may promote parental withdrawal from the child (Dix
et al., 2004).
The manner in which parental emotion is linked with parental behavior and children’s likely
reactions to emotion-linked parental behaviors depends also on regulation, or the extent to which
parents control their emotions and the expression of their emotions. For example, the up-regulation
of parental positive affect may elicit infant attention and promote positive face-to-face play. But once
an infant becomes overstimulated, the down-regulation of parental positive affect may help the infant
recover and then reengage. In this example, the parents’ deliberate control of emotion expression
plays an important role in achieving the goal of positive, playful interaction. Likewise, the deliberate
modulation of anger may promote parents’ agenda in that the expression of mild frustration may
help to convey the salience of an event to a child without frightening the child, allowing the child
to attend to the information the parent wishes to convey. When parents lack awareness of their emo-
tions or struggle to regulate their emotions, it may be difficult for them to prioritize child-oriented
goals in the moment and to engage in effortful behaviors that are well matched to their parenting
goals. Poorly regulated emotions also may bias how parents appraise child behavior or parent-child
interaction. The previous examples illustrate the notion that parenting-related emotion activation,
621
engagement, and regulation processes unfold over time and are linked with one another in a bidi-
rectional fashion.
Central points from this perspective can be summarized as follows: “When invested in the inter-
ests of children, emotions organize sensitive/responsive parenting. Emotions undermine parenting,
however, when they are too weak, too strong, or poorly matched to child-rearing tasks” (Dix, 1991,
p. 3). Next, other perspectives that focus on social behavior more broadly, but that have implications
for understanding the role of emotions in parenting, are considered.
The Social Information-Processing Perspective

The social information-processing perspective primarily has been applied in the study of peer inter-
actions; however, it is applicable in any social interaction, including parent-child interaction. The
revision by Lemerise and Arsenio (2000) that sought to further embed the role of emotion processes
in the model is particularly relevant to the study of parental emotions and parenting. In this model,
there are six central steps or processes: (1) encoding the social partner’s cue, (2) interpreting the cue,
(3) clarifying goals, (4) constructing possible responses, (5) evaluating various responses and selecting
one, and (6) enacting a response. This process unfolds quickly over time and is cyclical, because after
initiating a response (step 6), the individual notes the social partner’s response (step 1), and the process
continues. In this model, it is acknowledged that individuals enter any social interaction with a “data-
base” consisting of knowledge, experiences, capabilities, and affect-event linkages that may influence
how they process and interpret their social partner’s cues. Emotional arousal and regulation, both trait
like and event specific, are thought to influence (and be influenced by) each of the six processes/
steps. For example, inferring that a child spilled dinner on purpose could elicit parental anger; by
contrast, being angry to begin with could prompt a parent to make such an attribution. This model
is consistent with Dix’s (1991) perspective in focusing on both cognitive and emotional processes, the
importance of goals, recognition that individual characteristics and external experiences can influ-
ence dyadic interaction, and emphasis on the bidirectional and dynamic nature of the processes that
occur during social interaction. The social information-processing perspective offers greater speci-
ficity in the appraisal processes and the interplay between emotion and cognition, and offers insight
on predictors of emotional processes during social interactions. Notably, the social information-pro-
cessing perspective has been applied frequently in the study of child maltreatment/harsh discipline
(e.g., Milner, 2000), and it is likely applicable in relation to parenting outcomes broadly.
Empathy, Sympathy, and Personal Distress

Another perspective relevant to a focus on parental emotions is that of Eisenberg, who has written
on the role of empathy/sympathy and personal distress in prosocial behavior (Eisenberg and Eggum,
2008). In this work, Eisenberg distinguished among sympathy, empathy, and personal distress. Sympa-
thy involves feeling concern or sadness for another person, whereas empathy involves feeling along
with another person (e.g., feeling sad because someone else is sad). By its nature, empathy involves
some degree of personal distress, defined as self-focused negative affect in response to another per-
son’s feelings. Eisenberg and colleagues proposed that there is an optimal level of vicarious arousal, or
personal distress, which prompts one to focus attention on the state and needs of others, enhancing
the likelihood of engaging in prosocial behavior, but that overarousal leads to a focus on self, under-
mining the cognitive capacities needed to respond in a prosocial manner. Extensive empirical work
with children has supported this view, and these patterns are likely applicable to adults too (Eisenberg
and Eggum, 2008). This perspective highlights the role of affect in self- versus other-orientation,
much like Dix (1991), and also points to the possibility that moderate levels of arousal are most
adaptive in relation to optimal social interaction. A distinct feature of this perspective is the focus on
622
responses to others’ distress, which may be particularly relevant in relation to individual differences
in parental responses to child negative emotions.
The Neurobiological Perspective on Parental Emotions

Finally, biological models of parenting derived from work with humans and other mammals point
to the central role of emotion in parenting. In particular, parental behavior is believed to be strongly
related to the neuroendocrinological systems implicated in reward and affect (e.g., hypothalamus,
amygdala, dopamine), executive function (e.g., prefrontal cortex) and social behavior (e.g., oxytocin;
Barrett and Fleming, 2011; Numan and Insel, 2003). More responsive/sensitive parents demonstrate
distinct patterns of emotion-related hormonal and neural activation when exposed to parenting-
related stimuli (Feldman, 2019; Kringelbach, Parsons, Young, and Stein, 2019; Rutherford, Wallace,
Laurent, and Mayes, 2015). Although most of this research has focused on biological mothers of
infants, research also demonstrates that these processes extend to biological and nonbiological moth-
ers and fathers of infants and older children (e.g., Abraham et al., 2014). This biological perspective is
compatible with the cognitive and emotional processes in the previous perspectives and highlights
the significance of neurobiological underpinnings of affect and cognition for parenting.
An Integrated Model: Parental Emotions and Parenting Behavior

These perspectives vary in subtle ways, but lead to the same conclusion: Human behavior dur-
ing parent-child interaction is influenced in part by emotions experienced in the moment as well
as biological concomitants of emotion and the ability to regulate those emotions. The manner in
which this occurs is complex and involves cognition, physiology, and neurology. Figure 18.1 is an
adaption of Lemerise and Arsenio’s (2000) model that integrates core features from each of the
previous perspectives and focuses explicitly on parenting behavior. The database includes examples
of personal characteristics and prior experiences that influence how parents respond to child cues;
these factors are elaborated later in this chapter. Global/trait emotional characteristics and mood are
separated from parenting-related affect to emphasize that these are distinct, albeit interrelated, levels
of parental affect (e.g., elevated depressive symptoms may increase parental irritability in response
to child misbehavior). Parenting-related affective processes involve both physiological arousal and
regulation, which are likely automatic, and more conscious felt emotions and deliberate efforts to
regulate behaviorally. The arrows denote that emotion experience/arousal and regulation influence
one another reciprocally. The X is intended to note that emotion and regulation may have interactive
or joint effects on parental social cognition and parenting behavior such that less optimal parent-
ing is most likely when negative/parent-oriented affect is high and emotion regulation is low. The
outermost layer includes the six steps of social information-processing that are initiated by a child
behavior. The bidirectional arrows illustrate that parenting-related emotion can influence social cog-
nitive processes and social cognitive processes can influence the affective processes.
To illustrate the model, when an infant cries, the likelihood that a mother notices, and hence
responds, may be undermined if she is feeling sad about something else and does not become aroused
by her infant’s cue. In this absence of cue encoding, she may engage in nonresponsive or withdrawn
behavior. In contrast, if she notices the infant’s cry and experiences moderate arousal or arousal that
is well regulated, she may be more inclined to empathize, enhancing the likelihood that she will
interpret the cause of distress from the infant’s perspective. Empathy may also enhance the likelihood
of prioritizing infant-oriented goals (e.g., making her baby feel better). Furthermore, the mother’s
moderate arousal is likely the ideal condition in which to employ the cognitive effort needed to gen-
erate and evaluate multiple response options. For example, the mother may be better able to focus her
attention on this task (calming her infant), recall recent relevant events such as last feedings, amount
623
2. Interpret behavior 3. Clarify goals
PARENTING-RELATED
1. Notice behavior Emotions/ Physiological Arousal
4. Generate possible
responses
Child’s Behavior
Cry, laugh, smile, DATABASE
talk, misbehave, etc Developmental History
Personality
Adult Attachment
X Parental Beliefs &
X
Knowledge
Experience w. Child
5. Choose
Evaluate Behavior
response
and Outcome
Emotion Regulation
Behavioral/ Physiological
6. Parental response
Figure 18.1 Integrated model of the role of parenting-related emotions in parenting
of recent sleep, current preferences of the infant, and flexibly switch between strategies as needed. Yet
another mother may be vigilant to her infant’s distress cues because they are aversive to her, enhanc-
ing attention to cues but altering the nature of progression through future stages. For example, she
may interpret her infant’s cries as manipulative, and prioritize the goal of teaching her child to be
less demanding, resulting in either nonresponsiveness or intrusive responses. These emotion-related
differences in parental behavior have important implication for child outcomes as well.
Parental Emotion and Child Outcomes

In Figure 18.2, three pathways by which parenting-related emotions and their regulation may shape
child outcomes are illustrated. First, parenting-related emotion and regulation may be indirectly
linked with child outcomes via parenting behavior. That is, child-oriented emotions or well-regulated
arousal may enhance optimal parenting, as described previously, which may, in turn, contribute to
adaptive developmental outcomes for children. Second, as argued elsewhere, parenting-related emo-
tion and regulation may be directly related to child outcomes via several mechanisms, beyond simple
genetic transmission (Leerkes, Su, Calkins, O’Brien, and Supple, 2017). That is, exposure to nega-
tive or dysregulated parental affect can elicit child distress in the moment via emotion contagion
or because it is perceived as threatening. Additionally, in the context of proximal contact with a
dysregulated parent, as is often the case among infants and young children, the child may become
physiologically dysregulated via the synchronization or desynchronization of biological rhythms
(Feldman, 2007). If such experiences are chronic, they could prompt children’s heightened stress
624
Direct Effects
Emotion contagion
Biological synchrony
Genetic transmission
Indirect Effects via Parenting
Parenting-Related Emotion Optimal Parenting Adaptive Child Outcomes
Emotions/Physiological Warm, sensitive, responsive Secure attachment
Arousal Appropriate limits/ Emotion regulation
Emotion/Physiological discipline Mental health
Regulation Supportive/autonomy Social & academic
Arousal X Regulation promoting, etc competence, etc
Moderator of Parenting Effects
Parenting Practices
e.g., punishment,
homework routine, screen
time limit
Figure 18.2 Pathways by which parental emotions are associated with child outcomes
reactivity and less effective emotion regulation (Moore, 2009), which has implications for a variety
of negative child outcomes. Finally, parenting-related emotion and regulation may moderate the
extent to which parenting practices relate to child outcomes (Darling and Steinberg, 1993; Grusec
and Goodnow, 1994). When parenting practices are delivered in the context of positive, empathic,
or child-oriented parental emotions, children may be more open to the socialization messages their
parents wish to convey than if the same practice is delivered in the context of negative or parent-
oriented emotions.
In the sections that follow, we begin with an overview of methodological approaches to measure
parenting-related emotion and regulation. Then, work related to four aspects of parenting-related
emotion are summarized: (1) empathic, positive, or child-oriented emotions, (2) negative or parent-
oriented emotions, (3) parenting-related emotion regulation, and (4) physiological indices of emo-
tion arousal and regulation. In each section, associations between parenting-related emotion and
parenting behavior or parent-child relationships and child outcomes are elaborated.
The Measurement of Parenting-Related Emotion

A broad variety of approaches has been used to measure parenting-related emotion and its regula-
tion. Given that emotion experiences are subjective and internal feeling states are a core component
of emotion process (Izard, 1991), much of the existing literature has focused on self-reported feel-
ing states and regulatory efforts while parenting or in response to parenting-related stimuli. Some
researchers ask parents to self-report the extent to which they experience, express, or regulate emo-
tions in response to certain situations (Le and Impett, 2016; Lorber, Del Vecchio, Feder, and Slep,
2017; Martini and Busseri, 2012; Sedlar and Hansen, 2001) or more generally within their families
(Halberstadt and Eaton, 2002). A strength of such measures is that they may capture typical respond-
ing across a range of relevant situations. However, individual parents may reflect on vastly different
types of experiences with their children, and some parents may struggle to accurately recall the
nature and intensity of past emotions.
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An approach that addresses these concerns is to ask parents to report on their emotions follow-
ing standardized parent-child interaction tasks that are designed to be challenging (e.g., a wait-
ing task; Cole, LeDonne, and Tan, 2013). Parents’ emotional reactions during standardized tasks
have also been assessed using a video-recall approach (Dix et al., 2004; Leerkes, 2010; Lorber and
O’Leary, 2005). First, parent-child interaction is filmed during the standard situation; then, parents
are asked to recall how they felt in the moment while using the video to stimulate their recall.
This approach has been used in both a dynamic and static manner. The more dynamic manner
involves using a dial allowing parents to stop the video and report on their emotions at multiple
moments throughout the interaction (Dix et al., 2004; Lorber and O’Leary, 2005). The more
static manner involves having parents watch the entire video and then rate their emotions a single
time at the end (Leerkes, 2010). The latter is more time efficient, but may reduce opportunities to
capture and maximize analytically the dynamic nature of emotions (e.g., frequency, pace, or pat-
terns of changing states and their triggers). Additionally, in the static video-recall approach and the
non-video-aided recall approach, primacy or recency effects may be an issue, and some parents
may focus primarily on peak states, whereas others may focus primarily on frequent states when
rating emotional reactions for the entire interaction. An advantage of the situation-specific recall
approach is that it provides an opportunity for researchers to probe parents for specific details
about felt emotions. In particular, some researchers (Dix et al., 2004; Leerkes, 2010) have used this
approach as an opportunity to discern if reported emotions are child oriented or parent oriented, as
described previously. Interview approaches such as these may also reduce concerns that parents use
emotion terms differently (e.g., some parents believe anger and frustration are equivalent emotions,
whereas others believe anger is more intense) because they are given the opportunity to explain
or elaborate on their feelings.
Although relying on emotion recall following standardized tasks has some clear advantages, a
concern is that individual differences in parental affective responses may be a function of differences
in the nature or intensity of the child’s behavior during the task (e.g., some children become mini-
mally distressed during distress-eliciting tasks, whereas others are frequently and intensely distressed).
Although the tasks are standardized, the emotion-eliciting stimuli are not. An approach that addresses
this situation is assessing parents’ emotional responses or physiological arousal to parenting-related
stimuli including photos, audio, and video of children engaging in specific behaviors (e.g., crying;
Ablow, Marks, Feldman, and Huffman, 2013; Frodi and Lamb, 1980) and vignettes describing child
behavior or parent-child interaction (Coplan, Hastings, Lagacé-Séguin and Moulton, 2002). A disad-
vantage of the standard stimuli approach is the possibility that affective responding to standard stimuli
may not fully capture how parents would respond affectively to their own child given the nature
of their relationship or history of prior interactions with one another. In one study, mothers’ self-
reported emotional reactions and physiological arousal during interactions with their own distressed
infants converged moderately with their emotional reactions and arousal in response to infant cry
videos, and both measures demonstrated similar predictive validity to maternal sensitivity (Leerkes,
2014), somewhat reducing this concern. Among the variety of standard stimuli used in the study
of parenting-related emotion, videos which most closely approximate the ongoing and multimodal
cues parents respond to when engaged in the act of parenting, may have the most ecological validity.
Given concerns related to social desirability pressure and recall biases when self-reporting on
parenting-related emotions, some researchers prefer to directly observe parents’ emotion expressions
during parent-child interaction. In doing so, researchers tend to focus on the holistic expression of
emotion at multiple points throughout the interaction considering verbal content and tone of voice,
facial expressions, and body movements (Dix, Moed, and Anderson, 2014; Main, Paxton, and Dale,
2016; Van der Giessen et al., 2014). A limitation of this approach is that adults vary in the extent
to which they modulate their expression of emotion, and the outward expression of emotion does
626
not always match the internal feeling state introducing error. In an effort to offset these concerns,
physiological measures of arousal, such as skin conductance, and regulation, such as vagal regulation,
explained in more detail ahead, have been used fairly frequently in the study of parenting-related
affective processes (Frodi and Lamb, 1980; Lorber and O’Leary, 2005; Moore, 2009). That is, physi-
ological responses are automatic and may be more difficult to control or mask. However, physiologi-
cal measures are not clearly tied to a specific affective state. For example, increased skin conductance
could be the result of anger or worry, and could reflect a focus on self, a focus on child, or both.
As such, the emotional processes underlying observed associations between physiological indices of
arousal or regulation and parenting or child outcomes may be difficult to specify.
Although none of the methodological approaches is without limitation, each approach has
yielded measures of parental affect that demonstrate predictive validity to parenting behavior and/
or child outcomes as elaborated throughout the chapter. Ultimately, triangulating these methods and
identifying converging patterns of findings across different approaches will be useful. In the following
literature review, we highlight methodological differences and their implications for interpreting the
results of specific studies or inconsistent patterns of findings between studies.
Positive, Empathic, and Child-Oriented Emotions
Associations of Positive, Empathic and Child-Oriented

Emotions With Parenting
One of the most significant behaviors expected to emerge from parents’ empathic or child-oriented
emotion is parental sensitivity, defined as the ability to respond promptly, contingently, and appro-
priately to child cues in a manner that prioritizes child needs (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, and Wall,
1978). Accordingly, parents’ empathy has been linked to their sensitivity in several studies. For exam-
ple, mothers’ insight and attunement to their child’s experiences, aspects of empathy, relate to greater
sensitivity both in infancy (Koren-Karie, Oppenheim, Dolev, Sher, and Etzion-Carasso, 2002) and
toddlerhood (Coyne, Low, Miller, Seifer, and Dickstein, 2007). Additionally, mothers’ empathy in
response to videos of crying infants and to their own infants during distress-eliciting tasks is associ-
ated with greater accuracy in detecting infant distress, more appropriate causal attributions about
crying, less negative beliefs about crying, and greater observed maternal sensitivity in response to
infant distress (Leerkes, 2010; Leerkes et al., 2015; Leerkes, Su, et al., 2016). All measures in these
previous studies were assessed concurrently, so it is difficult to know if effects of empathy are medi-
ated by the more cognitive processes, or the opposite. However, in one study, mothers’ accurate cue
detection and feelings of efficacy were associated with higher sensitivity in response to infant distress
only among mothers who also reported high empathy (Leerkes, Crockenberg, and Burrous, 2004).
Thus, cognitive precursors of optimal parenting may only exert a positive influence on sensitivity
when parents are emotionally motivated to act on their children’s behalf. In contrast, a lack of paren-
tal empathy may contribute to child neglect (De Paul and Guibert, 2008), and parents identified as
high risk for abuse reported lower levels of child-specific empathy than did low-risk parents (Perez-
Albeniz and de Paul, 2004).
Empirical studies of positive parent emotions, such as joy, in relation to parenting behavior are
scant. Dix et al. (2004) reported that child-oriented maternal joy was associated with more synchro-
nous maternal behavior when interacting with their toddlers. Additionally, parents’ trait-positive
affect, which may reflect, in part, positive parenting-related affect, is a consistent correlate of sup-
portive, positive parenting behaviors, with opposite relations to harsh, negative parenting behaviors
(Rueger, Katz, Risser, and Lovejoy, 2011). Positive parent emotions have been studied extensively in
relation to child outcomes.
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Associations of Positive, Empathic and Child-Oriented

Emotions With Child Outcomes
The frequency and intensity of positive emotions parents display toward the child and other family
members may serve as a basis for the child’s expectations about positive emotional expression and
communication in the broader social environment (Eisenberg, Cumberland, and Spinrad, 1998).
Meta-analytic findings of parents’ self-reported emotional expressiveness in the family indicate
parental positive emotion has robust relations to children’s self-expressiveness of positive emotion
(Halberstadt and Eaton, 2002). It should be noted that the focal measure in this meta-analysis (The
Self-Expressiveness in the Family Questionnaire; Halberstadt, Cassidy, Stifter, Parke, and Fox, 1995)
reflects parents’ tendencies to display positive emotion to any family member, may or may not be
expressed in the child’s presence, may or may not be parenting related, and may be parent or child
oriented. Nevertheless, such reports are more closely tied to parenting-related affect than trait affect
because they occur within the context of the family. That mothers’ self-reported positive emotional
expressiveness in the family and observed positive emotion with the child at age 5–8 years loads
adequately on a single latent variable that relates to better self-regulatory skills, social competence,
and lower behavior problems in the child 2 years later increases confidence in the meta-analytic find-
ings related to the self-report measure (Eisenberg et al., 2003).
Shared parent-child positive affect is thought to contribute to more complex dyadic constructs
like mutually responsive orientation, described as a reciprocal, binding, cooperative, and affectively
positive parent-child relationship (Kochanska, 2002). When parents display greater empathy for the
children’s needs, children view socialization messages as more positive and reasonable, and children
may be more receptive to parents’ socialization messages and requests in the context of affectively
positive relationships (Grusec and Davidov, 2010; Grusec and Goodnow, 1994). Consistent with this
view, mother-child interactions involving positive emotion relate to greater effortful control and
compliance to parental requests (Kochanska and Aksan, 1995), greater social competence (Denham,
Mitchell-Copeland, Strandberg, Auerbach, and Blair, 1997), and fewer behavior problems (McCoy
and Raver, 2011) among toddlers and school-age children. In mother- and father-child interactions,
high dyadic positive affect and flexibility when the child was 3 predicted lower externalizing prob-
lems 2 years later (Lunkenheimer, Olson, Hollenstein, Sameroff, and Winter, 2011).
Additionally, positive emotional exchanges with the parent likely contribute to a child’s sense of
reciprocal care and concern for others’ needs, which, in turn, supports the development of conscience,
including internalization of external rules, socio-moral emotions like guilt and empathy/sympathy,
and more moral cognitions (Thompson, Meyer, and McGinley, 2006). In this vein, mutually respon-
sive orientation and interactive emotional positivity among children and parents are related to such
indicators of conscience from toddlerhood through early adulthood (Eisenberg, VanSchyndel, and
Hofer, 2015; Kochanska, 2002; Lindsey, Cremeens, Colwell, and Caldera, 2009), mediated, in part, by
the child’s compliance to parents and enjoyment of parent-child interactions (Kochanska, Forman,
Aksan, and Dunbar, 2005).
In summary, parents who experience many positive, empathic, and child-oriented emotions while
parenting tend to also display positive parenting behaviors. These kinds of emotions and related
behaviors appear to support the development of positive parent-child relationships and better soci-
oemotional outcomes in the child. However, there are caveats to consider with respect to parents’
positive and empathic emotions. First, some parents may display positive emotional expressions due
to a chronic suppression of negative emotions, which is a risk factor for attachment insecurity and
difficulties with emotion regulation (Cassidy, 1994). Second, parental empathic and positive emo-
tions may not buffer all developmental risks. As an example, maternal happiness during interactions
with the child predict fewer behavior problems over time only in children already low in behavior
problems (Denham et al., 2000). Third, the majority of research on the benefits of child-oriented
628
emotion is drawn from infant and child samples. Self-reported “child-centrism” relates to child-ori-
ented emotion and behaviors, but may also share variance with characteristics like so-called helicop-
ter parenting (Ashton-James, Kushlev, and Dunn, 2013). Thus, the types of child-oriented emotions
and behaviors parents display through their children’s adolescence and emerging adulthood may have
varying outcomes. Additional research is needed to address these caveats.
Negative and Parent-Oriented Emotions
Associations of Negative and Parent-Oriented Emotions With Parenting

Parenting-related anger has been the negative emotion considered most frequently in relation to par-
enting behavior. In particular, self-reported anger in response to child misbehavior or crying is higher
among maltreating parents compared with community parents, parents who report using more phys-
ical punishment, and parents who endorse more authoritarian parenting (Chen, Zhou, Eisenberg,
Valiente, and Wang, 2011; Dix and Reinhold, 1991; Frodi and Lamb, 1980; Lorber, O’Leary, and
Slep, 2011; Peterson, Ewigman, and Vandiver, 1994). Additionally, parenting-related negative emo-
tions/anger are associated with parental flooding, or the feeling of being overwhelmed by child
misbehavior, and both are simultaneously associated with overreactive discipline (Del Vecchio et al.,
2016; Lorber, Mitnick, and Slep, 2016). Notably, Lorber and Slep (2005) sought to determine if the
dynamic association, or dependence, between toddler and mother negative affect predicted mala-
daptive discipline over and above the mean intensity of maternal negative emotion. Mothers whose
reports of negative emotion were more strongly dependent on their child’s negative emotions, as
determined statistically, engaged in both more harsh and more lax discipline. This finding illustrates
that individual differences in how upset parents become by their children’s aversive behaviors pre-
dicts parenting quality. Consistent with the view that such effects occur, in part, because anger leads
to more negative social cognition, mothers’ negative emotion during discipline encounters, assessed
via video recall, was associated with their overreactive discipline via more negative appraisals of the
child’s behavior (Lorber and O’Leary, 2005).
Parental negative emotions have implications for parenting in non-discipline contexts as well.
For example, mother-oriented negative emotions (i.e., sadness, anger, worry) are linked with less
synchronous and more withdrawn (i.e., watching only) and restrictive maternal behaviors during
mother-toddler interaction (Bryan and Dix, 2009; Dix et al., 2004). Likewise, mother-oriented nega-
tive emotions in response to infant crying are associated with less accurate interpretation of infant
distress cues, lower endorsement of child-oriented parenting goals, and lower observed maternal
sensitivity in a distress-eliciting context when infants were 6 months old (Leerkes, 2010; Leerkes
et al., 2004). In addition to direct effects of negative parental emotion on less optimal parenting,
negative affect can also modulate the extent to which child behaviors and social cognitive factors are
related to parenting. Specifically, high negative/mother-oriented emotion exacerbates the association
between observed infant distress and lower maternal sensitivity in distress-eliciting contexts (Leerkes,
2010) and undermines the positive association between mothers’ infant-oriented emotion goals and
enhanced sensitivity to distress (Leerkes et al., 2004). The latter finding is consistent with the view
that negative parental affect may undermine a parents’ ability to engage in a goal-oriented manner
that prioritizes child needs.
Patterns of dyadic or mutual negative affect between parent and child are associated with parent-
ing outcomes. For example, in a study of mother-adolescent interaction during a conflict discussion,
dyads that engaged in high levels of synchronous/mutual negative affect reported less satisfaction
with the outcome of the discussion, but the overall amount of mother and child negative affect did
not have this effect (Main et al., 2016). Thus, mutual or co-occurring negative affect was particu-
larly problematic. Certainly, it makes sense that if a child is angry, the parents’ ability to maintain
629
composure may be important to de-escalate conflict and maintain a positive relationship. However,
the absence of negative parental affect could also be problematic given that emotion flexibility
(reflecting changes from one state to another, and multiple types of shared and non-shared affective
states) is linked with both mothers’ and adolescents’ concurrent perceptions of better relationship
quality (Lougheed and Hollenstein, 2016) and reductions in maternal controlling behavior over time
independent of the relative amounts of negative to positive affect (Van der Giessen et al., 2014). In
other words, the flexible sharing of emotions, both positive and negative, likely reflects a generally
positive parent-child relationship and may also promote adaptive child outcomes.
Associations of Negative and Parent-Oriented

Emotions With Child Outcomes
Frequent negative or parent-oriented emotions may undermine child outcomes for a variety of
reasons. For example, children may feel frightened in the moment and over time feel less confident
in their parents’ capacity to keep them safe when exposed to high levels of parental negative affect
(Lyons-Ruth and Jacobvitz, 2016). In such contexts, children may become hypervigilant to negative
emotion cues, which has implications for their stress-responding and physical health, subsequent
emotion and behavioral regulation, and their understanding of their own and others’ emotions (Ehr-
lich, Miller, Jones, and Cassidy, 2016; Eisenberg, Cumberland, and Spinrad, 1998; Shackman et al.,
2010). Children may also learn to engage in heightened displays of negative affect via social learning,
which has negative implications for their relationships with others (Eisenberg et al., 1998).
Despite strong conceptual arguments, associations between parent-oriented negative emotions
and child outcomes vary across studies, which may be a function of methodological differences in
the assessment of parental emotions. For example, a meta-analysis of studies focused on self-reported
negative emotional expression in the family indicated that parents’ expressions of sadness/crying,
but not anger/hostility, are associated with deficits in emotion understanding, particularly among
adolescents and young adults (Halberstadt and Eaton, 2002). Additionally, there was a modest posi-
tive association between parents’ and children’s expressions of negative affect. However, it is unclear
if such associations reflect children’s open and appropriate expression of negative affect in an adap-
tive manner or heightened reactivity that is maladaptive. In subsequent studies, parents’ self-reported
negative expressiveness in the family was associated with their reports of their preschoolers’ use of
more maladaptive emotion regulation behaviors, higher negative emotionality, and higher external-
izing symptoms over time, but was unrelated to observed measures of children’s emotion knowledge
and a physiological measure of children’s adaptive emotion regulation (Chen et al., 2011; Hu, Wang,
and Liu, 2017; Nelson et al., 2012; Wu, Wang, and Liu, 2017). This pattern of findings raises concerns
that observed associations between parental self-expressiveness of negative emotion in the family and
child outcomes may be a function of shared method variance.
Likewise, observed parental negative affect during caregiving, in which the target and source of
the negative affect are unclear, demonstrates mixed findings. For example, maternal negative affect
was associated with infant attachment insecurity in one such study (Main, Tomasini, and Tolan,
1979) and attachment security in another (Pauli-Pott and Mertesacker, 2009). However, in studies in
which observed parental affect is clearly tied with aversive child behaviors, a more consistent pattern
of associations with negative child outcomes is apparent. For example, observed maternal negative
affect that co-occurred with child negative affect was associated with attachment insecurity and with
toddlers’ elevated externalizing symptoms (Lindsey and Caldera, 2015; Martin, Clements, and Crnic,
2011). Likewise, reciprocal observed negative affect between parents and early adolescents during a
conflict discussion was associated with adolescents’ heightened concurrent teacher-reported negative
emotionality and lower attention focusing, inhibitory control and GPA approximately 2 years later
(Moed et al., 2016). Dix et al. (2014) operationally defined aversion sensitivity as the rate at which
630
observed maternal negative reactivity increased as a function of the aversiveness (low to high) of the
child’s behavior in the previous conversational turn during a difficult discussion. Mothers’ higher
levels of aversion-focused negativity during these interactions with their 5- to 11-year-old children
was related to children’s heightened externalizing symptoms and lower social competence and emo-
tion regulation independent of mothers’ and children’s mean level negativity during the interaction
(Moed, Dix, Anderson, and Greene, 2017). Thus, parental negative emotions that are clearly tied to
child behavior, and therefore less likely to reflect parental negative mood generally, are more consist-
ently linked with maladaptive child outcomes. However, the extent to which these associations are
accounted for by the child’s exposure to child-directed parental negative affect or other aspects of
parenting is not clear.
Leerkes, Parade, and Gudmundson (2011) addressed the possibility that parental affect may have
both direct and indirect effects on child outcomes via parenting behavior. They examined direct
effects of mothers’ negative, parent-oriented emotions in response to videos of crying infants, assessed
prenatally, on their infant’s later attachment outcomes as well as indirect effects via maternal behav-
ior. The pattern of associations varied for maternal anger and anxiety. Specifically, maternal anger in
response to crying was indirectly associated with children’s attachment avoidance via mothers’ puni-
tive responses to infant distress, likely because infants learn to minimize their expression of negative
affect in this context. In contrast, mothers’ anxiety in response to crying was directly associated with
children’s attachment resistance over and above observed maternal sensitivity perhaps because their
children can sense their distress when in close proximity. The specificity of these findings points to
the benefit of considering discrete parental negative emotions rather than negative emotions more
broadly.
These studies illustrate the complexity of the role of negative emotion in parenting and child
outcomes and point to three conclusions. First, negative parent-oriented emotions are linked with
maladaptive parenting, in part, via or in conjunction with social cognitive processes. Second, con-
sidering parental affect in conjunction with child affect/behavior or dynamic links between the two
offers insight above and beyond simple measures of negative parental affect. Third, negative parental
emotions that are tied with child behavior/affect are associated with maladaptive child outcomes,
both directly and indirectly via compromised parenting. The regulation of negative parenting-related
emotion is also a likely predictor of parenting behavior and child outcomes.
Parenting-Related Emotion Regulation

Emotion regulation, generally speaking, is the automatic or effortful behaviors, strategies, and skills
that modulate the experience and expression of emotions, both positive and negative (Calkins and
Hill, 2007). The regulation of negative emotions often focuses on down-regulation and includes
behavioral strategies, such as taking respite from a challenging situation or seeking emotional support
from others; cognitive strategies, such as reframing a problem or reflecting on the cause and conse-
quences of emotions; and physiological processes that are automatic but also modulated by behavio-
ral and cognitive strategies (e.g., deep breathing, meditation). The regulation of positive emotion is
less studied and can include both the up-regulation of positive emotion, which can help in regulating
negative emotion as well as promoting openness to new knowledge, skills, and relationships, and the
down-regulation of positive emotion so it does not interfere with the completion of important tasks
or engender risky behavior (Fredrickson, 2013). When confronted with difficult child behaviors
or challenging parenting tasks, the ability to down-regulate negative and parent-oriented emotions
and up-regulate positive and child-oriented emotions may be essential to enact well-timed and
appropriately modulated parenting behaviors that are consistent with the parent’s socialization goals.
The former has been considered more extensively. Although parental global emotion regulation is
associated with more adaptive parenting (Crandall, Deater-Deckard, and Riley, 2015; Shaffer and
631
Obradović, 2017) and child outcomes (Buckholdt, Parra, and Jobe-Shields, 2014; Han, Qian, Gao,
and Dong, 2015; Sarıtaş, Grusec, and Gençöz, 2013), it is unclear if these associations are a function
of a parent’s general tendency to regulate adaptively or if such measures serve as a proxy for parents’
ability to regulate affect in encounters with their children, which, in fact, accounts for these associa-
tions. Given the emphasis on parenting-related emotion, this chapter focuses on the regulation of
parenting-related emotion.
Associations of Parenting-Related Emotion Regulation With Parenting

Most research on the regulation of parenting-related emotion has relied on self-reports of parenting-
related emotion regulation. For example, mothers of preschoolers who indicated they would be
unlikely to suppress their negative emotions in response to a series of parenting vignettes endorsed
more authoritarian parenting beliefs, a consistent correlate of more hostile and controlling parenting
(Martini, Root, and Jenkins, 2004). Results from a subsequent study, however, suggested that the links
between emotion suppression and parenting outcomes may depend on the goal of emotion suppres-
sion (Martini and Busseri, 2012). In a sample of 90 mothers and their college-age children, mother-
reported child-oriented suppression of anger at child (e.g., to prevent hurting the child’s feelings)
was positively associated with both mother and child perceptions of relationship quality. In contrast,
self-oriented suppression of anger at the child (e.g., to avoid consequences for the parent was linked
with both mother and child reports of lower relationship quality). Thus, the deliberate suppression of
negative parenting-related emotion in an effort to promote child interests appears to benefit parent-
ing, whereas suppression for self-oriented reasons does not. To our knowledge, this is the only study
to translate Dix’s (1991) views about parent- and child-oriented emotion to the realm of regulation.
Although it is generally believed that suppressing negative affect and enhancing positive affect
while parenting is adaptive, Le and Impett (2016) argued otherwise. For example, parents of 4- to
12-year-olds reported lower well-being, poorer parent-child relationship quality, and lower respon-
siveness to their children in situations in which they suppressed their negative emotion or amplified
their positive emotions in front of their children compared with a parenting condition in which
they were not asked to think about specific emotions. Likewise, across a 10- day period, on days
parents reported suppressing their negative emotions and amplifying their positive emotions while
caregiving at a higher level than their average, they also reported lower feelings of authenticity,
responsiveness to their child, relationship quality, and emotional well-being (Le and Impett, 2016).
Although these findings suggest that regulating both positive and negative affect while parenting may
be difficult, stronger conclusions could be drawn if some additional comparisons were considered.
For example, parents may feel even worse and be less responsive on days in which child behavior is
equally negative but the parent does not engage in the suppression of negative affect or amplifica-
tion of positive affect. Additionally, Le and Impett noted that the costs of emotion suppression and
amplification may depend on the underlying goal as suggested by Martini and Busseri (2012). For
example, amplification of positive emotion to foster continued positive engagement with the child
may be adaptive, whereas amplification to avoid tackling a problem may be maladaptive. Nuances
such as these are difficult to tease apart empirically, but doing so may be valuable.
It may also be the case that parents’ ability to regulate their affect varies across parenting contexts
as well. Two research teams have sought to create context-specific self-reports of parenting-related
emotion regulation. First, Lorber and colleagues (Lorber, 2012; Lorber et al., 2017) developed the
Parental Emotion Regulation Inventory (PERI) in an effort to assess mothers’ adaptive and mala-
daptive regulatory strategies when confronted with their toddlers’ misbehavior. PERI items assess
mothers’ reappraisal about their child, emotion suppression, escape (e.g., walking away from discipline
encounter), and capitulation (i.e., giving in to the child). There was mixed evidence regarding the
adaptiveness of parental reappraisal and suppression in relation to parental discipline, but parental
632
capitulation and escape were linked with more overreactive and aggressive discipline. It may be that
parents who engage in these more avoidant regulatory behaviors engage in a mixed pattern of pas-
sive and overly harsh parenting. Second, Ravindran, Engle, McElwain, and Kramer (2015) created a
self-report of emotion regulation during sibling conflict for use with parents of young children. This
measure was not directly examined in relation to parenting behavior; however, mothers in a sibling
intervention that focused partly on enhancing parental support of better sibling dynamics reported
lower post-intervention dysregulation than control mothers. It is possible that this difference reflects
more optimal parenting among intervention mothers. Early work with both self-report measures of
parenting-related emotion regulation is promising, but additional longitudinal research with observed
measures of parenting is needed. Further, similar measures focused on parental emotion regulation
when children are distressed/having a tantrum or when the dyad is in conflict would be useful addi-
tions to the field for two reasons. First, it is difficult to observe parental regulation during encounters
of this type because they are fairly low frequency and brief. Second, it is probable that regulatory
abilities in these contexts may moderate previously reported associations between emotional reac-
tions to aversive child behaviors and parenting behavior in the moment and child outcomes.
In one study in which emotion regulation was observed while parenting, parenting-related emo-
tion regulation was rated by trained observers via a single global rating during a mother-child con-
flict discussion in a small sample. Mothers also reported on their global difficulty regulating their
emotions (Morelen, Shaffer, and Suveg, 2016). The global and parenting-specific measures of emo-
tion regulation were unrelated, but both predicted maternal self-reports of non-supportive emotion
socialization with a nearly identical moderate effect size. However, it is unclear that the global obser-
vational rating of emotion regulation truly reflected regulation given the degree to which the con-
flict discussion was stressful likely varied based on child behavior; also a mother could have appeared
regulated simply because she was not distressed. Analog tasks in which the researcher can control the
emotionally evocative stimuli may be a useful way to address this ambiguity. For example, during the
Frustration Intolerance Test, adults are asked to complete a computerized maze of a grocery store
while listening to the audio of a child having a tantrum. The total amount of time adults attempt
to solve the maze, out of a maximum of 10 minutes, reflects the extent to which they can continue
to problem solve in the context of a parenting-related stressor. Promising research demonstrates that
performance is associated with a reduced tendency to engage in self-reported harsh/abusive parent-
ing practices (Rodriguez, Baker, Pu, and Tucker, 2017; Rodriguez, Russa, and Kircher, 2015).
Associations of Parenting-Related Emotion Regulation

With Child Outcomes
Currently, there is scant research linking parenting-related emotion regulation with child outcomes.
For example, mothers’ and fathers’ reports of being dysregulated during sibling conflict are associ-
ated with poorer quality sibling interactions (lower warmth, higher agonism) among young children
(Ravindran et al., 2015). Likewise, parental escape during discipline encounters is associated with
toddlers’ greater physical aggression, as reported by parents (Lorber et al., 2016). Finally, observed
maternal emotion regulation is modestly associated with mother-reported child emotion regulation
among children who were approximately 9 years old, but the association was not significant given
the small sample (Morelen et al., 2016). Although these findings are consistent with expectation,
methodological limitations undermine strong conclusions. In all cases, measures of parental emotion
regulation and child outcomes were concurrent, raising questions about the direction of effect. In
addition, in all but the study by Morelen et al., parents reported on both emotion regulation and
child outcomes, and thus associations could be a function of shared method variance.
In summary, additional research, particularly longitudinal, multimethod research is needed to better
understand the role of observed, analog, or parent-reported regulation of parenting-related emotions
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in relation to parenting behavior and child outcomes. The evidence in favor of such links is stronger
when physiological indices of emotion regulation are considered; this literature is reviewed next.
Physiological Indices of Arousal and Regulation

Given the methodological difficulties detailed previously, a number of investigators have relied on
physiological indices of arousal and regulation during parenting with a particular focus on auto-
nomic nervous system (ANS) responding. The ANS is composed of two branches: The sympathetic
nervous system (SNS) and the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS). The SNS controls fight-or-
flight responses when confronted with threats, whereas the PNS promotes homeostasis and restora-
tive processes. The most frequently studied SNS response in parenting research is skin conductance
level (SCL), or the amount of sweat that rises from sweat ducts on the hands or feet. SCL reactivity
has been linked to behavioral inhibition in challenging contexts (Gray, 1975) and to personal distress
as opposed to empathy toward others (Eisenberg and Fabes, 1990). Thus, heightened SCL while
parenting may undermine optimal parenting.
The most frequently studied PNS response in parenting is vagal withdrawal. Vagal withdrawal
reflects regulation of the heart by the vagus nerve when faced with challenge. Under normal condi-
tions, vagal control of the heart is high, facilitating a slow, steady resting heart rate. High resting RSA,
believed to be an indicator of global well-being, easy temperament, and adaptive self-regulation, has
been associated with more adaptive parenting, much like global measures of emotion regulation
(Connell, Hughes-Scalise, Klostermann, and Azem, 2011; Root, Hastings, and Rubin, 2016). When
confronted with a challenge, vagal withdrawal, or the release of vagal control of the heart, is adap-
tive because it facilitates an increase in heart rate, which, in turn, mobilizes active efforts to cope.
Vagal withdrawal is indexed by decreases in respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) during situations in
which coping or regulation is needed (Porges, 2007). As such, during stressful parent-child interac-
tions, RSA withdrawal is expected to predict more optimal parenting. (Although not the focus of
this chapter, it is important to note that RSA augmentation promotes social engagement and may
be linked with more adaptive parenting in non-stressful, cooperative situations; Miller, Kahle, Lopez,
and Hastings, 2015.)
In addition, heart rate has been examined in relation to parenting outcomes. Heart rate is con-
trolled by both the SNS and PNS, and as such is not a pure measure of arousal or regulation. Never-
theless, examination of patterns of change from non-stressful to stressful parenting tasks, or over the
course of a task with changing demands, may reflect the relative input of SNS or PNS control across
time. Thus, we incorporate these findings ahead.
Associations of Physiological Arousal and Regulation With Parenting
Main Effects of Arousal and Regulation

Results of research examining associations between SCL augmentation, reflecting arousal, and par-
enting behavior have been mixed. For example, when presented with infant cry stimuli, child abusers
and mothers who engage in high rates of harsh discipline demonstrate higher SCL augmentation
relative to other mothers (Frodi and Lamb, 1980; Joosen, Mesman, Bakermans-Kranenburg, and
van iJzendoorn, 2013). In another study, mothers’ SCL augmentation during a discipline encounter
predicted mothers’ more negative appraisals of child behavior, which, in turn, predicted harsh disci-
pline suggesting arousal may influence parenting indirectly via its impact on social cognition (Lorber
and O’Leary, 2005). However, in other studies, SCL augmentation when exposed to cry stimuli was
unrelated to observed maternal sensitivity as a direct effect (Ablow et al., 2013; Emery, McElwain,
Groh, Haydon, and Roisman, 2014) or as an indirect effect via social cognition (Leerkes et al., 2015;
634
Leerkes, Su, et al., 2016). One possibility for the mixed findings is that SCL arousal is particularly
predictive of harsh parenting, but less predictive of variability in other aspects of parenting, such as
responsiveness or sensitivity. Another possibility is that results vary as a function of untested modera-
tors, a point elaborated ahead.
In contrast, RSA withdrawal during stressful parenting-related tasks is linked with more adap-
tive parenting. For example, when mothers were presented with infant cry stimuli, low mean level
RSA and RSA withdrawal relative to a non-stressful baseline predicted higher sensitivity and lower
harsh discipline (Ablow et al., 2013; Joosen et al., 2013; Joosen, Mesman, Bakermans-Kranenburg,
and van iJzendoorn, 2013). Most relevant, however, are studies in which RSA is measured dur-
ing parent-child interaction. In this vein, Moore (2009) reported that mothers who demonstrated
higher RSA withdrawal from a non-stressful baseline to the reengagement episode of the Still-Face
paradigm, during which most infants are distressed, were rated as more sensitive than mothers who
demonstrated less RSA withdrawal. In a subsequent study, mothers who demonstrated greater RSA
withdrawal during a distressing parent-infant interaction at 6 months made fewer negative causal
attributions about crying and endorsed fewer negative beliefs about crying, which, in turn, predicted
more sensitive maternal behavior both concurrently and 8 months later, suggesting that maternal
physiological regulation impacts parenting behavior, in part, via its impact on social cognition con-
sistent with the integrated model presented at the outset of the chapter (Leerkes, Su, et al., 2016).
Using a fine-grained approach comparing RSA changes and maternal behavior over 30-second
increments, differences in the time-ordered relations between RSA and parenting behavior between
maltreating and non-maltreating mothers were apparent (Skowron, Cipriano-Essel, Benjamin, Pincus,
and Van Ryzin, 2013). Among non-abusive mothers, elevated positive parenting and reduced nega-
tive parenting occurred more frequently following reductions in RSA in the prior epoch. Among
maltreating mothers, low RSA in an epoch relative to mean level RSA across epochs was linked
with more positive parenting in that epoch, but more hostile control in the next epoch, suggesting
that positive parenting is more physiologically taxing, and thus perhaps harder to maintain, among
maltreating mothers. In a related study focused on the dynamic changes in RSA across a task, initial
RSA withdrawal (reflecting regulation), followed by RSA augmentation (perhaps facilitating social
engagement) was linked with more positive interactive synchrony between mother and child during
task (Giuliano, Skowron, and Berkman, 2015). These results point to the importance of considering
the temporal dynamics of RSA in addition to mean level task differences. A similar conclusion can
be drawn when considering associations between parental heart rate and parenting behavior.
For example, mean level heart rate during a parent-child interaction was unrelated to the quality
of parenting among parents of adolescents (Manczak, McLean, McAdams, and Chen, 2015). How-
ever, a pattern of increasing parental heart rate near the beginning of a conflict discussion believed
to reflect SNS activation, followed by decreasing heart rate during the resolution of the conflict
believed to reflect PNS activation, was associated with greater emotional availability to the child
(Zhang, Cui, Han, and Yan, 2017). Likewise, highly sensitive mothers demonstrated a greater increase
in heart rate when presented with infant cry stimuli compared with less sensitive mothers ( Joosen
et al., 2013), and synchronous mother-infant heart rate occurs more during episodes of behavioral
synchrony, a feature of sensitive maternal behavior (Feldman, Magori-Cohen, Galili, Singer, and
Louzoun, 2011). Thus, more optimal parenting occurs among parents whose heart rate changes in a
pattern that is well-matched to the child’s state or task demands.
Patterns of Arousal and Regulation

Although main effects of physiological regulation are notable, patterns of arousal and regulation or
the extent to which regulation modulates arousal is particularly important in relation to parenting
and may explain mixed findings with regard to skin conductance level (i.e., physiological arousal).
635
This perspective stems from the aforementioned view that moderate levels of arousal, or arousal that
is well regulated, promote sympathy and prosocial responding as opposed to personal distress, which
prompts a focus on self and less competent social behavior (Eisenberg and Eggum, 2008). Consistent
with this view, the association between indices of negative maternal affect (i.e., high basal cortisol,
which reflects chronic stress arousal and reports of being overwhelmed or flooded by child misbe-
havior) and negative maternal behaviors was attenuated among mothers who demonstrated high
RSA withdrawal from baseline to a stressful parenting task (Lorber et al., 2016; Mills-Koonce et al.,
2009). Both studies focused on RSA withdrawal as a moderator of the effect of parental negative
affect, but not SNS arousal, on parenting. Most studies, however, have included simultaneous physi-
ological indicators from the SNS and PNS.
Although the SNS and PNS are often viewed as acting in an antagonistic fashion such that if one
is high, then the other is low, a variety of patterns is, in fact, apparent, reflects different underlying
physiological states, and has different implications for behavior (Berntson, Norman, Hawkley, and
Cacioppo, 2008). It has been argued that high SCL augmentation from baseline to a stressful par-
enting task accompanied by high RSA withdrawal reflects a state in which arousal and regulation
counterbalance one another in an optimal fashion promoting parents’ ability to focus on their child’s
cues, interpret them accurately, empathize with their state, and prioritize child needs over their own,
thereby enhancing sensitivity (Leerkes et al., 2015). In contrast, high SCL augmentation accompa-
nied by low RSA withdrawal may be viewed as under-regulation. Mothers in this dysregulated state
may be particularly likely to interpret infant cues negatively and prioritize their own needs, contrib-
uting to insensitive responding. Likewise, low SCL augmentation accompanied by high RSA with-
drawal may reflect overregulation and prompt flat affect and nonresponsiveness, because it reflects a
lack of awareness of child cues or limited motivation to intervene.
Support for this perspective was evidenced in a prospective, longitudinal study of first-time moth-
ers (Leerkes et al., 2015). During the third trimester, mothers’ RSA and SCL were measured during
a resting baseline and while exposed to videos of crying infants. After each video, mothers were
interviewed about their emotional and cognitive responses. Subsequently, maternal sensitivity was
rated during a series of distress-eliciting tasks when their infants were 6 months old. Mothers who
demonstrated high SCL augmentation accompanied by low RSA withdrawal engaged in more nega-
tive, parent-oriented social cognition about crying, which, in turn, predicted less sensitive maternal
behavior with her own infant more than 6 months later. This indirect effect of dysregulated arousal
via social cognition was statistically significant over a host of covariates including trait measures
of maternal emotion and emotion regulation demonstrating the unique role of parenting-related
arousal and regulation on sensitivity. As a follow-up, mothers’ RSA and SCL while interacting with
their own infants during distress-eliciting tasks at 6 months were assessed, and mothers reported on
their social cognition during these interactions using a video-recall procedure. High SCL arousal
accompanied by high RSA regulation were linked with more positive, infant-oriented social cogni-
tion (including empathy), which, in turn, predicted more sensitive maternal behavior (Leerkes, Su,
et al., 2016).
Other researchers have utilized different approaches to examine direct effects of patterns of
arousal and regulation (SNS/PNS) in relation to parenting. In one such study, profiles of sympa-
thovagal balance (i.e., the ratio by which heart rate is controlled by the SNS versus the PNS) across
Strange Situation episodes were identified and examined in relation to observed parenting during a
free-play task (Sturge-Apple, Skibo, Rogosch, Ignjatovic, and Heinzelman, 2011). Mothers who were
moderately aroused, characterized by a balanced ratio of SNS and PNS activation during separations
and recovery during reunion episodes, engaged in more sensitive and less negative behavior with
their infants than the other groups. Mothers who were hyper-aroused characterized by higher SNS
relative to PNS control of the heart and engaged in high levels of harsh and intrusive parenting.
Mothers who were hypo-aroused, characterized by higher PNS relative to SNS control of the heart,
636
were disengaged with their infants. Using a different approach to assess patterns of SNS/PNS acti-
vation, Miller et al. (2015) standardized indicators of mothers’ SNS activation (cardiac pre-ejection
period) and PNS activation (RSA) during challenging joint problem-solving tasks with their chil-
dren. They then calculated their sum to assess activation across systems, and their difference to assess
dominance of one system relative to the other. Mothers with a pattern of high-SNS dominance were
rated as more negative while interacting with their preschoolers. Mothers who demonstrated high
activation across both systems reported fewer negative parenting behaviors relative to mothers who
demonstrated co-inhibition (i.e., low SNS and PNS activity). The associations between physiological
patterns and parenting in both studies are primarily consistent with the joint pattern perspective, but
the possible intermediary role of social-cognitive factors was not considered.
Associations of Physiological Arousal and Regulation

With Child Outcomes
Relatively little research exists on the links between physiological measures of parental arousal and
regulation and child outcomes, and evidence of main effects is mixed. For example, in one study,
there was a concurrent association between maternal physiological dysregulation during the Strange
Situation procedure (high RSA/low RSA withdrawal) and attachment insecurity (Hill-Soderlund
et al., 2008); whereas in a similar study, no such effect was apparent (Smith, Woodhouse, Clark, and
Skowron, 2016). In a study with preschoolers, maternal and child RSA during a cleanup task cor-
related positively, and synchronous mother-child RSA across tasks was linked with children’s lower
externalizing symptoms (Lunkenheimer et al., 2015). It may be that the better regulated a mother is
during a stressful task, the better regulated her child is, but the reverse could also be true, making it
difficult to draw strong conclusions about causality.
Scant research considering patterns of maternal arousal and regulation in relation to child outcomes
has been conducted, but in research that exists, maternal sensitivity was directly tested as a possible
mediator. Once again, the interaction between RSA and SCL predicted child outcomes, but neither
operated as a main effect in relation to infant attachment disorganization, attachment security, or
mother-reported behavior problems (Leerkes, Gedaly, and Su, 2016; Leerkes et al., 2017). In each case,
mother’s heightened SCL while interacting with her infant during distress-eliciting tasks at 6 months
was linked with negative child outcomes (insecure or disorganized attachment, higher behavior prob-
lems) only if her simultaneous RSA withdrawal was low. These effects were direct and not accounted
for by maternal behavior. Thus, across outcomes, heightened maternal arousal when interacting with
her infant was not in and of itself maladaptive. Rather, poorly regulated maternal arousal was linked to
less adaptive social cognition, insensitive maternal behavior, and maladaptive child outcomes.
In summary, evidence suggests that parents’ physiological regulation and well-regulated arousal
during challenging tasks are linked with more optimal parenting behavior and more adaptive child
outcomes. Physiological arousal in and of itself seems more consistently related with indices of harsh
parenting than positive parenting. Although few have considered social-cognitive processes as media-
tors, those that have lend support to the integrated model (Figure 18.1). The bulk of research on phys-
iological predictors of parenting has been conducted with mothers of young children; thus, additional
research with fathers and with parents of older children is warranted. Given accumulating evidence
that parenting-related emotion is an important predictor of parenting and child outcomes, factors
that predict individual differences in parenting-related emotions and regulation are reviewed ahead.
Individual Differences in Parenting-Related Emotions

As noted in Figure 18.1, parents’ tendency toward certain forms and intensities of parenting-related
emotion and emotion regulation are rooted in a number of individual-difference factors in the
637
parent (i.e., the database), but characteristics of the child and broader context play a role also (Dix,
1991). As such, the social information-processing model in Figure 18.1 may be thought of as embed-
ded within the broader context. Central predictors are highlighted ahead, but this is not an exhaus-
tive review (for a thorough review on the determinants of parenting, see Belsky and Jaffee, 2006;
Bornstein, 2016). Furthermore, although presented separately, these predictors may additively or
interactively transact, within or across domains, to predict individual differences in parents’ emo-
tions. For example, the accumulation of stress in parents’ economic, marital, social, and mental health
domains tends to decrease parental well-being, and thus may decrease the likelihood of empathic,
child-oriented emotions and related behaviors (Newland, 2014).
Components of the Database
Developmental History and Adult Attachment

Parents’ developmental history, particularly the nature of parenting they experienced in childhood,
or how they make meaning of parenting experiences, relates to many forms of parenting-related
emotion likely because it shapes schemas about emotions and relationships. For example, mothers’
secure attachment representations predict greater parenting-related joy/pleasure with toddlers (Slade,
Belsky, Aber, and Phelps, 1999), empathy with infants and school-age children (Leerkes et al., 2015;
Stern, Borelli, and Smiley, 2015), and better physiological regulation when exposed to infant crying
(Ablow et al., 2013). In contrast, insecure dismissing mothers report greater perceptions of infant
cries as aversive and more feelings of anger in response to infant cries than secure-autonomous
mothers (Ablow et al., 2013). Likewise, insecure representations predict observed angry/intrusive
parenting with toddlers (Adam, Gunnar, and Tanaka, 2004), presumably reflecting parent-oriented
negative affect. A similar pattern of negative, parent-oriented affect is apparent among parents of
infants and older children who self-report high levels of attachment avoidance or anxiety ( Jones,
Cassidy, and Shaver, 2015). Beyond adult attachment representations, mothers’ reports of parental
emotional rejection in childhood predict less empathy and more negative emotions in response to
infant cry stimuli (Leerkes and Crockenberg, 2006), and mothers with a history of family abuse/
violence display greater hostility during interactions with their 4- to 6-year-old children (Bailey,
DeOliveira, Wolfe, Evans, and Hartwick, 2012). Thus, negative experiences in the family of origin
consistently predict more negative and parent-oriented affect and perhaps poorer emotion regulation
during emotionally evocative parent-child interactions, although additional research on the latter
would be beneficial because few studies to date have addressed associations between family of origin
experiences and parenting-related emotion regulation.
Personality and Emotion Traits

Stable traits also relate to parent emotions because general tendencies influence domain-specific
behavior. In studies of parents of both young children and adolescents, higher extraversion, open-
ness, and agreeableness correlate with mothers’ and fathers’ expressiveness of positive emotion in the
family, whereas expressiveness of negative emotion correlates with higher neuroticism and lower
agreeableness (Hughes and Gullone, 2010; Smith et al., 2007). Likewise, mothers’ agreeableness is
positively associated with empathy in response to infant crying, whereas neuroticism is associated
with mother-oriented anger and anxiety (Leerkes et al., 2015).
Global emotion traits also play an important role in parenting-related emotion. For example, trait-
positive emotionality is associated with higher empathy toward crying infants, whereas trait-negative
emotionality is associated with higher mother-oriented anxiety and anger (Leerkes et al., 2015),
and self-reports of global emotion regulation are associated with self-reports of parenting-related
638
emotion regulation when interacting with young children (Lorber, 2012; Ravindran et al., 2015).
Moreover, currently unpublished work suggests that global emotion regulation predicts physiologi-
cal indices of arousal and regulation while parenting. Specifically, in the sample described previ-
ously (Leerkes, Su, et al., 2016), mothers completed the Difficulties with Emotion Regulation Scale
(Gratz and Roemer, 2004) at 6 months postpartum, prior to engaging in the laboratory observation
with their infants. Mothers who reported more emotion regulation difficulties demonstrated poorer
physiological regulation while interacting with their infants as indexed by lower RSA withdrawal
during the interactive tasks relative to baseline. Additionally, mothers who demonstrated dysregu-
lated arousal (high SCL augmentation/low RSA withdrawal) during the interactive tasks, the pat-
tern associated with less adaptive social cognition, less sensitive maternal behavior, and maladaptive
child outcomes (Leerkes, Gedaly, and Su, 2016; Leerkes, Su, et al., 2016, 2017) reported higher
emotion regulation difficulties than mothers who demonstrated well-regulated arousal (high SCL
augmentation/low RSA withdrawal). In summary, stable emotion tendencies and personality traits
predict parenting-related emotions and the regulation of parenting-related emotion, but these asso-
ciations are generally small to moderate, suggesting trait measures of affect are not a strong proxy for
parenting-related affect.
Parental Psychopathology
Among parent mental health factors, depression consistently relates to less positive emotional quality
during parent-child interactions (Lovejoy, Graczyk, O’Hare, and Neuman, 2000). Given depres-
sive symptoms may increase a focus on self, it is not surprising that mothers’ depressive symptoms
are linked with more mother-oriented negative emotions, fewer child-oriented positive emotions/
empathy, and greater negative reactivity to difficult child behavior during parent-child interaction
with infants and toddlers (Dix et al., 2004; 2014; Leerkes, 2010). Additionally, depressed mothers
demonstrate blunted physiological regulation during stressful parent-child interactions (Oppenhe-
imer, Measelle, Laurent, and Ablow, 2013) and less neural activation in brain regions implicated in
affect and motivation when exposed to infant emotional stimuli (Laurent and Ablow, 2013).
Although less frequently studied, it seems likely that other aspects of mental health may also influ-
ence parenting-related emotion and regulation. For example, it may be the case that anxious parents
experience heightened self-focused anxiety in stressful conditions, which undermines parenting and
child outcomes.That first-time mothers demonstrate elevated general worry and cortisol responding,
reflecting stress reactivity, during parent-child interaction with their toddlers relative to multiparous
mothers, and worry was associated with more overprotective parenting supports this view (Kalomiris
and Kiel, 2016). Likewise, it may be the case that the highly atypical parenting behaviors observed
among parents of disorganized infants (e.g., engaging in frightening behaviors, appearing frightened
themselves), who often suffer from severe forms of psychopathology including post-traumatic stress
disorder and borderline personality disorder, may be the result of emotion regulation difficulties
(Enlow, Egeland, Carlson, Blood, and Wright, 2014; Gratz et al., 2014; Lyons-Ruth and Jacobvitz,
2016). In summary, parental psychopathology, particularly depressive symptoms, is implicated in par-
enting-related affect and affect-regulation, but additional research in this area is warranted.
Parenting Knowledge, Beliefs, and Experience

Parents’ prior experiences with children, knowledge of child development, and beliefs about par-
enting influence their expectations for child behavior (Bornstein, Cote, Haynes, Hahn, and Park,
2010). When these expectations are violated, parents may be more likely to experience negative and
parent-oriented emotions. Consistent with this view, prior experience caring for young children, and
positive and infant-oriented beliefs about crying, predict mothers’ heightened empathy and reduced
639
mother-oriented anger and anxiety in response to infant crying (Leerkes et al., 2015; Leerkes, Su,
et al., 2016). In contrast, negative, traditional, or authoritarian parenting beliefs may increase the
likelihood of parents’ experiencing anger in response to child noncompliance (Coplan et al., 2002;
Hastings and Rubin, 1999). The history of the relationship with the child may also influence parents’
emotions such that parents who feel a stronger bond or attachment with a child may be more likely
to experience empathic/child-oriented emotions in contrast to negative, parent-oriented emotions
in response to challenging child behaviors. Conversely, parents who have a history of difficulty
managing the child’s negative reactivity may be increasingly likely to experience parent-oriented
emotions and more likely to enact harsh parenting behaviors in response to child cues (Scaramella
and Leve, 2004). Child characteristics are also paramount because parenting-related emotions are in
response to child behavior.
Child Characteristics
It has long been recognized that child characteristics influence parents’ behavioral and emotional
reactions (Bell, 1968). For example, the age of the child may impact parents’ emotion responses to
the child because certain stages of development, such as the “terrible twos” are simply more difficult
for parents, which may affect parenting-related emotions. As children grow older, their ability to
autonomously align their behavior with parental socialization goals increases (Teti and Huang, 2005),
which may lead to reductions in certain types of parent-oriented emotions. Likewise, child disability
or developmental disorders can impact the parent-child relationship and parents’ emotional and psy-
chological well-being in the parenting role. In general, parents’ negative emotions and stress appear
to be impacted by child mastery of skills, symptom severity, and behavior problems (Hauser-Cram,
Warfield, Shonkoff, and Krauss, 2001; Stewart, McGillivray, Forbes, and Austin, 2017). Thus, different
forms of positive and negative emotions may be experienced by parents on the basis of children’s
developmental age and status.
Child temperament, the most frequently considered child characteristic in relation to parenting
affect, may also increase the likelihood of certain parenting emotions because it affects the difficulty
inherent in parenting, the amount and type of reinforcement parents receive for their efforts, and
their expectations for child behavior based on previous experiences with the child. In particular,
child negative emotionality or parents’ perceptions of child difficulty is associated with less posi-
tive and more negative parenting responses (Kiff, Lengua, and Zalewski, 2011). More difficult child
behaviors including crying and misbehavior are linked with parents’ concurrent reports of negative,
parent-oriented emotions and physiological arousal (Del Vecchio et al., 2016; Leerkes, Su, et al.,
2016; Lorber and O’Leary, 2005), but the intensity of infant crying is also linked with parental empa-
thy in the moment (Leerkes, Su, et al., 2016). Thus, the extent to which child negative emotionality
undermines adaptive parental affect may depend on children’s stable temperamental traits. Consistent
with this view, there is some evidence that temperamental characteristics interact with children’s
in-the-moment responses to predict parents’ emotions such that parents are more likely to display
negative affect when children display negative affect in the moment and parents perceive them to
have more extreme temperamental characteristics generally, including high surgency or negative
emotionality (Fields-Olivieri, Cole, and Maggi, 2017). Parental traits may also mitigate the impact of
children’s challenging temperament traits on parenting-related emotion (Crockenberg and Leerkes,
2003). In one study, mothers who reported more problematic temperamental characteristics in their
3- to 7-year-old children displayed more negative and less positive affect during parent-child inter-
actions; however, these relations were attenuated in mothers with lower trait-negative affect, higher
surgency, or higher orienting sensitivity (Atzaba-Poria, Deater-Deckard, and Bell, 2014). Aspects of
child temperament other than negative emotionality have been studied less frequently in relation to
parents’ emotion, but there is some evidence that parents experience more positive, child-oriented
640
emotions if their children are well-regulated and high in positive emotionality (Cole et al., 2013;
Kochanska, Friesenborg, Lange, and Martel, 2004).
Contextual Factors
Although not illustrated in Figure 18.1, family and contextual factors also play a role in parents’ emo-
tional experiences because stress and support affect how parents perceive and are affected by child
behaviors (Dix, 1991). Social and relational assets like positive marital and social relationship experi-
ences and availability of social/material support relate to more positive emotions about the child and
parenting role and more empathic or child-oriented responses to infant distress (Andresen and Tell-
een, 1992; Leerkes and Crockenberg, 2006). In contrast, sources of ecological and life stress, particu-
larly those associated with financial distress, have been consistently linked to angry, withdrawn, and
less positive parenting (Kaiser and Delaney, 1996). Ahead, we highlight the role of socioeconomic
status and culture in predicting parenting-related emotion and emotion regulation.
Socioeconomic Status
Two frequently studied aspects of socioeconomic status in relation to parenting are parental edu-
cation and family income. More educated parents may have better access to and perhaps seek out
better quality parenting-related information. In fact, more educated mothers of toddlers reported
that written parenting materials were more helpful, which accounted for some of the associa-
tion between their education and their knowledge of child development (Bornstein et al., 2010).
Presumably more accurate knowledge of child development is linked with more realistic attribu-
tions for child behavior and perhaps less negative parenting-related emotion. In fact, most studies
cited in this chapter have not reported on the association between parents’ education and their
parenting-related emotion or emotion regulation. The few that have demonstrate mixed results
regarding associations with parental emotion/arousal. For example, education was not significantly
associated with mothers’ reported emotional reactions to videos of crying infants (Leerkes et al.,
2015), but was associated with heightened SCL reactivity, reflecting arousal, during emotionally
arousing interactive tasks with their own infants (Leerkes, Su, et al., 2016). In contrast, maternal
education was consistently unrelated to maternal physiological regulation (i.e., RSA) in response
to videos of crying infants (Leerkes et al., 2015), when interacting with their infants (Leerkes, Su,
et al., 2016), and when interacting with their young children (Skowron et al., 2013). Additional
research about the role of parental education in parenting-related emotions is warranted for meth-
odological and conceptual reasons. Methodologically, is seems probable that social desirability may
be heightened among more educated parents, which may affect how they self-report on emotional
reactions, particularly negative emotions. As such, this may be an important control variable. Con-
ceptually, it seems probable that education is related to parental cognitions about child behavior,
which likely plays a key role in parents’ emotional responding. As such, effects of education on
parenting-related affective processes are likely indirect, but may have important implications for
screening and intervention purposes.
The stressors affiliated with low income (e.g., inability to meet the family’s health or material
needs, low-quality or unsafe living conditions, limited leisure time), may also make parents more
susceptible to heightened negative emotions, reduced positive emotions, and depleted regulatory
resources in response to child behavior (Dix, 1991; Kaiser and Delaney, 1996). Consistent with this
view, unmarried, impoverished, and less educated mothers of 5-year-olds expressed more negative
and less positive affect when describing their children (Martin, Razza, and Brooks-Gunn, 2015),
suggesting that the effects of poverty on parenting may be accounted for, in part, by parental affect.
Similar to parent education, few studies reviewed in this chapter have explored income as a primary
641
variable of interest. However, when explored as a potential covariate of parental emotions, greater
income has been found to relate to less anger in response to infant crying, and more adaptive emo-
tion regulation abilities in mothers (Leerkes et al., 2011; Morelan et al., 2016). Nonetheless, a larger
number of cited studies reported null or inconsistent links between income and relevant emotional
variables (Bailey et al., 2012; Dix et al., 2004; Lunkenheimer et al., 2011; Stern et al., 2015).
Inconsistent findings across studies may reflect untested moderating effects with other family
or parental qualities that alter the association between socioeconomic status and parenting-related
emotions. For example, in a meta-analytic study, depression related to moderately less positive emo-
tional quality in parent-child interactions only for mothers classified as economically disadvantaged
(Lovejoy et al., 2000). Likewise, mothers’ cumulative reported stressors, including potential socioeco-
nomic risks like lower maternal/paternal education, paternal unemployment, and a greater number
of children in the home, related to mothers’ lower scores on a positive affect measure composed
of trait and parenting emotions and a measure of global emotion regulation capacity composed of
self-report items and resting vagal tone (Deater-Deckard, Li, and Bell, 2016). However, the positive
relation between stressors and a similar measure of negative affect was significant only for mothers
with poorer emotion regulation capacities. This study addressed the idea that poor emotion regula-
tion may strengthen the links between stressors and negative parenting emotions; however, it is also
possible that relations between poorer emotion regulation and negative emotion are stronger in
the context of high socioeconomic stress. Additionally, indirect effects of socioeconomic status on
parenting-related emotion are possible. For example, mothers’ socioeconomic risk (e.g., single parent
status, living in mobile or multifamily housing, low maternal/paternal education, paternal unem-
ployment) had a robust negative relation with executive function abilities or the cognitive regulation
of attention and memory (Deater-Deckard, Chen, Wang, and Bell, 2012). Further, greater cumu-
lative socioeconomic risks exacerbated the negative association between home chaos and moth-
ers’ executive function. Given executive function influences cognitive, emotional, and behavioral
responses to the environment, mothers with greater executive function skills should be less likely
to display deficits like distractibility found to predict reactively harsh or negative parenting. Thus,
executive function difficulties may be one mechanism through which socioeconomic stressors chal-
lenge parents’ abilities to display child-oriented emotional responses.
Ethnicity and Culture

It has also been proposed that ethnic and cultural differences in the acceptability of positive and
negative emotions relate to parents’ emotion socialization goals, and thus how parents display and
encourage these emotions with their children (Cole and Tan, 2015; Dunbar, Leerkes, Coard, Sup-
ple, and Calkins, 2017). Cultural differences in parents’ child-oriented goals for child competence
and well-being also have notable implications for parents’ emotions while parenting. Non-Hispanic
Caucasian parents from Western cultures are found to express a relatively high degree of positive
emotion and affection with their children, presumed to result from the value placed on maintaining
emotional closeness in the parent-child relationship while also encouraging sociability and inde-
pendence in their children (Chen, Fu, and Zhao, 2015; Cole and Tan, 2015). Conversely, Asian
parents are found to display relatively lower levels of positive emotion to their children and to utilize
negative emotional reactions to address socialization goals of child self-control and success in an
interdependent society. Similarly, an emphasis on hierarchy and obedience to authority figures, often
characteristic of Asian or Central American families, may encourage a relative reduction in parental
positive emotion expression when self-control or teaching goals are salient to the parent, but allow
for empathy or positive emotions in other caregiving contexts. It is less clear how these cultural dif-
ferences underlie patterns of felt emotions while parenting compared with emotional expression,
642
although it might be inferred that positive emotional experiences are more closely tied to different
forms of child behavior based on cultural values.
Social-ecological factors may also help to explain some cultural differences in parental emotions.
Dunbar and colleagues (2017) proposed that given the broad context of racial discrimination in the
United States, parents of African American children may experience concerns for both their chil-
dren’s cultural socialization as well as their children’s preparedness to experience racial bias, which
may contribute to how they socialize child emotions. Compared with European American parents,
parents of African American children judge their children’s displays of negative emotions as less
acceptable and, in boys, perceive greater negative social consequences for these emotions (Nelson,
Leerkes, O’Brien, Calkins, and Marcovitch, 2012). Encouraging the expression of negative emotions,
typically viewed as a supportive response in research on European American parents, was found to
relate to lower teacher-reported academic performance and social competence in African American
children (Nelson et al., 2013). Accordingly, African American parents have been found to report
fewer supportive reactions and more unsupportive responses to their children’s negative emotions
and to display lower observed emotion regulation skills during a conflict discussion with their child
relative to European American parents (Morelen et al., 2016; Nelson et al., 2012). Thus, it is possible
that African American parents experience greater levels of negative emotion in response to their
children’s negative emotions and behavior compared with European American parents. However,
these negative emotions may be motivated, in part, by a child-oriented concern for the develop-
ment of bias preparation and readiness to successfully navigate the majority culture. Further, ethnic
differences in rates of negative or harsh parenting responses may be confounded by other ecological
factors such as neighborhood quality and family financial resources (Pinderhughes, Nix, Foster, Jones
and the Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group, 2001). Last, although a great deal of research
on cultural differences in parenting compares Western, industrialized, and/or Caucasian samples
with other groups based on race/ethnicity or nationality, shifts in technology and globalization may
contribute to both methodologically richer conceptions of culture as well as less defined boundaries
between cultural groups (Chen et al., 2015; Cole and Tan, 2015).
In summary, multiple parent, child, and contextual factors influence the type and intensity of
parenting-related emotions experienced by parents and their ability to regulate those emotions.
These findings suggest that parenting-related emotion may operate as an untested mediator of links
between these more distal factors or global traits and parenting behavior as suggested by Belsky and
Jaffee (2006). Such findings have important implications for intervention.
Applied Implications of Parenting-Related Emotions

The existing literature on the role of emotions in parenting and child outcomes underscores the
promise of interventions aimed at parental emotion and emotion regulation. For example, train-
ing parents to be mindful of their own arousal and to regulate their distress when confronted with
challenging parenting situations may enhance their ability to focus on child needs rather than their
own. Efforts to enhance parental cue detection and empathy and reduce negative beliefs and attribu-
tions about child behavior may be particularly effective in conjunction with such approaches. Many
of these components are built into existing interventions targeting parents of infants and young
children, such as the mindfulness-enhanced Strengthening Families Program (Coatsworth, Duncan,
Greenberg, and Nix, 2010), Attachment and Biobehavioral Catch-Up (Bick and Dozier, 2013), the
Circle of Security (Cassidy et al., 2010), the Video-Feedback Intervention to Promote Positive Par-
enting ( Juffer, Bakermans-Kranenburg, and van iJzendoorn, 2008), Minding the Baby (Slade et al.,
2005), emotion coaching interventions (Havighurst et al., 2013), and Enhanced Triple P (Positive
Parenting Program; Sanders, Markie-Dadds, Tully, and Bor, 2000).
643
Although the intervention studies conducted to date demonstrate these approaches are effective
at enhancing parenting and/or child outcomes, it is not clear which of the targeted underlying skills,
such as parental emotion regulation, awareness of child cues, or empathy, have, in fact, been enhanced
as they have not typically been directly measured. In the future, precise work of this nature could
offer important insights on enhancements to existing interventions and inform basic science about
the predictors of optimal parenting. The methods used to assesses parenting-related emotions, emo-
tion regulation, and physiology summarized in this chapter could be useful in this regard. In addi-
tion, existing evidence about factors that predict individual differences in parenting-related emotion
could be used to develop screening tools to identify which parents may be in greatest need of this
type of intervention. Of course, emotion-focused intervention efforts are likely to be most effective
if embedded within or offered in tandem with interventions that address other existing stressors/
problems (e.g., income assistance, mental health treatment).
Future Directions in the Study of Parenting-Related Emotions

Although research on the role of affective processes and parenting has proliferated, research in this
area could be expanded and refined in several ways. First, at the most basic level, descriptive infor-
mation about the range and intensity of emotions experienced during typical and atypical parent-
ing activities across children’s developmental stages would be useful to shed light on normative
versus atypical parental emotion experiences and to facilitate parent education. Second, relatively
few researchers make distinctions between parent-oriented versus child-oriented emotions, despite
a strong conceptual argument for doing so (Dix, 1991). Procedures laid out by Dix et al. (2004) for
the careful coding of the orientation of affect should be applied more frequently. However, given
this interview technique is time consuming, we are in the process of validating a parental self-report
that clarifies the orientation of emotions in response to infant crying. Sample items include “When
my child cries, . . .” “I feel sad for my child” (child-oriented), “I feel sad for myself because I have
to deal with it” (parent-oriented), “I feel annoyed at my child for pulling me away from other
things” (parent-oriented), and “I feel angry at the situation or person that upset my child” (child-
oriented). The items were developed after conducting extensive interviews with parents (Leerkes,
2010; Leerkes et al., 2015), and preliminary evidence indicates that the self-reported scales converge
with our extensive interview measure, correlate with observed maternal behavior as expected, and
predict relevant child outcomes. Such a measure could be adapted for other emotional contexts, such
as discipline or conflict encounters. Applying the lens of parent- versus child orientation to the study
of parental emotion regulation is also of value to determine if the finding that benefits of parental
emotion suppression are primarily apparent if done for child-oriented reasons as demonstrated by
Martini and Busseri (2012) is replicated in other samples. If so, nuanced information about when
parental emotion suppression is adaptive may inform parent education and intervention efforts.
Third, more breadth and nuance in the types of parental emotions and physiological systems stud-
ied are needed. Additional research focused on parent-oriented negative emotion beyond anger, such
as anxiety, guilt, and worry, is needed. Likewise, additional research on the role of positive parenting-
emotion and its regulation would be beneficial. Moreover, considering the balance or ratio of posi-
tive, child-oriented emotion to negative, parent-oriented emotion may be useful for three reasons.
First, flexibility and diversity in emotional states during social interaction is adaptive (Lougheed
and Hollenstein, 2016). Second, the defensive exclusion of positive or negative emotions may have
consequences for both parent and child (Cassidy, 1994). Third, high levels of child-oriented emo-
tion/regulation may come at a cost to parents’ well-being (Le and Impett, 2016). Although research
focused on autonomic nervous system responding while parenting has yielded fascinating results,
considering additional physiological systems, such as HPA axis responding (e.g., cortisol; Kalomiris
and Kiel, 2016), could be useful in the study of parental affect. Such research could address whether
644
parental cortisol reactivity during parenting predicts parenting-related emotion and regulation, par-
enting behavior, and child outcomes over and above parents’ general cortisol stress reactivity, or if
variation in patterns of diurnal cortisol relate to the relative valence or magnitude of parents’ emo-
tional and/or regulatory responses to child behavior. Of course, the time lag between stressor and
response and other methodological concerns make assessing cortisol reactions to parenting-related
stressors somewhat difficult. Given the expense of gathering physiological measures, validated, inex-
pensive, and time-efficient measures of parental emotion and particularly parenting-related emotion
regulation are needed, particularly for applied researchers.
Fourth, additional research testing the mechanisms linking parental affect to parenting and child
outcomes is needed. In addition to prospective, longitudinal designs, brief experimental manipula-
tions could expose such processes. For example, examining the impact of parental mood induction
on both parent social cognition and behavior is of value as it would allow stronger conclusions
about the direction of effects than correlational research. Likewise, training parents to engage in the
same practice while expressing different forms of affect and observing child reactions could address
the possibility that parental affect moderates the association between specific practices and child
outcomes.
Finally, the literature to date primarily focuses on main effect associations between parenting-
related emotion or emotion regulation and (1) parenting behavior and (2) child outcomes. Greater
attention to contextual and personal factors that moderate these associations is warranted. For exam-
ple, the extent to which parental negative emotions undermine parenting quality or parental emotion
regulation capacities enhance parenting quality may vary depending on the presences of other con-
textual stressors (e.g., Deater-Deckard et al., 2016). It is reasonable that both may be more strongly
associated with parenting outcomes in the context of elevated contextual risk. Further, certain chil-
dren, particularly those with heightened negative emotionality, may be more susceptible to the nega-
tive effects of parental arousal and dysregulation either via differential susceptibility (e.g., Belsky and
Pluess, 2013) or diathesis stress (e.g., Zuckerman, 1999) effects. Finally, children’s interpretations of
parental emotion and the manner in which it affects them may vary as a function of culture. As an
example, African American children may view parental anger in response to their distress as norma-
tive and protective in the context of racism, whereas European American children may view parental
anger in response to distress as nonnormative and an indication of limited parental concern or affec-
tion (Leerkes, Supple, and Gudmundson, 2014; Perry, Leerkes, Dunbar, and Cavanaugh, 2017). These
differences in emotion belief systems may explain why the same emotion-related parenting behaviors
have a negative effect on European American children but not African American children (Leerkes,
Supple, Su, and Cavanaugh, 2015). Moving forward, it would be advantageous if the suggested efforts
occurred in more ethnically and culturally diverse samples, across a range of child ages and stages, and
included both fathers and mothers more consistently.
Conclusion
In the time since Dix (1991) laid out his conceptualization about the affective organization of
parenting, research supporting key propositions has accumulated. Parenting is clearly an emotional
activity, involving the daily experience of positive and negative emotion. Positive, empathic, and
child-oriented emotions serve to promote parenting behavior that prioritizes child concerns, leading
to positive developmental outcomes for children. In contrast, high levels of negative, parent-oriented
emotion undermine the social cognitive factors that promote a focus on child concerns. The emerg-
ing physiological work clearly demonstrates that the ability to regulate emotions plays a critical role
in modulating associations between negative parenting-related emotion and both parenting behavior
and child outcomes. Moreover, the research related to parental emotion suggests that in-the-moment
parental affect and regulation may be one proximal process by which more frequently studied distal
645
factors (e.g., contextual stress) and broad parental traits (e.g., personality) influence parenting behav-
ior. Existing literature on the role of parenting-related emotion and its regulation in relation to
parenting sets the stage for additional theory refinement and basic science related to the origins of
parenting, and for the continued and expanded design, refinement, and dissemination of interven-
tions focused on parenting-related emotion and affiliated processes.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported, in part, by a postdoctoral fellowship provided by the National Institute of
Child Health and Human Development (T32-HD07376) through the Center for Developmental
Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, to the second author.
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19
PARENTING SELF-EFFICACY
Introduction
Usually, papers on parenting self-efficacy greet their readers with the Janus head of parenting: An
activity that can turn from a source of endless pride into agony and sorrow. After at least 800 sci-
entific publications on the subject, it is relevant to ask whether the study of parenting self-efficacy
has made the challenges parents face look a bit less daunting. The concept of parenting self-efficacy
refers to a collection of expectations that parents hold about the success of their parenting activities.
Implicitly and explicitly (Coleman and Karraker, 1998; Ehrensaft, Knous-Westfall, Cohen, and Chen,
2015; Jones and Prinz, 2005), researchers focus on parenting self-efficacy to help tip the balance
toward parental well-being and away from despair. It is also believed that better understanding of the
role of self-efficacy in parental functioning may translate in more effective policy and practice. The
goals of this chapter are to trace the reception of the self-efficacy concept in the study of parent-
ing; to investigate whether the concept of parenting self-efficacy has increased our understanding of
issues related to parenting and parenthood (Coleman and Karraker, 1998); to examine whether core
ideas about the association between parenting self-efficacy, parenting competence, and intervention
mechanisms have held up over time; to discuss measurement of parenting self-efficacy; and to fore-
cast which directions parenting self-efficacy research should take to be of greater value to parents,
professionals, and scientists.
History of the Parenting Self-Efficacy Construct

This section summarizes the history of self-efficacy theory as formulated by Albert Bandura, and
describes how within this framework, parenting researchers applied the self-efficacy concept to the
domain of parenting.
Self-Efficacy Theory
Bandura (1977) formulated a unifying theory of psychological treatment efficacy. In this theory, a
single mechanism accounts for changes in the behaviors targeted by psychological treatments: Psy-
chological procedures cause changes in people’s expectations that they can successfully perform the
targeted behaviors. Bandura used “efficacy expectation” with reference to single discrete behaviors
and used the term “self-efficacy” with reference to the collection of expectations that people hold
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Parenting Self-Efficacy
about their total behavioral repertoire. He based his propositions on social learning theory, which
states that behaviors are learned, not by direct associations with contingencies, but by conscious pro-
cessing of information extracted from the environment. Rather than locating control over behavior
within the environment, as done by proponents of behavioristic theories, Bandura (2001) firmly
stated that people control their behavior and cognitions themselves and assigned considerable impor-
tance to conscious thought. According to Bandura, when people think that they can successfully
enact a particular behavior, it is reasonable to expect that they also will be more likely to display that
behavior, especially if they can expect desirable consequences as a result of the behavior. Bandura
(1977) made a conceptual distinction between expectations of efficacy, “the conviction that one can
successfully execute the behavior required to produce the outcomes” (p. 193), and expectations of
outcome, “a person’s estimate that a given behavior will lead to certain outcomes” (p. 193). Both
sets of expectations alter the likelihood of a given behavior, but if persons perceive their efficacy to
enact a behavior as insufficient, the level of outcome expectation is no longer relevant. When people
judge the success of their performance on the basis of an outcome, the two sets of expectations will
be strongly associated.
Bandura conceptualized efficacy expectations as a dynamic factor varying along three dimensions
within and between individuals. Efficacy expectations differ in magnitude, meaning that sometimes
people expect that they can successfully perform a task at a low level of difficulty, but at other times
or within other settings they expect to be successful in performing very difficult tasks. Differences
in generality describe how broadly the efficacy expectations apply to the tasks or settings at hand.
Differences in strength refer to the perseverance with which people enact behavior despite negative
feedback about the chances of success. Bandura stressed that the multidimensional nature of efficacy
cognitions needs to be carefully considered when attempting to assess dynamic relations between
efficacy expectations and behavior.
The integrative nature of Bandura’s theory of self-efficacy derives from his postulate that efficacy
expectations are built up from four types of information. These types of information are thus the
interface between people’s efficacy expectations and the environment, and are, therefore, highly rel-
evant for explaining individual differences in parenting self-efficacy and for thinking about interven-
tions. The term used for these types of information is ‘sources of self-efficacy’. The most powerful
source is accomplishments of behavior performance. If the goal is to improve another person’s self-efficacy,
one may use a form of induction to have the person perform a particular behavior and make the
person aware of this fact, thus providing evidence that this behavior is within the realm of possi-
ble behaviors. For example, in parenting interventions, unstructured parent-child interactions may
be facilitated. An interventionist may point out, either in the moment or using video-recording,
that positive parenting behavior occurred. By making parents aware of these accomplishments, such
interventions feed the magnitude, generality, and/or strength of parents’ efficacy expectations for
such behavior. In addition to information derived from one’s own experiences, vicarious experiences
may lead to a change in expectations, when successful performances of behavior by other people are
observed. Vicarious experiences will be even more convincing to the extent in which the “models”
enacting the behavior are perceived as like oneself in ways relevant to the behavior. For example,
parenting classes may be a source of parenting self-efficacy if parenting successes are being shared by
participants, and detract from parenting self-efficacy if the focus is exclusively on parenting failures.
A third type of information is verbal persuasion. Improvement of self-efficacy can be achieved by
suggesting to persons that they will be successful in performing particular behaviors or completing
particular tasks. Verbal persuasion is supposed to be a relatively weak source for efficacy expectations
to change, as other people’s perceptions carry less evidentiary value than one’s own experiences. For
example, suggesting without much proof that the parent will be highly sensitive may lead to height-
ened self-efficacy that is vulnerable to confrontation with failure to respond appropriately (Cassé,
Oosterman, and Schuengel, 2015). As a fourth type of information, Bandura put forward emotional
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arousal. If emotional arousal in response to a specific task or setting has a positive valence, such as
in excitement, persons are more likely to expect that their performance will be successful, whereas
negative emotions, such as fear, aversion, or anger, will inform the person that successful performance
is less likely. Thus, emotions and physical states, as experienced when certain tasks are first performed,
may influence people’s expectations about their efficacy, even after emotional and physical responses
to the task or setting have habituated. For example, when parents suffer from anxiety, emotional
arousal that occurs during parenting activities may trigger a threat-related thought scheme, under-
mining the expectation that the activities may lead to success. Bandura stressed that these four types
of information are likely to interact, enhancing or undermining each other’s effects, such as when
a strongly aversive reaction while witnessing someone else perform parenting tasks undermines the
positive effect that such a vicarious experience may otherwise have. Figure 19.1 summarizes the key
concepts and their interrelations in Bandura’s theory on self-efficacy.
According to Bandura (1977), self-efficacy plays an important role in motivation and goal set-
ting. People initiate and persist in a particular behavior because they expect a desired outcome and
because they think that they can perform this behavior. Furthermore, the magnitude of efficacy
expectations creates a standard for behavior, which people use for performance evaluation and self-
reward. People are, therefore, more prone to spend energy and effort on the performance of behav-
iors that they see as likely successful and thus self-rewarding, and they are prone to avoid investment
on tasks that are unlikely to be successful and thus lack this self-rewarding quality. When people are
forced to perform tasks for which they experience low efficacy, affect will turn negative, given the
negative prospect of outcomes and the limited opportunities for self-reward. Of course, if despite
negative feelings a person unexpectedly succeeds on the task, efficacy expectations may be revised
upward. However, it is more likely, according to this theory, that people may become ensnared in
a vicious cycle of weak self-efficacy and unsuccessful performance because performing a task in a
negative affect state decreases the chances of success.
Reception of Self-Efficacy Theory in Parenting Research

Self-efficacy theory (Bandura, 1977) made its way in scholarly thinking about parenting during
a time when scholars broadened their interest from a narrow focus on observable behavior and
Magnitude, generality, strength

efficacy
regarding general, domain-general,
expectaons
domain-specific, and task-specific
behaviors
accomplishments
vicarious experience outcome
verbal persuasion expectaons
arousal
behavior goals &

enactment standards
Figure 19.1 Conceptual model of bandura’s self-efficacy theory
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parenting practices to parental cognitions. This reorientation was part of a paradigm shift in the
behavioral sciences from behavioral learning principles to cognitive and developmental theories.
Researchers expressed hope that the self-efficacy concept would open a window onto the personal
strength and resilience that parents need when facing perilous socioeconomic conditions and mental
health problems of their own (Coleman and Karraker, 1998). Evidently, Bandura’s self-efficacy the-
ory offered plausible mechanisms, such as the types of information people derive their self-efficacy
from, to make parenting interventions more effective. These potential intervention mechanisms were
welcome because traditional forms of educating parents in childrearing skills showed disappointing
results. Supporting parents’ resilience and hardiness by strengthening the proximal psychological
resource of parenting self-efficacy also appeared more feasible than lifting target populations out of
their disadvantaged socioeconomic situations, at least when only short term interventions are con-
sidered. As discussed later in this chapter, on the basis of early applications of self-efficacy theory in
the domain of parenting, programs were developed that explicitly aimed to bolster parents’ efficacy
expectations in specific parenting tasks and settings, using induction of accomplishment performance
as a specific intervention component (Sanders and Woolley, 2005).
Broad application of self-efficacy theory was foreseen by Bandura, stating that “the theoretical
framework . . . is generalizable beyond the psychotherapy domain to other psychological phenomena
involving behavioral choices and regulation of effort in activities that can have adverse effects” (1977,
p. 204). Parenting is clearly a phenomenon where people must make choices for themselves and their
children and where they must regulate their effort to cope with their affective responses to dysregu-
lated behavior of children. Bandura himself published about the impact of parenting self-efficacy on
children’s academic achievement and career orientation (Bandura, Barbaranelli, Caprara, Pastorelli,
2001), at a time when the number of publications on parenting self-efficacy quickly accelerated.
As with any theory or proposition, the parenting field has interpreted and received their theory
and concepts in a variety of ways. One important area of divergence among students of parenting
self-efficacy concerns the level of generality at which they have defined and operationalized the
concept of parenting self-efficacy. Self-efficacy in its most specific form refers to expectations regard-
ing a concrete, circumscribed set of tasks in one or more specific settings. In contrast, self-efficacy in
its most general form refers to a sense of efficacy concerning any task in all settings imaginable. In
between these two extremes lie levels of self-efficacy that refer to tasks and settings associated with
being a parent, or tasks and settings that together form an identifiable component of that role, such
as providing nurturance and comfort to a child. The choice regarding the level at which parenting
self-efficacy is studied has important theoretical ramifications, as highly generalized self-efficacy
would be a stable person characteristic that is resistant to change, whereas task- or setting-specific
self-efficacy would be more responsive and dynamic, bound to the immediate context. Techni-
cally, therefore, a range of parenting-related modifiers of the self-efficacy concept may be defined,
including “parents’ general self-efficacy” for self-efficacy that is not limited to the parenting role but
transcends roles and settings; “parental self-efficacy” for behaviors that include, but are not limited to,
parenting; “parenting self-efficacy” for parenting behaviors proper; and “parenting task- or parent-
ing setting-specific self-efficacy.” In some publications, the purposeful use of these different terms
is explicitly noted (Sanders and Woolley, 2005) or the importance of these distinctions is stressed
(Coleman and Karraker, 1998), but this has not always been the case. Throughout the text of the
current chapter, the term “parenting self-efficacy” is used because most of the empirical knowledge
pertains to self-efficacy at this level of generality; it will be noted when theory or research refers
explicitly to self-efficacy at higher or lower levels of generality
With respect to the other two dimensions, besides generality, on which self-efficacy may vary,
the dimension of magnitude of parenting self-efficacy has received the bulk of researchers’ atten-
tion. More recently, the dimension of strength has also received some attention (Cassé, Oosterman,
and Schuengel, 2015; Kunseler, Oosterman, de Moor, Verhage, and Schuengel, 2016; Verhage,
657
Oosterman, and Schuengel, 2015). Magnitude of self-efficacy can be assessed directly by present-
ing parents with tasks of varying degrees of difficulty and then asking them how confident they are
that they can successfully do these tasks (Bandura, 2006). However, the differences among parents in
standards for those tasks may put such an approach in peril, because some parents may have very low
bars and others very high bars for determining whether a certain task is difficult and whether this
task has been completed successfully. Furthermore, it is not always clear whether in the process of
instrument construction researchers have analyzed parenting tasks and settings and scaled these tasks
and settings according to difficulty level. This problem is sometimes circumvented when parents are
asked how they would sum up their performance as parents, relying on parents themselves to decide
which tasks belong to that domain. Conceptualized in that way, parenting self-efficacy is akin to
parental self-esteem. The section on measurement issues later in this chapter revisits the distinctions
between different levels of self-efficacy, and describes the various ways in which individual differ-
ences in magnitude of parenting self-efficacy have been operationalized.
In summary, research on parenting self-efficacy is conducted within a well-articulated theoreti-
cal framework. This framework specifies the types of cognitions that are likely to motivate behavior
within the parenting role, provides explicit propositions about the types of information that feed
these cognitions, and specifies dimensions along which individual differences in these cognitions
may be described.
State of the Art in Parenting Self-Efficacy

This section describes influential ideas about the role of parenting self-efficacy and provides an over-
view of the subject matter of research activity around this concept. Since previous state-of-the-art
reviews by Coleman and Karraker (1998; 18 studies reviewed) and Jones and Prinz (2005; 47 stud-
ies), the field has expanded with accelerating pace. A systematic bibliographic analysis was, therefore,
conducted to underlie the current review. Articles, books, book chapters, reviews, or other editorial
material indexed in the Web of Science Core Collection by August 3, 2017, were selected on the
basis of topic search (title, abstract, keywords) for parenting self-efficacy, including 15 variants for
this term1. The search based on these criteria yielded 788 records. Figure 19.2 displays the trend in
publication frequency, suggesting exponential growth.
Full records including references were downloaded and imported into the software pro-
gram VOSviewer 1.6.5 (Van Eck and Waltman, 2016) for the construction and visualization of
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Frequency
60
40
20
0
1986
1987
1988
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
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Figure 19.2 Number of publications in web of science on parenting self-efficacy by publication year
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bibliographic networks. This software projects “nodes,” such as publications, authors, or terms, in a
two-dimensional space based on a normalized index for bibliographic similarity (i.e., link strength),
such as the number of co-citations of two publications by third publications or the number of times
two terms occur together in the same publication (Van Eck and Waltman, 2014). In addition, the
program performs cluster analysis on the link strengths to reveal additional distinctions beyond those
that can be derived from the two-dimensional projection. To describe the most influential publica-
tions on parenting self-efficacy, a network of frequently cited publications (20 times or more) was
constructed based on co-citation by the other publications on parenting self-efficacy. To map the
topics and themes studied in relation to parenting self-efficacy, a network was created of co-occur-
rence of terms extracted by natural language processing of titles and abstracts for nouns and adjec-
tive-noun combinations. The algorithm ranks the terms found on the basis of the extent to which
co-occurrence appears systematic or random, keeping only the 60% most relevant terms. From the
447 terms, 268 were presented for further manual selection. Terms were excluded if they referred
to the parenting self-efficacy construct (because publications were already selected on that basis) or
if the term appeared trivial (such as headings of the abstract, statistical terms, or country of study).
Influential Ideas About Parenting Self-Efficacy

In the co-citation map (Figure 19.3), seven clusters could be identified as well as six highly influen-
tial publications. These publications formulate central ideas about parenting self-efficacy, shaping the
direction of research and interpretation of research findings within the body of research. The evolu-
tion of the field over time will be described according to three central ideas that can be extracted
from the six key publications while noting the links between these ideas and the co-citation clusters.
Parenting Self-Efficacy Mediates Risk and Protective Factors

One cluster of publications revolves around the idea that positive parenting self-efficacy directly
promotes well-functioning as a parent. Building on Bandura’s self-efficacy theory, Taylor and Brown
(1994) formulated as a general principle that having positive expectations of one’s ability to affect
the world around, even if somewhat illusory, is normative and contributes to psychological well-
being. The benefits accruing from moderate illusion of control would be especially relevant for the
transition to parenthood. Infants come into the world with only very basic means of self-regulation,
which they can develop only when their parents persist resourcefully in aiding infants to learn how
to regulate their sleep-wake cycles, learn to adapt to regular feeding patterns, and learn to trust their
caregivers for keeping them safe and secure. Parents are hypothesized to be more persistent if they are
optimistic that infants’ initial dysregulation, distress, and relative imperviousness to soothing, reassur-
ance, and guidance would eventually subside because of their parenting. In fact, Taylor and Brown
cited the work by Donovan and Leavitt (1989; Donovan, Leavitt, and Walsh, 1990) on illusion of
control, learned helplessness, and security of parent-infant attachment as evidence for the existence
of a general principle across areas of functioning, namely, that moderate but not extreme illusion of
control is optimal for well-being, mental health, and functioning.
Cutrona and Troutman ’s (1986) study of postpartum depression provided the first empirical
support for parenting self-efficacy as a mechanism that links risk and protective factors to par-
ents’ mental health. Parenting self-efficacy was hypothesized as a mediator through which infant
difficult temperament would undermine maternal feelings of competence, which would, in turn,
engender depressive thoughts and feelings. Social support would compensate these negative feel-
ings by promoting parenting self-efficacy through vicarious experiences and verbal persuasion. This
model received support through path analyses of self-reported depression and social support dur-
ing pregnancy, and depression, infant difficult temperament, and parenting self-efficacy at 3 months
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Figure 19.3 Map of co-cited publications within the body of research on parenting self-efficacy
Note: Co-citation map produced by VOSviewer 1.6.5 (Van Eck and Waltman, 2016), setting minimum number of citations at 20. Labels indicate first author and publication year. The size
of each circle represents the number of citations by the 788 publications on parenting self-efficacy. Publications as belonging to the same cluster on the basis of similarity in co-citation are
identified by color (indicated by the circles in the printed gray-scale version. A full-color, online, interactive version of the map can be accessed by installing VOSviewer and download-
ing the data file (doi:10.17605/OSF.IO/T6JGD).
postpartum. Although the associations strongly converged with theoretical predictions, the modest
sample size for testing a structural multivariate model made it uncertain whether this model would
hold up in other samples.
The idea of parenting self-efficacy as a proximal mediator of risk or protective factors was taken
a step further by Teti and Gelfand (1991), who observed competence during infant feeding and free
play of mothers with and without unipolar depression. This study demonstrated a moderately strong
association between parenting self-efficacy and observed maternal competence (conceptualized
around the sensitivity construct of Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, and Wall, 1978), supporting the idea
that parenting self-efficacy may benefit the parent, and the child. The association between parenting
self-efficacy and competence remained moderately strong after maternal depression and social sup-
port were considered, whereas the relation between maternal competence and maternal depression
and social support was no longer significant after taking parenting self-efficacy into account. The
results thus supported a model in which parenting self-efficacy mediated the effects of depression and
social support on parenting. Together with the indirect associations between infant difficult tem-
perament and maternal competence through parenting self-efficacy, the findings supported a view
of parenting self-efficacy as “a dynamic construct that shapes and is shaped by behavior, knowledge,
and perceptions” (Teti and Gelfand, 1991, p. 928). When Dix and Meunier (2009) reviewed research
on the different psychological processes that mediate the effect of parental depression on parenting
competence, they concluded that parenting self-efficacy was one of the few of such mediating pro-
cesses that had received support from multiple empirical tests of mediation, citing Teti and Gelfand’s
study alongside two other studies ( Jackson and Huang, 2000; Leung and Slep, 2006).
The Relations Between Parenting Self-Efficacy Antecedents

and Consequences Are Transactional
Echoing the emphasis by Teti and Gelfand (1991) on the dynamic nature of the parenting self-effi-
cacy construct and building on Bandura’s theorizing about the development of self-efficacy, a second
cluster of publications revolves around the idea that parenting self-efficacy, children’s development
of emotional and behavioral problems, parents’ psychosocial functioning, and parenting practices are
related in bidirectional, transactional ways. Parenting self-efficacy would lead to more competent
parenting behavior, which usually would lead to success experiences and performance feedback
that further bolster parenting self-efficacy. Competent parenting would support the development
of children’s self-regulatory competence, which facilitates parent-child interactions even further.
Conversely, low parenting self-efficacy, incompetent parenting behavior, and children’s dysregulation
would drag each other further down. This transactional model implies that associations among par-
enting self-efficacy, parenting competence, and children’s developmental outcomes become stronger
over time, unless these transactional pathways of child and parent co-development are disrupted by
extraneous benign or malignant factors. Indeed, in their narrative summary of the literature on par-
enting self-efficacy, Jones and Prinz (2005) concluded on the basis of the evidence for effects of par-
enting self-efficacy on parenting competence, on parents’ psychosocial functioning, and on children’s
psychosocial functioning and vice versa, that the links are probably transactional.
Focusing on factors that may influence transactions between parenting self-efficacy, parenting
behavior, and child development for the worse, Johnston and Mash (2001) reviewed research on
characteristics of families of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). They
noted that studies generally found that parents of children with ADHD reported lower parenting
self-efficacy, especially when children showed comorbid aggression. They called for developmental
research to study the pathways through which these differences would come about, which should
include information about genetic propensities for developing ADHD symptoms and measures of
early childhood precursors of ADHD that may predict or be predicted by parenting behaviors and
661
parenting self-efficacy. Research to date has stopped short of including all these factors, but Meunier,
Roskam, and Browne (2011) found support for a bidirectional association across two measurements
of parental behavior and child externalizing behavior in a sample of 340 preschoolers and their par-
ents. However, bidirectionality was found only for mothers, whereas only an effect of child behavior
on father’s parenting self-efficacy was found and not vice versa. For mothers and fathers, domain-
specific parenting self-efficacy mediated the positive associations between externalizing child behav-
ior and negative parental control and the negative associations between externalizing behavior and
parental support.
Interventions might influence the transactions between parenting self-efficacy, parenting behav-
ior, and child development for the better. Bandura’s theory suggests several avenues for influenc-
ing parenting self-efficacy, and Coleman and Karraker (1998) therefore suggested that intervention
strategies may be built around parenting self-efficacy as a modifiable risk (if low) or vantage (if high)
factor. Interventions on specific parenting skills to curb the vicious circle between child behavior
problems, ineffective parenting, and low parenting self-efficacy have been justified often by the
correlational study of Sanders and Woolley (2005). They assessed general self-efficacy, self-efficacy
for the domain of parenting, and self-efficacy regarding specific parenting tasks (e.g., dealing with
children’s disobedience) and childrearing settings (e.g., dealing with noncompliance or distress while
shopping or during a phone conversation) among mothers referred for parent training due to child
disruptive behavior and mothers from the general population. For task-specific self-efficacy and gen-
eral self-efficacy, the clinical group scored lower than the general population group, not for domain-
general parenting self-efficacy. Sanders and Woolley cited these results as evidence that parents who
seek help for the behavior problems of their children are likely to have low self-efficacy in specific
daily parenting tasks, rather than needing help to think more positively about themselves as parents
in general. They argued that interventions should increase parenting self-efficacy through training of
skills for managing problematic child behaviors and for successfully navigating situations that present
the highest risks for child misbehavior.
The Triple P-Positive Parenting Program, designed by Sanders (1999) to provide parents with
skills for daily parenting tasks, has been found to increase parenting self-efficacy and parenting skills,
although the strongest effects were found if studies relied on parents’ self-report and weaker effects
were found if parenting was assessed using observational methods (Nowak and Heinrichs, 2008).
The mechanisms through which such changes are achieved remain ill understood, however (Sandler,
Schoenfelder, Wolchik, and MacKinnon, 2011). A trial of differential efficacy of child- and parent-
focused interventions for child externalizing problems found that effects were similar, whether the
intervention focus was on child social cognition, child inhibition, parental verbal responsiveness, or
parenting self-efficacy (Roskam et al., 2017), which would be consistent with a bidirectional model
of associations between child behavior, parenting behavior, and parenting self-efficacy. This bidirec-
tionality may explain why parenting programs, which usually consist of multiple ingredients, may be
effective through multiple mediating pathways, rather than a single pathway.
Parenting Self-Efficacy Guides Parents’ Goal Setting and Pursuit

According to Bandura’s social cognitive theory, self-efficacy affects the goals that people set for
themselves and for others (Bandura, 1977, 1991). Bandura et al. (2001) set out to demonstrate the
importance of the linkage between parenting self-efficacy and parental aspirations in the context of
children’s academic efficacy and career choices. Using a follow-up design, they showed how parents’
socioeconomic status was connected to adolescents’ career choices through the academic aspirations
of parents for their children, which predicted children’s academic, social, self-regulatory self-efficacy,
and academic achievement. Parents’ self-efficacy within the domain of supporting their children’s
academic pursuits was associated with socioeconomic status and indirectly to children’s academic
662
self-efficacy, academic achievement, and career aspirations via parents’ aspirations for the academic
pursuits of their children. In an earlier study, Elder, Eccles, Ardelt, and Lord (1995) also demonstrated
that for inner-city, economically deprived families, parenting self-efficacy explained the linkages
between economic hardship, parents’ depressed affect, and academic achievement promoting parent-
ing strategies. Thus, the linkage between parenting self-efficacy not only with the substance of par-
ents’ goals but also with investment in the pursuit of those goals was brought forward as a mechanism
of trans-generational continuity in socioeconomic position.
In summary, the field of parenting self-efficacy research has moved from a simple, unidirectional
view in which parenting self-efficacy mediates the impact of distal factors on parenting behavior and
child outcomes, toward a model in which parenting self-efficacy is part of a network of reciprocal,
bidirectional relations. In addition to behavioral and developmental conceptual models, the field has
also articulated models in which parenting self-efficacy is part of a broader set of parenting-related
cognitions.
Thematic Areas in Parenting Self-Efficacy Research

The terms used in publications on parenting self-efficacy can be described according to five reason-
ably coherent thematic clusters differentiated by color on a co-occurrence map (Figure 19.4). A brief
interpretation is given for each cluster, based on the co-occurring terms, and indicated by the color
label on the map. A number of these clusters warrants discussion of recent progress in these thematic
areas.
Parenting and Parenthood (Red; 88 Items)

The terms in this cluster describe how the concept of parenting self-efficacy has been recruited over
the years to better explain the effects that parents may have on their children’s functioning and vice
versa. Unsurprisingly, terms relating to parenting (parental role, parenting behavior, mother-child
interaction, parenting ability, parenting stress, father, emotional support, warmth, communication),
family characteristics (family cohesion, family income, SES, ethnicity), and child characteristics and
outcomes (ADHD, autism, behavior problems, gender, diagnosis) figure prominently together in this
diverse cluster. This cluster also includes terms referring to prediction and explanation (mediation,
indirect effect, significant predictor, variance, regression analysis, longitudinal study, pathway).
Two previous reviews have summarized the evidence that parenting self-efficacy would help to
explain individual differences in parent and child adjustment (Coleman and Karraker, 1998; Jones
and Prinz, 2005). The summary of the then-existing evidence supported associations between, on
the one hand, high parenting self-efficacy and, on the other hand, positive parenting practices, strate-
gies, and behaviors. Strongest associations were found in large-sample studies with a multi-informant
or multi-measure approach ( Jones and Prinz, 2005). However, some of the findings may be criti-
cized due to reliance on single-informant report for the constructs under investigation. Although
self-report is unavoidable when measuring a cognitive construct such as parenting self-efficacy, self-
reports of associated measures of parenting practices, strategies, and behaviors lead to potential con-
founding of real associations with response sets. Parenting measures based on independent observer
ratings limit this problem (Aspland and Gardner, 2003). Two of the earliest studies on parenting
self-efficacy and parenting behavior included observational measures but yielded mixed findings.
Teti and Gelfand (1991) found significant positive associations between parenting self-efficacy and
parenting behavioral competence in interaction with the child; Bohlin and Hagekull (1987) found
no significant associations between parenting self-efficacy and intrusive parenting behavior. Subse-
quent studies have continued to yield positive as well as null-findings, as can be concluded from the
systematic review of Jones and Prinz (2005). Jones and Prinz argued that differences in significance
663
Figure 19.4 Map of co-occurring terms within the body of research on parenting self-efficacy
Note: Map of machine-read nouns and adjective-noun phrases produced by VOSviewer 1.6.5 (Van Eck and Waltman,
2016), selecting 60% of terms with highest relevance score and hand-selecting trivial terms and versions of parenting
self-efficacy. Distances are inversely proportional to similarity based on co-occurrence in publications. Size of each circle
represents the occurrences within the 788 publications on parenting self-efficacy. Color (labeled in the grayscale print)
identifies publications as belonging to the same cluster based on similarity in co-occurrence. An interactive version in color
of the map can be accessed by installing VOSviewer and downloading the data file (DOI:10.17605/OSF.IO/T6JGD).
of the findings are not likely the result of type of measurement, such as general or task-specific
parenting self-efficacy, but may occur as result of invalid or unreliable measures of parenting self-
efficacy. Donovan and Leavitt’s (1989) work showed that mothers differ in their tendency to report
an underestimation of, moderately optimistic assessment of, or unrealistically high assessment of
control over parenting situations (a construct affiliated to parenting self-efficacy), arguing that the
moderately optimistic but not the unrealistically high illusion of control would be associated with
adaptive parenting. This finding would mean that associations between parenting self-efficacy and
parenting practices and behaviors could be curvilinear, depending on the number of parents with
unrealistically high or low parenting self-efficacy. A later study of Wilson, Gettings, Guntzviller, and
Munz (2014) reported a curvilinear association between parenting self-efficacy and observed paren-
tal sensitivity among low-income parents. These studies suggest that nonlinear associations between
664
parenting self-efficacy and parenting behavioral competence are possible, although the extent of this
nonlinearity may differ by population.
Unrealistically high parenting self-efficacy may be kept in check by more knowledge about the
tasks to which parenting self-efficacy refers. Parenting knowledge has been found to predict observed
supportive parenting and child outcomes, independent of internal attributions of parenting success,
a concept that partly overlaps with parenting self-efficacy (Bornstein, Putnick, and Suwalsky, 2017).
Conrad, Gross, Fogg, and Ruchala (1992) indicated that high parenting self-efficacy was associ-
ated only with quality of parent-toddler interaction when maternal knowledge of infant develop-
ment was high as well. Furthermore, Glatz, Cotter, and Buchanan (2017) in a study with parents
of adolescents with externalizing behavior problems showed that parenting self-efficacy was linked
only to promotive parenting in parents who had experience in parenting an older sibling without
externalizing behavior problems. These studies demonstrated that maternal (experiential) knowledge
of normative child development is a crucial aspect of the link between parenting self-efficacy and
parenting behavioral competence.
Coleman and Karraker (1998) argued that the effect of parenting self-efficacy on parenting prac-
tices, strategies, and behaviors might be affected by situational factors, such as the previously men-
tioned family characteristics (e.g., SES, family structure or cohesion). During stressful circumstances,
such as economic hardship or family instability and conflict, the impact of parenting self-efficacy
on parenting quality may increase in magnitude (Coleman and Karraker, 1998; Elder et al., 1995),
whereas other studies have drawn attention to the protective influence of parenting self-efficacy
on the adverse effects of social and family distress on parenting and child outcomes. As an example
for the latter, Cassé, Oosterman, and Schuengel (2016) showed that associations between partner
relationship dissatisfaction and infant-mother attachment quality depended on mothers’ parenting
self-efficacy.
The picture emerging from this thematic cluster shows little systematic effort to tease out the
precise links between parenting self-efficacy and actual parenting quality, undercutting the potential
role for parenting self-efficacy as a proxy for parenting competence. The curvilinear shapes of these
linkages within specific populations are insufficiently known, which limits the usefulness of this con-
struct not only for scientific research into parenting but also for individual clinical work.
Parenting Interventions (Green; 71 Items)

The second largest cluster contains terms used with high-frequency in intervention research (trial,
effectiveness, evaluation, condition, baseline, parenting program), including the mentioning of
“controlled trial” in 10 publications. Many of these studies on the effectiveness of parenting inter-
ventions have focused on parenting self-efficacy as an outcome measure. Two systematic reviews
examined the impact of group-based interventions on parenting self-efficacy (Barlow, Smailagic,
Huband, Roloff, and Bennett, 2012), of which one specifically focused on interventions for parents
of preschool-age children (Wittkowski, Dowling, and Smith, 2016). Interventions differed across
basic theoretical premises (behavioral, cognitive-behavioral, multimodal) and intervention duration.
The Wittkowski et al. review included only studies with a randomized control trial design, whereas
Barlow et al. included both randomized and quasi-randomized controlled trials. On the basis of
quantitative synthesis, Barlow et al. found statistically significant intervention effects on parenting-
self-efficacy post-intervention at 6 months follow-up but not at 1 year follow-up. These findings,
including the significant heterogeneity at 6 months follow-up, imply that interventions may affect
the magnitude of parenting self-efficacy while affecting to a lesser degree the strength of parenting
self-efficacy. The narrative review of Wittkowski et al. (2016) concluded that there were differences
in intervention effects between studies that used general measures of self-efficacy versus studies that
used task-specific measures of parenting self-efficacy. With regard to the latter, effect sizes ranged
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from medium to large post-intervention, whereas effect sizes in studies which applied general par-
enting self-efficacy measures ranged from small to medium. Follow-up data gave inconclusive results,
based on the large variation in time to follow-up and the lack of complete data in several studies as
well as the differences in terms of significance. Taken together, the evidence supports that parenting
self-efficacy is amenable to short-term change through interventions, whereas effects on the longer
term are uncertain. It is, therefore, important to study over a longer period intervention effects
not only on parenting self-efficacy, but also on parenting competence, and outcomes to investigate
whether parenting self-efficacy may revert to baseline if changes in parenting self-efficacy do not lead
to ensuing changes in parenting competence and outcomes. The hypothesized transactional associa-
tions between parenting self-efficacy, parenting competence, and outcomes imply that small, indirect
intervention effects may be overturned as parenting competence and outcomes, despite their small
improvement, continue to be a source of negative feedback on parenting self-efficacy.
Another question that may arise from this work is whether increased parenting self-efficacy medi-
ates intervention effects on parenting and child outcomes, which is the assumption underlying most
intervention studies in the context of parenting self-efficacy. The thematic cluster also included trials
in which parenting self-efficacy was examined in relation to co-occurring terms (child outcomes,
parenting skills, parent-child relationship, behavior problems). However, studies in which parent-
ing self-efficacy was examined as a mediator of intervention effects are scarce. In the randomized
controlled trial study of Dekoviç, Asscher, Manders, Prins, and Van der Laan (2012), multisystemic
therapy was found to enhance parenting self-efficacy, which, in turn, predicted changes in positive
discipline, which ultimately predicted decreases in adolescent externalizing problems. These findings
accord with the study of Seabra-Santos et al. (2016) in which the effectiveness of the Incredible Years
intervention program was evaluated for preschoolers at risk for disruptive behavior problems and
their parents. The program was found to improve parenting self-efficacy, which, in turn, predicted
stronger decrease in dysfunctional parenting practices, although the effect size was small. In contrast,
Hartung, Lups, and Hahlweg (2010) found that changes in dysfunctional parenting mediated Triple
P intervention effects on parenting self-efficacy, whereas the opposite model, in which the effects of
the parent training program on dysfunctional parenting was mediated by positive changes in parent-
ing self-efficacy, was not significant. The direction of influence between parenting self-efficacy and
parenting behavior has been examined as well in the longitudinal study of Glatz and Koning (2016)
on the effectiveness of the program “Prevention of Alcohol Use in Students” for adolescents and
their parents. Intervention effects on parenting self-efficacy were mediated by parents’ rule setting,
whereas statistical models including parenting self-efficacy as a mediator of the intervention effects
on parents’ rule setting, were not supported by the data. One study was found in which parent-
ing self-efficacy was examined in relation to child feeding practices (Spence, Campbell, Crawford,
McNaughton, and Hesketh, 2014). In contrast to expectations, parenting self-efficacy could not be
identified as mediator of the intervention effect on child diet quality while maternal feeding knowl-
edge acted as mediator.
Taken together, this cluster represents a body of work primarily focusing on effects of interven-
tions with parenting self-efficacy as an outcome measure. Although group-based interventions have
been found to enhance parenting self-efficacy across a range of studies, at least temporarily, more
research is needed to examine effects on the long-term as well. Furthermore, findings are equivocal
as to the causal role of parenting self-efficacy in effecting improvement in parenting competence
and child outcomes, suggesting that the transactional model linking these factors may be too simple.
Transition to Parenthood (Blue; 48 Items)

As already indicated by the substantial number of interventions delivered during pregnancy and
the first few months after childbirth, there has been considerable interest in the role of parenting
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self-efficacy across the transition to parenthood. Becoming a parent for the first time (new mother,
first-time mother, primipara, first child) is accompanied by multiple unique experiences (related to
pregnancy, childbirth, delivery, and breastfeeding) that may trigger both positive and negative beliefs
and expectations about life as a parent (Harwood, McLean, and Durkin, 2007). High levels of par-
enting self-efficacy in the transition to parenthood may be of help in coping with the challenges
new parents face and, therefore, are seen as an important indicator of positive adaptation to parent-
hood. Parenting self-efficacy gradually increases during the first months after birth in mothers from
low-risk community samples (Porter and Hsu, 2003; Verhage, Oosterman, and Schuengel, 2013), in
mothers from low-income urban areas (Zayas, Jankowski, and McKee, 2005) as well as in middle-
class, educated fathers (Hudson, Elek, and Fleck, 2001).
Because increasing parenting self-efficacy in the transition to parenthood is normative, and in
line with the importance of parenting in promoting inclusive fitness, decreases in parenting self-
efficacy warrant special attention. A substantial number of studies have examined potential risk
factors for low or decreased parenting self-efficacy during the transition to parenthood. As a result,
this cluster includes terms referring to maternal (maternal and mother’s perception, postnatal depres-
sion, postpartum depression, Edinburgh postnatal depression scale), child (infant temperament, pre-
term infant), and environmental (couple, family member, marital satisfaction, partner) characteristics.
The following discussion of research on the transition to parenthood, therefore, focuses, in turn, on
maternal, child, and environmental characteristics that are relevant during this transition.
The most frequently theorized and studied maternal characteristic in relation to low parenting
self-efficacy is maternal depression. As a construct, depression is closely related to efficacy beliefs.
Bandura (1989) argued that mental states of depression are accompanied by a selective recall of
negative cognitions and past failures and, therefore, predispose individuals to low self-efficacy. Con-
sequently, psychological therapies for depression would reach their effect by increasing efficacy
for behaviors that are incompatible with failure and helplessness. Consistent with these concep-
tual notions, empirical studies have shown moderate to strong associations between parenting self-
efficacy and maternal depression, most often measured postnatally (Cutrona and Troutman, 1986;
Haslam, Pakenham, and Smith, 2006; Leahy-Warren, McCarthy, and Corcoran, 2012; Teti and Gel-
fand, 1991; Teti, O’Connell, and Reiner, 1996). Studies on prenatal depression, however, are scarce
and have revealed inconsistent results. Two studies reported negative correlations between antenatal
depression and parenting self-efficacy in respectively pregnant women at risk (Zayas et al., 2005)
and low-risk pregnant women (Porter and Hsu, 2003), whereas another study revealed no associa-
tions between prenatal depression and prenatal parenting self-efficacy (Leerkes and Burney, 2007).
In a large longitudinal study in which first-time pregnant women were followed over the course of
pregnancy (with assessments at 12, 22, and 32 weeks), the negative link between prenatal depression
and parenting self-efficacy was further confirmed (Wernand, Kunseler, Oosterman, Beekman, and
Schuengel, 2014). Moreover, this study found that more depression symptoms predicted less positive
change in parenting self-efficacy during pregnancy, although this association became nonsignificant
when anxiety symptoms were included. Surprisingly, anxiety symptoms predicted parenting self-
efficacy changes during pregnancy even after accounting for symptoms of depression. The more
prominent role of anxiety during pregnancy as compared with depression is in line with studies that
examine anxiety and depression in relation to changes in parenting self-efficacy across the transi-
tion to parenthood (Kunseler, Willemen, Oosterman, and Schuengel, 2014; Porter and Hsu, 2003).
Additionally, high prenatal parenting self-efficacy has been found to predict stronger decrease of
anxiety levels across the transition to parenthood, even until 9 (Don, Chong, Biehle, Gordon, and
Mickelson, 2014) and 12 months after birth (Kunseler et al., 2014). On the basis of Bandura’s (1977)
and Jones and Prinz’s (2005) theoretical notions regarding the bidirectional influences between
self-efficacy and parental functioning, Kunseler et al. (2014) examined whether high anxiety and
depression symptoms were as much predictors as well as outcome variables in association with
667
parenting self-efficacy. Findings of this study supported the bidirectional relation between parenting
self-efficacy and mood symptoms.
Child characteristics have been examined in relation to parenting self-efficacy around the transition
to parenthood since the classical study of Cutrona and Troutman (1986), in which infant difficult
temperament was found to be associated with lower parenting self-efficacy in low-risk women, 3
months after birth of the child. The central idea of this study was that caring for a temperamentally
difficult child may “erode feelings of competency,” which refers to the primary source of efficacy
beliefs, accomplishments of behavior performance (Bandura, 1977). Several cross-sectional studies
have since reported a direct link between infant temperament and parenting self-efficacy, indicat-
ing that mothers who perceived their child as more irritable, fussy, or difficult to soothe had lower
parenting self-efficacy levels shortly after birth of the child (Leerkes and Crockenberg, 2002; Teti
and Gelfand, 1991).
Few studies examined perceived infant temperament in relation to changes in parenting self-
efficacy across the transition to parenthood. Porter and Hsu (2003) examined longitudinal changes
in mother-perceived infant negative affectivity and parenting self-efficacy and revealed, respectively,
decreased negative affectivity and increased parenting self-efficacy from 1 to 3 months postpar-
tum. Moreover, postnatal reports of infant negative affectivity at 1 and 3 months were significantly
related to lower parenting self-efficacy. However, the direction of influence between the associations
remained undecided, as was the case for the study by Lipscomb et al. (2011), who found associations
between infant negative emotionality and decreasing parenting self-efficacy in adoptive mothers. The
study of Verhage et al. (2013) tested the direction of effects between infant negative temperament
and parenting self-efficacy, assessed during the third trimester of pregnancy and twice after birth in
a group of first-time pregnant women. The structural model supported parenting self-efficacy as a
predictor of perceived infant negative temperament, even when parenting self-efficacy was assessed
prior to birth. Despite the concurrent negative associations between perceived infant temperament
and parenting self-efficacy, effects of perceived temperament on later parenting self-efficacy were
not significant. These findings support the pivotal role of parenting self-efficacy in the way in which
mothers perceive and interpret their children’s signals and behaviors. These findings may appear to
contradict Cutrona and Troutman’s (1986) model of infant temperament as an undermining factor
for parenting self-efficacy, but children’s temperament may still influence parental experiences, even
though parental perceptions of temperament may be shaped by many other factors. To unravel the
independent effects of child temperament on parenting self-efficacy, studies including observational
measures are needed. Future studies can build on the early explorative work of Bohlin and Hagekull
(1987), who showed significant negative associations between observational assessments of 1- to
5-month-old infants’ nonoptimal interactive behavior, including low social initiation and responsive-
ness, and parenting self-efficacy.
With regard to environmental characteristics, most attention has been paid to the partner relationship
(marital satisfaction, partner, couple) in the adjustment to parenthood. Social support may enhance
perceptions of self-efficacy via vicarious experiences, such as observing successful parenting by
members of one’s peer group, and verbal persuasion, such as when friends and family may respond
to dwindling confidence by providing encouragement (Bandura, 1977, Cutrona and Troutman,
1986). Empirical work has supported direct associations between various types of social support and
parenting self-efficacy in early parenthood (Donovan and Leavitt, 1989; Teti and Gelfand, 1991).
For example, Razurel and Kaiser (2015) showed that first-time pregnant women’s satisfaction with
different types of social support (partner, mother, family, friends, professionals) was positively related
with higher postnatal parenting self-efficacy. Other studies showed indirect relations between social
support and parenting self-efficacy, such as the study by Mihelic, Filus, and Morawaska (2016), which
found that pregnant women who received higher levels of social and family support showed less
prenatal maladjustment (less anxiety and depression), mediating the effect of support on higher
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prenatal parental self-efficacy. On the basis of early work, social support has also been examined as a
moderator in more complex models to explain parenting outcomes (Cutrona and Troutman, 1986;
Teti and Gelfand, 1991). For example, Zeiders, Umana-Taylor, Jahromi, and Updegraff (2015) fol-
lowed adolescent mothers from pregnancy and early parenthood to 60 months postpartum. Support
was positively related to adolescent mothers’ parenting self-efficacy, but only when the grandmother-
adolescent mother relation was characterized by autonomy support.
To conclude, the concept of parenting self-efficacy has shown its value as a marker of maternal
maladjustment across the transition to parenthood, in the form of mood symptoms and negative
perceptions of infant temperament. Increased parenting self-efficacy across the transition to parent-
hood has appeared to be a normative experience, which is more likely if mothers can count on
social support. Until recently, there was little known about the role of fathers during the transition
to parenthood. A substantial number of studies have examined parenting self-efficacy in new fathers,
including studies that compared mothers and fathers. These studies showed almost similar asso-
ciations between parenting self-efficacy and mental health in the transition to parenthood of men
(Biehle and Mickelson, 2011; Demontigny, Girard, Lacharite, Dubeau, and Devault, 2013; Giallo
et al., 2013; Gross and Marcussen 2017; Junttila, Aromaa, Rautava, Piha, and Raiha, 2015; Pinto,
Figueiredo, Pinheiro, and Canario, 2016). However, more research is needed to examine more spe-
cifically how self-efficacy beliefs of fathers are shaped in the context of interactions with the child
and the social environment as well as the interplay between efficacy expectations of both partners.
Operationalization (Yellow; 23 Items)

A smaller cluster of terms revolves around issues of operationalization (instrument, scale, item, fac-
tor structure, theoretical model) and psychometric qualities (reliability, validity, internal consistency).
Wittkowski et al. (2017) reviewed the work on operationalizing parenting self-efficacy. The section
ahead on measurement issues provides an overview of operationalizations that have been developed
of parenting self-efficacy across different construct levels, including a summary of findings from
psychometric work.
Child Health (Magenta; 21 Items)

The term mapping revealed a small but distinct cluster of terms relating to the physical health of
children (BMI, obesity, screen time, physical activity, weight, diet). This cluster sits in between the
cluster on parenting and parenthood and the cluster on parenting interventions. The most frequently
used term in this cluster, physical activity, was found in 34 publications.
The terms in this cluster were found in studies that from 2004 on have documented how parent-
ing self-efficacy for changing children’s behavior toward more physical activity and more healthy eat-
ing is negatively associated with related outcomes such as BMI (Adkins, Sherwood, Story, and Davis,
2004), screen time (Downing, Hinkley, Salmon, Hnatiuk, and Hesketh, 2017), and suboptimal diet
(Spence et al., 2014), even when controlling for demographic background factors. In addition, these
publications have described the development and testing of interventions aimed at improving chil-
dren’s body composition by educating and training parents in the skills needed to change children’s
activity and feeding patterns. Several publications present protocols of studies that are underway
to test the effect of interventions on parenting self-efficacy in the child health domain (Paul et al.,
2014; Ruiter, Frasnen, Molleman, van der Velden, and Engels, 2015; Stea et al., 2016). Thus far, only
one study found that intervention effectively changed parenting self-efficacy in the health domain
(Gerards et al., 2015). Two studies reported an effect on child health behavior but not on parent-
ing self-efficacy in the health domain (Nyberg et al., 2015; Spence et al., 2014). No study has yet
reported that parent self-efficacy mediates the efficacy of parenting interventions to improve child
669
health. Thus, the empirical evidence in this small body of applied work suggests that interventions
aimed at parenting practices can be effective, even if parenting self-efficacy does not improve, at least
within the short term and in this specific domain of parenting. These findings, therefore, challenge
core ideas, such as the mediating role of parenting self-efficacy and the transactional association
between parenting self-efficacy and parenting competence.
Theoretical Developments in Parenting Self-Efficacy

Attempts to integrate self-efficacy theory in alternative theoretical frameworks or amend its proposi-
tions have been met with varying success within the field of parenting as well as the wider psycho-
logical field. This section discusses a number of these efforts at integration or amendment within the
domain of parenting.
Self-Determination and Transition to Parenthood

Within Bandura’s broader social cognitive theory (2001), motivation for pursuing a given course of
action is based on efficacy expectations. Generally speaking, people are likely to motivate themselves
for behaviors for which their efficacy expectations are high. Deci and Ryan (2008) challenged this
view of motivation as a unitary construct. They postulated that people seek to satisfy at least three
basic psychological needs. One of these psychological needs is to feel competent in one’s actions. The
other psychological needs are to experience relatedness with others and to autonomously determine
one’s actions. Optimal well-being is achieved if these three needs are met through one’s activities.
In this situation, persons will explain that they perform such an activity for its own sake, which is
the hallmark of intrinsically motivated behavior. If a certain activity is perceived to satisfy the need
for competence, but potentially frustrates the needs of autonomy or relatedness, Deci and Ryan
have claimed it unlikely that people view such an activity as intrinsically motivated. Rather, people
describe their behavior as a-motivated, externally regulated, or at most motivated by introjection of
by identifying with goals that other people find important. Self-determination theory thus differs
from self-efficacy theory in the role of motivation and how motivation should be psychologically dif-
ferentiated. This theoretical issue is particularly relevant for parenting, because being a parent involves
a range of activities and tasks that may compete with other activities and tasks which people seek
to fulfill their need to experience autonomy, relatedness, or competence, such as their professional
pursuits, leisure, or sport activities, and their social and romantic lives. The transition to parenthood
may, therefore, require from men and women that they reconsider and reorganize their activities,
and change their perspectives on the extent to which the different life domains may satisfy their
psychological needs lest the arrival of the child lead to need frustration and diminished well-being.
Consistent with self-determination theory, studies have found that parenting self-efficacy (meas-
ured with the scale of Teti and Gelfand, 1991) was positively associated with intrinsic motivation
for having and rearing children (Gauthier et al., 2007, 2010). Parenting self-efficacy as measured
with the Parenting Sense of Competence Scale ( Johnston and Mash, 1989) was positively associated
with intrinsic reasons for breastfeeding (Kestler-Peleg, Shamir-Dardikman, Hermoni, and Ginsburg,
2015). Parenting self-efficacy was negatively associated with lack of personal motivation to have and
rear a child (Gauthier, Senecal, and Guay, 2007) and with introjected motivation for breastfeeding
(due to pressure by others; Kestler-Peleg et al.). However, external regulation and extrinsic motiva-
tion failed to show the expected negative associations with parenting self-efficacy in these studies,
other than in the case of breastfeeding because of pressure from others. Furthermore, a longitudinal
study across the transition to parenthood failed to support effects of changes in parenting self-efficacy
on intrinsic motivation, nor did intrinsic motivation explain the negative association between par-
enting self-efficacy and maternal depressive symptoms (Gauthier, Guay, Senecal, and Pierce, 2010).
670
Despite these initial failures to demonstrate that self-determination theory has incremental valid-
ity in explaining processes within parenting, the self-determination framework may still be relevant to
explain findings that are difficult to reconcile with self-efficacy theory. As one example, in a study on
parenting perfectionism among expecting mothers and fathers, the researchers expected that setting
impossibly high standards for oneself as a parent would predict elevated parenting stress and decreas-
ing parenting self-efficacy (Lee, Schoppe-Sullivan, and Dush, 2012). However, this negative effect
on parenting self-efficacy and parenting satisfaction was found only for perfectionism with regard
to meeting societal expectations for being a good parent, whereas perfectionism with regard to the
standards that parents set for themselves was predictive of increased parenting self-efficacy, parenting
satisfaction, and lower parenting stress, in particular for fathers. Self-efficacy theory would predict
only negative effects, because perfectionism is due to lead to negative accomplishment experiences.
However, from the perspective of self-determination theory, societal-oriented perfectionism reflects
external regulation of parenting behavior, whereas self-oriented perfectionism reflects intrinsic moti-
vation to try to be the best possible parent. Perfectionistic parents who set self-oriented standards are
thus bound to experience more well-being during their parenting activities and perceive parenting as
meeting their psychological needs, including the need to experience competence. Furthermore, the
finding of Zeiders et al. (2015) that autonomy supportive support from grandmothers to adolescent
mothers was most strongly associated with adolescent mothers’ parenting self-efficacy also points
toward a role for self-determination. It, therefore, appears fruitful to continue to include assessments
of type of motivation and satisfaction of psychological needs in research aimed at understanding the
diverging pathways across the transition to parenthood.
Measurement Issues in Parenting Self-Efficacy

This section briefly discusses a number of instruments that have operationalized parenting self-
efficacy, based on a recent systematic review by Wittkowski et al. (2017). This review turned up 34
unique measures, even leaving aside the many instruments that focused on specific, narrow domains
of parenting (e.g., parenting self-efficacy for healthy dietary and physical behaviors in preschoolers;
Bohman, Rasmussen, and Ghaderi, 2016). The broad range of instruments may, for one part, be the
result of the wide-ranging, continuously transforming, and context-dependent set of parental behav-
iors and settings that are salient for parents from different populations (Barnes and Adamson-Macedo,
2007). For another part, the broad range of instruments may be due to differences in the way that
researchers conceptualize self-efficacy (De Montigny and Lacharité, 2005). To guide researchers and
clinicians in their choice and interpretation of instruments, Coleman and Karraker (1998) proposed
an overall distinction according to the domain-level that was operationalized by the measure, that
is task-specific, domain-specific, and domain-general parenting self-efficacy. These differences in
domain level would be closely related to the sensitivity to change of parenting self-efficacy measures,
and thus their clinical usefulness. A domain-general measure, such as the Parental Sense of Compe-
tence Scale (PSOC; Johnston and Mash, 1989), would be unlikely to be sensitive to effects of inter-
ventions or changes in the situation of parents (Crncec, Barnett, and Mathey, 2008), and therefore be
of little use for deciding to start or to end interventions.
Wittkowski et al.’s review of the larger set of instruments showed that instruments differ on sev-
eral other theoretically relevant dimensions as well. For example, several but certainly not all instru-
ments include input sources for parenting self-efficacy (i.e., performance accomplishment, vicarious
experience, verbal persuasion, and emotional arousal), assessment of resources and constraints, or
consequences of self-efficacy. Thus, in principle, researchers and clinicians have a wide range of tools
available to suit their specific research questions and needs. However, Wittkowski et al. also assessed
the quality of research into the psychometric soundness of these instruments, revealing considerable
variation. Very few instruments had been tested for criterion validity, responsiveness, or readability.
671
On the basis of their assessment of this literature, they highlighted six instruments to consider using
for research or clinical purpose. The five instruments that were developed as operationalizations of
Bandura’s self-efficacy construct are briefly discussed; the Being a Mother (BAM) Scale did not refer
to any particular theoretical framework (Matthey, 2011) and is, therefore, not discussed here.
The Perceived Maternal Parenting Self-Efficacy Scale (PMP-SE; Barnes and Adamson-Macedo,
2007; 20 items) was developed as a domain-specific measure for parenting preterm infants. The
instrument has four a priori defined subscales, covering self-efficacy regarding (1) caregiving proce-
dures, (2) evoking behaviors in the infant (such as soothing), (3) reading behaviors or infants’ signal-
ing, and (4) situational beliefs (ability to judge overall interaction). Internal consistency, test-retest
reliability, and construct validity in the form of factor structure, criterion validity, and discriminant
validity were documented. Twelve studies using this measure were identified in Web of Science,
including parents of preterm infants and parents of other infants. For example, Shorey, Chan, Chong,
and He (2015) conducted a randomized trial of postnatal psychoeducation for primiparas, reporting
a strong positive effect on this measure of parenting self-efficacy. De Cock, Heinrichs, Rijk, and van
Bakel (2015) used the PMP-SE in a student sample, demonstrating experimentally that exposure to
a crying baby doll led to lower prospective parenting self-efficacy. These studies, therefore, support
the sensitivity of the PMP-SE to change.
The Karitane Parenting Confidence Scale (KPCS; Crncec et al., 2008) was developed as a 15-item,
domain-specific parenting self-efficacy measure for use in clinical services for parents of infants (up
to age 12 months). Scale development was guided by focus groups, who recommended to use par-
enting confidence as synonymous for parenting self-efficacy to aid communication with parents
and who advised on the item content. The items asked parents how often they feel confident about
tasks and settings associated with parenting. The initial psychometric testing by Crncec et al. was
conducted with several clinical and comparison groups, supporting aspects of construct validity, and
discrimination ability. KPCS scores correctly classified 88% of participants as clinical cases (i.e., hav-
ing sought or having been referred for parenting support), yielding initial clinical cut-off and reliable
change indices. In line with the purposes for which the KPCS was developed, most of the 11 studies
(Web of Science) with the KPCS focused on effects of parent support interventions. For example,
Pontoppidan, Klest, and Sandoy (2016) found that the Incredible Years Parents and Babies program
did not enhance outcomes including parenting self-efficacy in Danish parents, and Shrestha and
Adachi (2016) reported that newborn care education increases parenting self-efficacy among Nepa-
lese primiparas. Several studies are still underway, which may help to answer the question whether the
KPCS successfully operationalizes parenting self-efficacy as a modifiable promotive factor.
Coleman and Karraker (2003) developed the Self-Efficacy for Parenting Tasks Index-Toddler
Scale (SEPTI-TS; originally 53 items) as a domain-specific self-efficacy measure for the most salient
dimensions of relationships between parents and their toddlers, citing reviews by Zeanah et al. (1997)
and Emde (1989). Coleman and Karraker did not find that this domain-specific measure was more
strongly associated with observed parenting competence than a domain-general measure of parent-
ing self-efficacy (PSOC). However, in contrast to the PSOC, the SEPTI-TS was associated with
children’s developmental status as well as with observed positive child behaviors during a parent-
child interaction task. Van Rijen, Gasanova, Boonstra, and Huijding (2014) undertook psychometric
testing of a Dutch translation of the scale, reducing the number of subscales to self-efficacy in the
task-domains of nurturing, discipline, play, and routine (26 items). The domain-specific SEPTI-TS
was more strongly associated with the domain-general parenting self-efficacy subscale from the
Parenting Stress Index (Abidin, 1990) than with the domain-specific Maternal Self-Efficacy Scale of
Teti and Gelfand (1991). Furthermore, the 10th-percentile cut-off only modestly differentiated the
normal sample in this study from a clinical sample of parents of toddlers admitted to psychiatric care.
Thus, construct validity and discrimination ability as well as sensitivity to change of this measure are
still to be established, due to the lack of intervention trials with this measure.
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The Child Adjustment and Parent Efficacy Scale (CAPES; Morawska, Sanders, Haslam, Filus, and
Fletcher, 2014) was developed to combine the assessment of parent-perceived intensity of behavior
problems and emotional maladjustment of children between 5 and 12 years old with the assessment
of parenting self-efficacy. The 20-item parenting self-efficacy subscale asked parents how confident
they are that they can successfully deal with the emotional and behavioral problem behaviors dis-
played by their child. Although this construction leads to in-built dependence between the child
adjustment and parenting self-efficacy scales, the authors reported satisfactory discriminant valid-
ity evidence as well as good internal consistency. A second study using the Spanish version of the
CAPES partially replicated the factor structure and discriminant validity evidence, adding evidence
for convergent validity and test-rest reliability (Mejia, Filus, Calam, Morawska, and Sanders, 2016).
In addition to these validation studies, the CAPES parenting self-efficacy subscale has been used in
six studies (Web of Science), including five efficacy trials with versions of the Triple P-intervention
program. The Baker, Sanders, Turner, and Morawska (2017) trial reported positive effects on par-
enting self-efficacy as measured with the CAPES, underlining its sensitivity to change. However,
observational assessment revealed no effects on parental and child behaviors.
The Me-as-a-Parent Scale (MaaP; Hamilton, Matthews, and Crawford, 2015) was designed to
encompass the construct of parenting self-regulation, which includes parenting self-efficacy and the
constructs personal agency, self-management, and self-sufficiency. The authors aimed to capture this
broadly defined dimension of self-regulation among parents of across the broad 6 months to 15years
age range, and therefore focused on domain-general aspects of parenting self-efficacy. The authors
achieved adequate fit of a second-order model, in which the final 16 items loaded on the respective
four self-regulation latent constructs, which loaded strongly on the higher order self-regulation latent
construct. Positive correlations of the parenting self-efficacy subscale with the PSOC self-efficacy
scale supported convergent validity. The MaaP also demonstrated high rank-order stability. Only
one study was found that has included the MaaP in an intervention efficacy protocol (Gleeson et al.,
2017), making it too early to know whether, despite the domain-general operationalization of par-
enting self-efficacy, this instrument is sensitive to change.
In summary, a broad range of parenting self-efficacy instruments is available to research and clini-
cians, but only for a handful of instruments are clear descriptions of key psychometric and clinimet-
ric properties available (Wittkowski et al., 2017). For only three of these instruments (CAPES-SE,
KPCS, PMP-SE), evidence is available that supports sensitivity to the effects of interventions or
experimentally induced experiences. However, none of these studies tested the psychometric invari-
ance of the parenting self-efficacy construct across measurement occasions. It is, therefore, unclear
whether any changes observed reflect changes in magnitude of parenting self-efficacy, or changes in
the psychological meaning of parenting self-efficacy. For example, through a parenting intervention,
parents may start to perceive some parenting tasks and settings as more salient than before, but other
tasks or settings become less prominent; if invariance is rejected, mean level comparisons may be
misleading regarding the existence or nonexistence of an effect and the nature of the effect (Putnick
and Bornstein, 2016). Configural, metric, scalar, and residual invariance of parenting self-efficacy
may not be presumed and should be studied (De Moor, Verhage, Oosterman, and Schuengel, 2017)
across pre- and post-intervention measurements as well as across relevant life events, such as the
transition to parenthood. Not only should invariance across time points be studied, but also almost
no studies have considered the variance of parenting self-efficacy instruments across cultural and
socioeconomic groups. Costa, Faria, Alessandri, and Caprara (2016) administered a Perceived Paren-
tal Self-Efficacy (PPSE) questionnaire among Portuguese and Italian parents, and found configural,
metric, and scalar invariance. However, the parenting contexts of Portugal and Italy may be more
similar, whereas the parenting contexts in countries with different historical, religious, economic, and
cultural backgrounds may be more different. The fragmentation of the measurement landscape and
the lack of insight in reliability, validity, and invariance in the majority of instruments limit insights
673
that may be gleaned from quantitative syntheses of the body of research in this field, and precludes
drawing conclusions from any differences found between samples recruited from different cultural
and socioeconomic populations.
Future Directions in Parenting Self-Efficacy Research

Evidence for the role of parenting self-efficiency in parenting is mostly limited to cross-sectional
research designs. To establish whether parenting self-efficacy plays a mediating causal role, more lon-
gitudinal and experimental research is warranted. Such research needs to grapple with the purported
transactional associations between parenting self-efficacy, parenting, and child outcomes, meaning
that large studies are required to tease out within- and across-time associations.
The bidirectionality or transactional nature of associations with parenting self-efficacy carry
important implications for research in fields outside the transition to parenthood, as associations
found in cross-sectional studies have an equivocal interpretation. In particular, research that tries to
unravel the link between parenting self-efficacy and parenting behavior should take the possibility of
bidirectional or transactional associations into account. Parenting behavior has been rarely included
in longitudinal research of parenting self-efficacy, which limits understanding of the role of parent-
ing self-efficacy in the transformation of parenting behaviors and skills over time. There is a pressing
need to test how changes in parenting self-efficacy influence development of parenting behavior.
A crucial test for the transactional model of parenting self-efficacy and parental competence is
whether interventions aimed at either parenting self-efficacy or competence are similarly effective
and set in motion a virtuous cycle of continuous self-improvement. Intervention studies have shown
effects on parenting self-efficacy post-intervention and in the short term, but not in the longer term.
It will be important to determine the conditions for sustained momentum in these changes, because
it is unclear of what the relevance are trial results that report effects only on parenting self-efficacy.
Results of interventions which include parenting competence as well parenting self-efficacy have
remained inconclusive. Effects on parenting competence have been found without accompanying or
mediating effects on parenting self-efficacy, and effects on parent self-efficacy have been found with-
out effects on parenting competence. This situation may be partly due to the substantial variation in
the ways in which parenting self-efficacy and parenting behavior are operationalized. Task-specific
measures of parenting self-efficacy may be most sensitive in detecting changes in efficacy beliefs and
may be most suitable for inclusion in micro-trial designs (Leijten, Dishion, Thomaes, Raaijmakers,
Orobio de Castro, and Matthys, 2015) to test these mechanisms in action.
To improve measurement and for theoretical reasons, it will be important to better understand
individual differences in the concordance between parents’ own parenting self-efficacy and parenting
as it is actually experienced by children. Based on work by Donovan and Leavitt (1989), moderate
but not extreme illusion of control would be optimal for parenting outcomes. This insight is dif-
ficult to translate to practice. One reason is that the exact optimum point is unknown and would
likely vary across populations. Population norm studies that take potential curvilinear associations
between parenting self-efficacy, determinants, and outcomes into account are essential (cf. Bornstein
and Manian, 2013). The curvilinear association also raises questions about the relevance and inter-
pretation of the magnitude dimension of parenting self-efficacy. Parenting self-efficacy has been
conceptualized as a resilience factor. However, the concept of resilience is most prominent within
the dimension of parenting self-efficacy strength, as strength indicates the persistence with which
parents continue to apply their parenting skills in the face of initial difficulty or lack of success. To
date, studies of parenting self-efficacy have used experimental (Kunseler et al., 2016) or longitudinal
(Verhage et al., 2015) methods to index strength in the face of parenting stressors; for both research
and clinical purposes, it would be useful to build on these paradigms and develop scales that assess
parents’ perceived strength of parenting self-efficacy. Furthermore, such research could also test the
674
idea that strength may, in some cases, be associated with determinants and outcomes in a curvilinear
way, when parents persist too long in ineffective practices without considering alternative courses
of action.
While Bandura’s theory proposes four sources of parenting self-efficacy, most theorizing and
research has focused on accomplishments of behavior performance. The other sources, including
vicarious experiences, verbal persuasion, and emotional arousal have received scant attention in rela-
tion to changes in parenting self-efficacy. This may be a missed opportunity with regard to alterna-
tive avenues toward intervention. Such research may also indicate caution for some intervention
approaches that may be effective in the short term to shore up parenting self-efficacy, may weaken
the strength of parenting self-efficacy in the longer term (Cassé et al., 2015). Future research should
focus on these less well-studied sources of self-efficacy in the parenting domain as well as the interac-
tions between these sources in their impact on parenting self-efficacy. For example, group parenting
intervention may provide settings that are rich in experiential, vicarious, verbal, and affective stimuli
that impact on parenting self-efficacy in perhaps unpredictable ways. Teasing out these effects may
help program designers further optimize effectiveness of such formats. Furthermore, the regulation
of emotional arousal to infant and child stimuli has been shown to be important in the transition to
parenthood and the development of secure attachment relationships (Leerkes, Su, Calkins, O’Brien,
and Supple, 2017). Parenting self-efficacy may help to understand how emotional responses may be
linked to cognitions and accessed in the context of intervention.
Conclusion
In this chapter, we examined application of the self-efficacy concept as proposed by Bandura (1977)
to the study of parenting. Parenting self-efficacy has shown to be an appealing concept for the par-
enting field, which may partly be explained by Coleman and Karakker’s call in 1998 that parenting
self-efficacy is sensitive to risk as well as to intervention. The concept has, therefore, been seen by
many in the field as an important modifiable risk or promotive factor for children’s development, and
therefore as a strategic target for intervention. Subsequent research has largely produced replicating
statistical evidence that parenting self-efficacy mediates associations between risk and protective fac-
tors and parenting and child outcomes.
Parenting self-efficacy has been studied in relation to a host of different themes, including parent-
hood, interventions, transition to parenthood, measurement, and child health. Perhaps unsurprisingly,
longitudinal studies have been conducted most often in the context of the transition to parenthood,
in which both prenatal and postnatal expectations of efficacy are examined in relation to parental
mental health and child outcomes. Evidence from these studies points to bidirectional associations
between parenting self-efficacy and other parenting variables, such as mental health, rather than
unidirectional mediation.
More than 40 years after its original formulation, Bandura’s self-efficacy theory continues to be
read and applied in practice and research across many fields, including of parenting. However, as
anomalous findings accumulate on the mediating role of change and on the sources of parenting
self-efficacy, the field has to reconsider and reorient to reformulate those original insightful theoreti-
cal ideas.
Note
1. Search term variants were “parenting self-efficacy,” “parental self-efficacy,” “parenting self efficacy,” “parental
self efficacy,” “parental sense of competence,” “parenting sense of competence,” “sense of competence in
parenting,” “parenting efficacy,” “parental efficacy,” “maternal efficacy,” “paternal efficacy,” “maternal self-
efficacy,” “maternal self efficacy,” “paternal self-efficacy,” and “paternal self efficacy.”.
675
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20
PARENTING COGNITIONS
Introduction
Parenting cognition refers to the mental processes associated with childrearing. Typically, these cog-
nitions occur in parents, and that is the focus of this chapter. But thoughts about parenting occupy
individuals across the life span, from children who are trying to understand their parents, to worries
in expectant parents (Biehle and Mickelson, 2011), to seniors who may reflect on their parenting or
be involved in grandparenting (Mansson, Floyd, and Soliz, 2017). These varied thoughts are most
often studied under such labels as “attitudes,” “beliefs,” “perceptions,” and “expectations,” but are also
investigated using such descriptors as “theories” and “ethno-theories,” “decision-making,” or newer
psychological constructs including “mindfulness” and “meta-emotion philosophies.” There are now
more than 11 distinct constructs utilized to capture aspects of parenting cognition. Each of these
constructs will be differentiated and defined.
Technically, parenting cognitions fall in the domain of social cognition, rather than traditional
cognitive variables, such as intelligence, memory, or cognitive style. Although there are some inves-
tigations into the role of various conventional cognitive variables as they relate to parenting, such as
parental intelligence or memory (Dallacker, Hertwig, Peters, and Mata, 2016; Goodman, Simonoff,
and Stevenson, 1995), that literature is outside the scope of this review. Instead, this chapter is limited
to parenting social cognition, or parenting cognition for short.
Why are parenting cognitions important? We mention six fundamental reasons. First, as any parent
can attest, childrearing is mentally taxing. So phenomenologically, parenting cognitions represents
much of “the stuff ” involved in parenting. That mental activity begins long before the birth of a
child. But the mental challenges certainly ramp up with the arrival of a neonate (or an adopted
child), when parents must begin figuring out how to respond appropriately to the child’s signals. At a
minimum, parents must solve problems and make multiple decisions on a daily basis as they nurture
and guide their children’s development.
Second, parenting cognitions are a key determinant of childrearing behavior. A mother who
believes that infant crying is a signal for an unmet need and requires quick and appropriate response
is likely to respond in a way that is consistent with her belief. However, the 25% of parents who
think that infants can be “spoiled” by pampering or being too responsive to crying are unlikely to
be so responsive (Solomon, Martin, and Cottington, 1993). By recognizing the role that cognitions
play in parenting, we can better understand the determinants of behavior. Parenting cognitions are
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intrinsic to understanding the topics addressed in virtually every chapter of this Handbook, apart from
the chapters concerning the biology of parenting.
It follows, then, that parenting cognitions are related to children’s development. The link between
parental cognitions and child development represents a third and essential reason for studying them.
As Bornstein and colleagues wrote: “Thus, inadequate knowledge and expectations about children’s
development and behaviors infect problematic parenting and have been associated with nonoptimal
caregiving even among already at-risk parents” (Bornstein, Cote, Haynes, Hahn, and Park, 2010,
pp. 1687–1688). For example, DeBaryshe (1995) used the term “linchpin” in describing the impor-
tance of parents’ belief systems for children’s learning to read. For parents who believe that early
reading is important, their children were exposed to joint book reading and the children showed
more interest in books.
If cognitions relate to behavior, then to change behavior one must understand and know how to
utilize cognitions for behavior change. Indeed, to help parents become more effective at childrearing,
and to help induce them to engage in more healthy parenting behaviors, the most efficacious avenue
is often through modifying parenting cognitions. Unrealistic expectations or excessive concerns or
inappropriate beliefs can be addressed. Consequently, interventions often target parental cognitions.
This is the fourth key reason to study parenting cognitions.
A fifth reason to study parenting cognitions is that it affords a clear avenue for understanding
cultural differences (Bornstein and Lansford, 2010). Parental cognitions help to reveal how culture is
filtered through values and beliefs as well as can serve as a stimulus to activate behavior. For example,
in some countries, child noncompliance is swiftly reacted to with physical punishment, but in other
parts of the world, that behavior is likely ignored and even the thought of physically striking a child
is considered an aberration (Durrant, 2011).
A final reason why parental cognitions are important is that those thoughts affect parents’ well-
being. To promote parent and family well-being, it is necessary to recognize the role that cognitions
play. A reduction in a mother’s excessive anxiety about her children or increase in proactive chil-
drearing to avoid child injury is of obvious merit (Kalomiris and Kiel, 2016). Many parenting pro-
grams, such as Triple P (Sanders, Kirby, Tellegen, and Day, 2014), remind parents of the importance
of self-care to promote the parent’s health and effective childrearing.
What are the parenting cognitions of interest? Research has now expanded into a wide spec-
trum of mental constructs to try to capture much of parental mental activity. Thoughts related
to parenting are now a broad category of scientific inquiry that capture a variety of constructs.
These include the traditional variables (attitudes, beliefs) but also a range of new constructs, as will
be described.
Parental cognitions reflect a unique type of adult social cognition for several reasons. First, they
occur in the context of a long-term, close relationship. Second, these cognitions are often charged
with emotion (Dix, 1991; Leerkes and Augustine, 2019). Third, parenting cognitions are focused
on a moving target: A rapidly changing individual. Consequently, parents have new information
that they need to understand and integrate. A fourth unique feature is most individuals begin their
journey as parents with a very limited knowledge base or skills for dealing with infants, young
children, or teenagers. They have to learn fast.
This chapter provides an overview of the landscape concerning parenting cognitions. It covers
a wide terrain and, by necessity, relies on panoramic views. We begin with a short history of the
development of parenting cognitions. Then we identify many of the constructs being investigated.
That is followed by an evaluation of some recurrent issues and trends concerning parental cognition.
Our intent is to capture and reflect the nature of current investigations into parent cognitions, with
a focus on research published since 2010.
We do not address certain parental cognitive topics such as cognitive control (Crandall, Deater-
Deckard, and Riley, 2015), because the focus of this review is on social cognition constructs. As
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Parenting Cognitions
mentioned previously, nor will we address relations between parental cognitive abilities (e.g., intel-
ligence) and childrearing or child functioning. We also do not review any of the literature that
addresses cognitions in nontypical parents, such as studies that focus on abusive parents or parents
with diagnosable mental health problems.
A Brief History of Parental Cognitions

To set the stage for our review and evaluation of the topic, we begin with a brief history of parenting
cognitions. Each construct will be defined in its later section. Attitudes were the first type of parental
cognition assessed. The construct, as described by Herbert Spencer (1886), rapidly became a popular
focus of the Wurburg school experimentalists in Germany as well as early American psychologists
(e.g., William James, James Mark Baldwin, John Dewey). The first research study on parental attitudes
appeared in 1927 (Laws, 1927). The construct attracted considerable attention and popularity as a
vehicle to study a variety of questions about parents and children. By 1935, at least 28 studies had
been published on parental attitudes, allowing for the first review of a parenting cognition (Stogdill,
1936). These early “attitude” studies addressed such topics as the types of undesirable child behaviors,
views about parental control, and the assumed effects of childrearing behavior. The study of parental
attitudes, mostly captured by questionnaires, proliferated in the 1930s and 1940s into such topics
as overprotection and permissiveness, and expanded into such topics as breastfeeding, hyperactivity,
and sex education (see Holden, 1995). The influence of Freud and his disciples also contributed to
attention to parental attitudes and behavior (Horney, 1933; Jones, 1923).
In the late 1940s and 1950s, investigations into parental attitudes continued to be popular (Holden
and Edwards, 1989), and new constructs began to be studied. Evelyn Duvall (1946) published the first
study of parental values with her analysis of the “conceptions” of a “good mother” and a “good child”
based on interviews of 433 mothers from different social classes and ethnic groups. Although she
did not use the word “value,” she documented two general childrearing orientations: A traditional
value of keeping house and children who are clean, neat, obedient, and respectful and a nontradi-
tional orientation where the mothers valued training children to be self-reliant and children who are
cooperative, loving, healthy, and happy.
Parenting and cross-cultural work began with Whiting and Child’s (1953) psychoanalytic
approach to analyzing relations of child training and child behavior in 75 “primitive” societies. That
study opened the door to the study of parenting values as well as cross-cultural childrearing research.
A journal article using the term “parenting beliefs” appeared as early as 1950 (Harris, Gough, and
Martin, 1950) but was actually a study of maternal attitudes that differentiated prejudiced and non-
prejudiced children. Perhaps the first study that systematically assessed parental beliefs was an exten-
sive investigation of mothers’ beliefs and attitudes using interviews. The study addressed a long-term
and continuing social problem: Parents’ role in perpetuating prejudice and intergroup differences
(Radke-Yarrow, Trager, and Miller, 1952).
A different cognitive construct, perceptions, was featured in the landmark socialization study by
Sears, Maccoby, and Levin (1957), who recognized the importance of both self-perceptions and
attitudes. After conducting interviews with 379 mothers, they highlighted parenting cognitions in
their conclusion with the recognition that parent-child behavioral interactions “include the parents’
expression of attitudes, values, interests, and beliefs as well as their caretaking and training behavior”
(p. 457). Maternal perceptions, although omitted from that sentence, were prominently recognized.
Other parenting cognition variables emerged around that time. Differences in childrearing values
within cultures attracted attention (Brim, 1959; Kohn, 1959). Melvin Kohn, in a series of papers
and books (1959, 1969, 1979), systematically investigated relations between childrearing values and
parental education, occupation, and social class. He then developed a model of how social context
(i.e., social class) helps to determine parental values that then lead to childrearing values and, in turn,
683
parenting behavior. He proposed that parents from higher socioeconomic status are in occupations
where initiative, independence, and responsibility are valued and rewarded. In contrast, parents in
low socioeconomic jobs tend to have little freedom or responsibility in their jobs. Consequently, in
that context, values of obedience and conformity are necessary for success. Kohn argued that parents’
values toward self-direction and responsibility are influenced by their social class. In turn, these beliefs
influence their childrearing values. His theory has been supported by subsequent work, and extended
by linking parental beliefs about how parents influence children as will be discussed below.
A study about parental thoughts reflecting their postpartum concerns appeared in 1961. Rob-
ertson (1961) collected the worries of more than 2,000 mothers of young infants. The most
remarkable finding was the wide variety in the number of concerns reported. Eleven percent
of the mothers reported no concerns, in contrast to the 5.3% who reported 10 or more (rash,
spoiling). Later that decade, Lois Meek Stolz (1967) published the first book that was exclusively
focused on parental cognitions. She interviewed 78 parents about their childrearing values and
beliefs. Interest in other social cognition constructs, including expectations, appraisals, and goals,
began appearing in the late 1960s (e.g., Emmerich, 1969). Parental and child perceptions also
began to be assessed during this decade (Schaefer, 1965).
The 1970s saw even more attention to parents’ cognitions. Researchers began to investigate
parental perceptions of infants (Broussard and Hartner, 1970) and the impact of a variety of child
characteristics, including attractiveness, sex and gender labels, birth order, difficultness, behavior
problems, and developmental problems (Meyer and Sobieszek, 1972; Rubin, Provenzano, and Luria,
1974). Those studies led to a wave of research into the importance of perceptions of child character-
istics and behaviors and, most important, the idea of child effects on parents (Bell and Harper, 1977).
The 1970s also saw renewed attention to the influence of culture on parents. Beatrice Whiting
(1974), in her study of folk wisdom and childrearing, along with work by Robert Levine (1977),
helped to spur research. Levine highlighted the role of parenting cognitions by framing childrear-
ing as a way that parents adapt to different cultural milieux. Ross Parke (1978) joined the chorus
advocating for the importance of parental cognitions when he argued that a cognitive-mediational
approach to understanding parent-infant interactions was needed. He recognized that parenting cog-
nitions were critical for both explaining behavior and as an avenue for changing behavior.
In the 1980s, researchers turned increasing attention to parenting cognitions. Parenting beliefs,
thanks to an edited volume by Irving Sigel (1985), usurped the place of attitudes as the primary
parenting cognition construct, and were the subject of multiple reviews (Goodnow, 1988; Miller,
1986). Expectations gained traction as an important construct when they were linked to socializa-
tion and cultural differences (Goodnow, Cashmore, Cotton, and Knight, 1984). Japanese mothers’
expectations about their children’s abilities to accomplish developmental tasks were found to dif-
fer from those of American mothers (Hess, Kashiwagi, Azuma, Price, and Dickson, 1980). By the
early 1980s, parents’ expectations were recognized to be a developmentally important construct. For
example, Seginer (1983) published a literature review about parental expectations and children’s
academic achievement. She determined, on the basis of the 11 investigations, that parental expecta-
tions could be a cause of child achievement—but those expectations could also be a consequence
of child performance.
Perceptions also began to attract attention in the 1980s. At least some of the impetus to study per-
ceptions grew out of a provocative study that discovered mothers overestimated their children’s abili-
ties on IQ test items (Hunt and Paraskevopoulos, 1980). The researchers speculated on the impact
of those inaccurate perceptions. Studies of parents’ perceptions of their children’s temperament were
also recognized as containing both subjective and objective components (Lee and Bates, 1985).
Two major theoreticians in developmental psychology provided inspiration for work in this area:
Jean Piaget and John Bowlby. Piaget’s ideas about stages of children’s cognitive development pro-
moted some researchers to explore the idea of stages in parental thinking (Gutierrez and Sameroff,
684
1990; Newberger and Cook, 1983; Sameroff and Feil, 1985). For example, Sameroff and Feil (1985)
proposed that parental conceptions about their children could go through four discrete developmen-
tal stages. They argued that parental thought progressed from simple, reactive view of the parent-child
relationship to a sophisticated stage, reflecting complex and abstract thinking. Bowlby’s (1980) notion
of cognitive models of relationships highlighted parental cognition in the attachment process. His
ideas about the importance of these conceptions of oneself and others have been an active research
area in developmental and social psychology (Bretherton, 1995; Cassidy and Shaver, 2008; van iJzen-
doorn, 1995). The concept of parental reflective functioning stemmed from Bowlby’s work (Fonagy,
Steele, Steele, Moran, and Higgitt, 1991). Bowlby’s notion of cognitive schemas led to one approach
to capture parental thinking. Schemas refer to information structures in memory that serve to organ-
ize past experience and guide responses to new situations. For example, parents’ gender schemas
have been commonly assessed (Tenenbaum and Leaper, 2002), and this concept has been applied to
maltreating parents (Azar, Nix, and Makin-Byrd, 2005).
To illustrate the growth in attention devoted to different parental cognition constructs, we used
PsychInfo for each decade from the 1960s to the 2010s to count the number of publications that
included the constructs of parent attitudes, beliefs, values, perceptions, expectations, and percep-
tions. The average number of peer-reviewed articles per year concerning these search terms were
then computed for each decade, and these averages are displayed in Figure 20.1, Figure 20.2, and
Figure 20.3. Those figures illustrate the dramatic increase in attention to parenting cognition over
the past 50 years.
We next turn our attention to the types of constructs that have been investigated under the label
of “parenting cognitions.”
A Typology of Parenting Cognitions

Given the sustained attention devoted to parenting cognitions over the past 30 years, one would
expect the constructs to be clearly defined and distinct. However, that is not the case; there has been
considerable ambiguity and confusion about the meaning and labels of the constructs. For exam-
ple, beliefs are sometime called attitudes. Values are confused with goals. Attributions are referred
to as beliefs. And the conceptual muddle continues, impeding clarity, replication, and progress in
200
Percepons Beliefs
180
Mean Number of Publicaons
160
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
'60s '70s '80s '90s '00s '10s
Decade
Figure 20.1 Average number of articles published per decade studying parental perceptions and beliefs
685
90
Atudes Values
80

70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
'60s '70s '80s '90s '00s '10s
Decade
Figure 20.2 Average number of articles published per decade studying parental attitudes and values
60
Expectaons
50
40
30
20
10
0
'60s '70s '80s '90s '00s '10s
Decade
Figure 20.3 Average number of articles published per decade studying parental expectations
understanding parenting cognitions. Consequently, next we provide a typology of the concepts with
definitions and distinctions between the terms.
Bugental and Johnston (2000) developed a useful schema for categorizing cognitions.They argued
cognitions can be sorted into four categories: descriptive, evaluative-prescriptive, analytical, and effi-
cacy. We will use the first two categories for this chapter; analytical thoughts are being addressed in
the chapter on attributions by Bugental and Corpuz (2019) and efficacy is being addressed in the
chapter by Schuengel and Oosterman (2019). We modify Bugental and Johnston’s (2000) scheme
by making a distinction as to whether the cognition is focused on the present or the future. Conse-
quently, we begin with the two of the descriptive cognitions that are oriented in the present: Per-
ceptions and beliefs. We then discuss the two evaluative cognitions that are also based in the present:
Attitudes and values. Then we discuss three types of descriptive cognitions that are future oriented:
686
Expectations, concerns, and goals. After that, we discuss new types of parenting cognitions that have
appeared in the literature in the past few decades. Those constructs are depicted in Figure 20.4.
Present-Oriented, Nonevaluative Cognitions

Perceptions and beliefs reflect descriptive parenting cognitions focused in the present. Both con-
structs are fundamentally nonevaluative views of what parents think they are observing, or what they
believe. They also reflect what the parent perceives, or believes, to be accurate or the truth, even if it
is a biased perception or a baseless belief. Two other parenting cognitions are also present based, but
evaluative in nature: Attitudes and values. Both constructs involve making an assessment or judgment,
with the recognition that other parents may have differing views.
Perceptions
Perceptions refer to the ways the parent identifies or interprets the child, childrearing, or the par-
ent’s own experience. Various synonyms appear in the literature that refer to perceptions or self-
perceptions, including views, assessments, perspectives, or even judgments. These types of thoughts
are not intentionally evaluative or judgmental; rather, they reflect the parent’s perspective. In contrast
to attitudes, where it is expected that there are differences of opinion, perceptions are more akin to
reports of the parent’s experience. Of course, in reality, perceptions are often evaluative. Parents of
noncompliant or challenging preschoolers may perceive them as “difficult” or even “bad.”
Investigators have examined a wide variety of parenting perceptions and the correlates of those
perceptions. Over the past several years, researchers have studied parents perceptions about their chil-
dren (Lee, Keown, and Brown, 2016), the concordance between the parent’s and child’s views about
parent behavior (Dimler, Natsuaki, Hastings, Zahn-Waxler, and Klimes-Dougan, 2017), and self-
perceptions about their own behavior and well-being (Luthar and Ciciolla, 2016). Table 20.1 pro-
vides a sample of the types of parenting perceptions examined that have been published since 2010.
Figure 20.4 A schematic diagram of the parenting cognition variables to be reviewed
Table 20.1 Examples of Parental Perceptions Investigated Since 2010
Accuracy of perceptions of child emotional development (Kårstad, Kvello, Wichstom, and Berg-Nielson, 2014)
Child academic competencies (Raty and Kasanen, 2013)
Child behavior (Lee, Keown, and Brown, 2016)
Child body weight (Tompkins, Seablom, and Brock, 2015)
Child fearfulness (Kiel and Buss, 2011)
Fairness of division of housework (Newkirk, Perry-Jenkins, and Sayer, 2017)
Parent alienating behavior (Harman, Biringen, Ratajack, Outland, and Kraus, 2016)
Self-perceptions of their own parenting (Cote, Kwak, Putnick, Chung, and Bornstein, 2015)
687
How parents perceive their children has obvious importance for their parenting. If parents do not
recognize their child has a weight problem, then they will not be motivated to act (Tompkins, Sea-
blom, and Brock, 2015). Research into parental perceptions addresses three types of questions: First,
what do parents perceive? Second, how accurate are parental perceptions, and does accuracy matter?
A third, and most important, question is how do parental perceptions relate to parental behavior,
family interactions, or children’s development? Next, we mention some of the findings for several
of these questions.
Descriptive studies into the nature of parental perceptions do not simply include child character-
istics (e.g., temperament, weight). Views about fairness or acceptability of behaviors are also exem-
plars of this cognition. In one study, parents rated the acceptability of almost 60 behaviors designed to
alienate one parent from the other (e.g., “telling a child the other parent does not love him or her”;
Harman, Biringen, Ratajack, Outland, and Kraus, 2016). Although all parental alienating behaviors
were perceived as unacceptable, parents thought that it was more acceptable for mothers than for
fathers to engage in them. A second study assessing parental perceptions examined parental ratings
of the acceptability of parental discipline (Brown, Holden, and Ashraf, 2018). One of five different
terms referring to physical punishment appeared in vignettes. When the term “spank” appeared, par-
ents perceived that form of punishment as more common, effective, and acceptable than four other
synonymous terms (“slap,” “swat,” “hit,” “beat”). Another example concerns mothers’ perceptions of
the division of housework and childcare tasks. Mothers who perceived the division of labor as unfair
and, on returning to work, engaged in more childcare than they had anticipated, reported higher
levels of marital conflict than other mothers (Newkirk, Perry-Jenkins, and Sayer, 2017).
The question of the accuracy of parental perceptions has been investigated in a variety of con-
tent areas. Parents are likely to overestimate some child characteristics and underestimate others. In
a study of perceptions of 4-year-old children’s ability to understand emotions, 91% of the parents
significantly overestimated their children’s abilities by about 3 years (Kårstad, Kvello, Wichstrom,
and Berg-Nielsen, 2014). In a review of 13 studies assessing parental perceptions of their children’s
weight, Tompkins, Seablom, and Brock (2015) found that parents typically underestimated the
weight status of their overweight or obese children. Accuracy was affected by multiple variables,
including the child’s gender and age and ethnicity as well as health literacy. But those perceptions
related to behavior: Children whose parents perceived them as being overweight were likely to have
a negative view of their bodies but to actively be trying to lose weight (Robinson and Sutin, 2017).
Another type of parental perception is parents’ views about themselves. Parental self-perceptions
include feelings of competence or efficacy as caregivers and feelings of satisfaction as a parent (see
Schuengel and Oosterman, 2019), but also such topics as parental views about their investment in
that role, and perceptions about the task of balancing childrearing with other roles. Studies into
self-perceptions of parents reveal cultural differences. An illustration can be found in a study that
addressed self-perceptions (as well as attributions) in Korean immigrant mothers, European Ameri-
can mothers, and native South Korean mothers of 20-month-old children (Cote, Kwak, Putnick,
Chung, and Bornstein, 2015). Korean mothers were found to differ significantly from European
American mothers on their sense of investment in their children, satisfaction from parenting, com-
petence in the parent role, and ability to balance parenting with their other roles. Immigrant mothers’
self-perceptions were more like those of the native Koreans than of the European American mothers.
A fundamental question concerns whether parental perceptions are accurate. Most commonly,
that question has been studied by examining the extent of the correspondence of parents’ views
about their own childrearing behavior with the views of their children. A representative study of that
question found systematic differences between parents’ self-perceptions and their children’s percep-
tions of their parents’ behavior (Gaylord, Kitzmann, and Coleman, 2003). The larger the discrepancy,
the more likely a child was to have internalizing or externalizing behavior problems. Those find-
ings were echoed in a meta-analysis of 85 studies looking at the concordance of parent and child
688
perceptions (Korelitz and Garber, 2016). Mothers’ and fathers’ reports of their childrearing behavior
(e.g., acceptance, psychological control, and behavioral control) showed only modest levels of agree-
ment with children, and not surprisingly, they painted a rosier view of their parenting than their
children did.
The importance of accurate parental perceptions was illustrated in a study by Kiel and Buss
(2011). Maternal perceptions of their children’s fearfulness were assessed. Mothers who accurately
perceived and anticipated their children’s fears engaged in more appropriate and protective responses
to the children than did other mothers.
Beliefs
The second major type of descriptive cognition are parenting beliefs. Beliefs refer to those cognitions
that parents accept as true or real that are acquired by experience or some form of education. Like
perceptions, multiple synonyms for beliefs have appeared in the literature. Most commonly parental
beliefs are referred to as knowledge. However, the construct also appears as perspectives, ideas, con-
ceptions, implicit or naïve theories, and schemes. “Beliefs” is a better label than “knowledge” because
it captures the sense that a parent’s understanding of something may not be factual or accurate but
reflects what the parent thinks is true. One specific subcategory of beliefs that will not be discussed
in this chapter are attributions, beliefs about the causes of behavior. That construct is addressed by
Bugental and Corpuz (2019).
As is well recognized, a parent’s behavior is multiply determined. It is influenced by immedi-
ate context variables (e.g., the setting, emotions, child’s behavior), but also by distal factors (culture,
their own childrearing experiences; Belsky, 1984; Holden, 2015). Beliefs occupy a prominent place
among those determinants. That point will be illustrated with four examples. In Colonial America
(1607–1776), Puritan ministers preached to parents that their children were born sinful and that evil
nature had to be beaten out of them (Greven, 1977). Consequently, parents (and teachers) whipped
and beat children for disobedience, unruly behavior, and a multitude of minor infractions. A cross-
cultural example concerns parents’ beliefs about the capabilities of newborns. If a mother believes
that a neonate is not able to see or hear, then the mother is likely to act accordingly (Shrestha, Ulak,
Strand, Kvestad, and Hysing, 2017). A contemporary example are parents of children with autism
spectrum disorder. They hold a variety of beliefs about its etiology and developmental course, and
the particular beliefs held can affect child immunizations, family planning, and maternal mental
health (Herbert and Koulouglioti, 2010). A final example is the impact of differing beliefs about
breastfeeding. Views about whether neonates should receive colostrum, as well as what age a mother
should stop breastfeeding and introduce solid foods, are examples of how beliefs can have clear impli-
cations for infant health (Ergenekon-Ozelci, Elmaci, Ertem, and Saka, 2006).
As Figure 20.1 illustrated, parental beliefs have long been a popular research construct. A large
number of childrearing beliefs can be found in books (Goodnow and Collins, 1990; Sigel, 1985;
Sigel, McGillicuddy-DeLisi, and Goodnow, 1992). Systematic reviews about parental beliefs in gen-
eral are available (Goodnow, 1988; Goodnow, 2002; Hirsjarvi and Perala-Littunen, 2001). In addition,
narrowly focused reviews summarize such topics as parental beliefs about autism (Hebert and Kou-
louglioti, 2010), children’s cognitive abilities (Miller, 1986), children’s cognitive development (Miller,
1988), and disabilities (Danesco, 1997). By the early 1990s, a sufficient body of literature was available
to review relations between parental beliefs and child outcomes (Murphey, 1992).
Parental beliefs have been categorized in multiple ways. Stolz (1967) differentiated descriptive and
instrumental beliefs. Rubin and Mills (1990) differentiated reactive from proactive beliefs with moth-
ers of anxious withdrawn, hostile-aggressive, and typically developing children. A comprehensive
scheme was developed by Goodnow and Collins (1990). They categorized parental beliefs based on
six characteristics: Is the belief correct or accurate? Is the parent aware of the belief? To what extent
689
does the parent believe it or what is the strength of it? Is the belief unidimensional or differentiated?
To what extent does it reflect a normative belief or idiosyncratic belief? How it is related with other
beliefs and the larger culture? Hirsjarvi and Perala-Littunen (2001) sorted beliefs into categories
about children (e.g., problems, abilities, competence), parenthood (e.g., in general, mothers, adoles-
cent mothers), and between groups (e.g., culture, parents versus children).
It is now clear that parental beliefs can be highly nuanced, as illustrated by an investigation
into beliefs and social domains. In a study of beliefs concerning the legitimacy of parental authority
in Iran, mothers’ view of parental authority varied across domains (Assadi, Smetana, Shahmansouri,
and Mohammadi, 2011). Parental authority over children was considered to be legitimate for con-
ventional issues (e.g., religious practices), or prudential ones (e.g., leaving the house) but less so for
personal issues (e.g., neatness of room). Mothers who believed that parents should have authority
over adolescents’ personal domain experienced more conflicts with their teens than other mothers.
Investigations into parental beliefs have addressed six key questions, some of which parallel the
research into parental perceptions. An initial question is what kinds of beliefs do parents hold?
Researchers now investigate beliefs about the attributes of effective parenting (Winter, Morawska,
and Sanders, 2012), beliefs in myths about corporal punishment (Kish and Newcombe, 2015), chil-
dren’s portion size for meals (Potter et al., 2018), the parent’s role in protecting children from skin
cancer (Hamilton, Kirkpatrick, Rebar, White, and Hagger, 2017), and parents’ beliefs about children’s
anxiety (Wolk et al., 2016). Table 20.2 lists a sample of parental beliefs studied since 2010.
Investigations into parenting beliefs are not simply expanding into new topics but also becoming
increasingly sophisticated. Take, for example, parental beliefs about preschool children’s school readi-
ness. These beliefs are now well recognized as an important predictor of early school success (Hill,
2001). Parents hold views about transition practices (such as reading books, playing games, creating
art, teaching about nature; Puccioni, 2015). Even the construct of a parent’s belief about school readi-
ness is beginning to be dissected into different elements. For example, one investigation provides
justification for dividing the construct into two types of beliefs. First, there is a belief about whether
the child is ready for learning. This belief focuses on the child’s developmental and social/emotional
developmental readiness. The second belief is whether the child is ready for school, something that
taps into views about a child’s nascent pre-academic skills (counting, knowledge of colors) that will
be built on in school (Puccioni, 2015).
In addition to researchers documenting and explicating an expanding number of beliefs, there are
other important questions. Similar to investigations into parental perceptions, researchers assess the
accuracy of beliefs and the implications for parents of being more or less accurate. They also explore
Table 20.2 Examples of Beliefs Published Since 2010
Child injury (Brussoni and Olsen, 2011)

Child’s literacy (Puccioni, 2015)
Child’s peer problems (Farrell, 2017)
Child’s sleep (McDowall, Galland, Campbell, and Elder, 2017)
Child’s socialization and social skills (Özdemir and Cheah, 2013)
Democratic parenting (Schofield and Weaver, 2016)
Duties of a parent (Rojas-McWhinney and Bell, 2017)
Enrichment at home (Puccioni, 2015)
Nature versus nurture influences on development (Tazouti, Malarde, and Michea, 2010)
Normative childhood development (Zand et al., 2015)
Reading with child (Puccioni, 2015)
Responsibility for child’s behavior (Apetroaia, Hill, and Creswell, 2015)
Support provided to child (Schofield and Weaver, 2016)
690
those experiences and variables that contribute to the belief formation. How parenting beliefs affect
the parents themselves—such as their feelings of competency or self-worth—is of obvious impor-
tance. Another question concerns how parental beliefs are modified. What experiences or sources
of information contribute to changes in beliefs? A continuing and fundamental question is how do
parenting beliefs relate to parent behavior? Beyond that, and perhaps most important, how do paren-
tal beliefs affect children’s development? A final question that we touch on in a later section is the
role of beliefs in understanding culture and cultural differences. There is not space in this chapter to
review the research on each question, nor address each question. Instead, we illustrate findings for
three of the questions.
The accuracy or correctness of parental beliefs is an intriguing question. Does it really matter if a
parent can remember normative developmental milestones (e.g., when does a child start to teethe)?
That answer depends on the specific question being addressed. It probably does not make a difference
to the adult or the child if a parent cannot accurately report the average age a child begins to teethe. But
what if the belief is linked to a behavior? A study focusing on the accuracy of Nepalese mothers’ beliefs
illustrated the potential importance of beliefs (Shrestha et al., 2017). More than 1,270 mothers were
interviewed about their knowledge of child development and parent stimulation of children. Among
the questions asked were At what age do babies begin to see? and When should mothers begin to talk
to children? The correct answers (in utero or at birth for both questions) was given by only 37.6% and
18.4% of the mothers, respectively. Those beliefs have clear links for caregiving behavior.
An illustration of a study that addressed what experiences contribute to parents’ formation of
beliefs was conducted by Bornstein and his colleagues (2010). Using the Knowledge of Infant Devel-
opment Inventory (MacPhee, 1981), they assessed relations between the beliefs of European Ameri-
can mothers of toddlers and sociodemographic factors. Older mothers, mothers with more children,
more educated, higher socioeconomic status, and higher occupational status had more accurate (or
at least) scored higher on the scale than other mothers. However, gender of child and adoptive versus
birth mother status did not impact knowledge scores. Bornstein and his colleagues concluded that
mothers with more resources and social support gain more information from their social networks
and then supplement those beliefs with what they gain from more formal information sources, such
as professionals, educational programs, or written material.
A final illustration of a belief study concerns cultural variations regarding parenting beliefs about
school success. On the basis of interviews of immigrant Chinese and European American mothers
of preschool-age children, Chao (1996) revealed that the two groups of mothers held very different
beliefs about the parental role in promoting school success. More than half of the immigrant mothers
revealed beliefs about the importance of parent involvement and sacrifice to ensure their children’s
academic success. In contrast, the top three beliefs of the European American mothers were in con-
flict. European American mothers were more likely to view learning as fun, reading to children as
important, and academics as too often overemphasized. That study is just one of many that illustrate
how parental beliefs can be dramatically different across cultural groups.
Present-Oriented Evaluative Thoughts

In contrast to descriptive thoughts, evaluative thoughts reflect judgments in childrearing. Using the
temporal distinction of present versus future oriented, attitudes and values are the two cognitive
constructs that capture present thoughts.
Attitudes
Sometimes called endorsements, views, opinions, or other synonyms, attitudes are defined as “an
individual’s predisposition, reaction to, or affective evaluation of the supposed facts about an object
691
or situation . . . thus, attitudes are a function of beliefs” (Holden and Edwards, 1989, p. 37). Detailed
reviews on attitudes are available in Holden (1995) and Holden and Buck (2002) and elsewhere
(Holden and Edwards, 1989). Researchers have studied more than 100 different attitudes (Holden
and Buck, 2002). Interest in parental attitudes continues to be strong, although investigations have
expanded into different attitude topics.
Studies into parental attitudes can provide a revealing barometer to contemporary issues. In the
past decade, this includes attitudes about childhood and prepubertal HPV vaccinations (Kang, Culp,
and Abbas, 2017; Marlow, Waller, and Wardle, 2007), vaccinations delivered at schools (Kang et al.,
2017), the importance of physical activity (Edwardson and Gorely, 2010), adolescent fighting (Solo-
mon, Bradshaw, Wright, and Cheng, 2008), view of immigrants (Miklikowska, 2016), family violence
(Gracia, Rodriquez, Martin-Fernandez, and Lila, 2017), and exome sequencing (Sapp et al., 2014).
A list of some of the attitude variables studied since 2010 is provided in Table 20.3.
The parental attitude construct most frequently studied is attitudes about punishment and spe-
cifically toward corporal punishment. That construct has allowed for examining such questions as
cross-cultural differences (Lansford et al., 2014), charting attitudinal change as a reflection of legal
reforms (D’Souza, Russell, Wood, Signal, and Elder, 2016; Romano, Bell, and Norian, 2013), and
understanding childhood experiences associated with positive attitudes (Simons and Wurtele, 2010).
In addition, the construct has been used to document the effectiveness of interventions to change
attitudes (Holland and Holden, 2016; Miller-Perrin and Perrin, 2017; Reich, Penner, Duncan, and
Auger, 2012) and to reveal change over time, as found with Conservative Protestants over almost
30 years (Hoffmann, Ellison, and Barkowski, 2017).
Investigations into attitudes about parenting style frequently appear in journals. For example,
studies have examined mothers’ and fathers’ progressive versus authoritarian attitudes in nine coun-
tries (Bornstein, Putnick, and Lansford, 2011). Across the countries, mothers typically had more
progressive attitudes than fathers, but their attitudes were largely concordant. In addition, significant
cross-country differences were found. For example, parents in Sweden, China, and the United States
were less likely to espouse authoritarian attitudes than parents living in Colombia, Kenya, and the
Philippines.
The construct has afforded the examination of a number of substantive questions. For example,
one basic question concerns the origins of childrearing attitudes. Friedson (2016) discovered that
childrearing attitudes are related to both current socioeconomic status and socioeconomic status in
childhood. Specifically, coming from an economically disadvantaged background is associated with
authoritarian childrearing values (for obedience) and attitudes (for corporal punishment). Other
studies have identified childhood abusive experiences or one’s own parents’ attitudes as key influ-
ences on current attitudes (Chung et al., 2009; Clement and Chamberland, 2009).
Table 20.3 Examples of Childrearing Attitudes Published Since 2010
Coparental affect (Thomassin and Suveg, 2014)

Family stress (Greene and Gardner, 2012)
Favoritism ( Jeannin and van Leeuwen, 2014)
Interparental positive affect congruity (Thomassin and Suveg, 2014)
Involvement (Gaertner, Spinrad, Einsenberg, and Greving, 2007)
Negative affect in children (Thomassin and Suveg, 2014)
Parent partiality ( Jeannin and van Leeuwen, 2014)
Psychological control ( Jeannin and van Leeuwen, 2014)
Sensitivity (Rostad and Whitaker, 2016)
Support ( Jeannin and van Leeuwen, 2014)
Use of coercion (Greene and Gardner, 2012)
692
Intergenerational transmission of attitudes has also been frequently examined by assessing the
concordance of parent and child attitudes. This approach has been used to examine attitudes about
politics ( Jennings, Stoker, and Bowers, 2009), prejudice (Degner and Dalege, 2013), immigrants
(Miklikowska, 2016), gender roles (Farre and Vella, 2013), and attitudes about marriage (Willoughby,
Carroll, Vitas, and Hill, 2012), for example.
Values
Values refer to the qualities that parents consider important to childrearing or the outcomes they
desire for their children. In contrast to attitudes or goals, values are more general and abstract. Chil-
drearing values reflect an admixture of the parent’s individual worldview, cultural values and, in many
cases, religious values (Petro, Rich, Erasmus, and Roman, 2018; Prevoo and Tamis-LeMonda, 2017).
These values include how the parent should behave, which roles are most important (e.g., source of
warmth comfort, an authority figure, disciplinarian, educator), what characteristics the parent seeks
in the child, or more general family values (Fischer, Harvey, and Driscoll, 2009; Mowder and Shamah,
2011). A list of studies of parenting values can be found in Table 20.4.
Studies into parenting values that follow Kohn’s (1969) approach of linking childrearing values
to the social context have continued. Most prominent is the work by Lareau (2003 2011), who
dichotomized the socioeconomic status influenced values of concerted cultivation (i.e., parents need
to facilitate development) versus a natural growth (i.e., conformity and laissez-faire parenting; Bush
and Peterson, 2013).
Parental values are also the variable that was the focus of the most massive single study of parental
cognition. In a study of more than a quarter million parents from 90 nations, it was found that parents
value child independence in wealthier nations with more educated populations, in contrast to the
other countries where child obedience is more highly valued (Park and Lau, 2016).
Childrearing values have been used to document intergenerational change. Alwin (1984) meas-
ured how parental values, as measured by the traits desired in children, changed from 1958 to 1983.
He found an increase in the valuing of child autonomy with a corresponding decrease in seeking
child obedience. Intergenerational changes in collectivist versus individualistic values has also been
charted; Prioste, Narciso, Goncalves, and Pereira (2017) discovered that Portuguese adolescents val-
ued individualism, whereas their parents and grandparents prioritized collectivism.
The dichotomy of those two values has been frequently examined in cross-cultural studies. Col-
lectivist parents value interdependence, attending to the needs of others, and in many cultures, the
family. Individualist parents value self-reliance in their children, self-interest, and autonomy. These
two values co-occur, so a simple dichotomization is not accurate (Raeff, 1997; Tamis-LeMonda
et al., 2008). Other parenting values have also been explored. These include parent centered versus
child centered (Fischer et al., 2009) and decency, proper demeanor, self-maximization, and sociabil-
ity/lovingness, the four key value categories identified by Harwood, Miller, and Irizarry (1995).
For example, Greek mothers prioritized decency values for their children, in contrast to Taiwanese
mothers who focused on proper demeanor, and American mothers who were oriented to self-
maximization (Tamis-LeMonda, Koutsouvanou, and Albright, 2002).
Table 20.4 Examples of Childrearing Values Published Since 2010
Cultural values (White et al., 2013)

Generations (Prioste et al., 2017)
Globalization (Prevoo and Tamis-LeMonda, 2017)
Obedience (Friedson, 2016)
Values related to whether to do exome sequencing (Sapp et al., 2014)
693
In addition to Greece, cross-cultural studies have compared parenting values in such countries
as Taiwan (Xiao, 1999), Dominican Republic (Guilamo-Ramos et al., 2007), Mexico (Varela et al.,
2004), Turkey and Germany (Citlak, Leyendecker, Scholmerich, Driessen, and Harwood, 2008).
The acculturation of values from Latino immigrants in the United States (Fischer et al., 2009) has
also been studied. Parental values have proven to be a particularly useful construct for providing
an explanatory mechanism for understanding cross-cultural behavioral differences. However, with
globalization, the fluidity of national borders, and immigration, cultural differences in childrearing
values based on nationality is becoming less and less accurate (Prevoo and Tamis-LeMonda, 2017).
Future-Oriented Parenting Cognitions

Parents rear a rapidly changing organism who is growing in front of their eyes. They may anticipate
future ages (e.g., terrible twos, adolescence) but undoubtedly have an eye on the end-state: Adult-
hood. Consequently, it is not surprising that parents engage in three types of future-oriented parent-
ing cognitions: Expectations, concerns, and goals. To maintain the distinction between descriptive
and evaluative cognitions, expectations and concerns reflect descriptive cognitions, whereas goals
reflect proscriptive or evaluative cognitions.
Expectations
Expectations are the cognitions that parents have that something should, will, or is likely to occur
regarding their children or childrearing. Synonyms include anticipations, expectancies, and aspira-
tions. These typically are specific thoughts, such as “My son will not do well in math” or “I assume
my daughter will become anxious as soon as I leave,” or “I expect my child to go to college.” Con-
sequently, expectations convey messages to their children. Children learn about what their parents
think about their abilities, the difficulties to be encountered, and the importance of the activity from
parents’ expectations (Parsons, Adler, and Kaczala, 1982).
The foremost reason expectations are important is that they can guide parent behavior. Parents
will engage in behaviors that they expect to result in positive outcomes. For example, parents who
spank their children have positive outcome expectancies about the use of that particular type of
discipline (Holden, Miller, and Harris, 1999). Expectations drive proactive parenting. If mothers did
not expect their child to lose control in the face of the temptations in the supermarket, they would
not engage in proactive management strategies (Holden, 1983). More generally, parents engage in
proactive behaviors or even behavioral campaigns to prevent potential problems from developing
(Park and Cheah, 2005; Pettit, Keiley, Laird, Bates, and Dodge, 2007).
Expectations about parenting roles have long been studied with regard to the transition to parent-
hood (Belsky, 1985). However, even emerging adults have intentions about parenting, such as with
regard to breastfeeding, circumcision, co-sleeping, and infant childcare (Powell and Karraker, 2017).
Parenting expectations are closely linked to marital conflict and satisfaction. When expectations
about anticipated division of labor and involvement in infant care are violated, the new parents are
likely to experience conflict (Eastlick, Pitre, Williamson, Breitkreuz, and Rempel, 2014; Rodriguez
and Adamsons, 2012). There are also other types of expectations with regard to roles, support, and
values that can have an important impact on the marital relationship (Feinberg, 2002).
A considerable amount of research has related parental expectations to children’s school achieve-
ment. Indeed, parental expectations are one of the best predictors of school achievement according
to several meta-analyses (Fan and Chen, 2001; Jeynes, 2007), although the relation is not uniformly
strong across all ethnic groups (Yamamoto and Holloway, 2010). Parental academic achievement
expectations relate to parental behavior as well as child achievement (Davis-Kean, 2005; Fan and
Chen, 2001; Jeynes, 2007). Given the importance of academic achievement, research continues in
694
this area. In an experimental study, researchers discovered that parents’ educational expectations can
be positively affected by having parents open a savings account for college (Kim, Huang, Sherraden,
and Clancy, 2017).
In addition to studies regarding academic achievement, a plethora of child-based expectations
has been investigated (Goodnow, Cashmore, Cotton, and Knight, 1984). These include expectan-
cies concerning children’s obligations to the family (Lansford et al., 2016) and anticipations about
the future of their children with cerebral palsy (Barak, Elad, Silberg, and Brezner, 2017). Table 20.5
provides a sample of expectations that have been published since 2010.
High expectations can benefit children, but not always. If a parent has unrealistic expectations for
a child’s academic achievement, those cognitions can negatively affect a child. Unrealistic expecta-
tions can translate into parental over-involvement, excessive pressure, and over-control, all variables
associated with child maladjustment (Gurland and Grolnick, 2003; Roth, Assor, Niemiec, Ryan, and
Deci, 2009). In a study of German school-age children, the 30% of parents who expected too much,
and thereby engaged in “over-aspiration,” had children who performed less well in math achieve-
ment than the children of other parents (Murayama, Pekrun, Suzuki, Marsh, and Lichtenfeld, 2016).
As that study makes clear, it is important not to confound expectations and aspirations, a distinction
well recognized in sociology but not psychology (Metz, Fouad, and Ihle-Helledy, 2009).
A central question with parental expectations is where (or how) did they originate? Did it begin
as a thought in the parent? Or perhaps was it reverse order, in that the parent developed the expec-
tation on the basis of the child’s interest, talent, or performance? A third explanation is the belief
is the product of reciprocal or transactional experiences. There is evidence for all three temporal
orders: Parents may have a preexisting expectancy, perhaps due to cultural influence (Méndez, 2006);
but in other cases, parents adjust their expectations on the basis of the child’s characteristics (Maji,
Lerkkanen, Poikkeus, Rasku-Pottonen, and Nurmi, 2011), or expectations that are the product of
reciprocal relationships (Murayama et al., 2016).
Concerns
Closely related to expectations are parental concerns (or worries). This type of belief provides an
insight into parental cognition because it reflects a particular type of belief that is of special interest,
of importance, or is worrisome. Concerns may reflect nascent troubles that have the potential to
develop into a problem, or they could simply reflect an unfounded anxious thought. Since the first
study of parental concerns (Robertson, 1961), many worries have been assessed and documented.
Most often the focus is child behaviors, including behavior problems, sleep difficulties, diet and
weight, teen smoking, drinking, and driving (Beck, 1990). However, publications of concerns pro-
vide a good mirror of the times. Some of the time-related concerns include sex education (Geasler,
Dannison, and Edlund, 1995), vaccines (Kempe et al., 2011), and internet usage (Sorbring, 2014).
Table 20.5 Examples of Expectations Published Since 2010
Academic achievement (Marcenaro-Gutierrez and Lopez-Agudo, 2017)

Children’s education (Kim et al., 2017)
Division of childcare (Biehle and Mickelson, 2012)
Family obligations (Lansford et al., 2016)
Futures of children with cerebral palsy (Barak et al., 2017)
Prenatal parenting expectations (Mihelic, Filus, and Morawska, 2016)
Stranger danger (Francis et al., 2017)
Unrealistic expectations (Murayama, Pekrun, Suzuki, Marsh, & Lichtenfeld, 2016)
695
Minority parents tend to be more concerned with school readiness than other parents (Diamond,
Reagan, and Bandyk, 2000). Table 20.6 provides a representative list of the types of parental concerns
studied since 2010.
Specific concerns emerge at different developmental stages. For example, Kaitz (2007) identified
six domains of concerns for mothers of infants: Infant and family health, infant care, return to work,
mother’s well-being, relationships/support, and spouse. In contrast, adolescence provides very differ-
ent types of worries, with risks posed by peers, sex, smoking, drinking, and driving (Koning, van den
Eijnden, Glatz, and Vollebergh, 2013).
Concerns are likely influenced by two cognitive processes: Threat appraisal and coping appraisal.
The degree of concern is influenced by both parents’ assessment of the likelihood their child will
engage in the risk behavior as well as parental perceptions of their ability to influence the child’s risk
behavior (Koning et al., 2013).
Goals
The third type of future-oriented cognitions are goals—those outcomes parents seek for their chil-
dren, their childrearing practices, or their family. Goal is sometimes used interchangeably with values,
but they should be differentiated. Goals are more specific, concrete, and future oriented than values.
Values, at least how we distinguish them, refer to parents’ present orientation. Goals communicate,
either explicitly or implicitly, parental values. Goals can be immediate, short term, or long term. An
immediate goal refers to an outcome the parent seeks to accomplish in the specific situation, such
as gaining compliance, or reading a story to a child. A short-term goal refers to hopes for the near
future, typically in the course of a parent-child interaction (such as help the parent or have fun in the
park). In contrast, long-term socialization goals refer to outcomes that are years away, such as make
a high school team or attend graduate school (Keller et al., 2006; Ramirez, Oshin, and Milan, 2017).
More generally, Holden (2010) argued that effective parents have the long-term goal of keeping their
children on healthy developmental trajectories. That goal becomes activated if the child winds up
on an off-ramp and requires some type of parental intervention. Long-term goals help to motivate
parents through the daily and mundane tasks of childrearing (Whiting and Edwards, 1988).
Although attention to goals first appeared in the work of Stolz (1967), Emmerich (1969), and
Levine (1977, the study of parental goals was revived by Kuczynski (1984), Grusec (Grusec, Rudy,
and Martini, 1997; Hastings and Grusec, 1998), and Dix (Dix and Branca, 2003). Their investigations
made a number of distinctions. For example, parenting goals can be child centered, parent centered,
or relationship centered (Hastings and Grusec, 1998). Women tend to adopt more relationship-
centered goals than men, public situations increased the likelihood of adopting parent-centered goals,
and when the parents adopted different goals, it could affect their behavior and mood.
Table 20.6 Examples of Parental Concerns Published Since 2010
Children with autism (Bitsaka, Sharpley, Andronicos, and Agnew, 2017)

Children’s anxiety (Fisak, Holderfield, Douglas-Osborn, and Cartwright-Hatton, 2012)
Children’s body weight and obesity (Regber et al., 2013)
Children’s diet, nutrition, and activity level (Slater et al., 2010)
Concerns of expectant parents (Biehle and Mickelson, 2011)
Safety (Scarzello, 2016)
Use of electronics and internet (Sorbring, 2014)
Vaccines (Kempe et al., 2011)
696
Childrearing goals are not independent, but interrelated and overlapping. For example, in a quali-
tative study of parents’ goals concerning organized youth sports over 15 months (Dorsch et al., 2015),
the goals were categorized as instrumental (e.g., develop as an athlete), identity (e.g., affect oth-
ers’ perceptions of child), or relational (e.g., enhance family relationships). Each of those categories
contained subcategories. For relational goals, the specific aims included feeling support from family,
spending time together, and having something to talk about. Not surprisingly, the goals changed over
time, depending on the sport and the season.
Parents’ goals influence parental communications with their children. One study evaluated paren-
tal goals for their toddlers and how those goals related to parental communication patterns. Parental
reported goals could be categorized as educational, socioemotional, developmental, and pragmatic.
Parents who reported more educational goals for their children spent more time talking about aca-
demic topics than other parents (Rowe and Casillas, 2011). These studies are suggestive of the variety
of parent goals that have been investigated (see Table 20.7).
A number of studies point out that goals differ across groups of parents both within and across
cultures. Within culture, a common comparison has been to look at childrearing goals across ethnic
minority parents or between groups of immigrant parents. Typically, differences are found within
groups as well as between majority and minority parents (Prevoo and Tamis-LeMonda, 2017; Suizzo,
2007). For example, African American mothers in the United States put more importance on the
goals of rearing their daughters to being independent, self-confident, and strong women, compared
with Latina or European American mothers (Ramirez, Oshin, and Milan, 2017). Within cultural
comparisons of parenting goals can be found for Chinese Americans (Chao, 2000; Pearson and Rao,
2003; Suizzo, 2007), Mexican Americans (Suizzo, 2007), southeast Asian immigrants (Lui and Rol-
lock, 2012), and African Americans (Brodsky and DeVet, 2000; Brody, Flor, and Gibson, 1999; Ram-
irez et al., 2017; Richman and Mandara, 2013; Suizzo, Robinson, and Pahlke, 2008), for example.
The childrearing goals of parents from at least nine countries have now been investigated. These
include Cameroon and Costa Rica (Keller et al., 2006), the East Asian countries of China, Taiwan,
Japan, and Korea (Park, Coello, and Lau, 2014; Suizzo and Cheng, 2007), France (Suizzo, 2004),
Greece (Keller et al., 2006), India (Keller et al., 2006; Rao, McHale, and Pearson, 2003), and Mexico
(Keller et al., 2006; Zucker and Howes, 2009).
Several variables have been found to relate to variations in parental goals. The parenting style
relates to parents’ socialization goals for preschoolers. If parents endorsed an authoritarian style of
parenting, then they prioritized goals of socializing their children toward family respectfulness. In
contrast, for those parents who were authoritative, parents emphasized goals of valuing socioemo-
tional development (Pearson and Rao, 2003). Parental health can also affect childrearing goals. In a
sample of parents who had children with diabetes, some parents revealed that their diabetes-related
goals were more important than their general parenting goals. Those goals helped to influence
parental behavior: Parents who viewed the diabetes-specific goals as more important took more
responsibility in managing their children’s diabetes than did the other parents (Robinson et al., 2011).
Table 20.7 Examples of Parental Goals Published Since 2010
Benefits from youth sports (Dorsch, Smith, Wilson, and McDonough, 2015)
Children’s future (Chang and Lee, in press)
Goals differentiating Black from White parents (Richman and Mandara, 2013)
Goals for infants (Carra, Lavelli, Keller, and Kärtner, 2013)
Short- and long-term goals (Rowe and Casillas, 2011)
Socialization goals (Ramirez, Oshin, and Milan, 2017)
Specific goals related to children’s diabetes (Robinson et al., 2011)
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Novel Parenting Cognition Constructs

Over the past two decades, researchers have explored several new approaches to or types of parent-
ing cognitions. The primary exemplars of the new constructs are implicit attitudes, mindfulness, and
metacognitions.
Implicit Attitudes
As Maccoby and Martin (1983) and others (Dix, Ruble, and Zambarano, 1989) recognized long ago,
parents have implicit or intuitive thoughts that influence their cognitions and guide their behavior.
Theoretical models of cognition also recognize the dual process of both explicit and implicit process-
ing (Wilson, Lindsey, and Schooler, 2000). Explicit processes are under conscious control, whereas
implicit ones are unconscious or operate at a level individuals are not aware of. The assessment of
explicit parental cognitions can also be fraught with methodological problems (Holden and Edwards,
1989). For those reasons, the need to assess implicit attitudes has been well recognized (Holden and
Buck, 2002).
To assess implicit cognitions of parents, several approaches have been used. For example, one
approach involves assessing cognitions through fast-paced word sorting tasks, such as the Implicit
Association Task or Go/No Go Association Task (Nosek and Banaji, 2001). At least four published
studies provide preliminary data about implicit parental attitudes in samples of typical parents ( John-
ston, Belschner, et al., 2017; Koning et al., 2017; Martin, Sturge-Apple, Davies, and Romero, 2017;
Sturge-Apple, Rogge, Skibo, Peltz, and Suor, 2015). This work indicates that it is indeed possible to
assess implicit attitudes in parents and suggests the approach will be fruitful.
New approaches are also being developed to assessing implicit attitudes in parents and individuals
at risk for child maltreatment. Non-reactive, implicit measures are likely to be especially useful for
studying the cognitions of maltreating parents (Camilo, Garrido, and Calheiros, 2016). These efforts
include using a card game (Crouch et al., 2012), a reaction time study of responses to photographs
(Risser, Skowronski, and Crouch, 2011), a handgrip strength procedure to measure responses after
hearing child laughter or crying (Compier-de Block et al., 2015), and a recall task with priming by
use of positive and negative words (Crouch et al., 2010). Another creative, nonverbal approach uses
an eye tracking analog to assess empathy in reaction to vignettes that inappropriately characterized
a child’s behavior (Rodriguez, Cook, and Jedrziewski, 2012). Although the need to assess implicit
attitudes is great and the approaches are promising, more psychometric work is needed to verify the
reliability and validity of the methods.
Mentalizing
The metacognitive construct that has received the most research attention over the past two dec-
ades goes by several names: Parental reflective functioning (Fonagy and Target, 1997; Slade, 2005),
insightfulness (Koren-Karie, Oppenheim, Dolev, Sher, and Etzion-Carasso, 2002), mind-mindedness
(Meins and Fernyhough, 1999; Meins et al., 2003) and, most recently, parental mentalizing (Shai and
Belsky, 2011). Fundamentally, this concept refers to parents’ ability to understand behavior in light
of their own and their children’s mental states. Parents high in this ability understand that a child’s
mind is separate from their own, but recognize that both parent and child are reciprocally influenced
by each other. Each of the four variations of the concept has its own distinctions, but due to space
limitations, those will not be discussed.
Work in this area initially focused on mothers, infants, and the security of attachment (Slade,
2005), but it has now expanded to a variety of populations, including those with psychiatric prob-
lems (Katznelson, 2014). Assessments are made by extensive parent interviews, such as the Adult
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Attachment Interview (Main and Goldwyn, 1990), the Parent Development Interview (Aber, Slad,
Berger, Bresgi, and Kaplan, 1985), and the Working Model of the Child Interview (Zeanah and
Benoit, 1995). In an innovative approach to nonverbal data, Shai and Belsky (2011) developed a cod-
ing system of the parent’s and child’s bodily movements during parent-child interactions, but with
the sound turned off. Thus, their approach captures “embodied” mentalizing in parents.
Although this research is young, it is proving fruitful. Fonagy and Target (1997) argued that a
parent’s capacity to mentalize may be the key determinant of sensitive parenting and, in turn, secure
attachment. Some evidence for this review has been found. For example, Slade, Grienenberger, Bern-
bach, Levy, and Locker (2005) discovered links between adult attachment styles, reflective function-
ing, and infant attachments, all in the expected directions. More recently, mothers who used more
mental state words when talking about their children reported lower stress and exhibited less negative
behavior when interacting with their 4-year-olds (McMahon and Meins, 2012).
Mindfulness
A second construct that has become popular in the past two decades is mindfulness. Borrowed from
Buddhism, the term refers to the deliberate, open-minded awareness of moment-to-moment experi-
ences. The approach gained attention with Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting by
Myla and Jon Kabat-Zinn (1997). The effortful cognitions required for this approach are articulated
by Myla: “I have tried to bring some awareness to my moment-to-moment experiences as a parent:
observing, questioning, looking at what I most value and what I think is most important for my
children” (p. 9). Thus, mindful parenting can be defined as the intentional present-moment awareness
to the parent-child relationship. Duncan and his colleagues (Duncan, Coatsworth, and Greenberg,
2009) developed a model of mindfulness containing five elements: (1) listening with full attention,
(2) emotional awareness of child and parent, (3) use of self-regulation, (4) nonjudgmental acceptance
of child and oneself as a parent, and (5) compassion for the child and oneself.
Although mindfulness has only recently been applied to parenting, research has already demon-
strated some benefits. Increased mindfulness in parents is related to lower authoritarian beliefs and
higher authoritative beliefs (Williams and Wahler, 2010) as well as lower levels of stress in parents and
fewer mental health problems (Gouveia, Carona, Canavarro, and Moreira, 2016).
As an intervention, mindfulness training is already showing potential to help parents become
more effective in their childrearing role. By training parents to focus their thoughts in the present,
that simple redirection results in improved behavior for children with ADHD (Singh et al., 2010),
with autism spectrum disorder (Singh et al., 2006), and for the parent-child relationship (Coats-
worth, Duncan, Greenberg, and Nix, 2010). An 8-week mindful intervention to parents of children
receiving treatment at a psychiatric clinic resulted in several benefits. Increased mindful parenting
was related to a decrease in both parent and child problems (Meppelink, de Bruin,Wanders-Mulder,
Vennik, and Bögels, 2016). Each of these studies needs to be replicated, but the initial results are very
promising. The next step is to link mindfulness training to improved child outcomes (Cohen and
Semple, 2010).
Metacognition
Parental metacognition refers to thinking about thinking. This type of construct has been applied
to parents in two ways: Parental meta-emotion philosophy and meta-parenting. Meta-emotions was
introduced by Gottman, Katz, and Hooven in 1996 and refers to a set of coherent beliefs and feelings
about their own and their children’s emotions. Meta-parenting, a more general construct than meta-
emotion, was proposed by Holden and Hawk (2003) in an effort to recognize the types and quantity
of cognitive work that parents devote to childrearing.
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Since 1996, a number of investigations have explored the nature and ramifications of meta-
emotion philosophy. It consists of three component processes: Awareness, acceptance, and coaching.
Those cognitions are related to child emotional competence and, in turn, psychosocial adjustment
(Katz, Maliken, and Stettler, 2012). A study that demonstrates the utility of the construct discovered
that children with anxiety disorders have parents who are less aware of their own emotions and
engage in less emotional coaching than parents with typical children (Hurrell, Houwing, and Hud-
son, 2017). Another study found that maternal awareness and coaching of emotions in families with
intimate partner violence can moderate relations between parent symptomatology and children’s
internalizing behavior problems (Cohodes, Chen, and Lieberman, 2017).
Meta-parenting is a construct that was developed to assess effortful parental cognitions about their
children or parenting, typically before or after an interaction (Holden and Hawk, 2003). A number
of researchers and others have recognized that one of the principles of good childrearing is that it
should consist of deliberative, intentional, and nonreactive parental behavior (Steinberg, 2004). In an
effort to measure that, the construct of meta-parenting was developed. It consists of four types of
thoughts: Anticipating (or expectations), assessing, problem-solving, and reflecting.
Studies into meta-parenting reveal that parents report engaging in a great deal of it (Hawk and
Holden, 2006). Mothers of children with ADHD who are more stressed report engaging in more
meta-parenting (Tamm, Holden, Nakonezny, Swart, and Hughes, 2012). A study that compared
meta-parenting in African Americans, Mexican Americans, and European American mothers found
that African American mothers reported more assessing, anticipating, and reflecting than did Euro-
pean American mothers, with Mexican American mothers falling in between (Holden, Hawk, Smith,
Singh, and Ashraf, 2017). On the basis of the studies conducted to date, meta-parenting reflects a
combination of parental, child, and contextual variables.
Parental Cognitive Processes

As is evident from the earlier review, much of the research into parenting cognitions focuses on dis-
crete constructs, such as attitudes or beliefs. But those constructs are often in service of instrumental
cognitive processes. Two types of cognitive processes have received some attention: Decision-making
and information processing.
Parenting requires making countless decisions. Parents make decisions about breastfeeding, when
to enroll their child in alternative care, which school to attend, peer interactions, youth sports, when
to let their child have a cell phone, and so forth. Many decisions are trivial and inconsequential, but
some have clear implications for the child’s health, development, and well-being. To date, most of
work into understanding this cognitive process has been in the area of medical decision-making.
A prominent topic in parental medical decision for more than 25 years is parents’ decision-mak-
ing about child immunizations. This topic is of public health concern, given the myths surrounding
the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine and vaccine-declining parents. In a review of 31 studies
into this topic, Brown and colleagues (2010) identified a complex structure along with unfounded
concerns that influenced the parents’ decision. Similar studies are being conducted into parental
decision-making and their reluctance to immunize their children with human papillomavirus vac-
cination (Dempsey, Zimet, Davis, and Koutsky, 2006).
Another focus of parental decision-making research addresses help-seeking for medical or psy-
chological problems. One of the cognitive roadblocks for help-seeking is parents’ sense of stigma.
That perception can be a significant deterrent (Dempster, Wildan, and Keating, 2013). Another type
of deterrent of the decision to seek help is a parent characteristic. In a study of substance abusing par-
ents, only 40% of the mothers and 28% of the fathers were willing to allow their children to receive
mental health treatment (Kelley, D’Lima, Henson, and Cotton, 2014).
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The topic is of such import that there is now a questionnaire available to assess parenting cognitions
about barriers to enrolling children in mental health treatment programs (Dumas, Nissley-Tsiopinis,
and Moreland, 2007). Studies into parental help seeking have investigated parental decisions regard-
ing their children who snore (Boss, Links, Saxton, Cheng, and Beach, 2017), or fertility decisions of
parents with children with disorders of sex development ( Johnson et al., 2017).
A second parental cognitive process that has been studied is social information-processing. This
model is intended to capture some of the dynamic processes involved in thinking, including search-
ing for information, evaluating that information, selecting a behavior, and evaluating whether that
behavioral choice was successful. Social information processing theory (Crick and Dodge, 1994)
provides a useful theoretical guide for understanding some of the cognitive processing deficits in par-
ents that can result in child maltreatment. Using a social information approach, Azar and colleagues
(2008; Azar, Okado, Stevenson, and Robinson, 2013) described three critical elements of cognition:
Schemas, executive functioning, and products of them (i.e., appraisals, attributions). The processing
becomes activated with some event—a noncompliant or a tantruming child, for example. That event
then triggers the parent’s schema about the behavior or situation—a representation that serves to
filter the immediate events and informs the parent about what aspects of the environment to attend
to. According to Azar, parental goals and expectations come into play as part of the parent’s schema.
Unrealistic expectations, such as inappropriate views about the self-regulatory abilities of preschool-
ers, can emerge here. In many cases, if the situation is familiar, the parent responds with automatic
responses. However, if the situation is novel, then active cognitive processing is activated. Active
cognitive processing may involve problem-solving, which in itself includes problem identification,
solution generation and evaluation, enactment of responses, and reevaluation and modification if
necessary. Then, the final element in the model occurs—the products of the cognitive activity, such
as appraisals and attributions. These processes can be affected by the context, child characteristics,
and social support.
The social information-processing model is proving useful to understand parenting processes
(Lansford et al., 2014) and as well what can account for “misparenting” or maltreatment (Milner,
2000; Rodriguez, Silvia, and Gaskin, 2017). Several addition trends in the parenting cognition
research are identified next.
Trends in Parental Cognitions

In reviewing this literature, we make four observations. These trends are the increasing attention
devoted to the topic, the expanding diversity in constructs and research samples, the focus on capturing
change in cognition, and the applying of parenting cognition constructs to medical and health issues.
Increasing Attention to Parental Cognitions

The first trend was revealed early in this chapter by the first three figures: Increasing research atten-
tion is devoted to this area of inquiry. In fact, the research addressing one or more types of parenting
cognitions is increasing dramatically. For each of the five constructs charted, with only one excep-
tion, the mean number of publications per decade has increased substantially each decade since the
1960s.
Expanding Diversity
As reviewed earlier, the study of parental cognitions began with parental attitudes and since then has
steadily expanded into more than 10 constructs. The most recent entries, such as implicit attitudes,
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mindfulness, and mentalizing, reflect the expanding efforts to understand the mental activities of
parents.
The second type of diversity that research into parenting cognition has seen is a major expansion
into diverse samples of parents. Critics of the scientific literature point out that samples are too often
composed of only White, European Americans or at least from Western countries (Graham, 1992;
Henrich, Heine, and Norenzayan, 2010). That critique can no longer be applied to the research on
parenting cognitions because researchers now routinely collect parental cognition data from diverse
samples both in the United States and around the world.
For example, in North America, there are now studies of parental perceptions, beliefs, attitudes,
and other constructs (e.g., meta-parenting) sampled in African Americans, Latino Americans, and
European Americans (Holden et al., 2017). That work is providing a more detailed understand-
ing of intra-group as well as between-group differences. Differences within minority groups are
increasingly being recognized. For example, Greene and Garner (2012) found that African Ameri-
can mothers of preschoolers had varying and nuanced attitudes about corporal punishment. Simi-
larly, rather than just sampling college educated mothers, studies are now sampling the attitudes and
beliefs of low-income parents (Montgomery, Chaviano, Rayburn, and McWey, 2017). Cognitions
of immigrant samples in the United States include parents from Pakistan (Ali and Frederickson,
2011), Japan and South America (Bornstein and Cote, 2004), Korea (Cote et al., 2015; Lee, Keown,
and Brown, 2016), and West Africa (Carra, Lavelli, Keller, and Kartner, 2013), to provide a few
examples.
International diversity is reflected in an ever increasing roster of countries providing samples of
parents. No longer are Western countries the sole source for parenting cognition studies. Some stud-
ies collect data from single countries, such as childrearing attitudes in Keyna (Oburu, 2011) or New
Zealand (Dittman, Sibley, and Farruggia, 2013) or beliefs about discipline in Suriname (Kooij et al.,
2017). More ambitious studies compare parenting cognitions from multiple countries.
Multi-country collaborative studies focused on parenting cognitions are increasingly appearing
in the literature. In the study on self-perceptions and other parenting cognitions, Cote et al. (2015)
collected data from two countries with three samples of mothers: Koreans, Korean immigrants to the
United States, and Americans. Parents from eight European countries were studied in an investiga-
tion of parental perceptions of children’s body weight (Regber et al., 2013). Nine countries were
sampled by Bornstein, Putnick, and Lansford (2011) to study parents’ progressive and authoritarian
childrearing attitudes. To date, the study with the most internationally diverse sample of parents
contained data from 34 low and middle-income countries in a study of caregivers’ attitudes toward
physical punishment (Cappa and Khan, 2011).
Recognizing Group Differences

Increasingly, investigations into the thoughts of parents are going beyond main effects and recog-
nizing the distinctions attributable to such variables as culture, ethnic/racial group membership, or
socioeconomic status. For example, new research into the influence of socioeconomic status on
parenting cognitions illustrates how cognitions are a function of the environmental context and
prior experiences. This point is illustrated by findings related to socioeconomic status. Here are three
examples to make that point. First, college education (as well as parity and maternal age) is, not sur-
prisingly, associated with greater knowledge of child rearing (Bornstein et al., 2010). Second, parental
concerns about stranger danger were higher in mothers from lower, rather than higher, socioeco-
nomic status neighborhoods (Francis et al., 2017). Third, a parent’s socioeconomic status continues to
predict certain childrearing values. In a study that harkens back to the work of Kohn (1959), but with
a sample size of more than 225,000 parents, higher social class was linked to endorsing independence
but not endorsing obedience (Park and Lau, 2016).
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Capturing Change in Cognitions

The study of and recognition that parenting cognitions change with child development is a third
significant trend. Just as there is stability and change in parental behavior (Holden and Miller, 1999),
increasingly investigators are documenting change in parental attitudes, beliefs, and thinking in gen-
eral. Modifications in parenting cognitions stem from multiple sources, including a parental charac
teristic or quality, such as perceived influence over children’s behaviors and interests (Morrissey and
Gondoli, 2012), the change in anxiety and other cognitions across the transition to parenthood (Don,
Chong, Biehle, Gordon, and Mickelson, 2014), modifications in parents’ perceptions and attitudes
about their children’s chronic pain following an intervention (Sieberg et al., 2017), or change in
attitudes after learning new information about problems with corporal punishment (Holden, Brown,
Baldwin, and Caderao, 2014).
At least six studies addressed that last topic of how to changing attitudes toward corporal punish-
ment in an effort to address the public health concern surrounding parental discipline. Specifically,
five different intervention approaches have been undertaken in an effort to modify parents’ posi-
tive evaluation of spanking as a disciplinary technique. The interventions consist of reading baby
books that discourage spanking (Reich, Penner, Duncan, and Auger, 2012), providing information
about the research evidence concerning physical punishment (Holden et al., 2014; Miller-Perrin
and Perrin, 2017), teaching parents in group interventions (Grogan-Kaylor, Galano, Howell, Miller-
Graff, and Graham-Bermann, 2016), using motivational interviewing with a psychoeducational
intervention (Holland and Holden, 2016), and having parents operate an interactive video program
(Hudnut-Beumler, Smith, and Scholer, 2018). Each approach has been able to change parental atti-
tudes, although some approaches have larger effect sizes than others.
Change in parenting cognitions also can come from cognitive-behavior therapy and other sys-
tematic therapeutic interventions. Reviews of interventions (Azar et al., 2005; Forehand, Jones, and
Parent, 2013; Wight and Fullerton, 2013) reveal varying levels of effectiveness in modifying parental
attitudes, beliefs, and schemas about their children, parenting, and what children need. Interventions
are most likely to modify beliefs and attitudes that are too rigid, too simplistic, colored by negative
affect, or have inappropriate content. For example, traumatized mothers are able to improve their
perceptions of their toddlers following a reflective functioning intervention (Schechter et al., 2006).
Applying Research to Clinical and Health-Related Issues

The fourth trend is the application of parenting cognitions to clinical and health-related issues. These
types of studies are providing important insights into how to optimize the health and well-being of
families. To cite one example, an investigation into parental attitudes toward prepubertal HPV vac-
cination resulted in information about the characteristics of parents that need to be targeted with
information campaigns and what are sources of resistance (Marlow et al., 2007). In just one narrow
topic area—parental beliefs and attitudes about getting influenza vaccination shots in schools—there
have been enough published studies to allow for a literature review (Kang et al., 2017).
Work linking parental cognitions with child pathology has been fruitful; there is now a clear
understanding of relations between parenting cognitions and child psychopathology. The problem
of child anxiety is a good example. It has long been recognized that parents’ anxious cognitions are
related to children’s anxiety (Beidel and Turner, 1997). However, the mechanisms for this relation
have not been understood. Evidence indicates that the relation can at least partly be accounted for by
the social environment: Parent and child anxious cognitions are mediated by what has been labeled
“family accommodations.” Those accommodations consist of parental reinforcement of child anxiety
by parents affirming both the child’s anxious cognitions as well as their own ( Jones, Lebowitz, Marin,
and Stark, 2015). For example, the mother of a child who is anxious about driving over bridges may
703
change her route to avoid bridges. That decision serves to affirm both the parent’s and child’s anxious
cognitions about bridges being dangerous.
Other studies have recognized the bidirectional nature of parental cognitions with the child’s
anxious cognitive style. Parental anxious thoughts affect their children. Mothers who reported hav-
ing a catastrophic cognitive style were more likely to have children with anxiety (Whaley, Pinto, and
Sigman, 1999). At the same time, children’s anxious cognitions affect their parents. Parents of anxious
children tend to have a more fearful cognitive style and use more catastrophic language than parents
of non-anxious children. The fearful cognitive style is true for both clinically anxious and non-anx-
ious parents (Moore, Whaley, and Sigman, 2004). Laskey and Cartwright-Hatton (2009) found that
the relation between parental anxiety and children’s internalizing problems is mediated by parental
use of harsh punishment. Parents of anxious children were more likely to have negative beliefs about
their children and problematic or unhelpful parenting cognitions, such as negative beliefs about their
children. Two recently developed questionnaires are designed to assess the nature and determinants
of parental cognitions concerning their children’s anxiety (Kiel, Wagers, and Luebbe, in press; Wolk
et al., 2016).
Parental cognitions have also been implicated in other child mental health outcomes. For instance,
parental cognitions impact the mental health of mothers of children with autism spectrum disorder.
Benson (2016) found that maternal cognitions regarding perceptions of social support as well as
parenting self-efficacy did not significantly change over a 7-year period. Yet there was evidence that,
for some mothers, views about their social network did change. Those mothers who perceived their
social support and self-efficacy as increasing over time had more resilience and were less likely to
develop mental health problems than other mothers.
There are now international samples of parents to illustrate the relations between parental cogni-
tions and children’s mental health. For example, in a Korean sample of adolescents and their parents,
mothers who espoused rejecting attitudes toward their children had daughters who reported more
depressive symptoms and lower self-esteem than other teen girls. For boys, maternal rejecting atti-
tudes were also related to low self-esteem, but they were unrelated to children’s depressive symptoms
(Park, Kim, and Park, 2016).
Parental cognitions affect not only the development of child mental health problems, but also
the treatment effectiveness. Parents who perceive their children’s behavior to be unalterable tend to
have worse treatment outcomes than parents who believe that their children’s behavior can improve
(Morrissey-Kane, and Prinz, 1999). Similarly, when parents think that their children are learning
effective treatment strategies, the children are more likely to experience benefits from the treatment
( Johnston, Mah, and Regambal, 2010).
Another application of childrearing cognitions to a contemporary health-related problems is
the phenomenon of “helicopter parenting.” This parenting style was once called overprotective,
intrusive, or enmeshed parenting. Segrin, Woszidlo, Givertz, and Montgomery (2013) found that
helicopter parents tend to be anxious individuals who harbor regrets about their own unfilled goals.
This pattern of parenting is a threat to the mental health of offspring (Kouros, Pruitt, Ekas, Kiriaki,
and Sunderland, 2017).
As these examples illustrate, the importance of parenting cognitions for understanding, motivat-
ing, and working with parents is now well established in the medical and health community. To
optimize health care and preventive health care, medical personnel, in addition to other professionals,
are increasing aware of the key role played by parenting cognitions.
Evaluation of Parental Cognitions

We now take a step back to appraise the current state of parenting cognitions. That state is evaluated
by three questions: How suitable are the constructs used to capture parents’ thinking and thoughts?
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How good are the instruments designed to assess parenting cognitions? How strong is the evidence
for parental cognition-parent behavior linkages?
Suitability of the Constructs

In this chapter, we identified 11 constructs intended to capture aspects of the parents’ cognition as
they relate to their children. We briefly discuss the suitability of the constructs with three questions:
Are the constructs used appropriately? Are the constructs sufficient distinct? How well do the con-
structs capture parenting cognitions?
Investigations into this area are dogged with a continuing problem—that of synonyms and
incorrect labels. “Attitudes” are sometimes called “evaluations,” “beliefs” are commonly labeled as
“knowledge,” and the monikers for “expectations” include “anticipations” and “expectancies.” More
problematic is when constructs are mislabeled. “Values” are sometimes called “goals,” “attitudes are
labeled “beliefs,” and “beliefs” are called “perceptions.” Adopting uniform terminology with com-
mon definitions would reduce confusion, provide improved conceptual precision, and facilitate
research efforts. This confusion in terminology and a lack of agreement in labeling constructs has
persisted for decades, and it impedes research progress.
A second issue is construct overlap. When do expectations become goals, or values become goals?
Values, attitudes, and beliefs are also confused. Artificially segmenting cognitions into discrete com-
ponents is problematic but inevitable due to the ambiguity and subtleties inherent in the topic. In
this chapter, we have proposed definitions and distinctions between concepts in an effort to reduce
this problem.
The third question concerning the quality of the constructs is, do they capture the essential quali-
ties and variations of parenting cognitions? One way to address that question is to compare the cur-
rent constructs with the qualities that experts consider are required for effective parenting and have
a cognitive component. Eve, Byrne, and Gagliardi (2014) identified six fundamental qualities that are
necessary for effective parenting: Being willing and able to parent, putting child’s needs before one’s
own, fostering attachment, having insight, juggling appropriately the day-to-day versus complex/
long-term needs, and achieving a balance between consistency and flexibility.
Arguably, researchers have done a better job at capturing the first three qualities than the last three.
For example, we are not familiar with a measure of parent insight. Nor are there good measures
of the last two qualities. There have been some reports about conflicting thoughts by parents. As
expressed by the Kabat-Zinns:
As parents, we are continually walking the tightrope between freedom and limits, trust and
distrust; between activity and stillness; between junk and substance; between connection
and separation. It’s a worthwhile balancing act, a practice just like any balance pose in yoga,
but much more challenging.
(Kabat-Zinn and Kabat-Zinn, 1997, p. 264)
Parents have, and in fashion, must resolve these competing ideations, whether it be attitudes, beliefs,
or values (Willner and Crane, 1979). But to date, the topic has not received sufficient attention.
Holden and Ritchie (1988) proposed the use of the dialectic model as a way to understand parents’
resolution of how to deal with competing parent or child goals, conflicting goals, or when two
beliefs are at odds with each other. Bradley and his colleagues (Bradley, Iida, Pennar, Owen, and
Vandell, 2017) also recognized, in a longitudinal observational study, the dialectics inherent in the
tension between mothers’ supportive presence while respecting children’s autonomy seeking behav-
ior. Although parenting cognitions were not assessed, the mothers were presumably aware of the shift
over time in the dynamic interplay between the two qualities of their behavior.
705
In addition to recognizing the dynamics of changing cognitions and behavior, there are several
areas that are ripe for more research attention. One dimension of parental thinking that has periodi-
cally been cited as important as but has not been adequately studied is reasoning complexity (Deko-
vic and Gerris, 1992) or sophistication in thinking (Sameroff and Feil, 1985). Although efforts have
been made to capture that dimension, more work is needed. Similarly, more work is needed in the
area of the interrelations between parenting cognitions and parenting affect (Dix, 1991; Leerkes and
Augustine, 2019; Rueger, Katz, Risser, and Lovejoy, 2011). Positive or negative emotions can mediate
the link between cognitions and behaviors, and thus all need to be studied.
Measurement and Methodological Issues

Parental cognitions have been assessed for more than 100 years (Sears, 1899). However, the measure-
ment of cognitions is challenging and limited in several ways. Most of the work, with the exception
of some recent efforts, relies on questionnaires. Those surveys are most likely to target attitudes.
When Holden and Edwards (1989) published their review of parent attitude instruments, they had
identified a total of 83 childrearing attitude instruments. Since then, new attitude instruments con-
tinue to be developed, such as the attitudes toward the acceptability of alienating behaviors (Har-
man et al., 2016). There are also newly developed instruments or revised surveys that assess parental
expectations (Biehle and Mickelson, 2012), perceptions (Luthar and Ciciolla, 2016; Morey and Gen-
tzler, 2017), and meta-parenting (Holden et al., 2017), for example.
But greater care in developing and testing instruments is needed. There is little evidence that
the quality of the questionnaires have improved since the critique by Holden and Edwards (1989)
and others (Baumeister, Vohs, and Funder, 2007). More rigorous assessments of the psychometric
properties (i.e., multiple forms of reliability and validity) are needed. Given that many investiga-
tions into parental cognitions compare groups of parents, there is another psychometric considera-
tion that needs to be assessed. Another significant, but often ignored, criterion for the quality of an
instrument is what is labeled “measurement invariance.” This refers to whether the construct being
assessed has the same meaning to different groups of people or across time. For example, do beliefs
in the importance of being responsive to an infant mean the same thing to parents in Japan as they
do in the United States? Putnick and Bornstein (2016) argued that this psychometric attribute is
far too often ignored when instruments are being developed and tested. Investigators who develop
new assessments of parenting cognitions should plan to conduct a rigorous testing of the psycho-
metric properties of new instruments. The psychometric qualities of the instrument should then be
reported in journals like Psychological Assessment or Assessment, as was done with a new instrument to
assess parent’s attitudes toward their children’s anxiety (Kiel et al., in press).
Continuing efforts to improve existing instruments are also needed. For example, Knowledge
of Infant Development Inventory (KIDI, MacPhee, 1981) is commonly used to assess the extent of
parental knowledge. But as Bornstein and his colleagues (Bornstein et al., 2010) pointed out, parents
might score poorly on that knowledge inventory simply because they were assessed only at one point
in time, perhaps before they experienced some of the norm-based child development milestones or
their children developed more quickly—or slowly—than the norms. Thus, instruments assessing
parental cognition need to be sensitive to both individual differences as well as ethnic and cultural
differences.
In addition to the need for more methodological care in developing new or revised instruments,
a second need to expand the types of assessments used for parenting cognitions. With the exception
of the new efforts to assess parenting cognitions with implicit or nonreactive methods, most assess-
ments continue to rely on verbal reports. Consequently, the new approaches tapping into implicit
attitudes or using alternative ways of assessing parenting thoughts (Rodriguez, Russa, and Harmon,
2011; Sturge-Apple et al., 2015) are promising.
706
One methodological and conceptual resource that is underutilized by researchers into parental
cognitions is the work of social psychologists. Although the efforts into implicit attitudes have bor-
rowed methods developed in social psychology (Sturge-Apple et al., 2015), advances in social cogni-
tion knowledge (Banaji and Heiphetz, 2010; Carlston, 2010), have typically not made their way into
parenting cognition research. For example, one propitious direction is affective forecasting, or predic-
tions people make about their emotional reactions to anticipated events—and anticipated develop-
mental outcomes (Wilson and Gilbert, 2005). Forecasting is a conspicuous in parents’ thoughts and
ripe for investigation.
Cognitive Behavior Linkages

The relation between parenting cognition and behavior is complex and challenging to study. The
links between the two can be affected by parental emotion, knowledge, values, perceptions of norms,
the child, and many situational variables (Holden, 1988; McGillicuddy-DeLisi and Sigel, 1995). For
example, whereas some studies find clear links between attitudes and reported behavior (Vittrup,
Holden, and Buck, 2006), in other cases, there are significant discrepancies between reports of atti-
tudes and behavior (Cappa and Khan, 2011).
Despite its complexity, the ways in which cognitions translate into behavior remain a question
of singular importance. Perhaps due to the time commitment that is necessary to collect, code, and
analyze behavior, there are far too few published studies that include both cognitions and behavior.
To fully recognize the significance of parental cognitions, more attention must be devoted to its
links with behavior. For example, one avenue to pursue is to better understanding parental “passion
points,” a popular term used in marketing. Parents are likely to act on—and react to—their passion
points. By understanding the passion that underlies parental attitudes, beliefs, and goals, we will better
be able to understand the cognitive mediators of their behavior.
Conclusion
The study of parental cognition is a vibrant research area. Venerable constructs (i.e., attitudes) are
being applied with great frequency to contemporary problems. Future-oriented cognitions, including
expectations, goals, and concerns, compose an important category of parental thought. Implicit atti-
tudes and several new constructs to better understand parenting cognitions now appear in the research
literature. In summary, 11 parenting cognitive constructs are briefly reviewed and summarized.
Several trends from the large body of work in this area are identified. Beside the increasing
amount of research, another significant development is the diversity now found in samples of parents,
both in the United States and around the globe. Change in parenting cognitions is now frequently
investigated. Another notable trend is the application of parenting cognitions to medical and health
issues. At the same time, there is considerable work to do to improve the quality and scope of research
into parenting cognition. One glaring gap is the lack of recent work linking parenting cognitions to
behavior.
Parenting cognitions now occupies a prominent role in addressing a variety of topics related to
childrearing behavior, the well-being of parents and children, and interventions in the family. After
all, what goes on in the head of a parent should occupy the top of any research agendum investigat-
ing parents, children, or families.
Acknowledgments
We thank Zahrah Ahmed, Shelby Fry, Claire Krizman, Ashley Mai, and Allie Massman for their help
in conducting the library research.
707
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21
PARENTAL ATTRIBUTIONS
Introduction
Parenting involves the complex interaction of mutual influences between parents and their offspring.
One important feature of parenting is the causal attributions that parents hold about their children—
“Why does my baby cry all night?” “Is it something I am doing wrong?” “Is it something wrong
with him?” Ultimately, parenting also includes the ways in which children acquire causal notions
about the world they live in. In combination, the interaction between adaptive parental attributions
and child responsiveness influences both the short-term and the long-term outcomes of the young.
This interaction determines how the young grow up to achieve intellectual achievement and socially
valued attitudes and behaviors.
Causal reasoning is a central component in the social life of humans. Our interactions with chil-
dren (as with all our social interactions) are continuously influenced by our attributions concern-
ing the reasons why they do things, the reasons why we ourselves do things, and the reasons why
shared interactive events work out as they do. We speculate about the possible causes of events that
have occurred in the past, ongoing events in the present, and possible future events. In doing so, we
facilitate our ability to understand, predict, and effectively function within relationships, including
parent-child relationships.
During the 1970s, researchers moved away from an exclusive focus on parent effects to consider
of the role of child effects on parental practices (Bell, 1968). Within this new direction, it was soon
recognized that child effects are qualified by how parents interpret their children’s actions (Bell,
1979; Sameroff, 1975). Parents respond to identical social stimuli in different ways on the basis of
the causal inferences they draw. A crying infant, believed to be tired, may elicit parental sympathy
and comforting. The same infant behavior, if the child’s needs have apparently been met, may elicit
parental irritation or even anger. To some extent, parents rely on shared heuristics in drawing causal
inferences about caregiving events; for example, explicit child disobedience accompanied by non-
verbal cues suggesting defiance may be seen as intentional in nature. At the same time, parents also
show variability in the kinds of causal inferences they draw. Causal reasoning is a central component
in the social life of humans.
Although many aspects of parenting relationships among humans are widely shared with nonhu-
mans, attributional processes within social relationships are more distinctively human. Consideration
of these higher-level processes came to the fore late in the 1970s. In addition, parenting attributions
722
Parental Attributions
came to be understood as shaping and being shaped by parents’ own individual histories—a trans-
actional process.
Social cognitive learning theory directed attention to causal inference from a different per-
spective. That is, causal cognitions are thought to be acquired as a function of one’s own personal
experiences (and reinforcement history) and observations of the experiences of others. For exam-
ple, children may learn that certain kinds of disobedience are followed by parental anger or puni-
tive action. They may also acquire causal knowledge from the spoken attributions of others. For
example, they may repeatedly hear certain kinds of causal statements from their parents. Learning
theorists introduced different kinds of constructs in the ways in which they conceptualized such
social knowledge. Notably, Rotter, Bandura, and Seligman extended the basic premises of social
learning theory in this way.
In this chapter, we consider the nature and reasons for variations in parental attributions across
time, setting, and person. We trace the history of research on this topic and describe changes that
have occurred in attribution research. Early research on parenting was based on social learning the-
ory. Later research on parenting reflected a shift to social information-processing theory in explain-
ing parenting. Later, attribution theory was integrated within social information processing theory.
In introducing research on parental attribution, we begin by describing how attributions have
been defined and measured. We then proceed to discuss attributional interventions that have been
employed to prevent child abuse. Interventions are typically based on the theoretical premises
employed by the author(s). Those premises are described. We then report the relative success of the
intervention programs. We also consider differences in parental attributions that have been found to
be harmful or helpful to the outcomes of self and/or others. We move on to consider the variability
in attributional patterns shown by different groups. How do mothers differ from fathers in their attri-
bution patterns? How do parents (or teachers) respond differently to children who pose a challenge
to educational goals? Finally, we address the question of what differences are shown in attribution
patterns across country, socioeconomic level, and ethnicity.
What Is the Nature of Parental Attributions?

Although common usage is made of the term “parental attributions,” the construct of attribution itself
has been used in rather different ways within different theoretical frameworks. From the standpoint
of early attribution theory (as it evolved within the field of social cognition), attributions represent
causal inferences made in response to the covariation of ongoing events.
When theorists (Bandura, 1977) with a background in learning theory turned their attention
to causal constructs, they focused on variations in causal thought as a function of the individual’s
experience; from this theoretical point of view, causal cognitions are learned. Causal inferences have
also been conceptualized as knowledge structures or schemas. Consistent with a social information
processing approach, people may be thought of as building cognitive maps that serve to guide their
relationships with others (Baldwin, 1992).
Initial discussion of attribution processes focused on generalities in causal inference. It asked why
people, as a whole, analyze particular kinds of events as they do.
Concern with naïve causal cognitions has its origins in the early work of Heider (1944), as devel-
oped more completely by Kelley (1967), whose theory explored the ways in which social behavior
is explained differently on the basis of variations across time, situation, and person. The individual’s
understanding of social events follows from his or her use of covariation information. Thus, if Mary
is typically disobedient with her mother (but not her father), and if other children in the family obey
both parents, then it might be concluded that something is amiss in the dyadic relationship between
Mary and her mother. Conversely, if Mary is disobedient with both parents (across context) but her
723
siblings are obedient with both parents, it might be concluded that her behavior reflects “something
about Mary.”
Concern with attributional universals was explored in the work of Weiner (1985, 1986). Weiner
based his analyses on the use of three dimensions of causality: Locus, stability, and controllability.
He was concerned with the patterns of causal inference that contribute to perceptions of indi-
vidual responsibility. Inferences regarding responsibility strongly influence the emotional reactions
and behavioral responses shown to others—for their misdeeds or mishaps (Weiner, 1993). So, for
example, if a mother observes her capable 8-year-old son running into the street without looking,
she might respond with anger and a disciplinary action. Suppose, however, a mother asked an older
child to watch over an infant for a few minutes. If she then happened to look out the window and
saw the infant crawl into the street, she might experience great fear and run after him, but she would
not punish him; instead, she might sternly rebuke the sibling she had placed in charge. In the first
case, the mother’s ire at a child is influenced by the fact that she saw him as responsible for his act (old
enough to know better). In the second case, the mother’s response followed from her belief that the
infant was not yet capable of understanding the danger (and thus was not responsible).
Adults regularly make assumptions (sometimes unjustified) regarding the controllability of chil-
dren’s behavior—and thus the affective and behavioral responses they manifest. Although many
instances of such reasoning seem obvious, the same reasoning processes in other settings seem more
surprising. A classic example involves children who are overweight. Weight has traditionally been
thought to be controllable; thus, the child who is overweight is seen as blameworthy (Weiner, Perry,
and Magnusson, 1988).
Although Weiner gave only minor initial attention to the role of attributions in parenting issues,
his concepts were applied by others to these concerns. For example, Dix, Grusec, and their colleagues
(Dix and Grusec, 1985; Dix, Ruble, Grusec, and Nixon, 1986) applied constructs from both Weiner
and Kelley to demonstrate that parental attributions for children’s behavior varied systematically as
a function of children’s age. In addition, Himelstein, Graham, and Weiner (1991) demonstrated that
parents reveal a different attributional pattern with second-born than with firstborn children as they
acquire increased access to covariation information. Ultimately, the inferences that parents draw
about their children’s actions (how much children can control their actions, how much they intend
their actions) influence parents’ affective responses, along with their socialization strategies (Grusec,
Rudy, and Martini, 1997).
In general, attributions have been conceptualized as involving “explicit” cognitions (Greenwald
and Banaji, 1995). Within this framework, explicit attributional reasoning occurs as an effortful,
conscious response to ongoing events. At the same time, Lazarus (1991) proposed that certain kinds
of explicit analytical processes (primary appraisal) may short-circuit awareness, and thus may be con-
ceptualized as essentially occurring “automatically.” From this framework, potentially stressful events
are initially appraised for their evaluative implications and for their controllability.
This theoretical framework has primarily been applied to nonnormative parenting situations,
for example, coping with the caregiving stresses associated with children’s problematic behavior
(as reviewed by Bugental and Johnston, 2000) or with children who have special needs (Eiser and
Haverman, 1992). However, the same model is also applicable to the more common stresses that
characterize normative caregiving experiences (Crnic and Ross, 2017; Levy-Shiff, Dimitrowsky,
Shulman, and Har-Even, 1998).
Social cognitive learning theory directed attention to causal inference from a different perspective.
That is, causal cognitions are thought to be acquired as a function of one’s own personal experiences
(and reinforcement history) and observations of the experiences of others. For example, children
may learn that certain kinds of disobedience are followed by parental anger or punitive action. Chil-
dren may also acquire causal knowledge from the spoken attributions of others. For example, they
may repeatedly hear certain kinds of causal statements from their parents. Despite some overlapping
724
similarities, learning theorists introduced different kinds of constructs in the ways in which they
conceptualized social knowledge. Here, we think of the work of Rotter, Bandura, and Seligman—
individuals who have extended the basic premises of social learning theory in different ways.
Rotter (1966) directed attention to the stable ways in which we come to understand and manage
life experiences as a function of our causal knowledge of the world. He focused on individual dif-
ferences in placing causality (for all kinds of events) inside the person (internal locus) or outside the
person (external locus). Although the construct proved useful (and inspired thousands of studies), it
was also overly general (as noted by Seligman, 1992). It combines good and bad events, and it makes
no distinction between domains (e.g., social or academic outcomes).
Subsequently, other researchers solved one part of this problem by appealing to greater domain
specificity. For example, many efforts were made to measure locus of control specifically for par-
enting events (Nowicki and Segal’s measure of Locus of Control Orientation, 1974). In addition,
efforts were made to subdivide the unidimensional I-E construct into component factors (Leven-
son, 1973).
Bandura (1989) developed an individual difference construct that reflected the kinds of learn-
ing experiences that lead one to think of oneself as high or low in self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is a
composite construct that includes the belief that one has the requisite skills to execute particular
response patterns that are necessary to the accomplishment of some desired goal. Although Bandura
was not centrally concerned with parents’ self-efficacy, others applied these notions to the parenting
domain (Coleman and Karraker, 1997; Mash and Johnston, 1990; Teti and Gelfand, 1991). Bandura’s
framework would predict that parents acquire a sense of high or low self-efficacy as a function of
their experiences with their own children. The evidence for this prediction tends to provide a mixed
picture. That is, parents are likely to show lower levels of perceived efficacy if they have had a history
with “difficult” children; at the same time, low levels of parental self-efficacy may precede abusive
parent-child interactions (Mash and Johnston, 1990). This mixed picture has often led parenting
researchers (Grusec, Hastings, and Mammone, 1994) to give join consideration to the utility of self-
efficacy constructs (with origins in adults’ direct history as parents) and attributional constructs (with
origins in adults’ own childhood history).
Seligman and his colleagues approached the issue of attributions from an integrative theoreti-
cal framework. They introduced the construct of attributional (or explanatory) style as a cognitive
reformulation of the learned helplessness literature (Abramson, Seligman, and Teasdale, 1978). These
investigators suggested that causal attributions serve as qualifiers of differential reactions to negative
life events. That is, individuals respond very differently to the same events on the basis of the ways in
which they construe those events. Depression, ill health, and low achievement have all been found
to be possible outcomes of negative life events—but primarily for those who invoke a pessimistic
explanatory style (i.e., who see those events as due to internal, stable, and global causes; Burns and
Seligman, 1989). Seligman and his colleagues focused attention on the benefits that follow from an
optimistic explanatory style. Seligman applied his attributional model to children (and the ways in
which they may be inoculated against negative experiences by challenging a pessimistic explanatory
style; Seligman, Reivich, Jaycox, and Gillham, 1995). Although he was not directly concerned with
the application of his measures or constructs to parenting outcomes, others developed scales that do
so (Donovan, Leavitt, and Walsh, 1997; Stratton and Swaffer, 1988).
Causal cognitions have also been approached as organized knowledge structures that serve as
cognitive representations of past experience. Early in life, the child comes to organize the world
into meaningful categories, scripts, and schemas (Nelson, 1993). Knowledge is acquired on the basis
of the information to which they are exposed. From this standpoint, the parent brings to the rela-
tionship ready-made notions of the nature of children and the nature of parent-child relation-
ships. Thus, parents may “know” that parent-child conflict is caused by willful child disobedience
because of knowledge parents themselves acquired at an earlier age. When conceptualized in this way,
725
parental attributions represent memory-based cognitions—knowledge structures that provide a way

of understanding and predicting caregiving events.
Parental attributions can be conceptualized as stable knowledge structures that may be under-
stood as schemas (Grusec et al., 1997). When attributions are conceptualized in this way, use is
often made of dimensions drawn from other frameworks, for example, Weiner’s causal taxonomy
(locus, stability, and controllability) in describing variations in parents’ attributions. Bugental, Dix, and
Grusec—in their respective programs of research—were among the first to make use of Weiner’s
taxonomy in describing the role of causal thinking in parenting practices. Dix and Grusec (1985)
developed and tested an attributional model of parental cognitions; within this model, they suggested
that parents’ affective reactions to children’s behavior vary on the basis of their belief that such behav-
iors are intentional, controllable, or dispositional, as opposed to being determined by developmental
limitations or situational constraints. Bugental and Shennum (1984) focused on the extent to which
parents’ affective and behavioral responses to children’s behavior differed, on the basis of their percep-
tion that parents’ own actions and those of their children were controllable.
Memory-based knowledge structures have typically been conceptualized as involving implicit
processes. That is, they are activated automatically, do not involve effort, and operate outside of
awareness (although the nature of such processes may become aware). Borrowing from Kelly’s ideas
of personal constructs, Bargh, Lombardi, and Higgins (1988) proposed that humans acquire sche-
matic representations of self and others, and that these representations—with repeated experience—
become chronically accessible. As pointed out by Bargh and Chartrand (1999), contemporary
psychology has a tendency to overestimate the extent to which people are fully aware of the rapidly
changing kaleidoscope of their social lives. Much of our social information-processing goes on
nonconsciously and automatically. This is certainly true when individuals have competing demands
on their attention—as is the case for much of busy family life. Parents interact with children while
watching television, working on the computer, cooking a meal, driving a car, and so forth. Bugen-
tal, Lyon, Cortez, and Krantz (1997) assessed the ease with which parents accessed their cognitions
about caregiving events when they were cognitively “busy.” Parents were asked to make very fast
judgments about their relationships with children under conditions that mimic the demands of real
life (i.e., judgments were made when they were simultaneously engaged in a second task). When
parents had a “low-power” schema about their relationships with their children (i.e., they saw
their child as having more power than they did), they made judgments about power (e.g., “Who is
bossier? You or your child?”) very quickly. In other words, the thoughts of themselves as lacking
power came to mind automatically and without effort. In contrast, other parents found this to be a
less intuitive task (they were less likely to think of their relationship with their children in this way)
and were considerably slowed when they had to make this kind of judgment while occupied with
a second task.
Theoretical Approaches to Studying Parental Attributions
Social Cognitive Theories of Parenting

Early concern with parental cognitions emerged following increased general interest in cognitive
processes in psychology as a whole—thus moving beyond the earlier focus on child behavior and
parental reinforcement patterns, as noted by Maccoby (1992). Maccoby also noted an emerging trend
involving reciprocal influences between parents and their children. These theoretical directions led
to increased interest in the effects of cognitive processes in parent-child interaction (Goodnow, 1992;
Sigel and McGillicuddy-DeLisi (2002). Sigel’s early work made use of a cognitive perspective in the
literature on parenting. Researchers following this approach also directed attention to parental beliefs
about the causal factors involved in successful or unsuccessful parenting.
726
Introduction of Attribution Theory

Attribution theory emerged as an extension of social cognitive theory. It is concerned with general
explanatory processes. Humans are characterized by a basic motive to understand what causes the
events they experience that are negative or unexpected, as reviewed by Weiner (2017) in describing the
history of attribution theory. It could also be argued that the search for explanation begins early in life.
When Do Parents Ask “Why” Questions?

In understanding the role of parental attributions in family life, it is important to consider when such
constructs are activated. Are parents likely to engage in causal reasoning under all circumstances, or
are they selective in their demonstration of causal search processes? Are they more likely to search
for the reasons for positive events? Negative events? Ambiguous events?
In general, human beings are likely to engage in a search for causality in response to events that
require some type of response, for example, events that are undesired or potentially threatening. As sug-
gested by Pratto and John (1991), it is highly adaptive for organisms to direct attention automatically to
undesired events that may pose a threat to the perceiver’s well-being. In general, desired events are less
likely to require explanation, as they do not suggest the need for some kind of change or remediation.
Causal Analyses of Ambiguous or Novel Events

Causal appraisal regularly occurs in response to events that are ambiguous, novel, or unexpected
(Hastie, 1984; Wong and Weiner, 1981). Because the individual’s causal appraisal relies heavily on
a memory search when the stimulus events themselves provide few cues to their explanation, there
is a high likelihood of individual differences in the causal appraisal of uncertain events. That is, the
outcome of causal analyses in the face of an ambiguous or impoverished stimulus necessarily relies
on causal hypotheses retrieved from the individual’s own history. For example, parents who see
themselves as “victims” within caregiving relationships might easily interpret a child’s inattentiveness
(an ambiguous behavior) as a challenge to their fragile sense of control; in contrast, parents with a
stronger sense of control in the caregiving relationship might interpret the same event in a more
benign fashion (e.g., the child is tired, sleepy, or preoccupied).
Evidence supports of the role of ambiguous events as elicitors of parental attributions. In a longitu-
dinal study, Nix, Pinderhughes, Dodge, Bates, and Pettit (1999) assessed the relation between parental
attributions regarding their own children’s ambiguous problem behaviors (depicted as hypothetical
events in written vignettes) and their children’s future aggression. Parents’ hostile attributional style pre-
dicted children’s later externalizing behavior. Bugental, Lewis, Lin, Lyon, and Kopeikin (2000) found
that adults with a “low-power” attributional style (i.e., who believed that they had less power within
caregiving relationships than did their children) responded distinctively only when children’s response
patterns were ambiguous. That is, the responses shown by “high-power” versus “low-power” adults
were distinguishable only when a child “trainee” showed a problematic performance that was ambigu-
ous (i.e., it was unclear whether a child’s performance reflected lack of ability or deliberate resistance to
the adult’s training efforts). Adults with low perceived power showed only defensive response patterns
(e.g., elevations in heart rate, affective inconsistencies, narrowing of attention, and increases in the use
of force) when responding to a child whose behavior was undesired but motivationally ambiguous.
How Do Parental Attributions Influence Parent-Child Interactions?

Interest in the role of attributions within parenting relationships emerged in the 1970s. Very early
concerns with parents’ causal thought approached the construct as a stable stylistic variable—very
727
much like a diffuse personality trait. For example, early concerns with parents’ locus of control
explored linear relations between parents’ generalized beliefs (internal versus external locus of con-
trol) and the nature of their interactions with children (Nowicki and Segal, 1974). When develop-
mental psychologists came to think of parenting processes as context sensitive, parental attributions
were increasingly seen as operating in a contingent fashion (consistent with Mischel and Shoda’s,
1995, “if: then” notion of context-dependent personality constructs).
From this perspective, parental attributional processes are activated in response to relevant events
in the caregiving environment and serve to moderate and/or mediate their reactions to those events.
Moderators represent third variables that “partition a focal independent variable into subgroups that
establish its domains of maximal effectiveness in regard to a dependent variable.” Mediators represent
third variables that provide “the generative mechanism through which the focal independent variable
is able to influence the dependent variables of interest” (Baron and Kenny, 1986, p. 1173). Thus, the
effects of children on their developmental outcomes are altered by the qualifying (“moderating”) or
intervening (“mediating”) role of parental cognitions (Bell, 1979; Holden and Smith, 2017; Sameroff,
1975). In addition, parental attributions came to be understood as shaping and being shaped by their
own individual history—a transactional process.
Along with awareness of these more complex dyadic effects came awareness of the interdepend-
ence of response systems within the individual. For example, questions arose about the relation
between parents’ attributions and their emotions. Are the effects of parental attributions mediated by
their subsequent emotional reactions? Conversely, are the effects of parents’ emotional states medi-
ated by their subsequent attribution appraisals? For example, does a parent’s negative affective state
precede the judgment that a child has engaged in an intentional negative act, or does affect follow
from the causal appraisal?
Implicit Attributions
The sequential pattern one might expect depends on differences in type of attribution (i.e., implicit
attributions that involve automatic retrieval of causal knowledge structures versus explicit attribu-
tions that involve slower “on-line” appraisal of ongoing events). If individuals are confronted with an
ambiguous situation that requires a fast response, it is likely that they will directly retrieve a memory-
dependent attribution relevant to this setting—an implicit attribution. Such attributional constructs
are typically thought of as including both cognitive and affective components (sometimes referred to
as affectively tagged schemas; Fiske and Pavelchak, 1986).
Suppose, for example, that a parent has a negative attributional bias (either a low-power or “hos-
tile” attributional bias) about the causes of a child’s problem behavior. If a child engages in some
undesired action, the “biased” parent will make the immediate (“automatic”) interpretation that
the child has misbehaved intentionally. This interpretation is likely to be directly associated with
(or “tagged”) with negative affect. Activation of an implicit attributional schema may also serve to
automatically trigger motivational patterns (e.g., the activation of a “hostile” or low-power attribu-
tional schema will trigger the motive to exert high levels of power assertion). In short, the activation
of negatively biased parental attributional schemas leads to schema-consistent patterns of parental
thought, affect, and motivation.
Alternatively, of course, it may be that a parent’s mood state (rather than a caregiving event) pro-
vides the starting point in an attributional sequence. So, for example, a negative mood state may serve
to prime thoughts of the self as powerless (and foster continued or escalating levels of negative affect).
Consistent with this notion, Reznick (1999) observed that maternal depression predicted judgments
of negative infant intentionality.
Thus, an emotionally tagged caregiving schema may be primed by caregiving events, mood,
or causal ideation. However, in all cases, schema-relevant ideation and affect may be thought of as
728
operating in concert. This conceptualization can account for the effects of parental mood on parental
attributions (Dix, Reinhold, and Zambarano, 1990) or the effects of attributional priming on parental
affect (Bugental et al., 1993).
Explicit Attributions
If we are thinking about parents’ slower, on-line appraisal processes, a different sequence may ensue.
From the standpoint of cognitive appraisal theory (Lazarus, 1991), the activation of emotions follows
from at least some minimal evaluation of the significance of ongoing events. Empirical research has
shown that differential activation of explicit attributions leads to expected variations in subsequent
affect (Neumann, 2000). For example, if a father becomes aware that his daughter regularly complies
with her mother’s requests but disregards his requests, this may precipitate resentment or some other
negative affect. In such a case, the parent is processing covariation information in normative ways and
responds affectively to the outcome of that appraisal
Are Attributions Domain-General or Are They Context

and Domain Specific?
Questions emerge concerning the generality of parental attributions across domains and contexts.
Does a parent draw the same causal inferences in all social settings? Is there anything special about
attributions for parenting outcomes? Do parents engage in similar kinds of attributional processes
even within different kinds of caregiving contexts? If, for example, a child challenges parents during
a game, do parents make the same kind of attributions as they would during a disciplinary encounter?
Early attention to parental attributions was quite general in terms of domains. Parents were asked
about their generalized beliefs about the causes of life events—not the causes of caregiving events.
As pointed out earlier, the assumption that we make the same kinds of attributions about all kinds of
life experiences was increasingly questioned.
As the field advanced, greater recognition was given to the role of context in parenting (Bugental
and Lewis, 1998; Dix, 1992; Grusec and Goodnow, 1994). Contextual effects are relevant to parents’
attributions as well as to their actions. For example, Dix (1992) proposed that parents operate in dif-
ferent ways on the basis of the nature of their current goals. At some times, their responses to children
will be based on their empathic concerns for the child’s immediate welfare. At other times, their
responses will be based on their socialization goals (i.e., the extent to which they are attempting to
influence their children in ways that will facilitate their competence as adults). At still other times,
parents’ responses may involve their own personal goals—which at points will come into conflict
with the goals of their young. Grusec and Goodnow (1994) parsed parental goals in similar ways.
They distinguished between parent-centered goals (organized around power assertion), relationship-
centered goals (organized around warmth, negotiation, and cooperation), and child-centered goals
(organized around reasoning processes).
Parents may vary in their attributions on the basis of other contingencies as well. For example,
parents’ attributions for children’s misdeeds vary as a function of the seriousness of those misdeeds
(Hastings and Coplan, 1999). Attributions also differ as a function of qualifying events. For example,
parents of (medicated) ADHD children are less likely than other parents to see themselves as causal
contributors to their children’s behavior ( Johnston, Reynold, Freeman, and Geller, 1998).
The possibility that parents (and their young) activate different kinds of causal reasoning in dif-
ferent contexts is suggested by the work of Smetana (1995), Turiel (1983, 1998), and their col-
leagues concerning the different domains of social knowledge. Extending an early focus on children’s
understanding of these domains, Smetana (1997) suggested that such domain distinctions apply to
parents’ beliefs, goals, and practices. Thus, changes in parent-child interaction across the course of
729
development involve declines in parental investment in certain domains (e.g., reduced control of

the prudential or personal decisions of the young as they move into the adolescent years). Parental
reasoning concerning the causes of parent-child conflict could also differ across these years (Hastings
and Grusec, 1998; Rudy and Grusec 2001).
Bugental (2000) proposed that social life can be conceptualized as reflecting five domains that are
organized in distinctive ways and make use of different algorithms. Domains are defined as “bodies
of knowledge that act as guides to partitioning the world and that facilitate the solving of recurring
problems faced by organisms within that world” (p. 187). An algorithm is defined as “any effective
procedure for solving a problem or accomplishing an end” (p. 187). The four domains that are poten-
tially relevant to the relationship between parents and children (the fifth domain involves romantic
relationships) are organized around:
1. proximity-maintenance during late infancy with specific others in the service of safety (the
attachment domain),
2. use and recognition of social dominance (the hierarchical power domain),
3. identification and defense of the lines that divide “us” and “them” in group coalitions (the coa-
litional group domain), and
4. management of the reciprocal obligations and benefits that are involved in communal life (the
reciprocity domain).
Because of the shared nature of the goals or tasks implicit within each of these domains, the
young show a high level of similarity in their acquisition of the algorithms that organize these dif-
ferent domains. At the same time, the architecture of the human brain allows a substantial level of
flexibility in the ways in which these goals are implemented (as a result of our ability to simulate and
consider alternative solutions to problems). For example, the cognitive organization of domains is
adapted to reflect the individual’s personal history or shared cultural history. Biological influences on
these primary social domains also allow for a variety of ways of solving recurrent problems. So, for
example, the proximity goals of attachment relationships can be “solved” by maintenance of contact
via sight, sound, or touch. At the same time, the potential “tailoring” of domains to personal history,
culture, or immediate context is not infinite. For example, Bugental suggested that dysfunctional
parenting is most likely to occur when regulatory processes are mismatched to domains. Thus, if a
parent responds to an infant’s distress to separation (consistent with the algorithms of the attachment
domain) with assertion in an effort to “control” the child, a domain mismatch occurs. One thinks
here of the differential effectiveness of parents’ positive responses to the “honest” cries of young
infants (an effective means of reducing later crying) versus the ineffectiveness of parents’ positive
response to the strategic tantruming of a toddler (an ineffective means of reducing the child’s later
manifestations of such behavior; Hubbard and Van Ijzendoorn, 1991). Such domain mismatches are
likely to have their origins in early experience; thus, the child who fails to establish a secure attach-
ment bond is more likely to show an exaggerated investment in the power domain at later ages
(Grusec and Mammone, 1995).
What Is the Nature of Parental Attributions?

Ultimately, the inferences that parents draw about their children’s actions (how much they can con-
trol their action, how much they intended their action) influence parents’ affective responses and
their socialization strategies (Grusec et al., 1997).
In general, on-line attributions have been conceptualized as involving “explicit” cognitions
(Greenwald and Banaji, 1995). Within this framework, explicit attributional reasoning occurs as
an effortful, conscious response to ongoing events. At the same time, Lazarus (1991) proposed that
730
certain kinds of explicit analytical processes (primary appraisal) may short-circuit awareness, and thus
may be conceptualized as essentially occurring “automatically.” From this framework, potentially
stressful events are initially appraised for their evaluative implications and their controllability. This
theoretical perspective has primarily been applied to nonnormative parenting situations, for example,
coping with the caregiving stresses associated with children’s problematic behavior (as reviewed by
Bugental and Johnston, 2000) or with children’s special needs (Eiser and Haverman, 1992). However,
the same model is also applicable to more common stresses that characterize normative caregiving
experiences (Crnic and Ross, 2017; Levy-Shiff et al., 1998).
Attributions as Learned Beliefs

Heider conceptualized ways of thinking about perceived causality. He described human processes
as involving “common sense” or “naïve psychology,” believing that people observe, analyze, and
then provide an explanation for behaviors. His work had considerable influence on research, and it
ultimately posed a theoretical basis for family interventions. He noted that negative explanations of
others’ behaviors easily formed the basis for conflict. Thus, finding ways to substitute more positive
or neutral explanations is adaptive.
Later, attention turned to parental attributions and their effects on children.
This application attracted the attention of researchers in developmental science. Attention was
directed to the mediating effects of parental attributions on manifestations of harsh parenting.
Kelley and Weiner were central figures in developing attribution theory within social psychol-
ogy. They were interested in basic types of attributions that people make, and the circumstances that
lead to attributional reasoning. Kelley and Michela (1980) were concerned with the ways in which
attributions serve to mediate relations between information, beliefs, motives, behavior, affect, and
expectations. Weiner (1985) was concerned with individual differences in attributions. He parsed
attributions into three dimensions of causality—locus, stability, and controllability—and applied his
theory to a number of areas but gave the most notable application to achievement, motivation and,
ultimately, to the impact on emotion. Weiner’s attributional constructs were also applied to paren-
tal beliefs. As one example, Himelstein et al. (1991) demonstrated that mothers of only children
attribute greater importance to caregiving practices than do mothers of multiple children. They also
demonstrated that mothers of gifted children attribute greater importance to caregiving practices
than do mothers in special needs classes. Weiner (2017) was also concerned with general explanatory
processes in describing the history of attribution theory. Humans are characterized by a basic motive
to understand what causes the events they experience that are negative or unexpected.
Summary
Concern with the topic of parental attributions owes much of its early history to other fields—to
social cognition theories, social information-processing theory, and social learning theory. Related
concepts also evolved within attachment theory and the close relationships literature. Some the
apparent discrepancies in attributional processes may reflect differences in types of attributions meas-
ured. In addition, attributional processes may vary across context or domain, and change as parental
goals change. In short, parental cognitions are increasingly understood within a framework that
includes consideration of parental motives.
Parental Attributions on Social Information-Processing Framework

There has been extensive use of attributional constructs in developmental science primarily con-
cerned with their role in parental relationships with their children. Some of this research concerns
731
generalities in the role of parental attributions, whereas other research addresses more specific ques-
tions. We include discussion of the measures used as well as the use of different experimental designs.
Some of the earliest work that employed attributional constructs among parents was conducted by
Grusec and her colleagues. Dix et al. (1986) introduced an attributional model of parental cognition.
They demonstrated, as predicted, that parents evaluate children’s behavior differently, on the basis of
their assumptions regarding the child’s control over his or her own actions as well as developmental
increases in child abilities. Negative parental affect to a child’s misconduct increases in responses to
older children. This follows from parental assumptions regarding children’s increased ability to con-
trol their own behavior.
Grusec and colleagues were also interested in the origins of adult attributions, based on their early
history. Grusec, Adam, and Mammone (1993) found that a history of avoidant attachment early in
life predicts low perceived power as adults (as measured by the Parent Attribution Test, described
later). Employing this explanation, low perceived power is determined by children’s early history
with their mother, rather than (or in addition to) a source of attribution emulation. Grusec and col-
leagues suggested that parents’ attributions about their own children are heavily dependent on their
own history with their own parents. In testing this notion, Grusec and Mammone (1995) explored
the relation between attachment history and parental attributions through the use of the Adult
Attachment Interview (AAI; George, Kaplan, and Main, 1996). Although the AAI should not be
interpreted as an inside track to actual attachment history, it does provide a defensible measure of the
individual’s updated working model of attachment relationships. For example, attachment patterns
revealed by mothers on the AAI provide an excellent predictor of their own children’s attachment
pattern as measured by the Strange Situation (van IJzendoorn, 1995).
Women who showed a dismissive pattern of attachment on the AAI show a pattern of low per-
ceived power on the Parent Attribution Test; that is, they attribute high power to children and low
power to self. In addition, mothers who score as “preoccupied” on the AAI reveal an exaggerated
sense of their own power on the Parent Attribution Test (very high attributed power to self, low
attributed power to the child). It may be that early problems in establishing a secure attachment
relationship foster reliance on power-based interactions.
Stratton and Swaffer (1988) addressed the question of the relation between maternal causal beliefs
for children who were abused or have a handicap. Their research came at a time when questions
were being raised about the prevailing emphasis on parents’ personality traits as causal factors that
accounted for child abuse. Reflecting these concerns, a shift was made to a focus on parental beliefs.
With this shift, research was directed to the relation between parental beliefs and child abuse. Meas-
ures were taken on three groups of mothers: Mothers of children who were physically abused, moth-
ers of children with handicaps, and a control group. The Leeds Attributional Coding System (LACS)
was employed for the relevant comparisons. Each parental statement was coded for the extent it
was global, stable, internal, personal, and controllable. There was a particular emphasis on negative
outcomes (a focus that is also reflected in other attribution measures). Significant group differences
were found. Abusive mothers attribute greater control and more internal causes to children than to
themselves. The findings led to new and important directions in understanding the factors that oper-
ate in families in which parental abuse occurs.
Bugental and colleagues explored the predictors and outcomes of both parental and child attri-
butions. For parents, attributions (high versus low perceived control) were initially measured by the
original version of the Parent Attribution Test (Bugental and Shennum, 1984). The updated version
of the Parent Attribution Test (Bugental, Blue, and Cruzcosa, 1989) asks respondents to indicate how
important various factors would be as causes of negative and positive outcomes in the interaction
between parent and child. The causal factors listed on the Parent Attribution Test were based on
the original responses given by parents when asked to list the potential causes of both positive and
negative outcomes in the interaction between parents and children. The Parent Attribution Test, in
732
its final form, is designed to measure attributions made for either positive or negative outcomes in
interactions between a caregiver and a child. It has also been employed by other researchers to meas-
ure relations between parental attributions and child behavior problems (Bradley and Peters, 1991).
Many individual studies of parental attributions are not programmatic in nature but nonetheless
valuable. For example, Hildyard and Wolfe (2007) measured attributions more typically made for
child behavior by neglectful mothers than by non-neglectful mothers. Parents were given the IFEEL
picture test that includes vignettes of the behavior of young children to assess the attributions that
parents make for child behavior in different settings. Neglectful mothers are more likely to make
internal, stable attributions when it is unclear whether the child depicted in the vignette was at risk
of harm.
Wilson, Gardner, and Leung (2006) posed a question of direction of effects between maternal
attributions and preschool children’s conduct problems. Children’s conduct problems were measured
by the “parental account of childhood symptoms,” and maternal attributions were measured by
Walker’s Parental Attribution Questionnaire. Children’s conduct problems at age 3 predict maternal
attributions when children reached age 4. However, maternal attributions were not predictors of
children’s conduct problems.
Concern with the topic of parental attributions owes much of its early history to other fields—to
social cognition theories, social information-processing theory, and social learning theory. Related
concepts also evolved within attachment theory and the close relations literature. Some of the appar-
ent discrepancies in attributional processes may reflect differences in types of attributions measured.
In addition, attributional processes may vary across context or domain, and change as parental goals
change. In short, parental cognitions are increasingly understood within a framework that includes
consideration of parental motives.
Origins and Effects of Parental Attributions

At the present time, there are a number of research questions that have been subject to continu-
ing interest or that are currently emerging as topics of interest. One topic concerns the origins of
parental attributions. To what extent do attributions originate within adults’ history as parents? To
what extent do they originate in the adult’s own past experiences in childhood? To what extent are
they acquired as learned beliefs—either in the home environment or as shared cultural knowledge?
Attention has also been given to the extent to which children learn attributional patterns from their
parents. Partial support for this mechanism was found in research conducted by Bugental and Mar-
torell (1999). Parents (in particular, mothers) with low perceived power on the Parent Attribution
Test were more likely to have children who had low self-perceived power themselves (as measured
by their responses to the Child Attribution Test, involving cartoons that showed potential conflict
between children and adults). This program of research went on to explore what parental attribu-
tions predict. In addition, a central focus of the research program has been on the extent to which
parental attributions have unique effects on children who are “at-risk.” That is, parents were more
likely to respond differently to children who were born prematurely or had some other medical
problem associated with birth. In support of this hypothesis, Bugental and Happaney (2002) observed
and reported that negative scores on the Parent Attribution Test predict the relation between child
characteristics and maternal variations in stress reactivity. Negative maternal scores on the Parent
Attribution Test also predict the relation between child risk characteristics (e.g., conditions such as
preterm status or medical problems) and maternal stress reactivity.
Other research has explored factors that predict maternal attributional biases. For example, Wang,
Deater-Deckard, and Bell (2013) noted that mothers who interpret their child’s misbehavior as
intentional (rather than situational) are more likely to be hostile in response. They also explored
household climate as a potential moderator of this effect. Household chaos had important effects
733
on the mother-child relationship. The association between hostile maternal attributions and more
negative maternal behavior was stronger in household environments that were chaotic and disorderly.
In another study, Wang, Deater-Decker, and Bell (2016) explored the role of negative affect and
physiological regulation as predictors of maternal attributions. The question posed by the researchers
involved the role of the mother’s negative affect and RSA (respiratory sinus arrhythmia) as modera-
tors of the relation between children’s misbehaviors and the mother’s hostile attributions. The pre-
dicted role of maternal affect and RSA in response to child was confirmed.
Although it is easily seen that parental attributions are drawn from information within the indi-
vidual’s history, questions can be raised concerning the relevant body of knowledge (about parent-
child relationships). As one possibility, it may be that parental attributions are formed primarily on
the basis of their direct proximal experiences with children in a caregiving relationship. The major-
ity of research that has been concerned with the origins of parental attributions has followed this
approach. Alternatively, it may be that parental attributions are primarily influenced by adults’ distal
history, for example, their early history with their own parents, or through cultural explanations
about the nature of children and the nature of parenting.
Proximal Influences
Early concern with parental cognitions focused on beliefs about the nature of children. Increasingly,
attention turned to parents’ beliefs concerning the reasons for children’s behaviors. Why does my
child misbehave? Why is my child having problems in school? Investigators have drawn conclusions
regarding parental attributions for desired versus undesired child behavior, for the behaviors of girls
versus boys, and for changes in child behavior across the course of development.
Despite evidence that parents’ attributions are influenced by their experiences with their own
children, there is also a great deal of evidence to suggest that they come to the parenting relation-
ship with a well-established set of relevant beliefs. For example, Reznick (1999) found that, despite
many uniformities in the ways in which mothers draw causal inferences about their own infants,
there is a high overlap between maternal attributions for their own infants and their attributions for
infants in general. Supporting the notion that attributions precede direct experience with children,
the attributions of nonparental adults or prospective parents predict their responses to children just
as well (if not better) than do the attributions of parental adults (Bugental, 1999; Lewis, Bugental,
and Fleck, 1991).
Researchers in this field have looked to parents’ own childhood history as a major (and possible
primary) source of influence on their attributions. The only secure way of determining the effects of
early history on an adult’s attributions as a parent would involve longitudinal research. At this point,
this type of information is limited. As a result, it is necessary to rely primarily on suggestive evidence
regarding plausible longitudinal relationships.
Grusec et al. (1994) suggested that parents’ attributions about their own children are heavily
dependent on their own history with their own parents. In testing this notion, Grusec and her
colleagues (Grusec and Mammone, 1995) explored the relation between attachment history and
parental attributions through the use of the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). Although the AAI
should not be interpreted as an inside track to actual attachment history, it does provide a defensible
measure of the individual’s updated working model of attachment relationships. For example, attach-
ment patterns revealed by mothers on the AAI provide an excellent predictor of their own children’s
attachment pattern, as measured by the Strange Situation (van IJzendoorn, 1995). Those women
who showed a dismissive pattern of attachment on the AAI showed a pattern of low perceived power
on the Parent Attribution Test; that is, they attributed high power to children and low power to self.
In addition, mothers who scored as “preoccupied” on the AAI revealed an exaggerated sense of their
734
own power on the Parent Attribution Test (very high attributed power to self, and low attributed
power to the child). It may be that early problems in establishing a secure attachment relationship
foster reliance on power-based interactions.
From a different theoretical perspective, Haines, Metalsky, Cardamone, and Joiner (1999) explored
the childhood origins of a pessimistic attributional style. They concluded that either an insecure
attachment history or a history of parental abuse predicts a pessimistic attributional style. They sug-
gested that young children’s tendency to blame themselves for negative events—paired with very
negative life experiences—combine to foster this pattern. They also suggested that the simpler, less
differentiated self-image of younger children may lead children’s negative self-view to have a very
broad impact on many kinds of relationships—not just the parent-child relationship. Negative expe-
riences outside the home may, in turn, serve to provide further support for the child’s pessimistic
attributional style.
A number of efforts have been made to track the intergenerational continuity of attributional
patterns. Typically, this involves determining the relation between adults’ attributions, as measured by
adult scales, and children’s attributions, as measured by scales designed for younger ages. At this point,
primary support has been shown for the relation between mothers’ and children’s causal attributions
(Burks and Parke, 1996; Seligman et al., 1984).
In considering the transmission of power attributions, there would be reason to anticipate either
complementary relations (parents with high perceived power would have children with low per-
ceived power) or matched relations (parents with high perceived power would have children with
high perceived power). Bugental and Martorell (1999) assessed the relations between parents’ attri-
butions for caregiving outcomes on the PAT and children’s attributions for caregiving outcomes
(tested in a picture story format, and implemented with 6- to 10-year-olds). They found support
for a matching relation, with the strongest association being between mothers and sons. Additional
support for this pattern of matched attributions between mothers and sons is provided by the find-
ings of MacKinnon and her colleagues (1992, 1994); these investigators, within a longitudinal design,
showed a linkage between mothers’ and sons’ hostile attributional biases.
Distal Influences
In 1995, Miller reviewed the literature on parents’ attributions regarding their children’s behavior. As
has been noted in other reviews ( Joiner and Wagner, 1996), most researchers have studied parents’
causal appraisals of children’s undesired behaviors. As anticipated, parents show different attributional
patterns for children’s positive versus negative social behaviors—biases that may be interpreted as
“child serving.” That is, positive social behaviors are typically seen as due to something about the
child (e.g., his or her personality), whereas negative behaviors of the same children are more typically
seen as due to something about the situation. Subsequent research has supported the general findings
reported in Miller’s review. Positive (“child-serving”) parental biases have even been found to obtain
even among parents of children who show behavior problems ( Johnston et al., 1998); however, such
biases are somewhat less in response to “difficult” than to “easy” children.
In addition, parents typically show self-serving biases in the attributions offered for children who
behave in a desired fashion versus those who do not. For example, Himelstein et al. (1991) found that
parents of gifted children were more likely to make attributions to caregiving practices than were the
parents of children in special education classes. Similarly, Johnston and Freeman (1997) found that par-
ents of ADHD children were more likely than other parents to attribute their children’s misbehaviors to
internal and stable, but uncontrollable, causes. Their attributions for their children’s undesired behavior
was consistent with a “disease” model. As a result, these parents were less likely to assume responsibility
for their children’s misbehaviors than were the parents of other children (a self-serving bias).
735
A similar attributional pattern has been found for the parents of children with special needs
(Mickelson, Wroble, and Helgeson, 1999). Parents of children with Down syndrome, autism, or
developmental delays typically attribute their children’s needs to situational factors that are outside
their control (e.g., heredity, stress during pregnancy, fate, God’s will). Similarly, Bornstein, Haynes,
and Painter (2000) found that mothers of children who are deaf were less likely than mothers of
children who are hearing to engage in self-blame (internal attributions) for failure on parenting
tasks. The utility of this attributional pattern (avoiding blame for negative parenting experiences
with children with special needs) is suggested by the fact that attributions to fate or God’s will
predict better child adjustment, whereas attributions to self or environment predict worse adjust-
ment (Mickelson et al., 1999).
Considerable attention has been given to parents’ shifting attributions as a function of child age.
This line of thought was introduced by Dix et al. (1986) in their analysis of the changing ways that
parents interpret children’s actions at different ages; with increased age, parents are more likely to
believe that children’s actions are intentional and controllable—and thus children are more respon-
sible for their misbehaviors. Supporting this general notion, Reznick (1999) found that mothers
attributed increasing intentionality to their infants with age. Although some researchers have failed
to find such age changes in parental attributions, it is likely (as suggested by Miller, 1995) that dis-
crepancies reflect differences in types of child behavior studied—with developmental changes in
parental attributions more likely for child behaviors that are more controllable.
In addition, parents’ attributions for children’s behavior vary as a function of child gender (Cote
and Azar, 1997; Hastings and Coplan, 1999). Gender-related attributions are a good example of
causal analyses that reflect complex influences of direct experience and own personal or cultural
history. For example, the misbehavior of boys is more likely than the misbehavior of girls to be
attributed to dispositional causes (Hastings and Coplan, 1999). As suggested by Hastings and Coplan,
however, it is unclear whether these gender differences precede or follow experiences with children.
That is, boys are more aggressive and disobedient than girls (Maccoby and Jacklin, 1974); at the same
time, there are cultural differences in gender expectations (Hofstede, 1998). Very reasonably, a trans-
actional system is operating in which parental responses are influenced both by cultural beliefs and
child behavior, and, in turn, come to influence child behavior.
Eccles and her colleagues (Eccles, Freedman-Doan, Frome, and Jacobs, 2000) spearheaded an
interest in the effects of parents’ cognitions about the ability of their sons and daughters. They
directed particular attention to the effects of parental cognitions on gender-stereotyped activities
(e.g., math, sports). On the basis of their perceptions regarding the abilities of their sons versus their
daughters, parents make different attributions for their children’s performance. Parents’ gender-biased
attributions, in turn, influence children’s self-perceptions and activity choices.
The assessment of parental attributions for children’s school-related outcomes has typically been
limited to mothers. Cote and Azar (1997) extended our knowledge on this topic by assessing differ-
ences between mothers and fathers in attributions for the academic and social outcomes (in school)
of their sons and daughters (across the course of development). Complex interactions were found
between gender of parent and gender of child. For example, mothers of sons were more likely than
mothers of daughters to ask the reasons for any academic failure and to encourage them to try harder.
In contrast, fathers were more likely than mothers to directly involve themselves with the academic
and social problems of their daughters (e.g., talking to teachers on their behalf ). These differences
have implications for the implicit attributions made by fathers and mothers for the outcomes of their
sons and daughters (and the corresponding attributions that are likely for children themselves).
Over the last decades, there has been a steady body of work exploring differences across
cultures in parents’ caregiving beliefs and practices (Goodnow, 1997). Parental attributions may
be learned from general cultural sources—the ways in which families are depicted in the media
736
(including implicit attributions regarding the reasons for successful and unsuccessful parenting
outcomes) and common folklore passed on within families regarding the effects of different
kinds of parental practices or concerning the nature of children themselves and what makes
them do the things they do. From this perspective, parents’ ideas are acquired, negotiated, and
transmitted across generations as part of their active involvement in the rules and values of their
cultural group.
Most systematic research on cultural differences has focused on what may be thought of as typi-
cal family relationships. Bornstein and his colleagues (1998) conducted a study in seven countries
(Argentina, Belgium, France, Israel, Italy, Japan, and the United States). Primiparas mothers of
toddlers were asked (among other things) about their attributions regarding the causes of success
and failure on a series of parenting tasks (bathing, comforting, playing, teaching, communicat-
ing, disciplining, and dressing) using the Parent Attribution Questionnaire (PAQ; Sirignano and
Lachman, 1985). Specifically, mothers were queried regarding the importance of their own ability,
mood, and effort as well as the importance of task difficulty and child behavior. As anticipated,
there were a number of differences across cultures. Three examples provide an idea of the range
observed. Italian mothers attributed importance to their own ability and effort as sources of influ-
ence on caregiving success; in contrast, they attributed little importance to children’s behavior.
This finding only partially supports the prevalent notion that Italian mothers believe that child
development unfolds naturally, and is little influenced by parental intervention. The authors con-
cluded that Italian mothers may be attributing the emotional well-being of their children to
themselves—consistent with the strong emphasis on protection and warmth within la famiglia.
As expected, Japanese mothers downplayed the importance of their own ability (consistent with
cultural self-presentation norms). However, they attributed high importance to children’s behavior
as a causal determiner of success; according to this view, a “good child” is critical to positive car-
egiving outcomes. U.S. mothers attributed high importance both to themselves and to children
as causal influences on success but not on failure. This reflects a basically optimistic position with
regard to caregiving outcomes.
An important approach to attributions has assessed differential patterns that are shown across
countries. Lansford and Bornstein (2011) hosted a special issue of Parenting in which the contributing
researchers involved explored cultural differences in parental attributions. The analysis also included
comparisons of different attributional patterns shown by mothers and fathers for parenting successes
and failures. This series of papers provides a general framework for understanding cultural consisten-
cies and variations in parental attributions. We summarize some findings presented in this issue of
Parenting. We also include studies that were conducted prior to or following that review.
Bornstein and Cote (2004) conducted a study that explored relations between the parental
attributions of immigrant mothers to the United States from South America and Japan and the
parental attributions of mothers who stayed in their home country. The participants were moth-
ers of 20-month old children. Attributions of South American mothers more closely resembled
those of mothers in the United States. The attributions of immigrants from Japan more closely
resembled those of mothers in their home country. These findings advance our understanding the
impact of the mother’s country of origin on the nature and effects of environment or parenting
attributions.
Bornstein, Putnick, and Lansford (2011) assessed attributions (and attitudes) from a wide cross-cul-
tural perspective. Some countries are of particular interest due to their childrearing attitudes. For exam-
ple, Sweden places a strong emphasis on children’s rights. Parents in Kenya hold quite different attitudes.
Phillipson (2006) compared parent and child attributions for academic achievement in Hong
Kong, a city known for its cultural diversity. The central question addressed was whether variations
in child and parent attributions predict the academic achievement of the child. Children came from
737
either Chinese or British backgrounds. Western parents were more likely to attribute their child’s
success to ability, whereas Chinese parents were more likely to attribute their child’s success to effort.
Chang, Chen, and Ji (2011) explored parental attributions among mothers and fathers in China.
Parents were interviewed to obtain parental reports of their attributions for their successes and fail-
ures in interactions with their children. No differences were found between the attributions made
by mothers versus fathers. The concordance between parents appeared to reflect the transformation
that has taken place in China in the 30 years—which corresponds to the lifetime experiences of the
parents studied.
Chea and Sung-YunPark (2006) were concerned with preschoolers’ aggression and social
withdrawal, as understood from a cultural framework. There continues to be a conflict between
traditional (Confucian) values and Western values. Mothers of preschoolers reported the causal
attributions (as well as other measures) they made in response to child aggression and social with-
drawal. Attributions were measured by asking children to provide explanations for these behaviors.
In terms of attributions, mothers believed that aggression was due to external rather than internal
causes and great efforts were needed to prevent it. Concern was also expressed about their chil-
dren’s social withdrawal, but mothers believed that only minor efforts were needed to prevent this
behavior.
Rudy and Grusec (2001) compared Egyptian Canadian to Anglo-Canadian families for their
parental attributions (as well as other measures) using the Parent Attribution Test. Egyptian Cana-
dian fathers scored higher on their perceived control over difficult interactions (in relationships with
offspring) than did Anglo-Canadian fathers.
Bombi and colleagues (2011) described parental attributions made by mothers and fathers in
Italy. Employing the Parent Attribution Test (Bugental and Shennum, 1984), they found that fathers
showed greater perceived control over negative caregiving outcomes than did mothers. This gender
difference was described as reflecting the general expectation that mothers are more accountable for
providing childcare than are fathers. This effect was stronger in Naples than in Rome (conceivably
reflecting the less economically advantaged situation in Naples).
Savina, Moskovtsva, Naumenko, and Zilberg (2014) reviewed attribution processes in Russia. The
participants (Russian teachers, mothers, and school psychologists) rated how serious a (fictitious)
child’s internalizing or externalizing behavior was, the perceived causes of the problem behavior, and
recommended interventions to resolve the problems shown by the fictitious child. Teachers uni-
formly attributed externalizing behavior, but not internalizing behavior, to social causes (in compari-
son with mothers and psychologists). School psychologists were more likely to favor a psychological
intervention than were mothers.
Attention to cultural differences in parental attributions for their children’s academic outcomes has
centered on Asian versus Western cultures (Stevenson, Lee, et al., 1990; Tuss, Zimmer, and Ho, 1995).
For example, Stevenson, Lee, et al. (1990) assessed differences in parental attributions for their children’s
academic outcomes in the United States, Japan, and China. Parents in Asian countries typically believe
that children’s school performance is determined by effort—an attribution that assigns value to their
children “trying harder” as a means of doing better in school. In contrast, parents in Western countries
are more likely to believe that school performance is determined by ability—an attributional pattern
that is less suggestive of ways that children might improve their performance. At the same time, there are
indications that Asian parents do not verbalize their attributions concerning the role of effort; instead,
there appears to be a mutual understanding between parents and children that children should and will
exert high levels of effort in accomplishing academic goals (Bempechat, Graham, and Jimenez, 1999).
This shared expectation (that children will exert academic effort) should be distinguished from the
optimistic beliefs about the value of education held by African American and Latin American parents
in the United States (Stevenson, Chen, and Uttal, 1990). The first view focuses on a (shared) expecta-
tion of children themselves, and the second view focuses on expectations of educational institutions.
738
Variation in Parental Attributions in Ethnic Minority

and Immigrant Families
Although it is important to determine the extent to which and the ways in which parental attribu-
tions vary across culture, it is also important to know if parental attributions in the United States, for
example, differ in any systematic way among immigrant or ethnic minority families. Concern with
the extent to which immigrant families differ (and do not “fit in”) has been a recurrent popular con-
cern. Thus, whenever there is an increase in immigration of a previously underrepresented popula-
tion (as occurred in the United States with Irish and Italian populations, and later with immigrants
from Asian countries or from Mexico), both popular and scientific concerns with cultural variability
in differences tend to increase. At the broadest level, there has been a long-term interest within psy-
chology in the differences in minority populations in contrast with European Americans who have
continued to be a dominant group in the United States.
The wide variety of families whose native home is not in the United States allows the possibility
of determining how parental attributions differ (in comparison with the attributions of native-born
parents). Such families come from countries and cultures that may manifest different parental attri-
butions. In addition, some families are citizens or legal residents of the United States but retain the
language and customs more typical of the country of their parents’ origin.
Lansford et al. (2011) conducted an analysis of attributions (and attitudes) made by parents in the
United States but are from an ethnic minority or immigrant background. An analysis was made of
attributions made by mothers versus fathers as well as between parents who were from an ethnic
minority or European American backgrounds. The Parent Control Over Failure Scale of the Par-
ent Attribution Test (Bugental and Shennum, 1984) was employed to measure parental attributions.
Across ethnic groupings, fathers showed more adult control over failure than did mothers.
The findings for ethnicity (lower levels of attributions to uncontrollable variables by European
American parents than by Latin American or African American parents) were interpreted as suggest-
ing that ethnic differences among parents shape parental attributions regarding childrearing practices.
The implication is that European Americans reveal relatively high perceived control over negative
events in their relationship with their children.
Halgunseth, Ispa, and Rudy (2006) reviewed the literature on parental control in Latino families.
In doing so, they applied a perspective drawn from social information-processing theory, which pro-
poses that attributional processes are context dependent, and thus culture-dependent. The authors
described some of the social information processes that characterize Latino culture. An observed shift
in parental punishment with child age, they suggested, may be due to a shift in parental attributions
with age. That is, parents see their children are more capable of adapting their behavior to family
expectations and rules. Within the relatively hostile world experienced by Latino families, parents
may experience high levels of stress in response to children’s misbehavior. As a result of this elevated
state of arousal, Latino parents may judge their children’s behavior more negatively than they would
in a more welcoming environment.
Bugental and Happaney (2004) measured the attributional and abusive patterns of a population of
mothers who were primarily Latina but also included European Americans. All families were charac-
terized by a low income and low education. Child physical maltreatment was moderated by maternal
attributions (low perceived control in parenting relationship) among Latina mothers. An equivalent
pattern (but of verbal derogation) was observed for European American mothers with low-power
attributions (Bugental and Happaney, 2000).
Within the United States, Reznick (1999) found that Latin American mothers were less likely
than European American or African American mothers to attribute intentionality to infants. Reznick
also found differences in the judged intentionality of infant actions by mothers with different levels
of education. Mothers with higher levels of education (in comparison with less educated mothers)
739
were unwilling to judge infants’ negative actions as intentional or to see them as able to carry out
spiteful or mean acts.
Summary
Current research on parental attributions has produced several consistent themes. One theme relates
to their origins. Although parental attributions may be “updated” as a result of later experience, they
appear to be strongly influenced by adults’ own early history—within both their own family and
their culture. In the socioemotional domain, particular attention has been directed to the relation
between parental attributions and harsh or abusive parenting tactics; a consistent picture has emerged
in which parents with a blame-oriented attributional style are more likely to demonstrate harsh or
abusive tactics—in particular, with children who pose a perceived source of threat. Such parental
attributions (and resultant parenting tactics) also foster the likelihood of subsequent child aggressive-
ness and other types of antisocial behavior.
Concern with the role of parental attributions on children’s academic achievement motivation
and performance has directed particular interest to variations across gender and culture. Parents show
consistent differences across these child and culture differences that, in turn, may influence children’s
motivational patterns and, ultimately, their performance. Little information is currently available,
however, concerning the events that mediate the relation between parental attributions and child
achievement.
Parental Attributions and Parental Responses

Parental attributions have been studied for their direct effects on parental practices, physiological
responses, processing of social information, and emotional reactions. Dix, Grusec, and their col-
leagues (Dix et al., 1986) argued that parents’ attributions about their children’s social behavior
(and misbehavior) would influence the ways in which they responded (both affectively and behav-
iorally) to those children. This focus was on the consequences of attributions parents make con-
cerning children’s behavior. For example, Dix, Ruble, and Zambarano (1989) found that parents
increasingly see power-assertive strategies as a reasonable choice when children knowingly violate
rules and are fully capable of complying with those rules. Supporting these correlational findings,
Slep and O’Leary (1998) found that parents demonstrate a harsher style of interaction with their
children if they have been experimentally induced to believe that their children are misbehaving
intentionally.
A number of research programs have focused on the consequences of parents’ attributions about
their own control. Parental attributional patterns that reflect a generalized lack of perceived con-
trol (as parents) are associated with less effective parenting. Beginning at birth, parents who believe
that their infants’ perinatal problems are outside their control do not adapt as well as do those who
see such problems as controllable. In general, parents who believe they lack control are more likely
to engage in harsh parenting practices ( Janssens, 1994) and show a lack of positive affect (Carton,
Nowicki, and Balser, 1996). Paralleling these findings (employing self-efficacy rather than direct
attributional measures), Bondy and Mash (1997) found that a coercive parenting style is more com-
mon among parents who are low in self-efficacy.
Some investigators have taken a third dyadic approach to parental attributions—focusing on par-
ents’ attributions of their own control in comparison with the perceived control of children. Bugen-
tal and Shennum (1984) found that parents with low perceived power (relative to their children)
are highly reactive to child behaviors and settings that have implications for their ability to exert
control or dominance within the relationship. For example, with unresponsive children, parents show
(1) physiological mobilization (elevations in motoric activation, elevations in heart rate; Bugental,
740
Haynes, et al., 2000), (2) inconsistent or negative affect (Bugental, Blue, and Lewis, 1990; Bugental
and Happaney, 2000), and (3) reduced social information-processing ability (Bugental, Brown, and
Reiss, 1996). However, the assertiveness of their response is contingent on the possibility of success-
fully exercising control. For example, parents show a highly assertive tone of voice when the setting
allows them control and a highly unassertive tone of voice when such control is absent (Bugental
and Lewis, 1998).
When confronted with children’s misdeeds (an event that poses a potential threat to control),
parents who make “low-power” attributions either show a highly assertive or highly submissive
response—dependent on other contextual factors. For example, Mills (1999) found that “low-power”
women use negative control tactics (guilt induction and love withdrawal) with fearful children but
not with fearless children. Such reactivity is very different from the chameleon-like, interpersonal
mimicry that tends to characterize those people who are highly empathic. Rather than being “tuned
in” to children, those parents with low perceived power appear to be inept in interpreting chil-
dren’s intentions and in making fine-grained distinctions between types of child behavior (Lovejoy,
Polewko, and Harrison. 1996; Milner and Foody, 1994). Their responses appear to reflect exploita-
tion of the immediate situation in ways that optimize control. As suggested by Rudy and Grusec
(1999), this response pattern may reflect a “minimization” strategy (Taylor, 1991). That is, “low-
power” parents exploit situations they believe they can control and disengage from situations they
cannot control. This interpretation is consistent with the findings that low-power mothers are also
more likely to show a “dismissive” attachment style (Grusec and Mammone, 1995). It is likely that a
dismissive style in adults, like an avoidantly attached style in infants (Spangler and Grossman, 1993),
hides a high level of unexpressed distress.
Although most attention has been directed to the effects of mothers’ perceived lack of control
or power, a literature has emerged showing the negative effects of overestimated or “illusory” con-
trol. Consistent with this perspective, Donovan, Leavitt, and their colleagues (1990, 1997) observed
that mothers who overestimate their power (i.e., who make an unrealistic judgment regarding their
ability to terminate an infant’s cries) easily showed learned helplessness in their later reactions to
infant cries that they could not terminate. In addition, mothers showed distinctive autonomic and
affective responses—revealing elevations in heart rate and increases in depression. They also showed
a low ability to distinguish between the cries of “difficult” versus “easy” infants (cries that differed
in pitch properties). In many ways, the responses of mothers who overestimate their control parallel
the responses of mothers who underestimate their control. It may be that exaggerated perceptions of
control (in either direction) suggest a focus on competition for power—an emphasis that has nega-
tive implications for parent-child relationships.
A number of researchers have asked about the ways in which effective parenting is viewed in
different cultures. That is, they have asked parents for their causal beliefs about the consequences
of different parental practices, and their beliefs about the practices that are most likely to produce
children that fulfill their expectations. As one example, there are substantial differences across cultures
in the extent to which punitive control tactics are believed to be effective. Durrant, Broberg, and
Rose-Krasnor (1999) assessed differences between parents in Canada (where parental use of spank-
ing is sanctioned) and Sweden (where parental use of spanking is prohibited by law) in their use
of spanking and their beliefs about the effectiveness of spanking. As might be expected, substantial
differences arose in the use of spanking in the two countries. For example, 45% of Canadian moth-
ers said they would use physical punishment in some circumstances, whereas only 15% of Swedish
mothers said they would do so. Parents in the two countries showed large differences in the extent
to which they believed that spanking had desirable consequences (e.g., Agreement with such state-
ments as, “Sometimes a spank is the best way to get my child to listen.”). A secure interpretation of
these findings is somewhat constrained, of course, by possible cultural differences in willingness to
provide honest responses.
741
Palacios and Moreno (1996) pointed out the importance of attending to educational differences
a qualifying factor—across cultures—in parental beliefs about the effects of different parental prac-
tices. That is, those parents with higher levels of education and exposure to contemporary parenting
information are more likely to believe that positive caregiving outcomes follow from effortful activ-
ity, on the part of both parents and children. In contrast, parents from lower educational backgrounds
and more rural areas are less likely to believe that effortful activity will influence a child’s outcomes.
Instead, they are more likely to attribute causality to biological factors—children “are the way they
are.” From this standpoint, parents are more likely to believe that the best they can do is to contain
their children’s unruly behavior. Just as the effects of parental education cross national boundaries, the
effects of religious beliefs are ubiquitous. So, for example, conservative protestant parents are more
likely than those with other religions to believe that parental use of corporal punishment is an effec-
tive means of preventing future transgressions (Gershoff, Miller, and Holden, 1999).
Parental Attributions and Child Responses

Parents’ attributions have also been studied with respect to their implications for children’s immedi-
ate reactions, including (1) their behavioral compliance, (2) their physiological reactivity, (3) their
social information-processing, and (4) their emotional responses. In general, the children of parents
who perceive themselves as lacking control in the parenting relationship are likely to be low in
behavioral compliance. For example, Roberts, Joe, and Rowe-Hallbert (1992) found that clinic-
referred “oppositional” children were more likely to show resistive behavior with parents who had
an external locus of control than with parents who had an internal locus of control.
Donovan, Leavitt, and Walsh (2000) extended their research concerned with the responses of
mothers who overestimate their control to ask how children respond to such mothers. Mothers with
a high illusion of control were very likely to make use of power-assertive control strategies. However,
children were defiant with mothers who made very low estimates of their control as well as with
mothers who overestimated their control. This suggests the possibility that optimal attributions are
those in which parental power is seen as moderate rather than either extremely high or low.
In much of this research it is difficult to determine whether children’s more negative reactions to
parents follow from or precede parents’ lack of perceived control. In an effort to unscramble direc-
tion of effects, Bugental and her colleagues (1999) observed the reactions of children to videotaped
“teachers” who were either (1) unrelated mothers selected on the basis of their perceived power
(high versus low) or (2) an unrelated actress portraying an interactional style characteristic of high-
versus low-power mothers. Children (6- to 10-year-olds) responded to low-power women—or to
a woman showing a “low-power” response style—in distinctive ways. They showed low levels of
autonomic orienting (reflecting attentional disengagement). Consistent with such disengagement,
they also showed relatively poor performance on a cognitively demanding task.
How Do Parental Attributions Affect Parent-Child Interaction?

Parental attributions about children begin before they are even born, and may have profound effects
on parents’ very earliest relationships with their children. Lieberman (1999, pp. 739–740) provides an
informative anecdotal example of this process:
While she (the mother) was pregnant, she imagined her baby as demanding and devouring
every bit of energy she had, leaving her empty and depleted. When her daughter was 2
days old, she commented: “She is pretty, but she is very greedy.” . . . (interpreting) her baby
daughter’s healthy appetite as a sign of voraciousness and worried that there would not be
enough nourishment available for the two of them. . . . (T)his attribution of greediness had
742
a rather straightforward behavioral expression. The mother let the baby cry for 30 to 40
minutes if the crying occurred while the mother was eating.
How Do Parental Attributions Affect Children’s Long-Term

Socioemotional Welfare?
A considerable body of research has concerned the long-term effects of parental attributions on chil-
dren’s socioemotional welfare. Such concerns have been organized primarily around the implications
of parental attributions for child maltreatment and children’s aggression.
Implications for Child Maltreatment

A consistent linkage has been observed between parents’ attributional biases and their harshness or
maltreatment of the young. Most of this work has relied on correlational assessment of the associa-
tion between parental practices and parental attributions—with attendant problems in determining
direction of effects. To the extent these findings reveal causality, parents who either attribute defiant
intentions to children or who see themselves as lacking power are more likely to be harsh or abusive
(Bradley and Peters, 1991; Silvester, Bentovim, Stratton, and Hanks, 1995; Smith and O’Leary, 1995;
Stratton and Swaffer, 1988).
Although much of this body of work has explored the main effects of parental attributions on their
maltreatment of the young, some research has studied the moderating effects of attributions. When a
moderator model is tested, it typically reveals that parents who show maltreatment-promoting attri-
butions are more likely to maltreat children who may be interpreted as “difficult” or “demanding.”
For example, Bugental (2000) found that infants who show risk patterns at birth (low Apgar scores,
prematurity) were more subject to subsequent abuse by parents with low perceived power.
Implications for Child Aggression

Just as considerable attention has been directed to the implications of parental attributions for parents’
aggressive practices, systematic attention has also been given to the implications of parental attribu-
tions for the aggressive behaviors of their children. For example, Nix et al. (1999) conducted a longi-
tudinal investigation from which they concluded that mothers’ hostile attributional biases (as assessed
in response to ambiguous problem behaviors of children) predicted children’s externalizing behav-
iors at home and at school. Parents’ harsh disciplinary style served to partially mediate this relation.
MacKinnon et al. (1992, 1994) conducted a longitudinal study exploring the effects of attributions
on aggression in the family. Specifically, they assessed the role of maternal attributions—along with
child attributions—as predictors of aggressive interactions between mother and child. As anticipated,
the most aggressive dyads included the combination of mothers who revealed hostile attributions
when paired with sons who showed the same attributional pattern.
How Do Parental Attributions Foster or Limit Children’s Long-Term

Academic Motivation and Achievement?
One of the earliest interests in parental attributions concerned their influence on children’s motivation
and achievement in school. Weiner’s (1985) theoretical concepts of attributional processes have been
highly influential in this area of research. Even when investigators do not directly cite Weiner, the
attributional constructs they employ typically have their origins in his work. That is, central attention
has been directed to the extent to which parents attribute their children’s academic success or failure to
causes that are stable or unstable, internal or external, and controllable or uncontrollable (by the child).
743
Interest in parental attributions for children’s academic outcomes follows from the assumptions
that such causal beliefs ultimately come to influence children’s academic motivation and achieve-
ment. Supporting this general notion, a number of investigators have demonstrated that parents’
belief in controllable causes (e.g., child effort) is likely to predict their children’s academic success,
whereas parents’ belief in uncontrollable causes (e.g., luck) is likely to predict children’s undera-
chievement (O’Sullivan and Howe, 1996).
It is sometimes assumed that the higher levels of achievement shown by the children of “effort-
attributing” parents results from the greater investment such parents make in fostering their children’s
academic pursuits. However, the simple presence of a correlation between parental attributions and
child achievement does not itself imply causality. Increasing attention needs to be paid to variables
that may mediate the parent attribution-child performance relation. For example, Georgiou (1999)
used structural equation modeling to determine the role of different kinds of parental involve-
ment within this relation. Within an elementary-school population, those parents who attributed
high importance to their own role were more likely to be both (1) highly invested in developing
children’s academic interests (e.g., encouraging the child to read for pleasure) and (2) highly con-
trolling (e.g., controlling children’s television viewing time). In addition, parental attributions to
their children’s effort (but not their control activities) also predict parental investment in developing
their children’s academic ability. Further research is needed, however, to establish whether parental
investment in developing children’s interests actually serves to mediate the relation between parental
attributions and children’s achievement.
Summary
There is some disagreement across research programs in the direction of effect between parental
attributions and child behavior. One possible explanation may be that there are reciprocal effects
between the two. It is also possible that direction of effect varies by the child’s age. Further research
is needed to clarify the picture of the relation between these variables.
Paternal Parenting Attributions

There has been an increased interest in the role of fathers as they influence children’s cognitions and
behaviors. McKinnon-Lewis and colleagues (2001) explored associations of child attributions and
negative interaction between fathers and children. The sample employed involved fathers and young
adolescents in nonmetropolitan areas. In longitudinal analysis, they found that early negative behav-
iors by fathers predicted children’s later attributions. The research of others (Snyder, Cramer, Afrank,
and Patterson, 2005) has demonstrated that paternal-child interactions become more negative over
time, and may generalize to relationships with other people.
Nelson, Mitchell, and Yang (2008) directed attention to relations between self-reported hostile
intent attributions among children and their parents. A hostile intent attribution is the tendency to
interpret others’ behaviors as having hostile intent, even when the behavior is ambiguous or benign.
The central finding of the study was that maternal intent attributions relate to children’s intent attri-
butions. In contrast, paternal intent attributions relate to children’s relational aggression.
The role of fathers garners particular interest in countries in which equal opportunities are
offered to mothers and fathers to combine childcare and work. Sorbring and Gurdal (2011) reported
on the attributions and attitudes of mothers and fathers in Sweden, a country that encourages equal-
ity in parenting practices. This study assumes particular importance for a number of reasons. First,
the care of children is a high national priority. Second, women and men have equality in serving in
a parental role: Either one is given time off from work when a new child is born. Nonetheless, dif-
ferences in attributions were found between mothers and fathers.
744
Chen, Johnston, Sheeber, Leve, and Chen (2009) explored the possibility that negative parental
attributions (for adolescent behavior) mediate the relation between parent and adolescent depressive
symptoms. The gender of the adolescents moderated the relation between parental attributions and
adolescent behavior. Stronger associations were found between parental attributions and adolescent
depressive symptoms among girls. The authors concluded that adolescent girls may be particularly
sensitive to the negative attributions of their parents. Fathers were more likely to attribute caregiving
failures to both themselves and their children than did mothers.
Parental Attribution Measures

In the future of parental attribution research, our knowledge will be enhanced by redress of some con-
tinuing methodological limitations. Of the many issues that might be identified, several deserve particu-
lar attention. The first issue concerns problems with shared method variance. The most commonly seen
problem of this type involves reliance on parental self-report as both an independent and a dependent
measure. As a result, negative (or positive) biases may come to simultaneously influence both (1) what
parents have to say about causality and (2) what they have to say about their children’s behavior.
Exclusive reliance on self-report measures also creates simultaneous problems with managed self-
presentations; parents may easily be motivated to present themselves and their children in a favorable
light. Such limitations have long been known in the assessment of parental beliefs (Becker and Krug,
1965; Holden and Edwards, 1989). To avoid such problems, investigators need to routinely direct
attention to issues of social desirability of measures (Bugental and Lewis, 1998). That is, we can place
greater faith in what parents tell us if their responses are not easily managed. For example, attribu-
tions are more likely to reveal more spontaneous, implicit cognitions if they are assessed in natu-
ralistic circumstances (e.g., when the individual’s attention is constrained by the presence of other
ongoing activities). As one possible method for accomplishing this goal, attributions can be assessed
during discourse (e.g., the Leeds Attributional Coding System; Stratton et al., 1988). Spontaneously
produced attributional statements during a stressful conversation, although not completely free from
self-management, are more likely to be revealing of the speaker’s implicit attributions.
Another associated problem involves reliance on correlational research. Although new fields of
inquiry benefit from correlational analyses in an effort to determine possible relations (hypothesis
generation), there comes a point when attention is better directed to hypothesis testing and the use
of methods that allow causal inference. Causal modeling provides a first step in this direction—but
with the clear caveat that such methods only support the possibility of causality but do not prove
such causality. Ultimately, a full test of causality requires the use of experimental methods. In paren-
tal attribution research, this involves the experimental manipulation of (1) the kinds of caregiving
stimuli to which parents are exposed, (2) the mediating events believed to serve as causal links in the
attribution-behavior association (e.g., elevated levels of affect or arousal), and (3) parental attributions
themselves (within intervention research).
A specific measure was made of parental locus of control. The Parental Locus of Control (PLOC;
Campis, Lyman, and Prentice-Dunn, 1986) test was given to (1) parents who had no self-reported
difficulty as parents, and to (2) parents who sought services for parenting problems or whose children
had emotional or behavioral problems. Parents who scored low on the PLOC (more external) were
more likely to have sought services for parenting problems. Parents who scored high on the PLOC
(more internal) reported no parenting problems.
Parent Attribution Test

As described earlier, the Parent Attribution Test has been employed across a series of studies by
Bugental and colleagues. Low perceived power on the Parent Attribution Test interacts with the
745
risk levels (e.g., preterm status) of children. The most negative outcomes were found in families that
included a mother with low perceived power and a child who was at risk due to their birth history.
Positive Attributional Style

Ciarrochi, Heaven, and Davies (2007) conducted a longitudinal study in which they assessed the
predictive power of three parent “positive thinking” variables (self-esteem, hope, and positive attri-
butional style) on later measures of emotional well-being. Scores on the attribution scale were the
best predictors of low levels of hostility and fear. Hope predicted positive affect and high grades, and
low self-esteem predicted increases in sadness.
Maternal and Child Hostile Attributions

Healy, Murray, Cooper, Hughes, and Halligan (2015) conducted a longitudinal study that assessed
the development of children’s hostile attributions and aggression. The relevant maternal and child
variables were initially measured when children were 18 months and measured again when children
were 5 years old. Hostile maternal attributions related to negative parenting, which subsequently
predicted children’s hostile attributions and aggressive behavior.
Attribution Theory in Educational Settings

Early work concerned with the performance of adults in educational settings focused on the attribu-
tions made by students (Weiner, 1985). For example, students who attributed their successes to effort
were found to be more successful than those who attributed their successes to ability.
In later work, attention turned to parental attributions as a source of influence on the perfor-
mance of children. For example, Toevali and Kikas (2017) conducted a longitudinal study concerned
with the relation between children’s math performance and parental causal attributions for their
child’s math success. Measures were taken at the end of the second and third grades. A path analysis
determined predictors of children’s success in math. A negative relation emerged between parents’
help attributions and their child’s math success.
Rytkonen, Aunola, and Nurni (2005) focused on parental attributions concerning their children’s
academic achievement in school. They also addressed this question in a longitudinal design. When
children entered preschool, parents were more likely to attribute their child’s success to ability and
their failure to lack of effort. Also, they were more likely to attribute their child’s success to the ability
of the teacher. When children were still in preschool, first grade, or second grade, parents attributed
child success to child ability or successful teaching.
A number of investigators have been concerned with the variations that occur in teacher attribu-
tions across countries. Although the primary focus in this chapter is on parental attributions, teachers
regularly make attributions that influence their students. Teachers (in particular, of young children)
can be thought of as assuming a “parenting” role. Thus, it is of interest to compare variations in
teacher attributions that occur across countries and cultures.
Ho (2004) compared Australian and Chinese teachers’ attributions for their students’ behavior.
The potential causes were ability, effort, family, and teacher. Australian teachers placed more weight
on child ability, whereas Chinese teachers placed more weight on family factors. However, attribu-
tions to effort were strongly and equally valued across cultural contexts. These findings are diagnostic
of the ways in which collectivist values influence school-based values and interventions. Later, Ho
(2010) compared the differences in causal attributions made for child behavior by teachers in Aus-
tralia and China. The attributions included ability, effort, family, and teacher. In both groups, teachers
attributed more importance to (lack of ) effort by children and least importance to teacher factors.
746
Kleftaurus and Didaskalou (2006) were concerned with a common childhood problem of depres-
sion in Greece. A large sample revealed that 30% of the students in fifth and sixth grade showed
evidence of depression, as measured by the Children’s Depression Inventory. However, teachers were
rarely aware of the causal factors within the school setting. Instead, they were more likely to make
attributions to factors that occurred outside the school setting.
Wilcox, Washburn, and Patel (2007) addressed the issue of parental responses in seeking help for
children with ADHD. Parents were resistant to accept this medical diagnosis provided at the local
Child Development Center. Parents showed a preference for attributing their child’s condition to
learning or memory factors, or to attribute blame to themselves or their partner.
Maternal Attributions and Children’s Oppositional Behavior

Maternal attributions for children’s behavior to internal, stable, global factors predicted oppositional
behavior (controlling for the presence of ADHD). They interpreted these findings as indicating the
role of maternal attributions in maintaining child behavior. As such, they noted that maternal attri-
butions may be an appropriate target for intervention.
At a more general level, the same authors explored relations between mothers’ implicit and
explicit attributions and their self-reported parenting behavior ( Johnston et al., 2017). Self-report
measures were used to assess explicit attributions and the Implicit Association Test to assess implicit
attitudes. Child-blaming attributions were inversely related to positive parenting only when use was
made of a high cognitive load. Implicit measures are important not only for the findings reported
here but also for their general utility to reveal implicit cognitions.
Integrative Programs
Other investigators have made use of attribution measures developed by Johnston and colleagues
as well as by others who developed attribution measures. For example, Collette and Gimpel (2004)
explored the relation between maternal and child attributions in populations that included both
ADHD and non-ADHD populations. Mothers completed the Written Analogue Questionnaire
(a parent attribution measure; Johnston and Freeman, 1997) and children completed the Children’s
Attributional Style Questionnaire-Revised (Kaslow and Nolen-Hoeksema, 1991). As predicted, dif-
ferences were found between the two children’s groups (presence of absence of ADHD) for both
maternal and child measures. However, the correlation between child and maternal attributions was
not significant. Maternal but not child attributions were related to the child’s medication status. The
authors concluded that the attributional styles of ADHD children are more likely than other children
to be at risk for depression and/or low self-esteem at later ages.
Dysfunctional Attributions
Sturge-Apple, Suor, and Skibo (2014) have been concerned with the role of maternal working
memory as a moderator of the relation between mothers’ dysfunctional child-centered attributions
and their use of harsh disciplinary practices. Consistent with predictions, they found that the pres-
ence of low working memory among mothers acted as a risk factor for attribution biases and use of
harsh discipline.
Dodge (2006) proposed that social information-processing patterns (including hostile attri-
butional biases) are strongly predictive of aggressive behavior. He suggested that these processing
patterns mediate the effects of both genetic and environmental factors on aggression. His general
model involves a complex of sequential steps that include biased processing patterns and changes
in neural and psychophysiological processes. Dodge and colleagues (2015) made use of a social
747
information-processing pattern in understanding children’s attributions. They summarized the

model as involving the development of children’s hostile attributional biases as an interactive effect of
(1) their own neural dispositions, and (2) parental socialization practices. Hostile attributional biases,
in turn, predicted children’s aggressive behavior.
Taking a social information-processing approach to parenting risk, Azar, McGuier, Miller,
Hernandez-Mekonnen, and Johnson (2017) tracked the outcomes of preschool children who had
disadvantaged mothers with a history of child neglect in comparison with the outcomes of children
of disadvantaged mothers who did not have a history of neglect. Mothers exhibited hostile attribu-
tions to their children (as well as other individuals). The authors concluded that child neglect may
be an outcome of disturbances in parenting social cognition.
Crouch et al. (2017) added authoritarian parenting beliefs to the predicted relation between hos-
tile parental attributions and harsh parenting. Parents read stories about children’s transgressions and
completed a measure of authoritarian parenting beliefs. They were then asked to respond to each
story with their reactions (including their negative affect, attributions regarding the child’s negative
intent, and their predictions as to whether they would use harsh parenting). The authors found a
positive relation between authoritarian parenting and predicted use of harsh tactics. However, nega-
tive parental attributions fully mediated the relation between child transgressions and advocated use
of harsh parenting.
Attributions With Atypical Children

Special attention has been given to the parental attributions shown in response to children who are
atypical and whose behavior is not expected. The research conducted on this topic includes both
general and specific behavioral problems.
Wilson et al. (2006) assessed the attributional patterns shown by mothers who had children with
behavior problems. Mothers and their 3-year old children were observed at home. Mothers’ attribu-
tions were measured using an adaptation of Walker’s PAQ and child behavior was measured by the
Child Behavior Checklist. Mothers who thought the child’s behavior problems were internal to the
child were more likely to use negative control strategies and had more conflict with the child. In
addition, more negative maternal control strategies were employed if the child’s behavior was seen
as global and stable.
Jacobs, Woolfson, and Hunter (2017) were concerned with the attributional patterns shown by
mothers of children with developmental delays (DD) in comparison with the attributional patterns
shown by typically developing (TD) children. Maternal attributions were measured by the Written
Analogue Questionnaire. Parents of DD children viewed their misbehavior more leniently than they
viewed the misbehavior of TD children. These differences in perception influenced parental behav-
ior management strategies. As concluded by the authors, interventions for DD children should differ
from interventions designed for TD children.
Bussanich, Hartley, and Bolt (2017) were concerned with parental attributions for children with
autism spectrum disorder (ASD). A comparison group of parents of children who showed no signs
of ASD was also measured for their attributions. Interest on this topic follows from the common
expectation that ASD children’s positive behavior was due to factors that were less internal, less stable,
and less controllable by the child. The authors concluded that interventions that alter parental beliefs
about their children’s attributions have positive promise for the parent-child relationship.
Bolton et al. (2003) were concerned with the spontaneous causal attributions (along with the
depression levels and expressed emotions) of mothers of children who were referred for help because
of the child’s problem behavior. Expressed emotion was measured by the Camberwell Family Inter-
view (a standardized measure that assesses the emotions expressed by one family member toward
another family member). Mothers with high expressed emotion, compared with mothers with low
748
expressed emotion, were more likely to make attributions that their child’s behavior was idiosyncratic
and controllable by the child. In short, they engaged in child-blaming. In addition, the higher the
mother’s score on the Beck Depression Inventory, the more likely she was to engage in child-blaming.
Parents are exposed to cultural knowledge about atypical as well as typical children. Such knowl-
edge includes implicit attributions concerning the basis of “difference.” For example, children who
are physically or cognitively disabled are viewed in different ways in different cultures. In some
cultures, children’s disabilities are accepted as just another type of individual difference; indeed, such
cultures may not even have words to describe the concept of “disability” or “handicap” (e.g., as is true
for many Native American cultures; Connors and Donnellan, 1993). Traditional folk beliefs have
been found to be more common among Latino than Anglo families (e.g., belief in susto, the notion
that a child’s frightening experience may cause a chronic illness).
Members of different cultures not only differ in their attributions regarding the cause of children’s
disabilities, but also make different attributions regarding the future implications of those disabili-
ties. That is, they differ in the causal role they project for the child’s later outcomes. In the United
States, disabilities are standardly interpreted in terms of the level of risk they pose for the child’s later
outcomes, and attempted resolutions follow a technological approach to relevant service delivery
(Kalyanpur and Harry, 1999). In other cultures, disability may be viewed as having positive or spir-
itual implications (Kisanji, 1995). Ultimately, variations in the ways in which families understand
and explain children’s physical and medical challenges strongly influence how they cope with them
(Garwick, Kohrman, Titus, Wolman, and Blum, 1999).
Taken together, these studies provide support for a social information-processing view of rela-
tions between parents’ negative attributions and harsh parental practices with problematic children
(Milner, 1993).
Attribution-Based Interventions in Families

Changes in parent-child interactions can be expected to result from cognitively based interventions.
As illustrations of this approach, we provide examples of attribution-based interventions conducted
independently by different research groups.
Family Thriving Program

The first intervention began at the birth of children born at medical risk and continued for a year
(Bugental et al., 2002) with a follow-up study (Bugental and Happaney, 2004) to determine whether
maternal attributions prior to a child’s birth influence her response to child characteristics. The last set
of studies conducted in the program tested the extent to which maternal attributions prior to birth
predict a variety of negative response patterns among children at later ages (e.g., effects on health,
effects on stress levels, effects on cognitive abilities, and effects on negative behavior).
Bugental and colleagues (2002) initially made use of an experimental cognitively based interven-
tion with mothers at the birth of their first child. Mothers were identified who might be at risk for
harsh or abusive parenting due to the demands placed by an infant at-risk. Families were recruited
for inclusion if they had an infant at-risk (preterm, low birthweight, or another medical problem).
Families were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: (1) a novel cognitive reframing condi-
tion (referred to as the Family Thriving Program when being used or described in the community),
(2) Healthy Families America (the most commonly used child abuse program at that point in time),
and (3) a control condition that included only intake and follow-up measures (although parents
were told about existing services available to them in the County). At the end of the year, all parents
completed the Conflict Tactics Scale (Straus, 1979), a measure of the frequency of use of harsh or
abusive parenting.
749
The cognitive reframing intervention was designed to reduce harsh parenting or abuse. By alter-
ing parental ways of explaining the challenges experienced with their infants. As an illustration, one
mother complained about her infant being cranky and crying all the time—and she thought the
baby was mad at her.
The home visitor asked her what else might be going on. When the mother eventually came
up with a benign explanation (e.g., colic), the mother was asked what she might try to reduce this
problem (sometimes asking her to think of things she had heard of, and sometimes referring to a
childcare book provided by the State of California to new parents in low-income areas). This process
was repeated over the course of the first year of life, with occasional follow-up phone calls for the
next 2 years. Outcomes of the three conditions were measured when the children reached 1 year of
age. The main effect of condition showed that children in the cognitive reframing condition were
less likely to be physically abused (as measured by the Conflict Tactics Scale) than were children in
the Healthy Families condition or the control condition. Mothers in the cognitive reframing condi-
tion showed changes in their response to the Parent Attribution Test (PAT). After participation in
the intervention, they were less likely to attribute blame to their children than was true for mothers
in the other two conditions.
Bugental and Happaney (2000) conducted a follow-up study to determine whether maternal
attributions prior to a child’s birth influenced her response to child characteristics. Higher levels of
harsh parenting practices were shown among mothers with low perceived control (as measured on
the Parent Attribution Test prior to the child’s birth) and whose infants were low in birthweight.
In addition, mothers with low perceived control were less likely to maintain the safety of low birth-
weight children. These findings suggest that maternal attributions precede the birth of a child. This
allowed us to demonstrate that maternal attributions are present at birth but are more likely to pre-
dict caregiving problems in response to a “child at-risk (premature and/or low birthweight).”
We also conducted analyses of the effects of the intervention over time. Employing measures taken
in our previous study, we conducted follow-up analyses on different outcome measures. For example,
we predicted that children who participated in the Cognitive Reframing condition would show bet-
ter health than would those in the control condition. This prediction is based on projected increases
in providing time in maternal childcare, which, in turn, was predicted to mediate the relation between
participation in the intervention and higher health levels of the children involved (Bugental, Corpuz,
and Samec, 2013). These predictions were confirmed. Children whose mothers participated in the
Cognitive Reframing condition showed greater provision of time in childcare.Their children, in turn,
were healthier. This finding suggests the possibility that these children are more likely to survive to
adulthood, with the additional possibility of having healthy children of their own.
In addition, Bugental, Schwarz, and Lynch (2010) found that children whose mothers were in the
experimental condition showed greater cognitive abilities (as well as other positive outcomes) than
children in the control condition at age 3. This finding is consistent with earlier work (Lansford et al.
2002) showing that early physical maltreatment predicts later academic problems.
Finally, Bugental, Schwartz, and Corpuz (2012) tested the long-term effects of the intervention
on child aggression. Children in the experimental condition were less aggressive at age 3 than were
those in the control condition. This result is consistent with the general finding that aggression is
passed on in families. Benefits of this program as a function of reduced levels of abuse (in infancy and
later) and other types of benefits when the children were older. It appears that the acquisition of par-
enting skills acts as a resource that facilitates a variety of benefits for offspring and future generations.
Intervention to Alter Attributions of Abusive Mothers

The second intervention was developed by Beckerman, van Berkel, Messman, and Alink (2017).
Beckerman et al. (2017) focused on altering maladaptive attributions among mothers who had already
750
been identified as abusive. Their first step involved developing a parental attribution test (Parental
Attributions of Child Behavior; PACT). The attribution test involved a series of drawings of ambigu-
ous situations (e.g., a child causing a laptop to fall as a result of tripping over a laptop wire while
chasing a ball). Parents were asked whether the action was “naughty” or “cute.” They also responded
to a measure to report (1) their own daily stress (including parenting stress) and (2) their own history
of maltreatment. A focus was placed on reducing stress (including reduced cortisol levels in infants).
Mothers completed an attribution test and reported their own history of child abuse. Mothers’ nega-
tive attribution patterns mediated the relations between parenting stress and abusive parenting.
The investigators conducted a longitudinal study in which parents from maltreating families
were randomly assigned to experimental condition. A test was made of the effects of child maltreat-
ment on cortisol regulation in infants from age 1 to 3 years. They predicted and demonstrated that
negative maternal attributions mediate the relation between parenting stress and parental use of
harsh disciplinary practices. The intervention was successful, and the predicted mediational process
was confirmed. They concluded, on the basis of this work on the role of parental attributions, that
child abuse interventions should focus on reducing negative parental attributions as well as relevant
stressors. They also note that social information-processing theory provides important predictors of
disciplinary actions.
Fast Track: A Preventive Intervention for At-Risk Children

Dodge, Godwin, and the Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group (2013) tested the effects
of Fast Track (a preventive intervention initiated at a young age and ultimately directed to prevent-
ing adolescent antisocial behavior). Children who manifested aggressive behavior at a young age
(kindergarten) were accepted to the program and were randomly assigned to an intervention or a
control group. The intervention methods included social skills training, peer coaching, and tutor-
ing. The long-term impact was based on the reduction of antisocial behavior, an outcome that was
mediated by the reduction of hostile attributions, increased competent responses to social problems,
and reduction of aggression.
Preventive Intervention With Pregnant Women

As another example, Berlin, Dodge, and Reznick (2013) conducted an intervention with pregnant
women to prevent later maltreatment of their offspring. During the second half of pregnancy, pro-
spective mothers participated in an interview that included assessment of their attributions about
infant behavior (Infant Intentionality Questionnaire). The interview also included a measure of
mothers’ hostile attributions. They were asked questions about both the positive and negative expec-
tations of an infant’s intentions during the last half of their first year of life. Mothers’ attributions
during pregnancy served to predict their behavior with their children. Those who made hostile
attributions were more likely to maltreat their infants by the age of 2. In the service of preventing
or reducing harsh parenting, the authors provided useful suggestions for practitioners whose patients
manifest indications of future or ongoing use of harsh tactics with their children.
These findings document the need for child abuse interventions to focus on reducing negative
parental attributions as well as relevant stressors. They also demonstrate that social information-
processing theory provides important predictors of disciplinary actions.
Future Directions in the Study of Parental Attributions

In considering future directions in the study of parental attributions, we need to consider the gaps in
our existing knowledge, the adequacy of the methods we use, and the applications of our findings. In
751
doing so, we necessarily move across disciplinary boundaries. Parenting research has always benefited
by considering theory from other fields, by expanding and refining the ways in which we study par-
enting processes, and by considering the utility of our knowledge for children and families.
Along with the many continuing issues in this field (e.g., concern with parenting contexts or
domains, concern with origins of parents’ attributions), some issues represent relatively new con-
cerns. Two of these pose particularly intriguing possibilities.
Attributions Versus Expectations

Past research has focused on the role of parental attributions about past or hypothetical events; that
is, researchers typically asked parents about their perceptions of the causes of caregiving events that
actually occurred or that might occur. In general, such processes predict undesired relative to desired
caregiving outcomes. That is, parents who make certain kinds of attributions are more likely to
engage in harsh or ineffective parental practices and to have children who show deficits in their
emotional responses, social behaviors, and/or achievement motives. Less attention has been given to
parents’ expectations, or to the extent to which parents’ causal reasoning necessarily predicts their
expectations. Thus, for example, two parents may both believe that child effort predicts positive
outcomes (if children make an effort to behave in a socially positive way, they are likely to succeed
in doing so; if they study hard, they will succeed in school). At the same time, one of these parents
may expect that their child will actually make an effort, whereas another parent may question the
extent to which their child will do so. Differences in child behavior may, then, follow as a result of
parental expectations.
This literature points to tentative indications that optimal parenting may be more associated with
positive expectations than with attributions. Indeed, if positive events are expected, causal appraisal
serves little function. Asian families have been observed to hold optimistic expectations for children’s
social and academic behavior. Bempechat et al. (1999) pointed out that Asian parents invest little
effort in attempting to influence children to behave in responsible ways—they simply expect such
behavior as a “given.” More work is needed to determine the differential effects of expectations
versus attributions on parenting practices. Optimistic beliefs may preclude the need for attributional
activity (typically directed to explaining undesired or ambiguous events). Alternatively, of course, it
may be that certain kinds of attributions serve as necessary but not sufficient conditions for positive
caregiving outcomes. Thus, for example, parents’ beliefs that child effort is predictive of positive out-
comes may be a necessary but not a sufficient condition for positive outcomes.
In the future, parenting researchers may do well to follow the emerging debate within the close
relationships literature. Within this area (focused primarily on adult relationships), consideration has
been increasingly directed to the conceptual boundaries between expectations and attributions, and
the extent to which life outcomes are affected by these two processes (Carver et al., 2000; Folkman
and Moskowitz, 2000). For example, Carver and his colleagues suggested that expectations may be
more important processes than attributions in fostering positive life outcomes. Within this research,
there has been considerable support for the advantages of optimistic beliefs for future outcomes—
with a focus on social and health outcomes (Murray and Holmes, 1997; Scheier and Carver, 1993).
These ideas have also been framed in terms of the advantages of “positive illusions” (Taylor, Kemeny,
Reed, Bower, and Gruenewald, 2000). Those individuals who have a “trust” and anticipation that
good events will happen ultimately are more likely to act in ways that increase the probability that
desired events will indeed occur. That is, “optimism” or “positive illusion” serves to foster self-
fulfilling prophecies. Within these changing conceptions, there has also been a shift to “positive
psychology,” that is, to the processes (including attributional processes) that foster “well-being” and
“thriving” (Peterson, 2000; Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi, 2000)
752
Parental Attributions and Mediating Processes

There has been increasing use of moderator models in studying the effects of attributions. For exam-
ple, researchers have assessed the role of parental attributions as qualifiers of the relation between
child characteristics and parenting strategies. Thus, those parents who attribute high blame to chil-
dren may be particularly likely to use punitive tactics with an apparently unresponsive child. At this
point, models are needed that not only provide a role for attributional moderators but also con-
sider the route through which those attributions produce their effects. For example, is the relation
between parental blame and use of punitive tactics mediated by anger? By retributional motives?
As one important omission, little attention has been given to the role of stress-related physiologi-
cal processes as mediator variables. For example, there is evidence that parents with low perceived
power (1) are more likely to maltreat their children, (2) show high autonomic mobilization to car-
egiving threat, and (3) show social information-processing deficits in response to threat. However,
the relevant mediating role of autonomic processes has not been fully demonstrated. It may be that
greater attention should be given to other physiological indications of stress (e.g., increased produc-
tion of cortisol—a response that has potential implications for the social and cognitive processes
of parents and their young). That is, over-activation of the HPA (hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal)
axis—and resultant bombardment of the hippocampus with cortisol—has negative consequences
for both cognitive and social functioning (Bremner and Narayan, 1998). Thus, the effects found as a
function of biased cognitions (e.g., attentional narrowing, memory deficits) may, to some extent, be
mediated by associated hormonal reactivity. So, for example, children with low levels of perceived
control show elevated levels of cortisol in response to stress (Granger, Weisz, and Kauneckis, 1994),
and a similar pattern has been found for mothers with low perceived control (Bugental, 1999). Thus,
it will be profitable to further explore the mediating role of hormonal processes within conflictual
family relationships (Margolin and Gordis, 2000).
Conclusion
This chapter describes the complex nature and effects of parental causal attributions on caregiving
that parents provide. Parents have different expectations of the child based on their own personal-
ity (and their own role in providing caregiving) and the level of challenge and stress induced in
response to children. Two additional factors have notable effects on parental attributions. The first
involves parent and child gender. The second factor involves variations in country and ethnicity. In
some cases, the combination of gender and country prove to be important predictors of parental
attributions. Parents have different expectations of the child based on their own personality, their
role in providing caregiving, their cultural background, differences in expectations for mothers versus
fathers, and on the level of challenge (and stress) induced in response to children.
Parenting study has made extensive use of attribution theory in understanding factors that influ-
ence the level of care children are likely to receive. The social information-processing features
involved include caregivers’ causal beliefs about their influence on their children.
We have reviewed some of the interventions that have been employed and experimental evidence
for their effects. Interventions are useful theoretically; they also suggest effective programs for use
with relevant populations. Well-designed interventions have important indications for children’s
health and intellectual functioning. Thus, a better understanding of parental attributions increases
our knowledge or parenting and it also poses benefits for children.
Over the last 30 years, the theoretical framing of parental attributions has changed in ways that
reflect advances in both social cognitive psychology and social developmental science. We have
become more aware of distinctions in the ways that cognitive processes work—sometimes operating
753
as unaware, automatic, implicit processes and sometimes as aware, effortful, explicit processes. We
have also directed greater attention to the ways that attributional processes moderate parent-child
relationships, and we have an enhanced understanding of the circumstances that are most likely to
foster attributional activity. Although early work in this field focused on explicit attributional pro-
cesses, increasing importance has been given to the role of parental attributions as implicit processes.
During the course of family life, parental attributions regularly operate below the level of awareness
but nonetheless act as a running guide to parents’ interpretations of ongoing events, their emotional
responses to those events, and their parenting practices.
The basic ways that parental attributions play out during the course of interaction have been
studied with increasing recognition of context or domain. Rather than being seen as stable “person-
ality” constructs that exert a uniform influence on parenting practices, parental attributions are more
regularly seen as constructs that are accessed differentially with different children, and in different
caregiving settings. As an easy example, the kinds of parental attributions that foster optimal academic
outcomes differ from those that foster optimal socioemotional outcomes. There are also differences
in the kinds of attributions that parents make concerning children’s prosocial actions versus their
misdeeds. However, a broader range of child or caregiving events need to be considered in the study
of parental attributions. There has been a tendency to focus on parental attributions for children’s
misdeeds. Such research has strong implications for parents’ selection of disciplinary strategies. In
future work, it will be useful to learn more about parents’ attributions for other types of child varia-
bles. For example, we need to know more about parents’ attributions for the causes and consequences
of children’s medical conditions, physical disabilities, or temperament problems (e.g., fearfulness).
Continuing questions in this field include concern with the origins of parental attributions,
along with the short-term and long-term effects of parental attributions. Parental attributions are
influenced by direct proximal experiences with one’s own history, and they are influenced by distal
child and cultural factors. Attachment history has emerged as an important early influence on later
attributions for the parenting relationship.
There are several important gaps in the study of parental attributions. We need more information
about the extent to which parental attributions and expectations serve as overlapping or independ-
ent contributors to parental practices. More systematic attention should be directed to mediating
processes in the relation between parental attributions and child and family outcomes. That is, what
is the route through which parental attributions come to produce their effects? To what extent
do parental attributions influence parents’ and children’s behavior? Their affective and physiologi-
cal responses to caregiving events? The ways in which they process ongoing information? Finally,
increased efforts need to be given to fostering optimal parental attributions—either as part of parent
training or family intervention efforts. In this way, our knowledge can be directed to promoting
long-term benefits to children and families.
Acknowledgments
Some of the research described was funded by grants to the first author from the National Science
Foundation and the National Institute of Mental Health. We would like to express appreciation to
Sandra Padilla, our former research assistant, in editing this chapter.
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22
PARENT SOCIALIZATION AND
CHILDREN’S VALUES
Introduction
The term “socialization” refers broadly to the way in which individuals are assisted in the acquisition
of knowledge and skills necessary to function successfully as members of their social group. Bugental
and Goodnow (1998) described it as the continuous collaboration of elders and novices, of old hands
and newcomers, as the latter with the help of the former develop the attitudes, behaviors, values,
standards, and motives that enable novices and newcomers to become part of the social community.
There is considerable debate about the relative importance of different kinds of elders or old hands.
Frequently considered as most important are parents. But other agents of socialization include teach-
ers, older siblings, peers, formal institutions, and the media. This chapter focuses on parents who, for a
variety of reasons, can be considered to be primary sources of influence. Thus, Kuczynski and Grusec
(1997) argued that parents are most influential in the socialization of children for a number of rea-
sons: Socialization, which has evolved as an adaptive evolutionary strategy, is a biosocial system set up
to favor the parent’s primary influence on the child; society designates parents (or parent surrogates)
as primarily responsible for socialization; parents have greater time and opportunity to develop rela-
tionships with children, with these relationships essential for successful socialization; and parents also
have greater opportunity to monitor their children’s actions and social relationships, another centrally
important aspect of successful socialization. Parents also live in close proximity to their children, and
thus antisocial behavior on the part of those children compels parents to take action to modify their
own discomfort.
Although theory and research in the field of parental socialization focus on the influence of
parents on their children, it is also widely acknowledged that children are not passive objects to be
shaped and molded. Children are active participants in the socialization process, and they too influ-
ence their parents as well as their own development (Bell, 1979; Davidov, Knafo-Noam, Serbin, and
Moss, 2015; Lollis and Kuczynski, 1997). Children’s influence can take many forms. For example,
children’s challenging behavior can produce anger and loss of control in the parent, resulting in less
effective socialization practices. Yet child behaviors can also facilitate more effective parenting strate-
gies, with positive child behavior serving to maintain current parenting behavior and negative child
behavior motivating a change in the parent’s socialization approach. The influence of parental behav-
ior on children also depends on children’s own characteristics and perceptions. Thus, although the
current chapter focuses on parental influences on children’s internalization of values, it also touches
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Parent Socialization and Children’s Values
on children’s own influences and contributions, to underscore the complex transactional nature of
the socialization process.
Socialization determines several outcomes in children. One is the development of self-regulation
of emotion, thinking, and behavior. The second is the acquisition of a culture’s standards, attitudes,
and values, including appropriate and willing conformity to and cooperation with the direction of
authority figures. The final outcome of socialization is what Kuczynski and Grusec (1997) termed
“collateral effects.” During the course of helping children develop self-regulation and acquire values
and standards, parents also less intentionally teach role-taking skills, strategies for resolving conflicts,
and ways of viewing relationships. Their modes of interaction also promote or hinder the devel-
opment of self-esteem and self-efficacy and can promote internalizing problems in the form of
depression and anxiety. The focus of this chapter is on the acquisition of standards and values, with
the recognition that the ability to self-regulate is essential for adherence to values and that collateral
effects are an inevitable outcome of parenting efforts at imparting values.
There are many different kinds of values. Much research attention has been paid to moral val-
ues including the inhibition of antisocial behaviors, such as lying, stealing, and aggression, and the
encouragement of prosocial values that include helping or being kind to others in a variety of dif-
ferent ways. Often antisocial behaviors are grouped under the label of “externalizing” problems.
Values can be positive or negative in nature. Kasser and Ryan (1996), for example, divided values
into those that are intrinsic and those that are extrinsic. The former include aspirations for personal
growth, meaningful relationships, social responsibility, and physical health, whereas the latter involve
goals of financial success, physical attractiveness, and social recognition, with intrinsic motives more
likely to be associated with happiness and well-being. Similarly, Schwartz and colleagues (Schwartz,
1992; Schwartz and Sagiv, 1995) identified a value dimension which contrasts “self-transcendence”
with “self-enhancement” values. The former includes universalism and benevolence, which involve
protection of people and nature and preservation and enhancement of the welfare of others; the latter
includes power and achievement, which involve status, prestige, control over people and resources,
and personal success. These two sets of values are negatively correlated, with most attention paid by
researchers to the development of positive, or other-oriented values, which transcend the self.
Although this chapter is about parental socialization with a focus on values, parents have different
goals when they are socializing their children, goals that may not always involve the learning of val-
ues to guide behavior (Hastings and Grusec, 1998). Although long-term goals that include children’s
applying values and standards to their actions are central, parents also have short-term goals involv-
ing immediate obedience as well as relationship goals that include negotiation and compromise and
the development of a positive relationship that can lead to greater willing compliance with their
directives.
This chapter begins with a historical overview of theoretical perspectives and research on parent-
ing or childrearing, then moves to a discussion of five issues central for the understanding of parenting
and socialization: The fact that much of the research on parenting yields confusing results because
researchers fail to distinguish among different kinds of “good” and “bad” parenting, the importance of
internalization given that personal acceptance of values is a significant goal of socialization, the point
that biological and experiential variables are interwoven in a complex way, the roles played by culture
in parental socialization, and methodological challenges faced by socialization researchers. The chap-
ter then describes four theoretical approaches that have implications for understanding the acquisi-
tion of values: Self-determination theory, domains of social knowledge, domains of socialization, and
prosociality and morality as innate predispositions. Classical and more recent research in parenting
and value acquisition are then described. Finally, a suggestion is made as to why advice about chil-
drearing is so full of disagreement and the practical implications of this disagreement, followed by a
brief discussion of directions in which future research and theorizing about socialization might move.
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Historical Considerations of Socialization Processes

The scientific study of socialization began with Freud, with a major contribution to mainstream
developmental theory found in his analysis of conscience development. Freud suggested that chil-
dren incorporate or take over the attitudes and standards of their parents through a process of iden-
tification, with this incorporation motivated by fear of loss of parental love. By identifying with,
or becoming like their parents, children acquire a conscience and develop into well-functioning
members of society.
Social Learning Theory

Freud’s ideas about incorporation or identification were the basis of the internal control perspective
that has dominated the study of socialization. Thus, researchers have conceptualized parenting and
socialization as a process whereby children eventually no longer need to be controlled by their par-
ents but, rather, come to behave in accord with societal standards because they believe these standards
are inherently correct. Internal control theories originated in the development of social learning the-
ory, which was a combination of psychoanalytic theory and Hullian learning theory (Sears, Whiting,
Nowlis, and Sears, 1953; see Grusec, 1992, for a review). According to the approach, the actions of
parents are secondarily reinforcing because they are associated with primary drive reduction. Eventu-
ally, a secondary drive to be like the parent develops, and this development accounts for the child’s
eager willingness to emulate the parent, and thus become a conforming member of society. These
ideas resulted in a seminal study of the childrearing practices of mothers of preschoolers carried out
in Boston (Sears, Maccoby, and Levin, 1957), which demonstrated that mothers who endorsed with-
drawal of love as a form of discipline, provided they were also warm and nurturant (that is, provided
there was love to withdraw), were more likely to have children who behaved in a socially acceptable
manner than mothers who endorsed physical discipline such as spanking or withdrawal of rewards.
Other-Oriented Induction
Hoffman (1970), in a review of existing data, moved the thinking of socialization researchers still
further by concluding that reasoning, particularly reasoning that was other-oriented by focusing on
the consequences of misdeeds for others, was more effective than power assertion (withdrawal of
love and of material rewards as well as corporal punishment) in promoting children’s values. Warmth
he relegated to a somewhat secondary position. As well, he suggested that withdrawal of love held a
middle position between reasoning and power assertion in terms of its effectiveness for socialization.
Given the far-from-overwhelming nature of the data he reviewed, Hoffman (1970) tempered his
conclusions by noting that power assertion and love withdrawal had some role to play in the acquisi-
tion of values in their provision of arousal, but that reasoning needed to accompany them.
Parenting Styles
Mainstream social psychology was the source of a second major perspective on value internaliza-
tion, this one having to do with styles of parenting (Baumrind, 1971). Maccoby (1992) located the
origins of Baumrind’s approach in Lewin’s research (e.g., Lewin, Lippitt, and White, 1938) on group
atmospheres—research that was generated in reaction to alarm about the growth of totalitarianism
in Europe in the 1930s. Lewin’s work with groups of boys indicated that authoritarian or auto-
cratic direction led to compliance in the group leader’s presence. However, privately, the members
expressed dislike of the leader, and they stopped working in his absence. Moreover, they engaged in
wild horseplay, presumably an indication of suppressed tension. In democratic groups, characterized
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by joint participation in decision-making under the guidance of a dispassionate leader, boys worked
well even in the absence of the leader, with dispassionate leadership encouraging autonomy and
independent thinking. Finally, in a laissez-faire group, the members were disorganized and inef-
fective. This division of leadership styles was ultimately refined by Baumrind, who developed a
tripartite division of parenting styles. In Baumrind’s classification, the authoritative parent, who mir-
rored the democratic leader, was not only warm and responsive in tendencies but also imposed rules
and demanded mature behavior. In contrast, the authoritarian parent was strict and nonresponsive
to the child’s wishes and point of view, whereas the permissive parent had a laissez-faire approach
combining warmth with lack of sufficient boundaries. In subsequent refinements of her theory,
Baumrind (2012) distinguished between confrontive and coercive parenting styles, with both equally
demanding but with coercive power arbitrary, peremptory, and concerned with status distinctions
and confrontive power focused on reasoning, negotiation, and self-regulation. In essence, coercive
power assertion gives the child no choice but to comply, whereas confrontive power allows choice
among compliance, negotiation with a satisfactory compromise, or paying a known price for non-
compliance. The notion of parenting styles was further refined by Barber (2002), who distinguished
between psychological and behavioral control, with the former more linked to withdrawal of love
and the production of guilt or internalizing problems, and the latter focused on the provision of
structure and guidance and associated with socially acceptable behavior.
Bandura and Social Cognitive Theory

Sears and his colleagues had difficulty explaining why a secondary drive to be like the parent should
result in identifying with or internalizing the parents’ values (see Grusec, 1992). The solution was
offered by Bandura and Walters (1963), who proposed that observing the behavior of others is the
primary way in which we learn. In a series of studies, they and their colleagues demonstrated how
children learned ways of behaving simply through observing others, even in the absence of reinforce-
ment or punishment.
Relational Perspectives
Sears et al. (1957) touched on the importance of a loving relationship in the socialization process,
noting that reproducing the actions of a warm and nurturant parent would be a greater source of
secondary reinforcement than reproducing those of a cold or rejecting parent. Arising quite inde-
pendently of their work, however, although with roots also deep in psychoanalytic theory, was the
work of Bowlby (1969) and Ainsworth (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, and Wall, 1978), who focused on
the role of attachment in children’s social development, including their willingness to adopt paren-
tal values. Thus, Stayton, Hogan, and Ainsworth (1971) argued that the human species has evolved
to be compliant and that only insensitive and unresponsive parenting, the precursors of insecure
attachment, can interfere with this natural proclivity. A further refinement of this position comes in
the suggestion of Maccoby and Martin (1983) that willing (freely given) compliance with parental
directives is more likely to occur after parents themselves have been compliant with children’s bids
and wishes.
Central Issues in the Study of Socialization Processes
Failure to Differentiate Forms of Positive and Negative Parenting

There is a tendency for researchers to lump together different forms of positive parenting as though
they all have the same effect on children’s development (Grusec and Davidov, 2010). There is, however,
765
substantial evidence of specificity, suggesting that this is often not the case. McElwain and Booth-
LaForce (2006), for example, reported that mothers’ sensitivity to their baby’s distress, but not their
sensitivity when the baby was not distressed, was a predictor of attachment quality. Similarly, Leerkes
(2011) assessed mothers’ responsiveness during free play and in an emotion-arousing situation (fear
and frustration), including their quality of voice, touch, and affect, and found the latter but not the
former was related to security of attachment. Leerkes, Weaver, and O’Brien (2012) reported that
early responsiveness to distress is a unique predictor of subsequent positive social behavior, whereas
sensitivity in a non-distress situation is not. Additionally, although these two forms of responsiveness
are often positively associated, they have more unshared than shared variance and they are predicted
by different antecedents: In the case of maternal sensitivity in non-distress situations, demographic
risk is a predictor, whereas in the case of sensitive response in distress situations, prenatal focus on
infant cries as signs of infant distress is a predictor.
Warmth in the sense of expressions of love and affection (during non-distress situations) has also
been differentiated from responsiveness to distress. Davidov and Grusec (2006a) found in a study of
6- to 8-year-olds that mothers’ and fathers’ responsiveness to distress, but not their warmth, predicted
negative affect regulation. Maternal responsiveness to distress, but not warmth, also predicted chil-
dren’s empathy and prosocial responding. In contrast, warmth predicted better regulation of positive
affect and, in boys, greater peer acceptance, whereas these outcomes were not related to responsive-
ness to distress.
Specificity is also seen within non-distress interactions, with mothers’ sensitive responding to
different child cues predicting differential outcomes. Tamis-LeMonda, Bornstein, Baumwell, and
Melstein Damast (1996) showed that responsiveness to infants’ vocalization predicted subsequent
language ability, but not play skills, several months later, whereas responsiveness to infants’ play activi-
ties predicted their subsequent play skills, but not language development.
As another example of specificity, the effects of low levels of warmth have been compared with
those of rejection—two indices of negative parenting. In a meta-analysis, Hoeve et al. (2009) reported
that parental rejection and hostility was a better predictor of delinquency than lack of warmth and
support. Sarıtaş, Grusec, and Gençöz (2013) also found a distinction between these two examples of
harsh parenting, with the relation between maternal and adolescent emotion regulation mediated by
mothers’ rejection and hostility, but not by her lack of warmth.
Examining two other forms of positive parenting, Davidov and Grusec (2006b) compared the
effects of mothers’ willingness to cooperate with their children’s reasonable suggestions and wishes
with mothers’ knowledge of what discipline approaches worked best with their children. They found
that these two features of positive parenting each predicted children’s compliance, but in different sit-
uations. Thus, mothers’ sensitivity and responsiveness to their children’s wishes predicted how likely
children were to clean up a playroom in response to a maternal request, whereas mothers’ knowledge
of discipline effectiveness predicted how likely children were to clean up a playroom after they had
initially refused to do so. In contrast, knowledge of discipline effectiveness did not predict children’s
initial compliance, nor did cooperating with children’s reasonable wishes predict compliance after an
initial refusal. In another study, Chaparro and Grusec (2015) reported that mothers who shared with
their children their own experiences regarding moderately upsetting events, such as having lost an
object with sentimental value, had children who were more inclined to talk about upsetting events
to their mothers. However, mothers’ sharing about their own moderate rule transgressions, such as
getting a speeding ticket, did not predict their children’s willingness to talk about either distressing
events or mild antisocial behavior. Additionally, mothers’ disclosure about upsetting occurrences pre-
dicted children’s willing compliance as well as their prosocial behavior in the classroom. Disclosure
about rule transgressions was not related to either willing compliance or prosocial behavior.
In summary, it is evident that forms of positive or negative parenting—including responsiveness
to distress, responsiveness to non-distress, responsiveness to language and play cues, high levels of
766
warmth, low levels of warmth, rejection, compliance with a child’s wishes, knowledge of effective
discipline strategies, talking about upsetting events, and talking about transgressions—are not all
predictive of the same outcomes. A central issue in the study of parental socialization, then, is to
look at more specific aspects of parenting and to see how these specific aspects link to different child
outcomes.
Internalization of Values
A major goal of socialization is, by definition, to instill values and attitudes in children so that they
can move out of the family where there is close supervision into the larger world where they must
abide by societal rules or suffer the consequences. The German sociologist and philosopher Georg
Simmel wrote about the process as follows:
The tendency of society to satisfy itself as cheaply as possible results in appeals to “good
conscience,” through which the individual pays to himself the wages for his righteousness,
which otherwise would probably have to be assured to him in some way through law or
custom.
(Simmel, 1902, p. 19)
In this way, then, virtue becomes its own reward and society is not required to spend valuable
resources on the maintenance of socially acceptable behavior.
How does internalization or self-motivated behavior develop? How does a parent instill a value
that guides action even in the absence of surveillance? Various answers have been offered, begin-
ning with Freud’s analysis in terms of incorporation of parental values to avoid loss of love. Sears
et al. (1957) identified withdrawal of love as the most effective form of discipline for similar reasons.
Hoffman (1970) suggested that other-oriented reasoning was most effective because knowledge of
having hurt others could never be avoided. Researchers guided by attribution theory (e.g., Grusec,
1983; Lepper, 1983) argued that the most effective form of discipline was that which was just suf-
ficient to produce positive social behavior because, when children looked for a reason for engaging
in that positive behavior, they would be most likely to attribute it to intrinsic or self-driven motivation.
Any form of discipline greater than that which was just sufficient would enable the child to attribute
positive behavior to extrinsic events, such as avoidance of punishment or hope of social or material
reward, and, therefore, would work against internalization.
Often, internal control is seen as multifaceted and aligned along a continuum of degrees of inter-
nalization. Hoffman (1970), for example, distinguished between actions that were controlled by neu-
rotic guilt (associated with withdrawal of love) and those controlled by existential guilt (associated
with other-oriented induction). Deci and Ryan (1985) distinguished between introjected regulation
and integration. In the former, external rules have been taken in but are not integrated with the self
and, therefore, are experienced as internally controlling through such mechanisms as avoidance of
guilt or desire for pride. In the latter, regulation is assimilated with one’s core sense of self, thereby
resulting in a true sense of self-determination.
Control and Autonomy

Another approach to internalization focuses on the role of control and autonomy in the socializa-
tion process. Control can be positive in its effects: Behavioral control (Barber, 2002) and firm control
(Chao, 1994), for example, both of which focus on the importance of structure and rule-following,
generally have positive effects on children’s behavior when used at moderate levels. Psychologi-
cal control (Barber, 2002) focuses on guilt and on the suppression of independent thinking and,
767
in contrast, can have a negative impact on the child. Thus, control that is intrusive, pressuring, and
coercive can be detrimental to successful socialization because it interferes with the child’s feelings of
autonomy and choice and, therefore, with the internalization of values and standards.
Other Perspectives
Not all views of socialization are focused on internalization. Patterson (1997), for example, argued
that there is no need for such a construct. From a behavior modification point of view, behavior can
be managed when appropriate reinforcement contingencies are employed consistently. Once this
happens, positive behavior becomes automatic. Cultural comparisons also suggest that internaliza-
tion, seen as autonomously or self-motivated action, may not be a universal phenomenon. In some
so-called collectivist cultures, the goal of socialization is not to become independent or autonomous
so much as to move children from a state of independence to one of interdependence and coopera-
tion with the social group to facilitate integration into society. Grusec, Goodnow, and Kuczynski
(2000) offered one characterization of the differences between cultures that has to do with the audi-
ences that agents of socialization emphasize when discussing appropriate actions. In the one case, the
audience may be an internal dialogue with one’s conscience, whereas in the other case, it may be an
internal dialogue with parents or other authority figures.
The Interplay of Parenting and Genes

When considering the role of parental socialization in children’s acquisition of values, it must also be
kept in mind that children come into the world with their own unique genetic makeup. Children’s
genes not only contribute to a variety of child characteristics and behaviors, but also are implicated in
the effects of parental socialization in several important ways. Three of these processes are discussed:
Gene-environment correlations (rGE), gene-environment interactions (GxE), and epigenetics (for a
comprehensive review, see Avinun and Knafo-Noam, 2015).
First, rGEs reflect the fact that children’s genes and the parenting they receive are often correlated,
making it difficult to disentangle these respective influences. For example, a biological parent not
only acts as a socialization agent for their child but also shares half their genes with that child. Many
behaviors and characteristics of both children and adults have been shown to have a genetic compo-
nent (e.g., antisocial behavior, empathy, prosocial behavior, values; Knafo, Zahn-Waxler, Van Hulle,
Robinson, and Rhee, 2008; Rhee and Waldman, 2002; Uzefovsk, Döring, and Knafo-Noam, 2016).
Consequently, any similarity between parent and child in these genetically related attributes may be
due, at least in part, to the genetic similarity between them, rather than to the influence of the par-
ent’s rearing behaviors on the child. This type of rGE is passive. Another type of rGE that can affect
parenting is evocative. In this case, the child’s genetically related attributes evoke a relevant treatment
from the parent. For example, Jafee et al. (2004) showed that children’s difficult, antisocial behavior
(which had a genetic component) led to greater corporal punishment. These cases are also referred
to as “child effects,” given that the child influences parenting.
Second, interplay between genes and parenting also occurs in the case of GxE. In these instances,
the child’s genetic makeup influences the effects of parenting on the child. For example, Caspi et al.
(2003) showed that the effect of child maltreatment on subsequent depression depends on variations
in the individual’s serotonin transporter (5-HTT) gene. In their study, only individuals who had a
history of maltreatment and the short allele of the gene were at greater risk of a major depression;
the presence of only one risk factor (the short allele or an experience of maltreatment, but not both)
did not elevate the incidence of depression. This form of GxE is called diathesis-stress, or dual-risk.
Another pattern of GxE is referred to as differential susceptibility (e.g., Belsky, Bakermans-Kranen-
burg, and van IJzendoorn, 2007; Ellis, Boyce, Belsky, Bakermans-Kranenburg, and van IJzendoorn,
768
2011). In this case, children’s genetic makeup affects the degree to which they are susceptible to
environmental conditions, for better and for worse. Thus, some children are strongly influenced by
the quality of parenting they receive such that they are negatively affected by poor parenting and
positively affected by high-quality parenting. These children are sometimes referred to as “orchids”
because of their sensitivity to environmental conditions (Ellis et al., 2011). In contrast, other children
are relatively unaffected by such parenting variations and are sometimes referred to as “dandelions”
because of their ability to function adequately in many environments. As an example of differential
susceptibility, children with a particular allele of the dopamine receptor (DRD4) gene whose moth-
ers were insensitive showed higher degrees of externalizing problems than children without this
allele, whereas children with the same allele whose mothers were sensitive showed the lowest levels
of externalizing problems (Belsky et al., 2007). Thus, children with the particular allele were more
susceptible to the influences of both negative and positive parenting. Notably, given the multiplicity
of genes, the same children may be susceptible (orchid like) with respect to certain parenting influ-
ences and child outcomes, yet relatively unsusceptible (dandelion like) regarding other parenting
behaviors and outcomes (Avinun and Knafo-Noam, 2015).
Finally, a third form of gene-parenting interplay involves epigenetics. Although the genes of the
individual (specifically, sequence of the DNA) do not change once they have been formed, the degree
to which various genes are expressed or inactive is affected by biological changes to the DNA. These
epigenetic changes (epi = above in Greek) involve the addition of certain molecules (e.g., methyl
groups) to the DNA molecule, which affect the gene’s functioning. Importantly, epigenetic changes
in the genome can occur due to environmental influences across development, including parenting.
For example, Naumova et al. (2016) demonstrated associations between quality of parenting as per-
ceived by children from middle childhood to early adulthood and epigenetic changes (methylation)
of multiple genes which, in turn, predicted young adults’ psychosocial adjustment.
To conclude, although socialization focuses on environmental effects, a complete understanding
of parental socialization must also take into account the interplay of parenting and genes: How both
influences can be correlated, how one can modulate the effects of the other, and how parenting can
influence gene expression through epigenetics.
The Role of Culture

Another central issue for understanding parenting and children’s values is the role of culture. Culture,
or the macrosystem, is a collection of a myriad of explicit and implicit norms, expectations, values,
and customs that shape the behavior of individuals within the social group (Bronfenbrenner, 1979).
Bronfenbrenner argued that this layer of the environment has tremendous impact on the develop-
ment of the child. Culture not only guides behavior, but also shapes the meaning and consequences
of parents’ and children’s actions. Although the majority of research on parental socialization has been
conducted in Western cultures, there has also been a continuous interest in cultural variations in
parenting and its outcomes. In this section, the main processes by which the cultural context shapes
parental socialization are discussed. Later in this chapter, a more detailed review of research findings
pertaining to some of these processes is provided.
Research indicates that culture can influence parental socialization through a variety of inter-
related processes. First, parents in different cultures have different goals for the socialization of their
children; that is, they strive to promote different behaviors and qualities consistent with their cul-
tural values and beliefs as to what is important for a successful life in (their) society. These goals
are revealed, for example, when mothers are asked to describe what sort of adult they would like
their child to become (Rosenthal and Roer-Strier, 2001) or to rate their agreement with different
socialization goals for their children (Keller et al., 2006). As an example, parents from individualist
(mostly Western) cultures endorse socialization goals emphasizing autonomy and individuality, such
769
as children’s development of self-confidence, to a greater degree than their counterparts from col-
lectivist (interdependent) cultures. The latter are more likely to endorse goals emphasizing fitting in,
such as obeying one’s elders (Keller et al., 2006). These differences can also pertain to subtypes of
behavior. For example, although socialization agents across a variety of cultures emphasize prosocial
values (Schwartz and Bardi, 2001), the types of prosociality most valued and emphasized in each
culture can still vary. As an example, individuals from Western cultures particularly value spontane-
ous prosocial behavior, whereas those from interdependent cultures value prosocial behavior given
in response to a request or prior reciprocity at least equally if not more so (see Grusec, Davidov, and
Lundell, 2002).
Second, and relatedly, parents in different sociocultural contexts also have different expectations
regarding children’s developmental timetables, that is, the ages at which children are expected to
show certain behaviors or reach certain milestones, with these differences also mirroring the values
emphasized by the culture. For example, Hess, Kashiwagi, Azuma, Price, and Dickson (1980) found
that Japanese mothers expected children to control their emotions, comply with adults’ demands, and
show politeness in interaction with adults at younger ages than American mothers did, whereas the
latter expected children to speak their mind, express assertiveness, and master social skills in interac-
tions with peers at younger ages than the former. Roer-Strier and Rivlis (1998) found that mothers
of Israeli origin believed children are able to, and should, make their own decisions about activities,
clothes, and so forth (that is, they should display psychological autonomy) at much younger ages as
compared with mothers who had immigrated to Israel from the former Soviet Union.
Third, in addition to differences in what they are seeking to socialize in their children and when,
parents from different cultures also vary greatly in their beliefs as to how this should be accom-
plished, that is, the childrearing practices that they view as best. Thus, parents from different cultures
have different ideas and ideals regarding countless aspects of childrearing: How parental authority
should be implemented; which activities children should be included in; how children should be
put to bed; and whether and how parents should play with children, grant them autonomy, pressure
them to excel, give them responsibility, teach them about helping, and so on (e.g., Bornstein, 2007;
Chao, 1994, 1996; Harkness and Super, 1996; Keller et al., 2006). As a consequence, children reared
in different cultures are exposed to different learning opportunities. Their interactions with parents
(and other socialization agents), which reflect the culture’s ways of thinking and doing things, shape
children’s learning of knowledge, skills, and values in accordance with the conceptions and norms
of their social milieu. For example, Keller et al. (2004) showed how young infants’ interactions
with their mothers differ as a function of culture, with middle-class Western infants experiencing
more face-to-face exchanges and object stimulation (distal interaction style) compared with their
rural African counterparts who experience greater body contact and body stimulation (proximal
interaction style). The researchers reasoned that these different experiences convey different cultural
messages to children regarding the self, and therefore promote the learning and earlier attainment
of different developmental milestones; distal interactions reflect a view of the self as independent
and autonomous and facilitate the attainment of self-recognition, and proximal interactions reflect
a view of the self as interdependent and promote the achievement of self-regulation and compli-
ance. As another example, at older ages (3–11 years), Whiting and Whiting (1973, 1975) observed
how six cultures differed in the degree to which children were assigned responsibility for chores,
particularly caring for young siblings; this difference in treatment, in turn, accounted for differences
between the cultures in the extent of children’s nurturing and prosocial behavior toward others.
Being responsible for an infant gives children ample opportunities to learn and practice prosocial
behavior and social responsibility such as, for example, recognizing others’ needs and helping and
comforting them.
A final way in which culture influences parental socialization is by modulating the meaning and
outcomes of parental behaviors. Thus, the same parental behavior can have different meanings and,
770
therefore, different consequences, in different cultural contexts (Bornstein, 1995). For example, Rudy
and Grusec (2001, 2006) showed that authoritarian parenting carries a less negative meaning in a
collectivist cultural context as compared with an individualist context. Strict, authoritarian parenting
was associated with more negative perceptions of the child and reduced warmth only among parents
from an individualist culture (Anglo-Canadian), but not among parents from a collectivist culture
(Middle Eastern Canadians). Such cultural differences in the meanings of parenting behaviors can,
in turn, lead to differential effects of these parenting behaviors, such that the same parenting practice
can be detrimental in some contexts but not in others. In these instances, the sociocultural context
is said to act as a moderator, altering the effects of a given parenting technique or behavior on chil-
dren’s development. A review of research findings on cultural context as a moderator appears later
in this chapter.
Although the cultural context can influence socialization processes in multiple ways, it is impor-
tant to remember that there is substantial variability in values and behaviors within each culture,
that may even exceed the variability between cultures (Carlo, Roesch, Knight, and Koller, 2001).
Moreover, immigration leads to the inclusion of people from multiple cultures into Western society,
further increasing the latter’s heterogeneity, and globalization introduces Western ideas to other parts
of the world, which can contribute to multiplicity of values as well. Thus, the influence of culture on
parental socialization can be complex, with families often being affected by more than one culture
as well as by within-culture individual differences. Researchers ultimately need to take into account
all these sources of influence to determine which effects of parental socialization are universal and
which are culture dependent.
Methodological Concerns in Research on Socialization
Experimental Versus Correlational Research

Experimental research was prominent in the study of socialization during the 1960s and 1970s. But
this reliance on manipulation of simulated parenting variables became the object of criticism by a
number of developmental researchers. Bronfenbrenner (1974), for example, described the study of
child development as it then existed as the science of the influence of one strange environmental
factor or one strange person on one isolated behavior of a single child placed in a largely artificial
context, and McCall (1977) called for a change in research approaches that would provide a more
realistic view of the developmental process. Thus, we see an almost total swing to correlational stud-
ies, particularly studies where longitudinal data are collected. Although these longitudinal studies
allow for inferences about direction of effects—whether parenting is influencing child outcomes or
child behavior is influencing parenting, or both influences co-occur—they are nevertheless limited
by the fact that other, unmeasured variables correlated with the parenting feature of interest may be
the true causal agents.
Questionnaires and Naturalistic Observation

Another source of methodological contention has to do with the manner in which information
about parenting and child behavior is obtained. The major sources are questionnaires and naturalistic
observation, with the latter usually seen as less prone to biases, and thus a better source of information
about the topic of interest. Nevertheless, observation takes place over a short period of time, and, for
events that do not occur frequently, it may be limited in the information it provides. As well, there
are many socially undesirable ways of interacting with children, such as using harsh punishment, that
may be suppressed when parents are being observed. And, for multisite studies with large sample sizes
that are becoming more the norm, observational data are, of course, more difficult to obtain.
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New Ways of Gathering Information

Socialization researchers look for other ways of collecting data. Parent-child discussions, for example,
can provide a rich source of data, particularly when those discussions are about fraught topics (Wain-
ryb and Recchia, 2014). Narratives are another source of useful information. Vinik, Johnston, Grusec,
and Farrell (2013), for example, asked young adults to write about a time when they had learned an
important value and found that the narratives could be organized to reflect different types of sociali-
zation practices. Observation of parents’ behavior with their children is confounded by differences
in how children behave, and Bakermans-Kranenburg, Alink, Biro, Voorthuis, and IJzendoorn (2015)
described the use of a doll that can be preprogrammed to behave in a standardized fashion with all
participants and which they demonstrate is a valid measure of individual differences in parenting.
Audiotaped interviews can be employed to code maternal affect about the child, a time-efficient
and cost-effective procedure that can be used in large-scale phone surveys (Martin, Razza, and
Brooks-Gunn, 2015). Implicit measures of parental attitudes, that is, ways of assessing attitudes that
individuals may not wish to divulge or of which they may be even unaware frequently provide better
assessments of parenting beliefs than explicit measures where participants report knowingly (Sturge-
Apple, Rogge, Peltz, Suor, and Skibo, 2015). These are but some examples of the creative ways that
can be used to explore complex features of family functioning and socialization.
Theories of Socialization
Many theoretical approaches have directed the conduct of research and the summary of research
findings in the area of socialization. We turn to a subset of these theories as examples of current
ways of thinking.
Self-Determination Theory
Self-determination theory addresses issues of human motivation, with an emphasis on the reasons
for the behavioral choices people make. Specifically, it focuses on the extent to which behavior is
self-motivated or self-determined (Deci and Ryan, 1985; Ryan and Deci, 2017). Although much
of the research has dealt with achievement and work-related activities, it has also been applied to
parenting and internalization of values (Grolnick, Deci, and Ryan, 1997). According to the theory,
human beings have three basic psychological needs that must be met to ensure successful function-
ing: Competence or the need to experience mastery, relatedness or the need to be connected to
others, and autonomy, which is a need to make behavioral choices of one’s own volition and to act
in accord with one’s integrated self.
The need for autonomy and its relation to internalization is of particular interest for the study of
parenting and children’s socialization. Children feel autonomous when they have a sense of agency
and ownership of their behaviors, having chosen to accept the values presented by others and to
make them their own. Autonomy-supportive parenting involves three parenting actions: Providing
meaningful reasons for parents’ demands with respect to children’s behavior, giving opportunities for
choice and initiative-taking within a set of reasonable demands, and acknowledging children’s feel-
ings. To be autonomy-supportive, then, parents need to be nonjudgmental, allow active participation
in decision-making, and not be dominating, pressuring, or intrusive (Grolnick and Pomerantz, 2009;
Grolnick and Ryan, 1989). Autonomy support is undermined when mothers are stressed (Gurland
and Grolnick, 2005), when they are achievement oriented (Pomerantz and Eaton, 2001), or when
their self-esteem depends on their child’s behavior (Grolnick, Price, Beiswenger, and Sauck, 2007).
Autonomy support is facilitated when mothers take the perspective of their children during the
socialization process (Mageau, Sherman, Grusec, Koestner, and Bureau, 2017).
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Self-determination theorists posit a continuum of motivation (Deci and Ryan, 1985; Ryan and
Deci, 2000). Extrinsic motivation involves engagement in behavior in hope of reward or out of fear
of punishment. Slightly less external is introjected motivation, which entails subjecting oneself to
a value due to internal pressure. On the more internal side is identified motivation, which entails a
sense of personal importance of the value, and more internal still is integration where the value is
assimilated with one’s core sense of self. Self-determination theorists have had much to say about
the undermining by rewards of behavior that is inherently intrinsically motivated, that is, enjoyable
to perform without the need for some form of socialization. One of the first studies to address the
issue was conducted by Lepper, Greene, and Nisbett (1973), who found that preschoolers who were
told they would receive a reward for drawing pictures subsequently became less interested in the
drawing activity. This result was in contrast to preschoolers who received no reward for drawing, or
who received an unexplained reward at the end of the drawing session. Social rewards also under-
mine intrinsic motivation in the case of conditional positive regard. When college students recalled
that their parents used praise as a way of encouraging their performance in a variety of areas, they
reported that they were more likely to comply with parent expectations as a function of feelings
of internal compulsion, rather than due to a more autonomous motivation (Assor, Roth, and Deci,
2004). And Roth (2008) found that conditional positive regard predicted prosocial behavior that was
done to boost self-esteem rather than for other-oriented reasons.
Domains of Social Knowledge

Values come in many forms, requiring a consideration of these many forms in an adequate
understanding of socialization (Turiel, 1979). Some values are moral, involving the importance
of abstaining from harming others either psychologically or physically. Others are social con-
ventional, encompassing norms of socially acceptable actions, such as polite eating habits and
proper attire. Additionally, there are prudential values involving health and safety of the self
and personal ones that pertain only to the self, such as one’s choice of friends or what to wear.
Smetana (1981) demonstrated young children’s ability to distinguish between moral and social
conventional norms by presenting preschoolers with a series of moral and social conventional
transgressions, such as a child hitting another, taking another’s toy, not sitting in the designated
place during story time, and not putting belongings in their proper place. Children rated moral
transgressions as more serious and more deserving of punishment than social conventional vio-
lations. As well, they indicated that moral transgressions are always wrong, even if there is no
rule in the school forbidding them.
In Turiel’s analysis (1979, 2015) moral values are constructed by children. This assertion contrasts
with earlier notions from psychoanalytic and social learning approaches that values are transmitted
from the agent of socialization to the child. Thus, Turiel suggested that very young children come to
appreciate what is moral and immutable as a result of their own social interactions and experiences of
being harmed by others. However, Dahl and Campos (2013) showed that mothers’ responses to the
transgressions of their toddlers differ systematically as a function of the domain of child misbehavior
(moral, prudential, or pragmatic, which is akin to conventional). These early differentiated responses
by parents precede the age at which children have been shown to make explicit distinctions among
domains of social knowledge, and thus may be a central part of the mechanism by which children
develop these distinctions. In any case, an important feature of the domains of social knowledge per-
spective is that moral reasoning develops very early and not, as maintained by Kohlberg (1969), later
in the developmental course after children are capable of explicitly taking the perspective of others.
Although parents, according to Turiel’s analysis, may have less of a role to play in the acquisition of
moral values, they clearly have a substantial role to play in the development of social conventional
values, which can be different from one setting to another.
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Whereas moral, social conventional, and prudential values remain fixed over time, those that are
deemed to be personal change as a function of age as well as being somewhat different across cul-
tures. Although adolescents and parents agree that parents have the right to make rules in the moral,
social conventional, and prudential domains, this legitimacy gradually changes with respect to the
personal domain. With increasing age, more and more issues are deemed to be outside the realm of
legitimate parental regulation, with this progression satisfying growing needs for autonomy, agency,
and self-efficacy (Smetana, 2011).
The distinction among different categories of values has particular significance for understanding
how some reasons offered for engaging in positive social behavior are more effective than others.
Reasons (and disciplinary responses in general) need to be appropriate to the kind of misdeed under
consideration. For example, children evaluate teachers’ responses to moral and social conventional
misdeeds depending on the degree of concordance between the reason and the category of misdeed
(Killen, Bretton, Ferguson, and Handler, 1994; Nucci, 1984). Thus, children rated a response to vio-
lation of a social convention, such as stepping out of line or not raising one’s hand before speaking,
as better when it involved a reference to disruptions to classroom organization or social function-
ing (convention-relevant explanations) than when they were asked to consider the impact of such
actions on the welfare of others (a moral explanation). Children’s evaluations of teachers’ knowledge
and effectiveness were also higher when reasons were appropriate for the domain of transgression.
Similarly, Padilla-Walker (2008) noted that adolescents find yelling inappropriate in response to vio-
lations of social conventional or personal issues, but not in response to moral violations.
Domains of Socialization
Grusec and Davidov (2007, 2010, 2015), in an attempt to bring together a diversity of theoretical
approaches to socialization, have argued that socialization occurs in different domains. “Domains” in
this context refers to types of social interaction between children and agents of socialization, with the
notion that these different forms of interaction are guided by different principles, require different
abilities from parents (or other agents) and, most important, provide children with opportunities to
learn different important lessons and develop different skills. Building on the work of Fiske (1992)
and Bugental (2000), they focus on five domains: (1) protection, where children are distressed and
parents comfort and help them; (2) reciprocity, where parents and children are engaged in a positive
exchange of favors or mutually pleasurable activities; (3) guided learning, where parents teach chil-
dren and scaffold their learning of skills and values; (4) group participation, where parents introduce
children to customs and ways of thinking valued by their social group through exposure to models
of positive behavior as well as the activities, routines, and rituals in which they involve their children;
and (5) control, where children misbehave and parents use strategies to correct children’s conduct
and promote appropriate behavior. The role of socializing agents differs in each domain as does the
mechanism underlying effective parenting behavior as well as the skills and knowledge that children
are likely to develop as a consequence of their experience in that domain. The first two domains
have to do with establishment of a positive parent-child relationship, which then makes parenting
in the remaining three domains more effective in promoting positive social behavior. We consider
each domain in turn.
Protection Domain
In the protection domain, parents provide a safe haven for a child who is distressed or in danger.
The relationship is one between a caregiver and a care recipient and, according to Bowlby (1969),
it is this relationship that forms the foundation of personality development. When parents protect
and comfort their children, they provide them with a sense of confidence in protection (Goldberg,
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Grusec, and Jenkins, 1999), that is, a safe and secure base from which they can explore the world
and to where they can retreat when they begin to feel anxious. The nature of parent protecting
behavior varies as a function of age. Thus, retrieving, maintaining proximity, holding, soothing, and
comforting are appropriate for young children. For older children, helping them manage their own
distress becomes paramount. Hence, effective socialization in the protection domain is parenting
that facilitates children’s ability to self-regulate negative affect and that, in turn, enables children to
act appropriately and maturely in situations involving negative affect (Gottman, Katz, and Hooven,
1996). Secure relationships also lead to trust on the part of children that their parents are acting in
their best interests (Bretherton, Golby, and Cho, 1997; Kerns, Aspelmeier, Gentzler, and Grabill,
2001), thereby encouraging them to comply willingly with parental guidance.
Providing age-appropriate comfort also promotes empathy and prosocial behavior toward dis-
tressed others, both within the protection domain and in combination with other domains. For
example, competence at regulating negative affect, which stems from sensitive protection, helps
children focus sympathetically on the distress of others and try to help them, instead of being dis-
tracted and overwhelmed by their own distress (Davidov and Grusec, 2006a; Eisenberg, Wentzel,
and Harris, 1998). Moreover, while responding sensitively to their children’s distress and promoting
feelings of security, parents are also modeling empathy and compassion as well as typical practices for
helping others in distress. Children can then adopt these behaviors and exhibit them when interact-
ing with others, an interplay between the protection and group participation domains (Denham,
Bassett, and Wyatt, 2015). Interplay between the protection and guided learning domains can also
occur. For example, parents’ supportive explanations and coaching when their children are upset or
distressed help children both learn effective coping strategies and gain better understanding of their
own and others’ emotions (Fabes, Poulin, Eisenberg, and Madden-Derdich, 2002; Gottman et al.,
1996), an aspect of cognitive empathy that can further promote an appropriate prosocial response
on children’s part.
Reciprocity Domain
In this domain, children and agents of socialization are operating as equals engaging in a mutual
exchange of favors or in joint pleasurable activities. The reciprocity domain relies on the fact that
humans have an inborn tendency to reciprocate favors, a feature that, as with protection, promotes
their survival and reproductive success (Trevarthen, Kokkinaki, and Fiamenghi, 1999). Because reci-
procity is not limited to kin but also occurs between unrelated individuals, humans have also been
endowed with a “cheater mechanism” that makes them sensitive to times when they benefit others
but do not receive benefits in exchange (Cosmides and Tooby, 1992).
In parent-child interactions, reciprocity occurs when parents set aside their authority role and
allow the child to influence the interaction. This influence can operate, for example, during play,
which is a positive exchange between two people who have the same goals and interests. It should
be noted that if parents choose to take a didactic role during play then they are, of course, no longer
taking advantage of the opportunity for reciprocity. Play that is managed jointly and includes shared
positive affect predicts greater peer competence, more prosocial behavior, and fewer externalizing
problems in children and in adolescents (Criss, Shaw, and Ingoldsby, 2003; Lindsey, Cremeens, and
Caldera, 2010). As well, reciprocity can be facilitated when parents go along with children’s reason-
able and appropriate requests, bids, and initiations; parents’ compliance with their children in such
instances promotes the likelihood that children will comply, in turn, with their parents’ requests
(Davidov and Grusec, 2006b; Parpal and Maccoby, 1985). An important feature of the child’s compli-
ance in this domain is that it is willingly given rather than being externally forced (Kochanska, 2002).
Kochanska and her colleagues investigated parent-child relationships that are mutually coopera-
tive, harmonious, and affectively positive and which they characterize as having a mutually responsive
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orientation (MRO). Parent-child MRO during the toddler and preschool years is related to self-
regulation in later childhood as well as a variety of indicators of conscience (Kochanska, Aksan, and
Carlson, 2005). Coordinated and enjoyable routines, such as feeding rituals (e.g., child ducks head
when put into high chair, lifts chin so mother can put on bib, waits for juice to be poured), which
involve cooperation, harmonious communication, and positive affect ultimately promote positive
social behavior (Kochanska, Aksan, Prisco, and Adams, 2008). This early social engagement repre-
sents the beginning of the socialization process, with infants equipped to take part eagerly in social
and emotional exchanges that form the basis of positive adjustment. Brownell (2016) noted that this
exchange is facilitated by infants’ stable supine posture, which frees them to take part in face-to-face
communication and a shared focus on objects.
Guided Learning
In interactions in the guided learning domain, parents act as teachers and children as students, with
parents trying to assist children in acquiring new skills or a new piece of knowledge. Much of
this teaching goes on with respect to cognitive skills (Gauvain and Perez, 2015), but teaching is
also important with respect to values and positive social behavior. Assisting children’s acquisition of
knowledge and skills is done by working within what Vygotsky (1978) has termed the child’s “zone
of proximal development.” Here, children are helped to solve a problem, master a skill, or think about
an issue that they cannot yet accomplish independently. Once the child and teacher’s point of view
become shared, the child has mastered the new skill and the help of the teacher is no longer needed.
To be successful, guided learning requires scaffolding; that is, parents must provide temporary struc-
ture (“scaffolds”) in the form of questions, feedback, and strategy suggestions and tailor those to the
child’s changing skill level until these supports are no longer required (Wood, Bruner, and Ross,
1976). The process is aided by the human capacity for language, which makes it possible to pass on
relatively complex information through conversations, including points of view regarding values and
desired behavior.
Even very young children engage in conversations with their parents about values (Dunn and
Hughes, 2014; Wright and Bartsch, 2008). The way in which these conversations are conducted is
important. In studies of children’s moral reasoning, for example, Walker and Taylor (1991) reported
that interactions that are gentle and emotionally supportive and involve arguments from the parent
that are at a slightly higher stage of moral reasoning are predictors of more mature forms of moral
reasoning. Walker, Hennig, and Krettenauer (2000) found that conversations that included reflection
and restating the other’s point of view were more successful than those that included criticism of the
other’s point of view. Informative discussions were not effective, presumably because these could be
interpreted as opinionated lecturing.
Group Participation
In interactions in this domain, parents expose their children to a variety of activities and social cus-
toms that are typical and normative in their social groups as well as discouraging their exposure to
those that are considered antisocial. Much of this is done in the course of daily life, even unintention-
ally at times, but children nevertheless learn a great deal from these interactions, through observation,
participation, and a desire to emulate valued behaviors. This domain builds on the fact that humans
are social animals who have evolved with a strong motivation to be a member of an in-group where
good treatment and support are more likely (Brewer and Gardner, 1996). Parents and children share
group membership, and children adopt the values and standards of their parents accordingly. Kagan
(1982) documented the power of a motive to be like others when he observed how distressed chil-
dren become when they cannot imitate an adult’s actions or when an adult’s normative standard has
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been violated. They point with dismay and say “oh-oh” when they see small holes in clothing, dolls
with chipped paint, or missing bristles on a broom.
A form of group participation learning that Rogoff and her colleagues refer to as “learning by
observing and pitching in” happens when children watch and listen closely to others in anticipa-
tion of having to perform their actions at a later time (Rogoff, Moore, Correa-Chávez, and Dexter,
2015). Although this is a form of learning that occurs more frequently in cultures where children
are involved on a daily basis in adult activities, as opposed to segregated in formal school settings, it
nevertheless occurs in most cultural settings. For example, children play house, on the basis of their
own observations of how daily living is carried out, and they learn how to help around the house in
the course of observing their parents (Rheingold, 1982).
In addition to learning through observing, children also learn values and associated actions by
engaging in routines and rituals. Routines can include such activities as work around the house
that is expected to be done on a regular basis without being requested and that benefits others, an
activity that has been shown to predict prosocial behavior (Grusec, Goodnow, and Cohen, 1997).
Routines can also include engaging in value-related activities, such as volunteer work, as a family
activity. Social conventions, such as modes of dressing and table manners, also fit into the category
of routines. As children engage in these routines, without needing to be directed, they come to view
these culturally prescribed customs as simply the way things are done. Whereas routines are practices
that accomplish tasks, rituals such as holiday celebrations and regular family get-togethers are prac-
tices that have meaning by reflecting group membership and values, thereby enhancing feelings of
belongingness (Spagnola and Fiese, 2007). Engaging in these rituals, therefore, becomes part of the
individual’s identity and helps connect children to their family history. In this way, children develop
an intergenerational self that has been linked with adolescents’ increased resilience and better psy-
chological adjustment (Duke, Lazarus, and Fivush, 2008).
Control Domain
Interactions in the control domain are hierarchical in nature, with parents employing their greater
resources in the form of both reward and punishment to alter children’s unacceptable behavior. Most
research on control interactions has focused on discipline for misbehavior, with a general conclusion
that effective discipline needs to include both negative consequences for misbehavior and appropri-
ate reasoning. Grusec and Goodnow (1994) argued that effective socialization in the control domain
requires the child’s accurate perception of the parent’s value or message and the child’s acceptance
of that message. Parents can promote accurate perception of their message through frequent repeti-
tion of a message that is clear and consistent. Variables that determine children’s acceptance of that
message are the child’s perception of its appropriateness (e.g., it is seen as well-intentioned and fitted
to the nature of the misdeed), whether there is motivation on the child’s part to adopt the message
(e.g., empathy is aroused, there is a positive relationship with the parent, threats to autonomy are
minimized), and the child’s feeling that the value has been self-generated, that is, chosen by the child
as inherently correct.
Effective parenting in the control domain involves a number of complexities. First, control
interactions occur in contexts that are often highly emotionally charged. Thus, parental messages
may not be delivered in a clear manner, and motivation to please the parent and adopt the parental
message may be undermined by conflict and opposing viewpoints. Second, because acceptable
behavior in discipline situations is often motivated by external consequences (e.g., fear of punish-
ment or disapproval, or hope of reward or social approval), these external consequences also make
it challenging for the child to perceive the behavior as internally motivated. Third, for internali-
zation of values to occur, parents must exert their control in a balanced way. If there is too little
pressure, then behavior will not be altered. If there is too much pressure, then the altered behavior
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will not be internalized but, rather, attributed to parental pressure. Fourth, what constitutes the
right amount of control varies from child to child and from one situation to another. A variety of
variables—characteristics of children, parents, the immediate situation, and the broader context—
moderate or alter the results of parental discipline strategies (see reviews in Grusec and Davidov,
2007, 2010, 2015; see also examples regarding moderation by child temperament and by culture
in subsequent sections of this chapter). Thus, although it is possible to draw very general conclu-
sions about the relative effectiveness of certain discipline strategies (e.g., reasoning versus power
assertion), these conclusions ultimately are limited, given that the effectiveness of any given strat-
egy depends on a variety of factors. These factors include the child’s temperament, perceptions,
motivations, and age; the parent’s goals and beliefs; the nature of the misbehavior; and so on. The
implication is that to respond in an effective way in control situations, parents need to tailor their
disciplinary response to the specific child in the specific situation. Parents’ accurate knowledge of
their child’s point of view, including the child’s thoughts and feelings, can aid them in selecting
control interventions more suitable for their child, and thus in gaining better outcomes (Davidov
and Grusec, 2006b; Hastings and Grusec, 1997).
Conclusion
A domain approach to socialization emphasizes the multiple roles played by parents as socialization
agents, and the multiple pathways to socialization related to these different roles or forms of interac-
tion. It is also important to highlight that although the five domains were presented here separately
for purposes of clarity, in real life, they do not operate in isolation. During everyday interactions,
children and parents move dynamically between domains, switching from one form of interaction to
another depending on the demands of the current situation as well as the parent’s and child’s goals
and needs. As well, there is a great deal of interplay between domains. For example, the same situa-
tion can involve two or more domains simultaneously, or past interaction in one domain can affect
the outcomes of a current interaction in another domain. Examples of this interplay among domains
appeared earlier in this chapter in discussion of the protection domain.
Prosociality and Morality as Innate Predispositions

Humans may have an innate predisposition toward both prosociality and morality. This predisposi-
tion is said to stem from human evolutionary history, and can be observed very early in development
(e.g., Hamlin, 2013; Warneken and Tomasello, 2009, 2014). Ideas and evidence concerning such
intuitive prosociality and intuitive morality are presented in turn, along with a discussion of their
implications for socialization theory.
Prosociality
It is argued that the ecological conditions faced by our ancestors required them to become collabo-
rative foragers who needed to cooperate and depend on one another in countless ways (Silk and
House, 2016; Warneken and Tomasello, 2015). For example, relying on complex subsistence tech-
niques such as hunting, or learning to find and process foods, required cooperation between group
members, as did the task of rearing the young (see Davidov, Vaish, Knafo-Noam, and Hastings, 2016;
Silk and House, 2016). In the context of such interdependence between group members, prosocial
action—acting for the benefit of other group members—also served to increase the individual’s own
reproductive fitness. Thus, genetically based prosocial tendencies that facilitated cooperation were
more likely to be transmitted to future generations, resulting in a biological predisposition toward
prosociality in humans.
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The notion of such an innate prosocial tendency is supported by several pieces of evidence.
First, prosocial motivation develops remarkably early in ontogeny (see Davidov, Zahn-Waxler, Roth-
Hanania, and Knafo, 2013). Thus, as early as the first year of life, infants show concerned affect
toward distressed others and appear to search for the causes of their distress. Additionally, these
early manifestations of concern for others predict subsequent prosocial action (Liddle, Bradley, and
McGrath, 2015; Roth-Hanania, Davidov, and Zahn-Waxler, 2011). Moreover, multiple forms of
prosocial behavior, such as helping, comforting, sharing, and cooperating, are present during the
second year of life (Brownell, 2013, 2016). Second, early concern for others appears to be intrinsi-
cally motivated. Thus, Hepach, Vaish, and Tomasello (2012) showed that toddlers exhibit elevated
tension (reflected by pupil dilation) when they see another person in need of help; moreover, this
tension subsides after the person receives the help needed from either the toddler or another person.
This finding suggests that toddlers are genuinely motivated to see others get the help they need (see
also Hepach, Vaish, Grossmann, and Tomasello, 2016). In support of this conclusion, Warneken and
Tomasello (2008) showed that toddlers’ helping was reduced after they were given a material reward
for helping, suggesting that their original motivation to help was intrinsic. Third, there is evidence
of prosocial behavior in other species, further attesting to the evolutionary roots of this tendency.
For example, chimpanzees have been observed to console conspecifics who experienced aggression
(de Waal, 2008) and to help others obtain their goals in some situations (Warneken and Tomasello,
2009, 2015).
Morality
Evolutionary accounts of the development of a moral sense—the judgment of certain actions or
individuals as right and good and others as wrong and bad—stress its function of sustaining coop-
eration in the group (Hamlin, 2013). Cooperation is beneficial for the group as a whole, but often
requires curbing selfish goals or making some personal sacrifice. During human evolution, groups
whose members espoused collaboration even in the face of competing self-interests (e.g., doing
what is “right,” denouncing those who act badly, and so on) were more likely to survive and prosper
(Davidov et al., 2016).
Moral sensibilities, in addition to prosocial ones, appear early in human development. For exam-
ple, Hamlin, Wynn, and their colleagues showed that infants as young as 3 and 6 months of age prefer
helpful others over antisocial (hindering) others (Hamlin, 2013; Hamlin, Wynn, and Bloom, 2007).
This finding suggests a very early capacity to distinguish friends who are potentially good collabora-
tors from foes. Moreover, additional studies show that preverbal infants can also take into considera-
tion others’ mental states, such as their inferred intentions, when making these judgments, and that
older infants also direct punishments and rewards toward “good” and “bad” characters appropriately
(Hamlin, 2013). Additional work shows relatively sophisticated moral sensibilities in the early years,
such as the expectation of equal distribution of resources during the second year of life (Geraci and
Surian, 2011) and a capacity for moral self-awareness in young children (Thompson, 2012).
Implications for Socialization Theory

Both prosocial tendencies and moral proclivities appear to emerge earlier than assumed by classical
(Piagetian and Kohlbergian) theories of moral development or even more recent theories such as that
of Turiel. If human infants are already equipped with moral tendencies, then what is the role of paren-
tal socialization? Researchers largely agree that even if prosociality and intuitive morality are rooted
in innate dispositions, this possibility does not negate the important role of socialization. Socialization
forces still act on these tendencies, and can thus shape them in a multitude of ways by enhancing
them, reducing or suppressing them, teaching children how to express them in behavior, and so forth.
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Thus, whether and how these biological propensities for prosociality and intuitive morality become
manifested across development depends on children’s experiences in their environment, with parents
playing an important role (Brownell, 2013, 2016; Dahl, 2015; Davidov et al., 2016; House et al., 2013).
It is also notable that there are multiple motivations for prosocial action (Eisenberg, VanSchyndel, and
Spinrad, 2016) and a variety of moral sensibilities (Thompson, 2012), and some of these may be rooted
less in innate predispositions than others. For example, learning to treat rival outgroup members fairly,
in keeping with principles of justice, likely requires more guidance from parents (and teachers) than the
more intuitive ability to feel empathic concern for a sad familiar/friendly other. Finally, humans have
other innate tendencies that often compete with prosociality and morality, such as self-serving motives.
Learning how to balance these different tendencies, and to exert self-regulation to override self-interest
or conflicting emotions, is highly dependent on socialization mechanisms.
Classical and Modern Research on Socialization

We review a series of topics that have attracted researchers interested in parental socialization of
values over the years. These include several concerns pertaining to discipline and limit setting such
as the importance of consistency, the roles of perspective-taking and autonomy support, treatment
of antisocial behavior versus failure to act prosocially, comparisons of different forms of punishment,
and interactions between discipline techniques and temperament. We then move to discussions of
monitoring and disclosure and of the role of cultural context as a moderator of parenting.
Aspects of Discipline and Limit Setting
Consistency
A challenge for researchers has been the distinction between structure, that is, the making of clear
and consistent rules and their appropriate application, and control (Grolnick and Pomerantz, 2009).
Control can be associated with positive or negative outcomes, depending on the way in which it
is administered. Thus, behavioral control is generally connected with positive outcomes and psy-
chological control with negative outcomes (Hoeve et al., 2009). Control can also be confrontive or
coercive as in authoritative and authoritarian control (Baumrind, 2012), with the former associated
with positive and the latter with negative outcomes. Too much control can undermine feelings
of autonomy and even lead to reactance (Van Petegem, Soenens, Vansteenkiste, and Beyers, 2015).
Structure, or consistent discipline, is different from and less complex than control, with generally
positive outcomes.
At the other side of the consistency spectrum, inconsistency in setting limits has been shown to be
problematic for effective socialization. Inconsistent discipline at an early age predicts later behavior
problems (e.g., Manongdo and Ramírez García, 2011; Tildesley and Andrews, 2008). One mediator
of this relation is adolescents’ positive attitudes toward delinquent behavior (Halgunseth, Perkins,
Lippold, and Nix, 2013), with the suggestion that inconsistency indicates to children that standards
of conduct are ambiguous. Halgunseth et al. proposed as well that inconsistency enables children to
morally disengage from antisocial behavior by reconstructing antisocial acts so they seem less wrong
(Bandura, 1999). As well, of course, inconsistency allows children to engage in antisocial behavior
with the hope that this time they will not be punished.
Autonomy Support
Autonomy support involves the provision of meaningful rationales for limits and demands, giving
choice within those limits, and acknowledging children’s feelings ( Joussemet, Landry, and Koestner,
780
2008). According to self-determination theory, when these conditions are met, motivation for posi-
tive behavior is internalized. When parenting is intrusive, pressuring, and coercive and when it
involves guilt induction, threats of punishment, or conditional positive regard then internalization
is undermined and the conditions for external or introjected motivation are set up. Further, this
autonomy-frustrating parenting behavior has been shown to lead to reactance or motivation to do
the opposite of what is requested (Brehm and Brehm, 1981). Thus,Van Petegem et al. (2015) found
that coercive control was associated with the frustration of needs for autonomy that, in turn, led to
reactance or the motivation to do the opposite of what had been requested. This reactance, in its
own turn, predicted externalizing problems and noncompliance with parental requests. As well,Van
Petegem et al. found that frustration of feelings of autonomy predicted internalizing problems such
as anxiety and depression, possibly because children felt rejected or unappreciated, or because feel-
ing compelled to do the opposite of what is requested is also a challenge to feelings of autonomy
and, accordingly, leads to negative affect. An important additional finding of the Van Petegem et al.
study was that parent rule-setting was not related to the frustration of autonomy needs, reactance,
or problem behaviors. Rule-setting does not threaten autonomy so long as rules are presented in a
nonintrusive and noncoercive manner.
Perspective-Taking and Parents’ Knowledge

Perspective-taking is another feature of parenting that is implicated in autonomy support and intrin-
sic motivation. Mothers of young adolescents who stated that they took the perspective of their
adolescent were found to increase in their autonomy-supportive behavior over a period of 2 years
(Mageau et al., 2017). Presumably because these mothers try to understand how events look to their
child, they have a better chance of understanding the reasons for their children’s actions and can,
therefore, make better decisions about appropriate interventions. For example, if a reason for their
child’s misbehavior is that the child does not know the importance of the value, then mothers can
focus on making that value clearer, that is, on the child’s accurate perception of that value. If the rea-
son for misbehavior involves feeling frustrated and coerced, then the focus should be on setting up
conditions that facilitate acceptance (Grusec and Goodnow, 1994). Lundell, Grusec, McShane, and
Davidov (2008) reported that in addition to providing information about how best to proceed in the
socialization process, perspective-taking also facilitates a more positive exchange between parent and
child. They found that adolescents whose mothers scored high on a measure of perspective-taking
reported more positive and fewer negative goals during disagreements with their mothers. Thus,
the adolescents were more likely to say that they wanted to achieve a mutually acceptable outcome
and less likely to say that they wanted to force their mother to change her mind. As well, maternal
perspective-taking predicted less intense conflicts as reported by the dyads.
Closely related to perspective-taking, albeit with different correlates (Mageau et al., 2017), is
parents’ knowledge of their children’s perception of the meaning of a given parenting behavior and,
hence, how their children will react to that behavior. Grusec et al. (2000) suggested that knowledge
of how children are thinking and feeling is essential so that parents can select among various pos-
sibilities to achieve their goals. Hastings and Grusec (1997) interviewed parents and adolescents
about their disagreements and found that conflict outcomes were better when parents’ descriptions
of their adolescents’ thoughts and feelings during the disagreement matched those of the adolescent.
In another study, mothers who were accurate in their predictions of how their children evaluated
the effectiveness of different discipline interventions were better able to obtain cooperation after
initial noncompliance (Davidov and Grusec, 2006b). And mothers who know what their children
find distressing as well as comforting when they are distressed have children who cope better (Vinik,
Almas, and Grusec, 2011). Sherman, Grusec, and Almas (2017) reported that mothers who know
what their children say they would find comforting when distressed have children who, 2 years later,
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have better coping skills, although only if mothers were somewhat dissatisfied with aspects of their
children’s socioemotional development such as shyness, regulation of negative affect, and stubborn-
ness. Children of satisfied mothers did not show improvements in coping skills. Relatedly, Kiel and
Buss (2011) found that for temperamentally fearful toddlers, mothers’ accuracy in predicting their
toddler’s distress led to overly protective maternal behavior, resulting in increased risk of subsequent
social withdrawal. Thus, the outcome of parental accurate knowledge depends on the domain as well
as on parental goals and additional relevant variables such as child temperament (Kiel and Buss, 2012;
Sherman et al., 2017).
Antisocial Behavior Versus Failure to Act Prosocially

It is interesting that parents appear to treat the two aspects of moral action, prosocial behavior
and refraining from harming others, differently, at least in Western cultures. Grusec and Kuczynski
(1980), for example, found that mothers were more likely to punish antisocial behavior and to use
other-oriented induction when dealing with failures of prosociality. Similarly, Grusec, Dix, and Mills
(1982) reported that mothers who responded to vignettes describing the two classes of misdeed said
they would be angrier and would punish more in the case of antisocial misdeeds. In a study in which
mothers kept daily diaries of their children’s behavior, failure to comply with requests for prosocial
behavior, that is, noncompliance, was punished more than failure to be spontaneously prosocial
(Grusec, 1991). Vinik et al. (2013) noted that when young adults wrote about a time when they had
learned an important value, inhibition of antisocial behavior was reported more frequently in the
control domain than was prosocial behavior.
This distinction between the two forms of morality may reflect the fact that hurting others is
nearly always wrong, whereas helping others raises many questions that could lead to a decision that
it is not an appropriate action. Helping others may involve unintended negative outcomes for either
the helper or the recipient, such as an inference that the person being helped is weak and dependent,
or that unrealistic demands are being made on the helper.
In contrast to their mothers, it should be noted that elementary school children do not make
a distinction between the two forms of morality. When interviewed about vignettes involving the
antisocial act of stealing or a failure to share, 6- to 9-year-olds’ responses suggested they evalu-
ated these acts similarly, that is, as equally deserving of firm discipline. Their mothers, in contrast,
expected them to view failure to share as deserving of less severe intervention (Davidov, Grusec,
and Wolfe, 2012). As well, ambivalence regarding how to respond to failures of prosociality might
be more characteristic of Western cultures. In more collectivistic societies, such as Hindu Indians,
social responsibility is seen as more duty based and is thus expected, thereby taking on a moral status
(Miller and Bersoff, 1994).
Physical and Other Forms of Punishment

Punishment can take many different forms including physical punishment, withdrawal of rewards
and privileges, yelling, shaming, and guilt induction. These forms differ in their effectiveness. Great-
est interest has focused on physical punishment or spanking, with several summaries of the literature
and meta-analyses suggesting that spanking or physical punishment is largely ineffective and harmful,
that it is effective under certain circumstances, and that it is linked, but only modestly, with cogni-
tive, emotional, and behavioral problems (Gershoff and Grogan-Kaylor, 2016). A significant prob-
lem with many studies included in these summaries is that spanking and physical abuse were often
confounded. As well, there were very few studies that would enable at least a plausible inference
that behavior problems were caused by physical punishment, rather than such punishment being a
parental reaction to problematic behavior, that is, a child effect. Gershoff and Grogan-Kaylor’s (2016)
782
meta-analysis addressed these problems by considering separately studies that defined physical pun-
ishment as spanking, that is, hitting with an open hand on the buttocks or extremities. As well, they
considered studies designed to make the direction of causation from parent action to child outcomes
more plausible than vice versa. Their analysis supported the position that physical punishment leads
to children’s externalizing problems or antisocial behavior.
Although cultural context can moderate the effects of physical discipline (see ahead), it is impor-
tant to note that the detrimental effects of physical punishment are not limited to Western samples.
Thus, Lansford et al. (2005) compared the effects of physical punishment in six countries (Kenya,
China, Thailand, Philippines, Italy, and India), finding that parents’ greater use of physical discipline
was associated with poorer child outcomes (anxiety and aggression) in all these countries (although
to differing degrees, see ahead). Moreover, in a study in four Asian cultures, Lansford et al. (2010)
noted that children’s interpretation of physical punishment as a manifestation of parental hostility and
rejection mediates between its use and children’s behavioral and internalizing problems.
In addition to physical punishment, Gershoff et al. (2010) considered the relation between other
forms of punishment and children’s externalizing and internalizing problems in a sample of families
from several countries. Using corporal punishment, expressing disappointment, and yelling or scold-
ing were each associated with more child aggression whereas, in addition to corporal punishment,
giving a time-out, expressing disappointment, and shaming were associated with more child anxi-
ety. Teaching about good and bad behavior, getting the child to apologize, taking away privileges,
withdrawing love for misbehavior, threatening punishment, and promising a treat or privilege were
not predictors of negative child outcomes. We return to the topic of how sociocultural context can
moderate the effects of various forms of punishment later in this chapter.
Interactions Between Child Temperament and Discipline Effectiveness

Not every child reacts in the same way to a given form of discipline. One of the most frequently
studied variables with respect to its interaction with discipline is temperament. In a summary of the
research, Bates and Pettit (2015) compared children high in negative emotionality (prone to intense
negative emotional responses) with those who were low. The former were at greater risk than the
latter for poor outcomes, such as externalizing problems, when the parenting they received was harsh
or insensitive and unsupportive. The narrower temperament dimension of fearfulness also acts as a
moderator of discipline effectiveness. Thus, children high in fearfulness are at greater risk of devel-
oping externalizing problems as a result of harsh and strict parenting. In contrast, relatively fearless
children may be more affected by levels of parental warmth. Fearless children are also at greater risk,
compared with their fearful counterparts, from the effects of permissiveness or inconsistent disci-
pline. Cornell and Frick (2007) found that inconsistent discipline predicted low levels of empathy, an
important component of positive social behavior, but only for fearless and not for fearful children. In
a longitudinal study of young adolescents, Chaparro and Grusec (2016) also found that inconsistent
discipline was associated with low levels of empathy in children who were low in neuroticism but
not those who were high. Chaparro and Grusec suggested these results could be explained by the
fact that neurotic or fearful adolescents, unlike fearless ones, are particularly sensitive to the possibility
of punishment even when it is inconsistently applied and, therefore, are relatively unaffected by the
inconsistency (Lengua, 2008).
Monitoring and Disclosure

One important feature of effective socialization is knowing what children are doing—how they
spend their time when they are not with parents, who their friends are, how well they are doing
academically, and so on. Monitoring involves close surveillance of the child and includes asking for
783
information from children themselves as well as having conversations with teachers, peers, and other
parents about children’s activities (Crouter, Helms-Erikson, Updegraff, and McHale, 1999). Low
levels of monitoring have been associated with high levels of antisocial behavior (Hoeve et al., 2009).
But monitoring is not always effective. Thus, work by Kerr and Stattin (2000) and Stattin and Kerr
(2000) led to a rethinking the role of monitoring and knowledge of children in the socialization
process. Kerr and Stattin noted that knowledge of children and their activities can come about in
three ways—through solicitation of information, control of those activities, or by the child’s sponta-
neous disclosure of information. They found disclosure to be a more powerful predictor of positive
adolescent outcomes, including lowered risk of delinquency, than parental surveillance and limit set-
ting, with the latter predicting positive outcomes only when children’s feelings of being controlled
were partialed out.
Since these two papers appeared, there has been considerable research on disclosure, particularly
in adolescents, given that, in adolescence, more time is spent away from parents and, therefore, there
is less opportunity for direct surveillance and for accurate information-gathering. Although reason-
able levels of monitoring that is not overcontrolling, in the context of a positive parent-child rela-
tionship, have been shown to predict positive behavior (Fletcher, Steinberg, and Williams-Wheeler,
2004; Soenens, Vansteenkiste, Luyckx, and Goossens, 2006 ; Waizenhofer, Buchanan, and Jackson-
Newsom, 2004), the positive effects of disclosure continue to be revealed. The effect, not surprisingly,
is bidirectional, with children who disclose becoming less antisocial and children who are antisocial
becoming less likely to disclose (Kerr, Stattin, and Burk, 2010).
Although disclosure allows adolescents to have more control over their interactions with parents
by managing the amount of information parents have, it can, of course, be facilitated by parental
actions. Parenting style (Darling, Cumsille, Caldwell, and Dowdy, 2006; Sorkhabi and Middaugh,
2014), maternal acceptance of her child’s perspective (Smetana, Metzger, Gettman, and Campione-
Barr, 2006; Soenens et al., 2006) and, in two longitudinal studies, parents’ responsiveness and behav-
ioral control (Soenens et al., 2006) and mothers’ autonomy support (Mageau et al., 2017) are among
the features of parenting that have been linked to adolescent disclosure. Another antecedent of ado-
lescent disclosure is parents’ willingness to disclose about their own activities: Chaparro and Grusec
(2015) found that mothers’ and fathers’ willingness to talk about moderately distressing events was
correlated with children’s willingness to disclose in turn. Not surprisingly, parent and adolescent
disclosure about modest rule transgressions were not correlated. Presumably, adolescents need some
explicit assurance that their antisocial actions will not be followed by negative consequences. Thus,
adolescents report that negative reactions to disclosure such as showing mistrust, acting disappointed
and sad, and lecturing are events that would strongly inhibit disclosure (Tokić and Pećnik, 2011).
Children feel an obligation to disclose (Hunter, Barber, Olsen, McNeely, and Bose, 2011) and
view disclosure as a way of getting help and support (Chaparro and Grusec, 2015). They may choose
not to disclose as a way of displaying their autonomy (Darling et al., 2006) or of avoiding conflict
about what they consider to be personal issues. They also feel more obligated to disclose about issues
where they believe their parents have legitimate authority, such as health and well-being (Smetana,
Villalobos, Tasopoulos-Chan, Gettman, and Campione-Barr, 2009). Failure to disclose is different
from secrecy (a deliberate attempt to hide information), with the former predicted by mothers’ lower
levels of authoritativeness and the latter by mothers’ dispositional tendency toward anger (Almas,
Grusec, and Tackett, 2011).
Cultural Context as a Moderator of Parental Socialization

Cross-cultural research helps to shed light on which elements of parental socialization are universal
and which vary by culture. Some aspects of socialization that appear to be important in a variety of
cultures, and hence possibly universal, are perceived parental acceptance and rejection (e.g., Lansford
784
et al., 2010), the granting of at least some level of personal autonomy (Helwig, 2006), the process of
learning from parental models, and the provision of protection and alleviation of distress in times of
need (Bornstein, 1995; Bugental, 2000; Grusec and Davidov, 2010). However, many effects of par-
enting appear to be culture dependent, rather than universal; the remainder of this section reviews
research findings documenting such differential effects.
As noted earlier, sociocultural context can act as a moderator, influencing the outcomes of paren-
tal behaviors. This assertion is consistent with Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) notion that “in ecological
research, the principal main effects are likely to be interactions” (p. 38). In other words, links between
parenting behaviors and child outcomes can differ as a function of the sociocultural context in which
they are examined; linkages observed in one ecological niche will often differ from those observed
in another. The bulk of the research on cultural context as a moderator of parenting practices has
focused on differential effects of parenting styles (most often authoritarian parenting) and of specific
discipline strategies (most often corporal punishment). Moreover, studies in this area have com-
pared different ethnic affiliations within Western countries (e.g., Deater-Deckard, Dodge, Bates,
and Pettit, 1996; Lamborn, Dornbusch, and Steinberg, 1996), different nationalities or countries of
origin (e.g., Chao, 2001; Lansford et al., 2005), and sometimes also different religious backgrounds
(e.g., Ellison, Musick, and Holden, 2011; Gunnoe, Hetherington, and Reiss, 2006). Overall, this body
of work shows that relatively harsh practices or styles that are detrimental in Western-European,
middle-class contexts can have benign or positive consequences in other sociocultural contexts.
Chao has shown that parenting styles have different meanings and consequences in Chinese
culture from those in Western cultures (Chao, 1994; 2001). In contrast to findings for European
American adolescents, authoritarian parenting was not detrimental, and authoritative parenting not
beneficial, to adolescents who had been born in China and had immigrated with their families to
the United States (Chao, 2001). Thus, authoritarian parenting was linked to reduced closeness to
parents and to poorer academic outcomes in the European American group but not in the Chinese
immigrant group. The proposed explanation for this finding involves the Asian cultural notion of
“training,” which imbues strict parental control with the positive meanings of parental involvement,
concern for the child’s future, caring, and love. Consequently, strict and authoritarian parenting in
this cultural context has a different, more positive, meaning, and hence more positive consequences,
than those observed in Western contexts (Chao, 1994, 2001).
In some studies, differential outcomes have also been observed for corporal punishment as a func-
tion of culture, ethnic group, or religious affiliation. For example, Lansford et al. (2005) found that
the detrimental effects of corporal punishment were stronger in countries where such discipline was
not normative, and weaker (although still present) in countries where it was normative. Moreover,
the use of corporal punishment has been linked to more externalizing behavior problems such as
aggression in European American children and adolescents, but with no negative effects or even
reduced problem behavior in African American families (e.g., Deater-Deckard et al., 1996; Gun-
noe and Mariner, 1997; Lansford, Deater-Deckard, Dodge, Bates, and Pettit, 2004). With respect to
religious affiliation, Ellison et al. (2011) found that physical discipline was not related to detrimental
child outcomes in Conservative Protestant (CP) families, but predicted negative outcomes among
non-CP families (see also Gunnoe et al., 2006, for analogous findings regarding the differential effects
of fathers’ authoritarian parenting in CP and non-CP families). These findings suggest that corporal
punishment likely has a less negative meaning in some sociocultural contexts because, for example,
it is more normative, or signals parental involvement, or is strongly aligned with cultural values and
consequently results in fewer negative consequences for children.
It is important to note, however, that moderating effects of cultural context are not always found.
Some studies examining the consequences of corporal punishment in different ethnic groups, or the
consequences of authoritarian parenting in different cultures, have not found moderating effects of
cultural or ethnic background (e.g., Grogan-Kaylor, 2004; McLoyd and Smith, 2002; Mulvaney and
785
Mebert, 2007; Sorkhabi, 2005). What can account for this inconsistency of findings? One possibility
is that the moderating role of culture is itself affected by moderating variables. Several findings point
in this direction. For example, Davidov and Khoury-Kassabri (2013) found that culture moderated
the links between harsh parenting and depressive symptoms in Arab and Jewish Israeli young adults,
but only when gender was also taken into account as an additional moderator. Recollection of
greater use of corporal punishment by parents during childhood was associated with more depressive
symptoms among Jewish men and women and Arab women, but with fewer symptoms of depression
among Arab men. Another moderator involves the nature of the situation in which the discipline
is applied. Davidov and Atzaba-Poria (2016) found that culture of origin (Israeli versus Soviet) did
not moderate the effects of mothers’ general use of discipline strategies (punitive and psychological
control) on children’s behavior problems; however, culture did moderate the effects of these same
strategies when used specifically in response to transgressions in the academic area. Former Soviet
Union (FSU) parents in Israel emphasize academic excellence as vital for the child’s successful life
to a greater extent than do Israeli-origin families. Consequently, punitive or controlling responses
following children’s academic transgression may be viewed by children from FSU families as indica-
tion of parental involvement, caring, and concern for the child’s future, rather than as rejection or
coercion. Consistently, the researchers found that harsh parental responses to academic transgressions
had negative consequences in the Israeli-origin families, but no effects or even positive outcomes in
the Soviet-origin families.
Another potential moderator that should be considered together with culture is parents’ belief
in the correctness of their discipline intervention. For example, parents can use physical discipline
because they believe this is a good way to correct misbehavior, or because they become angry and
lose control. McLoyd, Kaplan, Hardaway, and Wood (2007) found that spanking was related to chil-
dren’s depression when mothers did not endorse it, but was unrelated to negative outcomes when
mothers saw it as the right way to discipline. Endorsement of the discipline intervention, then, is an
additional variable that can influence the effects of culture, yielding more complex patterns of inter-
action. When this and other crucial variables, such as gender or the nature of the situation, are not
considered in conjunction with culture, the moderating role of culture may sometimes be obscured.
Practical Considerations for Parenting

The considerable body of research on socialization processes and children’s acquisition of values
suggests that developmentalists ought to have something useful to contribute to the work of mental
health practitioners, teachers and, most important, parents as they nurture the next generation. It is
surprising, therefore, that there appears to be so much disagreement among professionals about the
appropriate way to rear children. Part of the reason for this disagreement is that parenting programs
focus on a variety of different parenting actions: Behavior management, development of the attach-
ment relationship, and enhancing the knowledge, skills, and confidence of parents among others (see
National Center for Parent, Family, and Community Engagement, 2015). Often, the advice given in
these different areas is contradictory and, hence, confusing. The domains of socialization approach
described earlier in this chapter offers one way of understanding the contradictions when it cat-
egorizes parenting according to different kinds of parent-child interactions. What is an appropriate
parental response when the dyad is in one domain may not be appropriate when it is in another
domain. Moreover, some parents may be operating well in some domains but require assistance in
others. And, to promote specific desired child behaviors, intervention programs must target aspects
of parenting that are most relevant to the child outcomes of interest. Thus, a focus on the features
of domains as well as how they complement and interact with each other may be helpful in design-
ing intervention and prevention programs better tailored to the needs of parents and children, and
therefore in guiding parents to be effective agents of socialization.
786
Future Directions for Theory and Research in Socialization

The topics addressed in this chapter point to several promising avenues for future work. First, there
is a need for further studies that will differentiate between specific aspects of parenting and exam-
ine their links to specific positive and negative child outcomes. The five domains of socialization
addressed by Grusec and Davidov (2010) provide one useful framework for such differentiation of
parenting behaviors, but other distinctions are also important. For example, distinctions can be made
within domains, such as different forms of reciprocity (Grusec and Davidov, 2015), or according to
analyses dissecting parenting in other meaningful ways (e.g., Bornstein, Tamis-LeMonda, Hahn, and
Haynes, 2008; Tamis-LeMonda et al., 1996). Such a differentiated approach is in contrast to a global
approach that focuses on general aspects of parenting such as “sensitivity,”“responsiveness,” and “posi-
tive parenting.” A differentiated approach has both theoretical and applied advantages over a global
one. It enables insights into the multiple pathways to socialization; by elucidating which specific
parenting behaviors predict which specific aspects of children’s adjustment, greater understanding
of parental socialization can be achieved. And this knowledge, in turn, can then be used to design
more precise and, therefore, more effective prevention and intervention programs. A differentiated
approach to parenting can also help clarify the interplay between different aspects of parenting—how
they interact with one another in predicting certain child outcomes—and thus further enhance
understanding of the socialization process.
A second area of continuing interest is the relationship between biological and parenting pro-
cesses. Some notable issues concern gene-environment correlations and interactions such as which
child genetic-based characteristics affect which aspects of parenting (evocative gene-environment
correlations), and which biological mechanisms render some children more amenable to parenting
influences than other children (see also Avinun and Knafo-Noam, 2015). Another question concerns
how parents’ own genetic makeup influences their parenting behaviors and their reactions to child
behaviors (Avinun and Knafo-Noam, 2017). Also meriting attention is the neurobiology of parental
socialization, such as how socialization processes are mediated in the brains (and neurohormonal
activity) of parents and children (e.g., see Abraham, Hendler, Zagoory-Sharon, and Feldman, 2016).
Finally, another focus in this area that has only recently emerged, but will likely draw increasing
attention, is the application of epigenetics to the study of parenting in humans (Lester, Conradt, and
Marsit, 2016). Thus, future studies could shed light on which aspects of parenting lead to which
epigenetic changes at what periods in development, and how these changes, in turn, influence the
subsequent behavior and adjustment of children and, even, of grandchildren (Harper, 2005).
A third important direction for future research involves an increasingly sophisticated look at
the moderating role of culture. The underlying mechanisms of cultural moderation effects are still
largely unknown, and studies designed to uncover them are greatly needed. Examples of pertinent
questions are how children from different cultural niches come to perceive parental behaviors dif-
ferently; whether parents from distinct ecologies express different emotions when they are enact-
ing the (“same”) behavior, thus imbuing it with a different meaning; and so on. As noted earlier,
effects of cultural moderation have been inconsistent, emerging in some studies but not in others.
This pattern likely reflects the fact that culture does not operate in isolation. Thus, other vari-
ables, such as the nature of the child’s transgression, child gender, and parent and child perceptions,
likely often act as moderators in conjunction with culture. Studies uncovering these complexities
will provide better understanding of how culture is implicated in parental socialization processes.
Finally, studies looking at the moderating role of culture beyond the control domain (where the
bulk of the work has been carried out) are also greatly needed. A study by Köster, Cavalcante,
Vera Cruz de Carvalho, Dôgo Resende, and Kärtner (2016), for example, focused on mothers’
scaffolding strategies and showed differential links between these strategies and toddlers’ prosocial
behavior as a function of culture.
787
These are several promising foci for research, but there are, of course, others as well, such as
the interplay between early (intuitive) moral sensibilities, parenting, and culture, or the interactions
between the parenting behaviors of two parents (or parent-figures) as well as the interplay between
other socialization agents and parenting in children’s acquisition of values (mesosystem influences),
and more. All of these are crucial to gaining an increased understanding of what is arguably the most
important task there is, namely, equipping the young to become well-functioning members of their
social group.
Conclusion
What can be said about the process of parental socialization given the current state of the research?
Offered here are three important sets of observations among many possible others. The first is that
there are different forms of positive and of negative parenting, which often have different impacts
on the socialization outcome. Linked to this observation is the fact that socialization goes on in dif-
ferent contexts or domains, and that each domain requires a different form of parenting. Thus, the
kind of parenting that is appropriate or effective in one domain cannot be assumed to be appropri-
ate or effective in another. Second, socialization is a bidirectional process, with children playing an
active role in it. Thus, children’s thoughts, emotions, and actions need to be taken into account so
as to facilitate the choice of effective parenting practices. Third, the cultural context provides yet
another level of complexity, by impacting multiple aspects of the socialization process, including
which behaviors parents are trying to promote, at what ages, and how, and the effects of their actions
on their children. Consequently, one form of intervention does not have the same effects for all
children, or in all sociocultural contexts. Untangling the nature of interactions between children’s
characteristics, cultural background, and the impact of different parenting practices will continue
to be an important feature of socialization research.
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23
PERSONALITY AND PARENTING
Peter Prinzie, Amaranta de Haan, and Jay Belsky
Introduction
In daily conversations, it is not uncommon to describe people as outgoing or rather shy; charming
or surly; perfectionist or careless; rigid or open minded. Individual differences in personality mani-
fest themselves in a wide range of behaviors and make people different from one another. There is
ample evidence that these personality characteristics pervade people’s behavior and lives in important
ways (Caspi and Shiner, 2006; Roberts, Kuncel, Shiner, Caspi, and Goldberg, 2007). Early-emerging
individual differences in personality shape how people experience and respond to a wide variety of
developmental tasks, ranging from the cultivation of social relationships to their academic success
and mastery of work tasks (Caspi, Roberts, and Shiner, 2005). There is accumulating evidence that
personality traits predict, and presumably contribute to, academic performance, health and occupa-
tional attainment, relationship success, economic well-being, and mortality as well as, if not better
than, socioeconomic status and cognitive ability (for reviews, see Borghans, Duckworth, Heckman,
and ter Weel, 2008; Ozer and Benet-Martinez, 2006; Roberts et al., 2007).
Yet when it comes to parenting, a central aspect of social functioning for many adults, it
seems that it is the exception rather than the rule to consider personality characteristics of moth-
ers and fathers. In fact, even though personality was formally introduced as a major, indeed the
major, determinant of parenting some three decades ago (Belsky, 1984), contemporary research
on child development informed by ecological thinking (Belsky, 1997; Bornstein, 2016; Bron-
fenbrenner, 1986; Bronfenbrenner and Morris, 1998; Lerner, Rothbaum, Boulos, and Castellino,
2002) remains disproportionately focused on contextual factors and forces, such as socioeconomic
status (Sirin, 2005), work satisfaction (Greenhaus and Powell, 2006), marital relationship (Erel and
Burman, 1995; Kaczynski, Lindahl, Malik, and Laurenceau, 2006), and social support (Armstrong,
Birnie-Lefcovitch, and Ungar, 2005) rather than personalogical, dispositional ones. When person-
ality traits or other psychological characteristics of parents are the focus of inquiry, investigators
typically examine only one or two aspects of adult psychological functioning, such as self-esteem
(Mash and Johnston, 1983), locus of control (Stevens, 1988), perspective-taking skills (Gondoli and
Silverberg, 1997), emotional distress (Conger, McCarty, Yang, Lahey, and Kropp, 1984), or parental
psychopathology (especially maternal depression; Caughy, Huang, and Lima, 2009; Gerdes et al.,
2007; Lovejoy, Graczyk, O’Hare, and Neuman, 2000; Wilson and Durbin, 2010, but also parental
ADHD; Park, Hudek, and Johnston, 2017).
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Peter Prinzie et al.
Although such research is informative in demonstrating that adult psychological characteristics

are relevant to parents’ capacity to engage in growth-promoting childrearing, a more comprehensive
approach to the measurement of personality is warranted when it comes to seeking to understand
how the psychological traits of parents affect how they care for their offspring. Fortunately, the field
of personality psychology has made great strides in identifying systematic taxonomies of personality
traits, as opposed to single traits; consequently, comprehensive knowledge about which psychological
resources may be particularly important to consider when seeking to understand the multiple deter-
minants of parenting is now available—and informs this review of theory and research on personality
and parenting.
In this chapter, we provide a detailed introduction to theory and evidence pertaining to research
into personality-parenting associations. We then proceed to review issues central to the study of
personality and, subsequently, parenting. Thereafter, we provide an extensive review of empirical
research on personality-parenting associations before describing directions for future research and
drawing some general conclusions.
Theoretical Frameworks for the Associations

Between Personality and Parenting
Although parental personality characteristics have a place in most ecological models of child devel-
opment (Belsky, 1984; Belsky and Jaffee, 2006; Bornstein, 2016; Bronfenbrenner, 1986), only a rela-
tively small number of studies have investigated associations between personality and parenting.
Personality characteristics may influence parenting, and through parenting, child development. In
addition, behavior-genetic research indicates that personality is, in part, heritable (Goldsmith, Losoya,
Brashaw, and Campos, 1994; Vukasović and Bratko, 2015). This means that parent personality, parent-
ing, and child characteristics may be linked due to shared genes and related biological dispositions.
Thus, empirical associations between personality, parenting, and child development may not docu-
ment causal relations as so often presumed, but the influence on parents and their children of genes
they share.
In this section, the historical context of work on personality and parenting is discussed. First, we
consider changes over the twentieth century in how personality was viewed in the field of psychol-
ogy more generally, then by noting the earliest psychoanalytic writings on this topic. Next, we turn
attention to two conceptual frameworks that were influential with respect to modern research on
the determinants of parenting. Thereafter, we focus on a general taxonomy of personality traits, the
“Big Five,” and we end with how this “Big Five” can be measured.
The Person-Situation Debate

A first historical line relevant to the study of parental personality as a determinant of parenting was
the position of personality psychology throughout the twentieth century. Gordon Allport, a pioneer
in the field of personality psychology, published a seminal paper in 1937 in which he attempted to
define and systematize the study of personality (Barenbaum and Winter, 2008). Allport reviewed
multiple definitions of personality and diverse methods for studying it, contending that traits are the
fundamental units of personality analysis. He defined traits as neuropsychic systems with dynamic
or motivational properties. Following Allport’s seminal contribution, researchers made important
advances during the 1940s through 1960s in identifying underlying personality traits through factor-
analytic methods (Barenbaum and Winter, 2008; Cattell, 1943, 1945; Tupes and Cristal, 1961).
Despite apparent progress, the study of personality traits was dealt a major blow when Mis-
chel (1968) argued that the usefulness and predictive power of personality traits were seriously
overstated. Indeed, he asserted that personality variables, which were usually assessed by means of
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Personality and Parenting
paper-and-pencil tests and questionnaires, accounted for only a very limited amount of variance
in human behavior. He further stipulated that these trait measures did not show the kind of cross-
situational consistency central to the very idea of personality traits. Mischel (1968) contended that
traits typically correlated no higher than .30 with actual and measured behavior, meaning that traits
can explain less than 10% of the variance in human behavior. These observations led Mischel to
emphasize the importance of situations when it came to explaining human behavior. In stimulating
what became known as the person-situation debate, Mischel was thus at the forefront of what sub-
sequently was referred to as the social-cognitive approach to studying human behavior (Barenbaum
and Winter, 2008).
Although Mischel’s critique at first created serious doubt and confusion among personality psy-
chologists, personality researchers eventually “recovered” from Mischel’s critiques (see Barenbaum
and Winter, 2008; Caspi, 1998; McAdams, 1997, for reviews). In two convincing studies, Epstein
(1979a, 1979b) revealed that the low correlations reflected, among other things, the difficulty of
predicting specific behavior in a particular situation from broad trait scales, especially in the face
of measurement error. Larger correlations linking personality traits and behavior could, would, and
did emerge using more reliable measures, with the latter being achieved by aggregating behaviors
over time and place. Thus, instead of predicting, for example, aggression on a single day in a single
classroom during a single time of day, accumulating such measurements over hours, days, and settings
(e.g., classroom, playground) could yield substantially stronger trait-behavior associations.
When this principle of aggregation is applied to parenting, it implies that effects of personality
(as well as of parenting) accumulate over a child’s lifetime, so a focus on a single parenting behavior
measured at a single point in time is likely to misrepresent—and underestimate—the contribution
of personality to parenting and to children’s development (McCartney and Rosenthal, 2000). Analo-
gously, differences between baseball players’ underlying abilities are trivial if considered on the basis
of a single at-bat, but they become meaningful over the course of a season and a career.
If researchers are interested in the percent of variance that two variables—a personality trait and
a manner of parenting—share, the unsquared correlation may be a better estimate of the proportion
of shared variance than the squared correlation when, for example, a latent variable underlies scores
on two variables (Ozer, 1985). Thus, a .30 correlation would chronicle 30% shared variance rather
than 9%, clearly implying that Mischel’s original critique underestimated the personality-behavior
relation. Notable is that effect sizes of several classic experiments in social psychology—that Mischel
did not consider and no doubt would have embraced had he done so—turn out to be quite similar
to the personality-behavior associations that Mischel derided (Funder and Ozer, 1983).
Also important to consider is the role of moderator variables when estimating personality effects
on behavior, including the salience of the trait for the individual (Bem and Allen, 1974) or self-
monitoring (Lippa and Mash, 1981; Snyder, 1974). Moderator variables can increase what some had
labeled as dismally low correlations among personality measures into respectable ones. This means
that characteristics of a person (e.g., self-monitoring) may restrict the extent to which the person
behaves in accordance with his or her personality characteristics. For example, stronger relations
between personality and performance outcomes were found for individuals who are low self-moni-
tors than for individuals who are high self-monitors (Barrick, Parks, and Mount, 2005). An important
line of work in contemporary personality research considers the role of situational variables in mod-
erating person-behavior linkages (Funder, 2006; Kenrick and Funder, 1991). Such inquiry indicates
that situations differ in the extent to which they dictate behaviors; one would expect, for example,
that extraversion affects behaviors more strongly at a party than at a funeral. By focusing on person-
situation interactions, rather than person-situation competition, personality psychology has moved
toward a more complete understanding of why people do what they do (Funder, 2008).
Movement beyond the person-situation debate eventually enabled the study of individual per-
sonality differences to move forward again toward the end of the 1970s and early 1980s. By the
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mid-1980s, research on personality and behavior had dramatically increased, with many research-
ers investigating the factor structure of personality traits and developing new personality measures
(Barenbaum and Winter, 2008; John and Srivastava, 1999).
Psychoanalytic Theorizing
A second historical line, relevant for personality-parenting research, was provided by psychoanalytic
theorists (Cohler and Paul, 2019). Early theorizing about which individual psychological characteris-
tics of adults affect their parenting behavior was based on psychoanalytic thinking. Freudian scholars
focused mostly on pathological aspects of parental character and the ways in which these would
contribute to child psychopathology (A. Freud, 1955/1970; Levy, 1943; Spitz, 1965/1970; Winnicott,
1948/1975). What these theorists and clinicians had in common was the belief that if parents’ emo-
tional needs had not been met during their own childhoods, these unmet needs would be reflected
in parents’ own problematic parenting (Holden and Buck, 2002). Even though it was also assumed
that flexible and adaptive personality characteristics would promote adaptive and growth-promoting
parenting, very little attention was given to how normative—rather than pathological—personality
characteristics affect parenting. Moreover, although psychoanalytic thinking stimulated the early
study of parent personality and child development, and even today exerts a hypothesis-generating
influence (Cohler and Paul, 2019), a significant problem with psychoanalytic research was the lack
of rigorous empirical research. Reliance on clinical and case studies severely limited the longer term
impact of psychoanalytic ideas on the last half century’s research on the study of child and adolescent
development, including the effects of parenting, and thus investigation of “why parents parent the
way they do” (Belsky, 1984, p. 83). Two conceptual frameworks have proven particularly influential
with respect to modern research on the determinants of parenting, and thus the role of adult person-
ality. Each is considered in turn.
Belsky’s Process Model

Belsky (1984) developed a process model of the determinants of parenting that was based on theo-
retical and empirical work on the causes of child abuse (Belsky, 1984; Belsky, Hertzog, and Rovine,
1986; Belsky and Vondra, 1989) and informed by Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological model of
human development. Thinking about why parents mistreat their children, he observed, generally
reflected three distinct conceptual perspectives: (1) psychiatric thinking called attention to the role
of a parent’s own problematic childrearing history and resultant personality characteristics, (2) child-
effects thinking highlighted the role that difficult child characteristics (inadvertently) play in the
etiology of maltreatment, and (3) sociological thinking highlighted the influence of social conditions
such as poverty and unemployment (while suggesting that other perspectives “blamed the victim”).
In seeking to integrate and extend these foundational perspectives to illuminate the determinants
of non-abusive parenting, Belsky’s (1984) process model stipulated that parenting is multiply deter-
mined by three general sources of influence: (1) the parent’s psychological resources or personality,
(2) the child’s individual characteristics and behavior, and (3) contextual sources of stress and support,
such as the marital relationship, occupational experience, and the social network.
Belsky (1984; Belsky and Jaffee, 2006) considered parent personality of primary importance. He
theorized that it not only directly influences parenting, but also shapes contextual stress and support,
or the broader context in which the parent-child relationship exists. For example, personality may
influence the occupational experiences of a mother or the marital satisfaction of a father, which
themselves can affect parenting. Moreover, parental personality was considered to have a substantial
impact on child development because, to behave in sensitive-responsive, growth-facilitating ways,
parents need to possess sufficient psychological maturity to take the perspective of others, control
800
impulses, feel secure in their own lives, and be able to find ways to meet their own needs. Personality
characteristics are especially important for parents because of the need to remain firm and nurturing
even in the face of challenging child behavior.
Heinicke’s Framework
Heinicke (1984; 2002) offered a second framework for characterizing the influence of parent person-
ality on parenting behavior. Like Belsky (1984), Heinicke (1984) focused on parental characteristics
and marital functioning, especially before the birth of the first child, as well as family support as
determinants of later parenting. Pre-birth assessment of parent personality and marital quality was
recommended in recognition of the fact that children’s behavior may affect parental psychological
functioning and marital relations.
Heinicke (1984) called attention to three major aspects of parent personality likely to influence
parental functioning, ones which in many ways overlap with factors and processes highlighted by
Belsky (1984): Parents’ adaptation-competence, capacity for positive sustained relationships, and self-
development. Adaptation-competence refers to the parent’s efficient, calm, persistent, and flexible
approach to problem-solving, no doubt requiring or involving the very patience and self-control that
Belsky (1984) emphasized. If parents are able to cope well with challenges they encounter before the
birth of their children, it is more probable that they will be successful in their role as parent. Capacity
for positive sustained relationships refers to the parent’s empathy and positive mutuality expressed
in an ongoing relationship. This capacity is seen to derive from parents’ own childhood experience
and, thereby, influence the sensitivity and warmth of their current intimate relationships. If parents
are able to develop and maintain positive relationships with others before the birth of their child,
it is more likely that they will also be able to provide sensitive, responsive, and growth-promoting
parenting to their child. Like Belsky (1984), then, Heinicke (1984), too, regarded the marital/partner
relationship as the most important support system when it came to parenting. Finally, self-develop-
ment refers to the parents’ capacity to function autonomously in relation to others and to feel self-
confident. Parents who are able to maintain self-esteem and appropriately individuated relationships
with others were thought to function better in the parenting sphere.
As already made clear, both Belsky’s (1984) and Heinicke’s (1984) theoretical frameworks empha-
size the importance of an adult’s psychological characteristics for shaping parenting, as well as other
factors, most notably the marital/partner relationship, itself likely to be shaped by the psychological
dispositions of the partners. Unfortunately, a vigorous debate in personality psychology about the
importance of traits versus situations for a long time hindered the systematic advancement of empiri-
cal knowledge about which individual characteristics may be of most general importance when it
comes to everyday functioning (Epstein and O’Brien, 1985; Kenrick and Funder, 1988).
Big Five Taxonomy of Personality Dimensions

The “Big Five” personality scheme played a major role in the renewal of interest in the effect of
personality traits on diverse aspects of human functioning. Personality research has been given
a new impetus and direction by a near consensus on the main factors that provide the struc-
ture within which the myriad of more specific personality traits can be arrayed. The Big Five
personality factors (Caspi and Shiner, 2006; Goldberg, 1990, 1993) are traditionally labeled and
numbered as follows: (1) extraversion (or surgency, positive affectivity), (2) agreeableness (versus
antagonism), (3) conscientiousness (or constraint), (4) emotional stability (versus neuroticism or
negative affectivity), and (5) openness to experience (or autonomy, intellect, culture). Each of
these higher order traits has lower-level facets (McAdams and Pals, 2006) that may be universal
(Allik and McCrae, 2004).
801
Before proceeding to describe each of the Big Five traits in somewhat more detail, we note that
they were first identified by Tupes and Christal (1961), whose factor-analytic work showed that
long lists of personality variables compiled by Cattell (1943, 1945) could be reduced to the five
aforementioned broadband personality traits. Notably, this same structure emerged in subsequent
lexical analyses of trait adjectives in several languages (De Raad, Perugini, Hrebickova, and Szarota,
1998; Goldberg, 1990; Hendriks, Hofstee, and De Raad, 2002; Norman, 1963; Saucier, Hampson,
and Goldberg, 2000). Notable as well is that factor analyses of questionnaires and Q-set ratings
designed to measure a broad range of individual differences replicated the Big Five structure in
diverse samples (e.g., across cultures; Schmitt et al., 2007; in clinical samples; McCrae, Costa, and
Busch, 1986) and across numerous raters such as self-reports, peers, and clinicians (DeYoung, Quilty,
and Peterson, 2007; John, Naumann, and Soto, 2008; John and Srivastava, 1999; McCrae and Costa,
1999). Furthermore, analyses of free natural language descriptions of personality also yielded a
highly similar structure of personality traits (Kohnstamm, Halverson, Mervielde, and Havill, 1998).
Resulting from these three distinctive lines of research, near consensus on the comprehensive-
ness of the Big Five model to capture the myriad of more specific personality traits has now been
reached (Caspi and Shiner, 2006; John and Srivastava, 1999; Mervielde, De Clercq, De Fruyt, and
Van Leeuwen, 2005).
Turning to the traits themselves, extraversion reflects the quantity and intensity of interpersonal
interaction, activity level, and capacity for joy that characterize individuals. A person scoring high on
extraversion is full of energy, enjoys being with people, is sociable, talkative, enthusiastic, gregarious,
optimistic, and affectionate, whereas a low-scoring individual is reserved, steady, skeptical, un-exuber-
ant, retiring, and quiet. Thinking of U.S. presidents, Bill Clinton was a far more extraverted person
than Barack Obama. Agreeableness reflects one’s interpersonal orientation along a continuum from
empathy to antagonism in thoughts, feelings, and actions. A person scoring high on this dimension is
friendly, generous, good natured, trusting, helpful, and straightforward, whereas a person scoring low
on this dimension is unfriendly, suspicious, uncooperative, irritable, and manipulative. Whereas the
former characterization reminds us of John F. Kennedy or even George W. Bush, the latter reminds
us of Richard Nixon. Conscientiousness reflects the extent to which a person is well organized,
thorough, and goal oriented, and has a strong sense of purpose and high standards. A person who
scores low on conscientiousness is easygoing, not very well organized, tending toward carelessness,
and preferring not to make plans. People like Bill Gates score high on this trait, whereas the character
of Homer Simpson can be situated at the other end of the continuum. Emotional stability contrasts
even-temperedness and a positive emotional adjustment with the experience of anger, hostility, irri-
tability, sadness, and worry. Think perhaps of the contrast between Donald Trump who often blows
his top at his aides and the cool stability of Angela Merkel, chancellor of Germany or Herman van
Rompuy, the first president of the European Council. Openness reflects the extent to which a person
enjoys new experiences, has broad interests and is imaginative. In contrast, a person scoring low on
this dimension is down-to-earth, practical, traditional, and pretty much set in his or her ways. Musi-
cians, like Beyoncé, or entrepreneurs, like Steve Jobs, have in general high levels of openness score,
whereas George Bush comes out as low on openness to experience in personality research. The Big
Five has been proven useful as a framework for organizing findings on individual differences not only
in adulthood (Caspi et al., 2005) but also in childhood and adolescence (Shiner and Caspi, 2003).
Like any dominant paradigm, the Big Five model is not without its critics, some of whom have
advanced alternative frameworks (Saucier, 2003). An alternative to the Big Five model has been pro-
posed by Ashton and Lee (2007), who showed that lexical analyses of personality adjectives in a
number of non-English languages resulted in six, rather than five, broad dimensions (see also Lee and
Ashton, 2004). This HEXACO model includes Honesty-Humility as a sixth factor. Nevertheless, the
Big Five has proven very useful for conceptualizing and measuring much of the variation in personality.
One of the primary advantages of the Big Five framework is its ability to organize previous research
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findings into a manageable number of conceptually coherent domains. Following this tradition, we
organize our review on personality-parenting linkages using the Big Five taxonomy of traits.
Personality Measurement
A central issue for the study of parental personality characteristics as determinants of parenting
behavior is the measurement of personality. As noted earlier, the Big Five taxonomy is one of the
most influential ones today. The Big Five factors of extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness,
emotional stability, and openness are conceptualized as broadband constructs, with each having
lower-level facets, and they are meant to be primarily descriptive of regularly occurring behav-
ior rather than explanatory or focused on inferred dynamic processes ( John and Srivastava, 1999).
A variety of measures has been developed to measure the Big Five, with the ones most commonly
used today including the NEO Personality Inventory-Revised, its short form and the NEO-PI-3
(Costa and McCrae, 1992; McCrae, Costa, and Martin, 2005), Goldberg’s (1992) bipolar inventory
measuring the Big Five with trait adjectives, the Big Five Inventory ( John, Donahue, and Kentle,
1991), the Five Factor Personality Inventory (Hendriks et al., 2002) and the Jackson Personality
Inventory ( Jackson, 1976), which has been reconfigured into the Big Five (Paunonen and Jackson,
1996). These instruments, like proponents of the Big Five personality factors, differ slightly in their
labeling of the factors, but all are very similar in terms of actual item content. Only for the con-
ceptualization of the fifth factor Openness are there some differences. Goldberg (1992) emphasizes
intellectual and creative cognition, calling the factor Intellect or Imagination, whereas Costa and
McCrae (1992) use a broader definition including unconventionality and behavioral flexibility, call-
ing the factor Openness.
Research in Personality and Parenting

Before proceeding to review evidence linking personality and parenting, we need to make clear that
there is perhaps somewhat less of a consensus among scholars of parenting than among scholars of per-
sonality as to what the core dimensions are that deserve empirical assessment—if only for purposes of
synthesizing results of diverse studies. However, notwithstanding the absence of a singular or cohesive
theory of how parental influence can be understood, there exists substantial consistency in how con-
temporary scientists characterize growth-facilitating (versus inadequate) parenting. Indeed, the three
dimensions of the parent-child relationship most consistently assessed and associated with individual
differences in children’s development are (1) warmth versus rejection, (2) behavioral control versus
lack thereof, and (3) autonomy support versus coercion (Collins, Maccoby, Steinberg, Hetherington,
and Bornstein, 2000; Maccoby, 1992; Pomerantz, and Thompson, 2008; Skinner, Johnson, and Snyder,
2005). Warmth (often labeled “responsiveness”) refers to “the extent to which parents intentionally
foster individuality, self-regulation and self-assertion by being attuned, supportive and acquiescent to
the child’s special needs and demands” (Baumrind, 1991, p. 62). Effective versus ineffective responsive
parenting should be regarded as a continuum while including acceptance-rejection, support-neglect,
affection-hostility, and positive affect-negative affect (Belsky, Domitrovich, and Crnic, 1997; Bugental
and Grusec, 2006; NICHD Early Child Care Research Network, 1999, 2003).
Behavioral control (sometimes labeled “structure”) refers to “the claims parents make on the child
to become integrated into the family whole by their maturity demands, supervision, disciplinary
efforts and willingness to confront the child who disobeys” (Baumrind, 1991, pp. 61–62). Behavioral
control refers to the provision of clear expectations for mature behavior combined with consistent
and appropriate limit setting. It also includes sensitivity, and thus well-timed, synchronous parent
behavior with an appropriate level of response stimulation and actions that follow the child’s signals
and facilitate self-regulation and positive development (Barber, 1996). The opposite of behavioral
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control reflects chaos and refers to parenting behaviors that are lax, noncontingent, inconsistent,
unpredictable, or arbitrary.
The third dimension, autonomy support, includes encouraging children to actively explore, dis-
cover, and formulate their own views and goals. High levels of autonomy support foster interactions
in which children are expected to express their views and opinions and are given weight in planning
and problem-solving. The conceptual opposite of autonomy support is coercion, also referred to as
psychological control, and is often characterized by intrusiveness, high-power assertion, or overcon-
trolling behavior (Barber, 1996). These three dimensions have been measured using observational,
questionnaire, and interview methodologies and have appeared in assessments of parenting for chil-
dren from preschool age to late adolescence. For purposes of this review, we use these dimensions
that capture much of the variation in parenting behaviors, to organize studies and frame findings
linking personality with parenting.
Extraversion
Extraversion reflects the quantity and intensity of interpersonal interaction, activity level, social dom-
inance, and capacity for joy that characterize individuals. A person scoring high on extraversion is
sociable, talkative, energetic, active, optimistic, and fun loving, whereas one scoring low is reserved,
un-exuberant, retiring, and quiet. On the basis of this description, one may might anticipate that
sociability, energy, and positive affect are also reflected in the parental behavior during interactions
with the child and that extraverted individuals function better as parents than less extraverted par-
ents, if only because parenting is a social task involving another—though dependent—person. The
high degree of engagement that is characteristic of the highly extraverted parent may contribute to
more stimulating parenting and more active, assertive parenting behavior in disciplinary encounters.
By contrast, one might hypothesize that persons with higher levels of extraversion and especially
of sociability might have more interest in social exchanges than might be experienced by a parent,
particularly one who stays home all day with children.
With regard to parental warmth, several studies provide evidence that extraversion is positively
associated with responsive, sensitive, emotionally engaged, and stimulating parenting (Belsky, Crnic,
and Woodworth, 1995; Levy-Shiff and Israelashvili, 1988). For example, Levy-Shiff and Israelash-
vili (1988) found that Israeli men scoring high on extraversion manifested more positive affect and
were more involved in father-child play and teaching when interacting with their 9-month olds
than men scoring low on extraversion. Mangelsdorf and her colleagues (1990) discovered similar
personality-parenting associations in a study with mothers and their 9-month-olds. Belsky and col-
leagues (1995) replicated these findings in naturalistic home observations with mother, father, and
their 15- and 21-month-old toddlers. These investigators reported that mothers and fathers alike who
were more extraverted expressed more positive affect toward their children and were more sensitive
when observed at home late in the afternoon and early in the evening. In a study of mothers, fathers,
and their children up to 8 years of age, parents who rated themselves high on extraversion reported
that they engaged in more positive supportive and warm parenting, such as displaying positive affec-
tion (Losoya, Callor, Rowe, and Goldsmith, 1997). However, some other investigations detected no
relation between extraversion and warmth (Clark, Kochanska, and Ready, 2000; Kochanska, Friesen-
borg, Lange, and Martel, 2004; Spinath and O’Connor, 2003). For example, Clark and colleagues
(2000) found no association between extraversion and warmth in a longitudinal study with mothers
of children age 13–15 months. In a sample with German twins and their children, ranging in age
from early childhood through young adulthood, Spinath and O’Connor (2003) detected no effect
between extraversion and self-reported supporting and indulgent parenting.
In light of this inconsistency, notable is the availability of two meta-analyses of the personality-
parenting literature. That by McCabe (2014) was restricted to studies including mothers, cross-sectional
804
analyses, and excluded research on infants and investigations of openness, whereas that by Prinzie,
Stams, Deković, Reijntjes, and Belsky (2009) applied no inclusion restrictions with regard to person-
ality and parenting dimensions and informants. Both efforts revealed a small but statistically signifi-
cant overall effect indicating that parents with higher scores on extraversion are more responsive and
show more warmth in the interactions with their children.
With regard to the relation between extraversion and parental behavioral control, findings are also
mixed. Parental extraversion was not related to consistent tracking of infants during naturalistic obser-
vations (Kochanska et al., 2004). However, in a Dutch sample of two-parent families with a 17-month-
old son, more extraverted mothers and fathers reported less laxness and more reinforcement and
positive discipline (Karreman, van Tuijl, van Aken, and Deković, 2008). In a study of Canadian parents
at high and low risk for major affective disorders, paternal but not maternal extraversion was related
to the structure, predictability, and consistency of parenting provided to 4- to 14-year-old children
(Ellenbogen and Hodgins, 2004). In their meta-analysis, McCabe (2014) and Prinzie et al. (2009)
found modest but significant positive relations between extraversion and behavioral control.
In the case of parental autonomy support, there is little evidence of a link with extraversion. This
proves to be the case in research on parents of infants (Kochanska, Aksan, and Nichols, 2003; Kochan-
ska, Clark, and Goldman, 1997), elementary school-age children (Prinzie et al., 2004), or adolescents
(Branje, van Lieshout, and van Aken, 2004).
On the basis of the evidence reviewed, we conclude that parental extraversion is positively related
to warmth and behavioral control but not to autonomy support. These relations are not moderated
by personality assessment or by methods used to assess parenting or child gender and are robust across
mother and father reports (Prinzie et al., 2009). It should be acknowledged, however, that the size of
the personality effect in question is modest at best.
Agreeableness
Agreeableness reflects one’s interpersonal orientation along a continuum from empathy to antago-
nism in thoughts, feelings, and actions. Theoretically, kind, good-natured, and easygoing parents
have the capacity to provide warmth and protection. The parental role requires concern for others,
and parents with greater ability to empathize with the child are probably better able to identify and
respond to children’s needs. People high in agreeableness likely provide a kind, warm environment
in which the child feels understood and protected. Moreover, parents high in agreeableness likely
interpret child behavior in a more positive manner than those low on this trait. Thus, an agree-
able parent who hears one child cry and recognizes that the sibling might be the source of the first
child’s pain would likely entertain the possibility that some kind of accident occurred rather than
that one sibling harmed another on purpose. Clearly, the basic hypothesis regarding parenting is that
more agreeable individuals should engage in more growth-facilitating parenting and foster respon-
sive and nurturant parenting while respecting the child’s autonomy. There is clear support for this
proposition.
For parental warmth, in Belsky et al. (1995), higher levels of agreeableness predicted greater
maternal (but not paternal) positive affect and lower levels of negative affect. Verhoeven and col-
leagues (2007) reported that more agreeable mothers and fathers provided more supportive care to
their 17-month-old sons than did parents scoring lower on agreeableness. Consistent with these
findings, Losoya et al. (1997) found in their study of parents with children as old as 8 years that
agreeableness was positively associated with supportive parenting. Kochanska et al. (1997) also
observed that lower levels of agreeableness were related to more power-assertive and less responsive
parenting in their study of young children, although in another study by this research team, only
the agreeableness-responsiveness association was replicated (Clark et al., 2000). However, Spinath
and O’Connor (2003) failed to chronicle any relation between agreeableness and warmth in a
805
sample of generally older parents. Nevertheless, results of the meta-analyses of Prinzie et al. (2009)
and McCabe (2014) were consistent with the originally advanced hypothesis. Additional modera-
tor analyses showed that personality-warmth relations vary by parental and child age (Prinzie et al.,
2009). The relation between agreeableness and warmth is less strong for older children and parents.
That the role of parenting behavior changes with age might be advanced as an explanation for the
finding that agreeableness become less important in accounting for parental warmth as children and
parents age. Several investigations revealed declines in parental warmth when children (and parents)
age, especially from early through mid-adolescence (Forehand and Jones, 2002; Shanahan, McHale,
Crouter, and Osgood, 2007). This period is marked by an increase in parent-child conflict while
parent-child closeness wanes.
With regard to the association between parental behavioral control and agreeableness, several
studies found a positive effect. In Belsky et al.’s (1995) research, more agreeable mothers but not
fathers showed more sensitivity during interactions with their firstborn sons age 15 months than
did parents scoring lower on agreeableness. Such mother-specific effects also emerged in a large
investigation of Belgian parents and their children of elementary school-age (Prinzie et al., 2004):
Maternal but not paternal agreeableness was related to lower levels of self-reported laxness; and
mothers with higher levels of agreeableness reported that they were less permissive and provided
less reinforcement of misbehavior of their child. Relatedly, Losoya et al. (1997), studying diverse
low-income mother-toddler dyads, found agreeableness to be positively associated with more
sensitive and positive parenting for those mothers who lived under conditions of low ecological
adversity (Kochanska, Kim, and Nordling, 2012). A few studies failed to chronicle similar findings.
For instance, in a 1-year longitudinal study with mothers and their toddlers, mothers with higher
scores on agreeableness were not more sensitive in interactions with their child during a laboratory
task than mothers who were less agreeable (Smith et al., 2007). Nevertheless, the meta-analyses of
Prinzie et al. (2009) and McCabe (2014) provided support for the hypothesis that agreeableness
and behavioral control would be positively related, thereby indicating that parents who are more
agreeable set limits and provide structure in a more consistent and appropriate way than do those
who are less agreeable. Agreeable people are easygoing, warm, and good natured, and thus people
who are high in agreeableness may be more successful in the provision of a kind, warm environ-
ment in which the child feels understood and protected. Agreeableness reflects also an individual’s
motives to maintain positive social relationships, and is related to the regulation of emotions dur-
ing social interactions (Tobin, Graziano, Vanman, and Tassinary, 2000). Parental emotion regula-
tion may facilitate sensitive responding and caregiving behavior (Rutherford, Wallace, Laurent,
and Mayes, 2014).
With regard to autonomy support, several studies document a significant association with agreeable-
ness. In the research by Belsky et al. (1995), mothers who scored high on agreeableness proved to be
less intrusive during interactions with their toddlers than did other mothers. In the aforementioned
Belgian research, agreeableness was negatively related to parental overreactivity 6 years later assessed
by adolescents (De Haan, Prinzie, and Deković, 2009). Overreactivity was operationalized as the ten-
dency to respond with anger, frustration, meanness, and irritation, and impatiently and aversively to
problematic behavior of their children. Higher levels of agreeableness were associated with less pater-
nal (but not maternal) authoritarianism in a sample of first-year undergraduate students (Peterson,
Smirles, and Wentworth, 1997). Based on 11 investigations, the meta-analysis of Prinzie et al. (2009)
revealed a modest positive association between agreeableness and autonomy support.
The reviewed literature clearly indicates that agreeableness is related to all aspects of parent-
ing under consideration. This means that parents who are friendlier are more responsive, provide
more structure, and support their children’s striving toward autonomy. These parents probably
approach their children in a way that is less likely to initiate or escalate conflictual parent-child
interactions.
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Conscientiousness
Conscientiousness reflects the extent to which a person is well-organized, thorough, and goal ori-
ented. Conscientious persons are dutiful, perseverant, punctual, and organized, possessing a strong
sense of purpose and high standards as well as the capacity to be self-regulated and highly disciplined.
How conscientiousness should relate to parenting behavior is not exactly clear. Parents who score
high on conscientiousness would be expected to impose high standards in parenting, thereby provid-
ing a consistent and well-structured childrearing environment (Huver, Otten, de Vries, and Engels,
2010). Indeed, a person low on conscientiousness, who is easygoing and tending toward carelessness,
may show parenting behavior that might not be very supportive of children’s functioning. High levels
of conscientiousness may point to one’s favor in work situations; it could prove too demanding to a
child. Disorder and chaos, in contrast to organization, are not optimal for a child’s development. So
it can be hypothesized that low levels of conscientiousness predict parenting behavior that might not
be very supportive of children’s functioning.
With regard to warmth, Losoya et al. (1997) and Cumberland-Li, Eisenberg, Champion, Gershoff,
and Fabes, (2003) found conscientiousness to be positively related to supportive parenting. Clark and
associates (2000) chronicled similar relations when looking at mothers of toddlers, observing that
more conscientious mothers were more responsive than less conscientious mothers. In a sample of
mothers with infants, Kochanska and colleagues (2004) discerned positive longitudinal associations
between warmth and maternal conscientiousness. More conscientious mothers were more respon-
sive than less conscientious mothers. Puff and Renk (2016), studying mothers of young children who
ranged in age from 2 to 6 years, rated their own personality and parenting behavior. Conscientious-
ness showed a negative curvilinear association with mothers’ warmth, involvement, and positive rein-
forcement. Bornstein, Hahn, and Haynes (2011) reported a similar finding in a community sample of
European American mothers of firstborn 20-month-old children. Conscientiousness was associated
with exploratory and symbolic play in a nonlinear way, indicating that conscientiousness is a posi-
tive feature but disorder is typically not in children’s best interest. Finally, research which discounted
effects of genes on both personality and parenting failed to discern an association between conscien-
tiousness and supportive parenting in a sample with German twins (Spinath and O’Connor, 2003).
Neitzel and Stright (2004) observed mother-child interactions during problem-solving tasks research
on family dyads consisting of preschool children and their mothers. Maternal conscientiousness was
negatively but not significantly related to encouragement.
Both previously mentioned meta-analyses of personality-parenting associations revealed small but
significant relations between conscientiousness and warmth, indicating that greater conscientiousness
was associated with greater parental warmth (McCabe et al., 2014; Prinzie et al., 2009). However,
in the meta-analysis of McCabe (2014), the direction of effect changed when all personality char-
acteristics were taken into account simultaneously. Now a negative association emerged between
conscientiousness and warmth. This intriguing result would seem to suggest that the positive relation
repeatedly chronicled in the literature can be explained by the variance shared by conscientiousness
and other personality characteristics. Another possible explanation is that maladaptive aspects of high
conscientiousness, such as perfectionism or workaholism (Widiger and Costa, 2002; 2012), are related
with less supportive parenting. Recall that this is what the aforementioned work of Puff and Renk
(2016) revealed. Future personality-parenting investigators should consider this possibility.
With regard to the relation between behavioral control and conscientiousness, findings are mixed.
Ellenbogen and Hodgins (2004) studied this association in the previously mentioned sample of par-
ents at high risk for major affective disorders who had a child between 4 and 14 years of age. Highly
conscientious parents provided more structure to their children than those with low or average
scores. Peterson et al. (1997) discerned similar results in a sample of first-year undergraduate students
and their parents. Mothers and fathers who were more conscientious provided more structure and
807
had more conversations about family rules. A finding that was replicated in a longitudinal investi-
gation with parents of adolescents (Oliver, Wright Guerin, and Coffman, 2009). Notably, however,
other investigations failed to detect a relation between conscientiousness and behavioral control. For
example, in a multicultural sample of mothers and their toddlers, Peterson and colleagues (1997)
evaluated whether maternal conscientiousness was related to maternal sensitivity as observed dur-
ing free play. Differences in attention and contingent responses to the affect and level of arousal and
interests proved not to be. Mangelsdorf and colleagues (2000) examined the joint contribution of
maternal and infant characteristics to the quality of attachment and reported that maternal consci-
entiousness was not related to sensitivity in mother-infant interactions during a structured task in
the laboratory.
Despite the apparent inconsistency in the findings just shared, the meta-analyses of McCabe
(2014) and Prinzie et al. (2009) revealed a positive association between conscientiousness and behav-
ioral control, indicating that parents who score high on conscientiousness provide more structure and
use more positive control practices such as limit setting and reinforcement.
For autonomy support, results are not consistent. Neitzel and Stright (2004) discovered that con-
scientious mothers reported more restrictiveness and overcontrolling behavior in a sample with
preschool children and their mothers, whereas Losoya and colleagues (1997) found that more con-
scientious mothers were less strict and used less negative control in their interactions with young
children. Clark and colleagues in contrast (2000) could not identify a significant relation between
maternal conscientiousness and power assertion, an aspect of autonomy support during observations
in disciplinary contexts in a study with mothers of infants, a finding that was replicated by Karreman
et al. (2008). On the basis of 17 studies, Prinzie et al. (2009) detected no effect between parental
conscientiousness and autonomy support.
On the basis of the reviewed research, we conclude that parental conscientiousness is positively
related to warmth and behavioral control but not to autonomy support. The association with
warmth and behavioral control is similar for fathers and mothers and not dependent on method.
That parents’ conscientiousness proved more strongly related to their behavioral control, compared
with autonomy support versus coercion, is interesting in light of the review of Kendler and Baker
(2007) on the heritability of parenting. These scholars theorized that this pattern might arise because
positive emotionality and structure in parent-child relationships is strongly affected by the genetically
influenced personality of both parent and child. By contrast, parental coercive control may be more
like a social attitude—an approach toward parenting learned by the parents during their own life
experiences and which they attempt to apply equally to all their children.
Emotional Stability (Versus Neuroticism)

Individuals who score low in neuroticism tend to be more emotionally stable and less reactive to
stress, whereas people high in neuroticism tend to be easily distressed, anxious, tense, nervous, and
lack emotional stability. This proneness toward negative emotionality would be expected to under-
mine parents’ ability to initiate and maintain positive affective, sensitive, and supportive interactions
with the child, and may limit a parent’s ability and willingness to respond adequately to a child’s sig-
nals. A disposition to experience anxiety could lead to intrusive and overprotective parenting (Sch-
neider et al., 2009; Van der Bruggen, Stams, and Bögels, 2008). Parents low on emotional stability
might be more likely than others to attribute negative intentions to their (young) children when they
misbehave, which can itself engender harsh parenting (Bornstein et al., 2011). Conversely, parents
scoring low on emotional stability may distance themselves from their relationship with the child,
thereby failing to provide structure and guidance. The overall result is likely to be highly unpredict-
able, inconsistent parenting (Belsky and Jaffee, 2006; Clark et al., 2000).
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A great deal of work has focused on the relation between maternal depression and parenting
(Lovejoy et al., 2000). But because this is not a chapter concerned with psychopathology but rather
with personality, consideration is restricted to research dealing with emotional stability or negative
affect measured as a continuous variable in nonclinical samples.
With regard to parental warmth, emotional stability has consistently been associated with warm
parenting. Kochanska and colleagues (2004) reported that maternal emotional stability was linked
to more positive, responsive, and sensitive parenting of infants. Mothers high on emotional stability
co-created a more positive affective ambience with their infants. For fathers, emotional stability was
only marginally related to such ambience. This link between emotional stability and responsiveness
was found to endure well into the preschool and early school years (Kochanska et al., 2003; Olsen,
Martin, and Halverson, 1999). In a sample of firstborn young children Belsky and colleagues (1995)
conducted naturalistic home observations of mothering and fathering. Emotionally stable mothers
and fathers were more affectively positive and sensitive. In a longitudinal study of primary school
children covering 6 years, De Haan and colleagues (2009) found bivariate correlations between
emotional stability and warm parenting, but this association was not significant in the multivariate
analyses that included other personality traits. This finding is consistent with previous research of
Smith et al. (2007) that also took all Big Five dimensions into account.
Meta-analytic findings revealed a significant association between emotional stability and
warmth (McCabe, 2014; Prinzie et al., 2009). Parents who manifest higher levels emotional stabil-
ity engage in more warm parenting. However, moderator analyses revealed that the personality-
warmth relation varied by parent and child age. The older the parent and the child, the less strong
the relation between emotional stability and warmth. That the nature of parenting changes with
age might be advanced as an explanation for the finding that emotional stability becomes less
important in accounting for parental warmth as children and parents age. Warmth has been almost
universally recognized as a central influence in early socialization, especially for the formation of
a secure attachment (Rothbaum and Weisz, 1994). Especially with young children, warm parent-
ing gives children the sense that they are respected and loved and strengthens their motivation to
obey and cooperate with their parents (Grusec et al., 2000). Several studies registered declines in
parental warmth when children and parents age, especially from early through mid-adolescence
(Shanahan et al., 2007). This period is characterized by an increase in parent-child disputes, as
parent-child closeness decreases.
Also study design seemed to moderate the emotional stability-warmth association. Stronger asso-
ciations were found in prospective longitudinal studies than in cross-sectional studies (Prinzie et al.,
2009). That some effect sizes are stronger in longitudinal studies compared with cross-sectional stud-
ies is in line with the detection of Kochanska and colleagues (2004) that relations between personal-
ity and parenting seem to grow stronger with the passage of time, as the dyadic relationship pattern
coalesced.
In the meta-analysis of McCabe (2014), the emotional stability-warmth association depended
on the parenting subdimension. The association between emotional stability and maternal warmth
was larger for studies that measured rejection than those that measured acceptance. This result is
in line with the way this personality dimension has been described in the literature. People with
higher levels of neuroticism are prone to experience irritability and hostility (Caspi et al., 2005;
Goldberg, 1993). These characteristics may be expected to be associated with higher levels of reject-
ing behaviors (i.e., rejection) more so than with lower levels of engaged and supportive behaviors
(i.e., acceptance). However, in the multivariate analysis including the Big Five as well as maternal
psychopathology, emotional stability did not explain a significant portion of variance in maternal
warmth. Given the well-established overlap between emotional (in)stability and psychopathology, it
is unfortunate that analyses were not conducted including only the other four Big Five traits to see
809
whether the effects of emotional stability would also have disappeared under those analytic condi-
tions; we think not.
With regard to the association between parental behavioral control and emotional stability, several
investigations reported a positive effect. Fish and Stifter (1993) found in sample of mothers with
5-month-old infants that greater emotional stability was related to more parenting sensitivity and
structure. More specifically, more emotionally stable mothers engaged in more behavior that fol-
lowed the baby’s signals and that facilitated the baby’s self-regulation than did other mothers. In a
Dutch sample of 17-month-old boys, Verhoeven and colleagues (2007) reported a negative associa-
tion between paternal and maternal emotional stability and lack of structure. This pattern is also
found in children at other developmental phases. For example, parents’ high neuroticism was associ-
ated with more negative emotional interactions and lower sensitivity for their toddlers (Belsky et al.,
1995). In Ellenbogen and Hodgins (2004), parents with high scores on emotional stability provided
more structure to their children 4–14 years of age than those with low or average scores. The parents
with higher levels of neuroticism provided lower levels of support to their children as well as a lack
of organization, consistency, and predictability.
The meta-analysis of Prinzie et al. (2009) included 13 studies and found an overall positive corre-
lation between emotional stability and behavioral control, an effect that is very similar to that which
emerged in McCabe’s (2014) meta-analysis. Parents with higher levels of emotional stability engage
in more structured parenting. These parents may be more able to provide a more consistent and
structured childrearing environment.
For parental autonomy support, there are some inconsistent findings. Some studies focusing on
infants and young children indicate higher levels of parental emotional stability and show more
autonomy supportive interactions with their children (see, e.g., Ellenbogen, and Hodgins, 2004;
Mangelsdorf, McHale, Diener, Goldstein, and Lehn, 2000), whereas other studies report just the
reverse: Clark and colleagues (2000) observed that mothers who were low in emotional stability used
a more controlling or forceful style in discipline contexts with their young toddlers. In the Virginia
Twin Study, higher levels of emotional stability were found to be associated with lower levels of
overprotection (Kendler, Sham, and MacLean, 1997).
On the basis of 21 studies, Prinzie and colleagues (2009) reported a small but significant effect
size for the association between emotional stability and autonomy support. Parents with greater
emotional stability are probably more inclined to tolerate or even support children’s striving toward
autonomy, viewing it in a positive light rather than as an attack on parental authority. This result is
consistent with findings indicating that less emotionally stable and less agreeable parents are more
likely to attribute negative intentions to their young children when they misbehave (Bugental and
Shennum, 1984). Moreover, more emotionally stable parents are less prone to frustration, distress,
irritation, and anger, which often result in harsh discipline, and probably approach their children in
a way that is less likely to initiate or escalate conflictual interactions.
The reviewed literature clearly indicates that emotional stability is related to all parenting dimen-
sions that we have been considering. This means that more emotionally stable parents are more
sensitive, provide more structure, and are more inclined to support their children’s striving toward
autonomy than less emotionally stable parents. These seemingly psychologically healthier parents
probably approach their children in a way that is less likely to initiate or escalate conflictual parent-
child interactions than other parents.
Openness to Experience (Autonomy, Intellect)

Openness to experience reflects the extent to which a person enjoys new experiences, has broad
interests, is imaginative, and approaches life in a creative, philosophical, and inquisitive way. Parents
scoring high on this dimension would be expected to be involved with the child and to provide
810
high levels of stimulation. Such parents should be quite flexible and open to novel, nontraditional
parenting approaches, and eager to learn about children’s individual qualities (Koenig, Barry, and
Kochanska, 2010).
With regard to the association between openness to experience and parental warmth, empirical
evidence is mixed. Levy-Shiff and Israelashvili (1988) observed that Israeli fathers who were more
open to experience engaged in more basic caregiving of their infants than fathers less open to expe-
rience, perhaps because the father role itself is a new experience worth exploring for these highly
open men. In the study of Metsäpelto and Pulkkinen (2003), mothers and fathers with higher levels
of openness were more nurturing with their elementary school-age children. This result is in line
with the investigation of Losoya and colleagues (1997), who found that openness was positively
related to positive parenting for mothers and fathers alike in a sample of children under the age of
8 years. However, in a study with European American mothers and their firstborn 20-month-olds,
no significant association emerged between openness and maternal sensitivity (Bornstein, Hendricks,
Haynes, and Painter, 2007), whereas in a sample with parents of infants, openness was differentially
predictive of mothers’ and fathers’ responsiveness. Paternal but not maternal openness was related
to positive ambience during observations of multiple typical daily care activities, chores, and play
routines (Kochanska et al., 2004). Prinzie and colleagues’ (2009) meta-analysis revealed a small but
statistically significant association between openness and warmth. Parents with higher levels of open-
ness show more positive affect and higher levels of responsiveness in interactions with their child.
Only a handful studies to date has addressed the link between openness to experience and paren-
tal behavioral control. Some investigations indicate that parents with higher levels of openness were
less lax and more consistent in interactions with their elementary school-age children (Prinzie et al.,
2004), whereas researches by several others with parents of infants (Clark et al., 2000) or toddlers
(Karreman et al., 2008) did not discern associations. In their meta-analysis, Prinzie and colleagues
(2009) detected a small positive correlation. Parents with higher levels of openness are more inclined
to set and enforce reasonable rules and standards, and to provide clear expectations in combination
with consistent and appropriate limit setting than other parents.
With regard to autonomy support and openness, Neitzel and Stright (2004) observed that those
mothers who were more rather than less open were more likely to regulate task difficulty, an effect
that was moderated by mother education. When mothers had less education, those with lower levels
of openness were less likely to encourage their child’s active role than mothers high in openness.
However, when mothers were highly educated, openness was not related to autonomy support.
Metsäpelto and Pulkkinen (2003) found in a longitudinal Finnish study with mothers and fathers of
young children that lower levels of openness were related to more parental restrictiveness.
Meta-analytic estimates of Prinzie et al. (2009) pointed to a small but significant positive associa-
tion between openness and parental autonomy support, indicating that mothers and fathers who are
more open to new experiences are more supportive of their children’s autonomy and autonomy
seeking. It seems likely that parents who are more open are accepting of their children’s exploration
of the world and desire to act on it independently, perhaps even recognizing themselves in their
child’s pursuit of agency.
On the basis of the reviewed literature, we conclude that openness to experience is significantly
related to all three parenting dimensions considered herein. Parents with higher levels of openness to
experience provide care that is more supportive, sensitive, responsive, and intellectually stimulating
than do other parents.
Summary
This review of research on personality and parenting makes clear that a parent’s personality, in terms
of the Big Five, is meaningfully, even if modestly, related to parenting. Whereas each of the Big Five
811
traits proved to be related to parental warmth and behavioral control, in the case of autonomy sup-
port, this was true only for agreeableness and emotional stability. More specifically, parents who man-
ifest higher levels of extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability, and openness
engage in more warm, responsive, and structured parenting. These traits seem conducive to meeting
the requirements of a demanding task such as parenting: Providing long-term warmth, caring and
structure, and socializing their children toward distant goals. In addition, parents who score higher on
agreeableness and emotional stability allow and encourage more autonomy in their children. Taken
together, these results indicate that personality can be seen as an inner resource that to a certain
degree influences parenting (Kochanska, Aksan, Penney, and Boldt, 2007).
That empirical evidence demonstrates that parental personality traits are more strongly related
to warmth and behavioral control, compared with autonomy support, is interesting in light of the
literature on the heritability of parenting (Kendler and Baker, 2007). Some scholars theorize that
supportive parenting, regardless of whether the parent or the child reports, is more heritable than
parental control, may be explained by the fact that positive emotionality in parent-child relationships
is strongly influenced by the genetically influenced personality of both parent and child (Avinun and
Knafo, 2014; Klahr and Burt, 2014). By contrast, parental coercive control, the opposite of autonomy
support, may be more like a social attitude—a parenting style learned by parents during their own
life experiences and which they strive to apply equally to all their children. Irrespective of whether
heritability is considered greater in the case of warmth and structure than coercive control, behavior-
genetic research pertaining to both personality and parenting raises the very real prospect that the
linkages detected between personality and parenting are genetically mediated.
Associations between the Big Five personality dimensions and the parenting dimensions were
generally small in magnitude. It is important neither to exaggerate nor to minimize the practical sig-
nificance of these effects. Although one should not disregard the likelihood that bivariate effects may
overestimate possible causal links between constructs (Tabachnick and Fidell, 2001), the small effect
sizes that were detected between parent personality and parenting should be considered in the light
of the following considerations. First, almost all investigations of associations between personality
and parenting are restricted by the fact that they have examined the potential effects of personality
on parenting only one trait at a time (for exceptions, see Bornstein et al., 2011; De Haan, Deković,
and Prinzie, 2012; Prinzie et al., 2004). Thus, one can wonder not simply about whether this or that
particular Big Five trait is associated with parenting, but about how much they collectively influence
parenting. As McCabe (2014) has shown in her meta-analyses, univariate and multivariate analyses
may lead to somewhat different results. Multivariate analyses including all Big Five factors and paren-
tal psychopathology revealed that extraversion explained no significant portion of maternal control
after accounting for correlations among maternal personality and psychopathology, whereas the
association between agreeableness and maternal parenting became stronger.
A second consideration concerns effects sizes. The small effect sizes reported in the literature are
very similar to the effects of personality on other domains, such as academic performance (Poropat,
2009; Schneider and Preckel, 2017) or work outcome (Huang, Ryan, Zabel, and Palmer, 2014). As
McCartney and Rosenthal (2000) emphasized, even small effect sizes can be of theoretical and prac-
tical importance. Because the effects of personality (as well as of parenting) accumulate over a child’s
lifetime, a focus on a single parenting behavior measured at a single point in time may underesti-
mate the contribution of personality to parenting, and thus to children’s development. Then there
is the fact that small effects are to be expected when investigating predictors of multiply determined
behavior (Ahadi and Diener, 1989) such as parenting. As Belsky (1984) outlined in his process
model of parenting, contextual factors such as work, the marriage relationship, and social networks
or child characteristics, such as temperament, also affect parenting, not just parental psychological
characteristics.
812
Taken together, this review of research on personality and parenting indicates that if a child had
to choose a parent, his or her development would likely benefit from choosing a parent who is high
in emotional stability, extraversion, agreeableness, openness to experience, and conscientiousness.
This is because such parents provide care that is more supportive, sensitive, responsive, and autonomy
stimulating, almost irrespective of the child’s age.
Future Directions in Theory and Research on

This chapter reveals how limited the relevant database on personality-parenting relations really is.
Compared with studies on parenting and child development, relatively few studies have examined
relations between personality and parenting. In addition, most inquiries have been cross-sectional in
design, limiting any causal inferences that might otherwise be established due (at least) to the absence
of temporal ordering between predictor and outcome. Future prospective longitudinal studies are
needed to deepen our understanding of the role that parent personality plays in parenting behavior.
All of the studies included in this review examined only one child in a family. Given behavior-
genetic evidence that non-shared environmental effects are often larger than shared ones (Turkheim
and Waldron, 2000), questions can be raised as to whether personality “effects” on parenting are
similar across children within the same family. In addition, the majority of the studies reviewed in this
chapter are conducted in a Western culture (United States or Europe) their generalizability to non-
Western countries is still unknown and has yet to be established. This omission is more conspicuous
when one considers the research that supports the notion that culture pervasively influences who
parents (Leinaweaver, 2014) as well as how parents view parenting and how they parent (Bornstein,
2016). In a study with mothers of firstborn 20-month old children from seven countries Bornstein
and colleagues (2007) showed that the Big Five relate differentially to diverse parenting cognitions.
Neuroticism, for example, was negatively related to parental competence and satisfaction in predomi-
nantly individualistic cultures (United States, Italy, Belgium, and Israel) but an inverse pattern was
found in predominantly collectivistic cultures (Argentina, Japan, and South Korea). Clearly, future
research should explore whether the associations between personality and parenting summarized in
this chapter generalize to other cultures. Furthermore, although research has provided evidence that
personality and psychopathology are not independent constructs, research on determinants of par-
enting has mainly focused on personality and psychopathology characteristics independently, thereby
limiting a more comprehensive understanding of how both continuous constructs affect parenting
(McCabe, 2014). Emerging models of mental disorders support a dimensional conceptualization of
psychopathology in which personality and psychopathology are considered as elements along the
same spectrum, rather than a dichotomy between normal (personality) and abnormal (psychopathol-
ogy) psychological characteristics (Klein, Dyson, Kujawa, and Kotov, 2012; Kotov, Gamez, Schmidt,
and Watson, 2010). The integration of the personality-parenting literature and the psychopathology-
parenting literature may advance insight into the potential influence of parental psychological char-
acteristics on parenting behavior and may generate novel hypotheses with regard to the determinants
of parenting. Beyond these obvious directions for future research, two others meriting consideration
are discussed in this section, the first dealing with mediators and the second with moderators of
personality-parenting associations.
Mediators of Personality-Parenting Associations

It is one thing to observe that a parent’s psychological make-up, that is, their personality, is predic-
tive of their parenting; it is quite another to understand the mechanisms responsible for this relation.
813
Three possibilities that have received some limited attention in the literature deserve more attention
in the future. The first involves parental competence, the second involves attributions, and the third
involves mood and emotion.
Parental sense of competence (i.e., the belief of parents that they can effectively manage parent-
ing tasks) is believed to motivate and shape behavior (Coleman and Karraker, 1997; McGillicuddy-
DeLisi and Sigel, 1995; Schuengel and Oosterman, 2019). Existing work shows that maternal sense
of competence is an important predictor of mothers’ capacity to provide an adaptive, stimulating,
and nurturing childrearing environment (Locke and Prinz, 2002). De Haan and colleagues (2009)
showed that parental sense of competence is a psychological mechanism that explains why parental
personality is important for both overreactive and warm parenting. In a prospective longitudinal
Belgian study, extraversion and agreeableness predisposed mothers and fathers to a higher sense of
competence, which, in turn, was related to warmer, and less overreactive, parenting 6 years later.
Parents with a lower sense of competence, who feel they are not able to change their child’s negative
behavior, may avoid the challenging task of disciplining their child in an effortful way. Instead, it is
plausible that they—unintentionally—use more overreactive techniques such as yelling and scream-
ing in an effort to control the child.
There is also increasing appreciation in developmental research that attributions play an important
role in close relationships, including in the parent-child relationship (Bugental and Corpuz, 2019).
Attributions can be defined as interpretations of causations of events and behavior (Bornstein, 2016).
Parenting attributions refer to ascribed meanings and definitions of a child’s behavior and can in this
way affect parenting behavior. Unlike internal attributions, which highlight factors in the person
as the cause of behavior, external attributions emphasize situational factors that contribute to the
cause of behavior. An internal attribution might refer a parent’s interpretation of a child’s behavior
as intentional and deliberate, whereas an external attribution might refer to a parent’s interpretation
of a child’s behavior as involuntary, transient, and even accidental (Coplan, Hastings, Lagacé-Séguin,
and Moulton, 2002).
Bugental and Shennum (1984) provided empirical evidence that mothers with more dysfunc-
tional attributional styles respond to children in ways that enhance or maintain the child’s difficult
behavior. Parents who think their child is whining because he is fatigued are prone to respond to
their child in a quite different (i.e., more sensitive) manner than when they believe the child is
attempting to manipulate them. Belsky and Jaffee (2006) suggested that associations such as these
between attributions and personality on the one hand and between attributions and parenting on
the other hand can be part of a dynamic process by which personality influences parenting. Perhaps
most notable in this regard is the seemingly real possibility that less agreeable and less emotional
stable parents are most likely to attribute negative intentions to their young children when they mis-
behave, and it is through this process that less emotionally stable and less trusting (i.e., less agreeable)
individuals come to engage in more ineffective parenting.
Given the clear associations between attributions and emotions, another hypothesis formulated
by Belsky and Jaffee (2006) is that emotions mediate the effect of personality on parenting—in
much the same way that attributions might (Leerkes and Augustine, 2019). Emotion is central to the
personality trait emotional stability, also labeled “negative affectivity,” and extraversion, sometimes
referred to in terms of “positive affectivity.” Few studies to date have investigated whether the per-
sonality-parenting relation is mediated by emotional expressions. In a longitudinal study with moth-
ers and toddlers, Smith et al. (2007) observed maternal parenting and positive emotional expression
during a free-play session. Personality characteristics were associated with positive emotional expres-
sions of mothers, and these emotional expressions, in turn, were related to more maternal sensitivity
observed during interactions with toddlers. Belsky and colleagues (1995) explored the mediating
impact of transient mood on personality parenting associations during naturalistic home observa-
tions of mothers and fathers and their firstborn son. Extraversion, with the experience of positive
814
emotions as a core feature, predicted mothers’ expressions of positive but not negative affect toward
their toddlers, whereas emotional stability, with the experience of negative emotions as a core feature,
predicted mothers’ expressions of negative but not positive affect. In light of these results and the
findings concerning attributions, an important goal for future research will be to uncover processes
that mediate personality effects on parenting.
Moderators of Personality-Parenting Associations

Most of the studies reviewed in this chapter focused on the main effects of parental personality on
parenting. Meta-analyses have pointed out that parental age moderates the relation between person-
ality and parenting (Prinzie et al., 2009). Research with young parents indicates that more agreeable
parents are more sensitive (Belsky et al., 1995; Losoya et al., 1997), but studies with samples of gen-
erally older parents failed to chronicle any relation (see, e.g., Spinath and O’Connor, 2003). Differ-
ences in psychological maturity may explain why agreeableness becomes less important as parents
age in accounting for their responsiveness, whereas emotional stability appears more important as a
predictor of parenting as parents age. Meta-analyses on personality development reveal that neuroti-
cism and agreeableness have different nomothetic developmental trajectories (Roberts, Walton, and
Viechtbauer, 2006). That is, people increase in emotional stability, especially in young adulthood
(age 20–40). In contrast, agreeableness changes only in old age. Assuming that agreeableness and
neuroticism are largely independent dimensions, they may have different relations to maturity which
together may account for differences in the reviewed literature.
The way parental personality affects parenting may depend on several other factors that are pro-
posed in Belsky’s (1984) process model on determinants of parenting. There is some empirical evi-
dence that child temperament moderates personality-parenting relations (Latzman, Elkovitch, and
Clark, 2009). Given that individual differences are amplified under stress (Caspi and Moffitt, 1993),
children with personality characteristics related to difficult temperament (i.e., low levels of extraver-
sion, conscientiousness, and emotional stability) might be a source of parenting stress (Koenig et al.,
2010). As parental emotional stability influences coping styles (Connor-Smith and Flachsbart, 2007),
differences in this trait may be more strongly related to parenting for children with “difficult” person-
ality characteristics. This hypothesis is also in accordance with the goodness-of-fit models (Thomas
and Chess, 1977) that emphasize the interplay between parental personality and child personality.
Empirical evidence indicates that during childhood, child personality characteristics can evoke
differential reactions from parents, thereby influencing future interactions (Clark et al., 2000; Coplan,
Arbeau, and Armer, 2008; Hannigan, McAdams, Plomin, and Eley, 2017; Kochanska et al., 2004).
For instance, on the basis of cross-sectional data, Coplan, Reichel, and Rowan (2009) reported that
maternal emotional stability was more strongly associated with overprotective parenting at higher
levels of child shyness. In a longitudinal study of fathers of adolescents, higher levels of paternal emo-
tional stability were associated with less adolescent perceived overreactive and more positive parent-
ing behaviors when children were high on extraversion, benevolence, conscientiousness, emotional
stability, and imagination (Prinzie et al., 2012). Children with high scores on these characteristics
may evoke more supportive parenting and may be more easily guided. Children with lower scores
on benevolence are more irritable and dominant and less compliant. These children may be a greater
source of stress for parents. These findings provide empirical evidence for a goodness-of-fit model of
parenting in which a match between parent and child characteristics is important. They indicate that
challenges resulting from children’s personality characteristics seem to amplify associations between
parental personality and parenting. The growing empirical support for the moderating effects of
child personality characteristics may stimulate research on the moderating effect of other deter
minants of parenting such as the quality of parents’ marriages or parents’ occupational experiences.
These are issues which future research should address.
815
Conclusion
In this chapter, we have reviewed history and theory concerning the study of personality and parent-
ing and presented the state of the art of contemporary research on personality-parenting associations.
We have seen that for a long time, scientists neglected personality characteristics in research on the
determinants of parenting, in considerable measure in reaction to Mischel’s critique of the field of
personality and also in response to the increasing influence of ecological theory (Bronfenbrenner,
1979). By emphasizing the role of social context in child development, the importance of individual
differences in parents faded to the background. We have seen further that because many develop-
mental investigators have not kept up with developments in the field of personality psychology, the
power of the Big Five to capture much of the variation in adult personality has simply not been
sufficiently appreciated. Moreover, when it came to studying parental psychological characteristics,
parenting research has mainly focused on personality or psychopathology separately, although there
is growing evidence that the two are not independent. We noted that both fields of study should
be integrated, and we highlighted other directions for future research. Undoubtedly, in the coming
years, we will increase our understanding of the mediators and moderators of personality-parenting
associations and the role of personality in shaping parenting relative to other determinants.
Acknowledgments
The first author gratefully acknowledges the support and the thoughtful comments of Didier Gimonnet.
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24
PSYCHOANALYSIS AND
PARENTHOOD
Introduction
Parenthood is one of the most central of adult social roles and a subjective experience endowed with
particular meanings fashioned over a lifetime. Although a couple may anticipate and plan for the first
birth and the transition to parenthood, evidence from studies of the transition to parenthood suggests
that prospective parents cannot fully anticipate the significance of caring for the baby (Bibring, 1959).
Furthermore, as the psychoanalyst Benedek (1973) observed, once a woman or man has become a
parent, one is a parent as long as there is memory; Benedek also suggested that even following the
years of active parenting, mothers and fathers continue to feel particular responsibility and affection
for their offspring. Across the course of life, parents continue to induct their offspring into new roles
through forward socialization, just as offspring continue through reciprocal socialization to influence
parental conceptions of self and management of such adult roles as being parents of young adults.
This process of continued reciprocal socialization across the course of adult life is experienced by
both parents and offspring in ways shaped by their own conceptions of self, their unique life history
and accompanying memories and hopes, and living in a particular time and place.
The present chapter considers parenthood across the course of adult life from the dual perspective
of psychoanalysis and the contemporary social context of adult lives in the United States. Acknowledg-
ing the many satisfactions of being a parent, parents in contemporary society all too often experience
feelings of role strain, overload, and conflict (Cohler, 1985). More than five decades ago, ethnographic
and comparative cross-cultural study showed the parenthood was a greater source of anxiety and hostil-
ity for U. S. American parents as contrasted with those in the six other cultures around the world for
whom comparative data were available (Fischer and Fischer, 1963; Minturn and Lambert, 1964). This
anxiety regarding being a competent parent is also reflected in the preoccupation of parents in our
society with guides and primers regarding childcare, and with feelings of responsibility for how children
“turn out” as adults (Clarke-Stewart, 1978; Ryff, Schmutte, and Lee, 1996).
This chapter first considers those aspects of psychoanalytic thinking that are particularly germane
to the study of parenthood, and then reviews particular psychoanalytic contributions to the study of
parenthood.The chapter then considers several areas in which psychoanalytic perspectives have been
used in the systematic study of parenthood. Perhaps the best known of these contributions has con-
cerned the study of pregnancy and the meaning for prospective parents (particularly mothers) of the
transition to parenthood. Additional areas in which psychoanalysis has made a contribution to the
study of parenthood include understanding the basis of parental contributions to the quality of the
823
child’s attachments to others and study of the father’s role in the family. The chapter concludes with
discussion of additional areas where psychoanalysis can make a contribution to the study of parent-
hood, including parenthood within lesbian and gay families, parenting, the lives of families living in
the midst of social disadvantage, and the study of family life following divorce.
Psychoanalysis as a Perspective for the Study of Parenthood

Psychoanalysis is among the most complex and often misunderstood perspectives on the study of
social life and personal development. Referring both to a method for the study of wish or intent and
a method of intervention among those experiencing distress in the conduct of their life, “psycho
analysis” was a term used by the Viennese physician S. Freud (1856–1939) for a method of observa-
tion founded on the study of associations that his patients made between thoughts that occurred to
them and that were then the subject of communications to S. Freud and realized through action and
the daily round. As a result of listening carefully to these communications, S. Freud was able to assist
his analysands to understand the significance of their own life experiences and help analysands to
realize enhanced personal vitality through recognition of an inevitable conflict between the experi-
ence of desire founded initially in the child’s caregiving experiences within the family, but necessar-
ily remaining out of conscious awareness as a consequence of taboos imposed by social reality, but
symbolically enacted as hysterical symptoms.
As a result of S. Freud’s careful clinical observations with his first analysands, he was prompted to
develop a comprehensive statement of mental life. In the introduction to The Interpretation of Dreams
(S. Freud, 1900), editor and translator Strachey (1958) noted that in his early psychoanalytic study, S.
Freud observed the compulsion among both his analysands and himself to connect ideas coming to
mind or “associations.” Apparently meaningless ideas made sense as a train of thought to which both
he and his analysands were able to attach meanings. S. Freud’s emphasis on wish or intent, revealed
through the meanings that his analysands attributed to relationships, including that with S. Freud
himself, together with realization that cultural context provides the template within which these
meanings are organized (Chodorow, 1999; Geertz, 1973, 1974; Kakar, 1995; Obeysekere, 1990), rep-
resents the foundation of psychoanalysis as a method of study in the human sciences. S. Freud’s focus
on careful listening to the pattern of the analysand’s associations and the meanings made of those
associations has provided a method of study relevant in the clinical context and in the study of the
meanings which we make of all aspects of our lives including the experience of parenthood (Cohler
and deBoer, 1996; Friedman, 2000; Hoffman, 1996, 1998; Schafer, 1980, 1981, 1992).
S. Freud recognized the importance of understanding the meanings that we make of our experi-
ences with others in the family even prior to his father’s death in October 1896. However, in the
aftermath of this loss, S. Freud recognized his feelings of sadness and accompanying feelings of joy
and relief that he traced to what he saw as an inevitable rivalry between fathers and sons beginning
in early childhood but reverberating across the course of life (Gay, 1988). S. Freud (1900, 1910a,
1910b) saw in Sophocles’s drama of Oedipus the king an example of this powerful wish that inevi-
tably arises within the family of early childhood when the little boy first realizes that there is a rival
for his mother‘s attentions (Rudnytsky, 1987). Ideally, over time, the little boy resolves these feelings
of rivalry by seeking to become like his father and going into the world to find a woman for him-
self like his remembered mother of early childhood. For the little girl, S. Freud saw the problem as
symmetrical: Although the little boy was able to maintain his relationship with his primary caregiver
and take his father as a rival, for the little girl, caregiver and rival were the same, leading to lifelong
struggle between these two generations of women within the family.
S. Freud described his own self-exploration in the wake of his father’s death (Anzieu, 1986; Gay,
1988) as a psychoanalysis, marking the beginning of what has since become a unique means of
inquiry regarding wish and intent in mental life (Anzieu, 1986). Ross (1984) observed that already
824
Psychoanalysis and Parenthood
within a week of the first anniversary of his father’s death, S. Freud had written to his Berlin corre-
spondent, Fliess, of the parallel between his feelings regarding his father and Oedipus’s deed in slaying
his father. An early result of his self-analysis, he reports to Fliess (S. Freud, 1897–1904, p. 272) that
a single idea of general value dawned on me. I have found, in my own case too, [the phe-
nomenon of] being in love with my mother and jealous of my father, and I now consider
it a universal event in early childhood.
This observation, fundamental for the subsequent elaboration of psychoanalysis as a human science,
focuses on the part of the son in this drama. What S. Freud neglected to consider was the callous
act on the part of Laius abandoning his infant son because of his own needs and fears, and more
generally the problem of parents whose own preoccupations are placed before the best interests of
the child. Ross (1982a) observed that S. Freud neglected Laius’s active role in the events leading up
to their final and fateful confrontation. Issues of incest and taboo haunt the House of Atreus from its
origins in the bad parenting reflected in the birth of Dionysus, heir of Zeus and the human Semele,
abandoned by his god father and denied his own legitimacy as a god.
S. Freud’s self-analysis, and the field of study that it inspired, has presented three problems in
using psychoanalysis in the study of parenthood: In the first place, beginning with S. Freud’s own
self-analysis, psychoanalysis has been a psychology of offspring struggling with feelings about the
remembered parents of early childhood. In the second place, S. Freud’s great discovery of his self-
analysis, that of ambivalent feelings toward parents, was based on the study of sons rather than daugh-
ters. In the third place, as a result of his own scientific education and the spirit of his times, S. Freud
emphasized the importance of the experience of early childhood as formative for adult personality.
In this model, there was little effort to portray personality development across the adult years as other
than the continuing repetition of unresolved childhood conflicts. Experiences distinctive of the adult
years were of little significance in understanding intention and action.
S. Freud viewed psychoanalysis as a means for offspring struggling with feelings about parents
rather than offspring, and specifically sons struggling with feelings about fathers. S. Freud “discov-
ered” in his self-analysis conflicting and ambivalent feelings toward his father’s death. Although he
had deeply loved his father, he also recognized that he regarded his father as a lifelong rival and was,
in some ways, relieved by his father’s death. S. Freud described the little boy’s desire for his mother
a fundamental or “nuclear wish,” and the resulting conflict between his wish for intimacy with his
mother and his rivalry with his father for his mother’s attention a fundamental or “nuclear conflict.”
S. Freud postulated that the little boy harbored wishes for an intimate relationship with his mother
on the basis of earliest experiences of caregiving, but that sometime in the second or third year of life,
the little boy became aware of his father as a rival and that the ground was laid for rivalry which the
little boy could not win (S. Freud, 1910a, 1910b). Anxiety leading to the formation of psychological
symptoms, such as obsessions, was the consequence of realizing that this wish could be a dangerous
situation in which the little boy feared he could suffer physical harm (castration) at the hands of his
presumably competitive and vengeful father. S. Freud (1910b) subsequently termed this nuclear con-
flict the “Oedipus complex” in deference to his then colleague Jung. However, as popularly under-
stood, this later term does not fully reflect the intensity and psychic pain of the boy’s intense struggle
with these issues of intimacy and rivalry implicit in the concept of conflict that S. Freud (1909) so
clearly showed in his report on the analysis of a 3-year-old boy.
S. Freud presumed that the parental relationship is accorded particular significance within the
Western Bourgeois family, reflected in the household pattern in which parents generally sleep sepa-
rately from children. He presumed that this priority accorded to the parents’ relationship with each
other, apart from offspring, was a universal phenomenon present in all cultures. Understood in
contemporary terms, it might be more accurate to suggest that every culture recognizes that some
825
relationships within the family are accorded particular status. However, it is not necessarily the case
that other cultures similarly privilege the intimate relationship of wife and husband and mother and
father which is characteristic of Western culture (Kakar, 1995; Obeysekere, 1990).
Because the wish to be rid of father and have mother for oneself was both socially and personally
unacceptable, it remained out of conscious awareness through the force of repression emerging with
the transition to middle childhood. Because this nuclear wish has force and direction, it continues
to seek satisfaction lifelong, a compromise between wish and personal and social reality, disguised as
dreams, so-called unintended actions, psychoneurotic symptoms enacted in and through the quality
of relationships with others, and even leading to such humanistic activity as art, literature, and music.
In this formulation, it is the son who wishes, fears, and regrets; the person of the father has little sig-
nificance apart from the meaning imparted by the son experiencing his father.
Ross (1984), struggling with his own feelings about being both a father and a son, portrayed the
dilemma posed by the neglect by the father, Laius, in Sophocles’s epochal statement in Western
culture regarding the motives of the father. Ross wondered what kind of a father would want to
abandon his firstborn son; Weiss (1985) and Ross (1984) both noted that the curse placed on Laius,
which led him to abandon his infant son, was a result of a pederastic act with the son of a neighbor-
ing king. Weiss maintained that Laius loved boys and did not want to marry, that Jocasta tricked him
into the union that led to Oedipus’s birth by getting Laius drunk. Weiss (1985) observed that each
parent was so preoccupied with own needs that those of the son were sacrificed. However, as Mahl
(1982) and Ross (1982a) observed, S. Freud later focused on the feelings of fathers regarding sons,
referring to his own jealousy of the youth of his sons even while he was growing older. Further, in
the Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905), S. Freud noted the phenomenon of jealousy of
middle-age mothers, perhaps entering menopause, just as their daughters were in the first bloom of
adolescence.
The tale of Oedipus focuses on parental preoccupation as the foundation for failure to consider
the best interests of offspring. In large part, psychoanalysis has been a psychology of sons’ (and daugh-
ters’) struggles to resolve conflict experienced with their own parents. Parents are implicated as the
source of their children’s distress. Michels (1993) noted that most early clinical findings providing
the basis for psychoanalytic study were from the analysis of childless young adults; parents were seen
from the perspective of the analysand, rather than in terms of parents’ own experience. As a con-
sequence, psychoanalysis had difficulty developing a psychology of parenthood. This problem was
compounded by S. Freud’s focus on the emergence and resolution of the nuclear conflict marking
the transition from early to middle childhood with little interest in personality development across
adulthood.
Viewed from a larger perspective, reconsideration of the meaning of the story of Oedipus in
terms of parental neglect poses the question of the significance of parents’ own psychology, found
on social and personal circumstances, in providing care for offspring across the course of life. In a
similar manner, the psychoanalyst Blos (1985) noted that issues posed by the nuclear conflict emerge
only after the child’s attainment of psychological autonomy from the mother in infancy; once this
struggle is experienced, its repercussions continue across the course of life, influencing the son’s own
experiences as a father.
A second problem is posed for the psychoanalytic study of parenthood, beyond that of psychoa-
nalysis as a psychology of offspring, rather than that of parents; it was founded on S. Freud’s portrayal
of his own ambivalent feelings as a son. It is ironic that nearly all of S. Freud’s early analysands were
women. In his early writing, S. Freud (1900) regarded the little girl’s struggles with her conflicting
feelings first as symmetrical to the problem posed for the little boy. Particularly as emerging in his
later writing (S. Freud, 1925, 1933), the little boy’s sense of morality develops as a consequence of
his fear of his father’s possible retaliation in the form of genital mutilation for the little boy’s desire
for an intimate relationship with his mother. This capacity for oversight and possible self-punishment
826
should such wishes be enacted, even in symbolic form, was clearly lacking among girls. S. Freud
presumed that because girls did not face the danger of such mutilation, believing such mutilation
had already been realized by a jealous mother as an explanation for their lack male genitals, there was
little impetus for the development of a moral sense found among boys, and based on prohibition as
the outcome of the fear of genital mutilation.
As psychoanalysis shifted from a theory of personality development based on mental conflict
to a relational psychology characteristic of much of contemporary psychoanalytic developmental
study, it has been possible to enlarge our understanding of gender, sexuality, and development to
include the reality of variation in life circumstances as factors involved in understanding which
girls and boys, women and men have of the significance of gender and psychological development.
It is only within the past decades that psychoanalysis has clarified issues related to psychological
development in girls (Chasseguet-Smirgel, 1970) and the related problem of gender differences
in the development of a moral sense (Chodorow, 1978, 1989, 1994, 1999; Gilligan, 1983, 1990).
Chodorow (1999) emphasized the extent to which, on the basis of shared understandings of bodies
and fantasies about body and self, women and men maintain particular stories about their sexual-
ity and their sense of right and wrong, feelings of loyalty and love, desire, guilt, remorse, or regrets
regarding the remembered past.
In the third place, following an epigenetic model (S. Freud, 1905) in which later outcomes were
presumed to originate in earlier structures (Gay, 1988; Sulloway, 1979), S. Freud paid more attention
to origins than to outcomes. Implicitly adopting Darwin’s perspective on evolution (Ritvo, 1990),
S. Freud worked backward from present psychological symptoms to remembered and reconstructed
events of early childhood. At the same time, he recognized that postdiction is much easier and more
certain than prediction in the study of lives (S. Freud, 1920). Much subsequent psychoanalytic study
followed in this tradition of epigenetic study from Abraham’s (1924) first elaboration of the epige-
netic model to Erikson’s (1951) effort to extend this model to the adult years. Early psychoanalytic
contributions to the study of parenthood continued in this tradition of epigenetic study (Benedek,
1959; Bibring, 1959; Deutsch, 1945). Benedek (1970d) noted the importance of studying parenthood
across the course of life, because adults remained parents as long as they retained memory. Colarusso
and Nemiroff (1979) showed the significance of a psychoanalytic understanding of adult lives that
recognized psychological development beyond childhood.
Reviews such as those of Wood, Traupmann, and Hay (1984) and Blieszner, Mancini, and Marek
(1996) supported the importance of understanding the meaning of parenthood for parents. Despite
these contributions, psychoanalytic focus on the study of parenthood has been on the role of the
parent’s own childhood experiences on their response to parenthood or to the complex issues of the
adolescent boy and his father (Blos, 1985), understood in terms of the father’s own Oedipal issues
without sufficient recognition of the father’s present place in the course of life and his experiences of
himself dealing with such particularly salient issues of adult lives as work and aging.
Historical Considerations in the Psychoanalytic Study of Parenthood

S. Freud (1900, 1915a, 1915b, 1916–1917, 1923, 1933) postulated a topographic model of the mind,
founded on the assumption that mental life was arrayed as levels of awareness ranging from out of
awareness and capable of entering into awareness (“unconscious”) to the realm of the potentially
knowable (“preconscious”) to conscious awareness (“consciousness”) (Rapaport and Gill, 1959). S.
Freud maintained that there was an inevitable conflict between the “nuclear” or fundamental wish
of the preschool epoch, portrayed as the desire for diffuse and exclusive pleasure and intimacy with
the parent of the other gender and internalized taboo against acknowledgment of this wish whose
expression was prohibited by society. S. Freud maintained that the nuclear wish has force and direc-
tion, always seeking satisfaction, albeit outside of even potential awareness. Awareness guards against
827
explicit expression of this wish, even though this wish may be admitted into conscious awareness in a
disguised manner. Attaching itself to some apparently innocuous aspect of daily life, but associatively
connected in some way with the wish, a compromise is struck between the wish and personal-social
reality in which there may be some partial discharge of the wish symbolically expressed in the form
of dreams, so-called unintended actions and slips of the tongue, psychoneurotic symptoms (hysteria,
phobias, obsessions, and compulsions), socially approved artistic expressions, and relationships with
others.
Precisely because this wish stemming from the family romance of childhood conflicts with per-
sonal and social reality, S. Freud’s model of the mind may be portrayed as a conflict psychology, a
drive psychology, or an instinct psychology. There is some contradiction between S. Freud’s focus on
the events of the preschool years as critical for personality development and his recognition of the
importance of the caregiver-infant tie as the foundation for later personality development. On the
one hand, S. Freud was little interested in events prior to the point in the child’s third to fifth year of
life when the boy’s competition for his mother’s affection and imagined fear of his father’s reprisal,
which ultimately leads to repression of this childhood conflict and to the search for a mate outside
the family. On the other hand, S. Freud emphasized the importance for the child’s later personality
development of the quality of love and affection experienced from the boy’s or girl’s mother in the
tie to caregiver of earliest childhood. S. Freud’s (1905) model of epigenetic development stresses the
inevitability of the child’s later capacity for loving others founded on such a close tie with the car-
egiver of earliest infancy. This epigenetic model provided the foundation for significant changes in
psychoanalytic models of development focusing on the child’s experience of caregiving the epoch
prior to emergence of the nuclear conflict over the preschool years.
In an effort to account for altruism and the development of a moral sense, S. Freud (1923, 1933)
posed a revised, structural model for psychoanalysis. This revised model posed three macrosystems,
ego or I, super-ego or observing I, and id or it. In this reformulation of his earlier topographic model
of levels of consciousness, mental life was seen as a horse with three riders, an it, seeking to direct
activity in the service of satisfaction of the nuclear wish, the I or ego whose origins were in the it, and
which searched the external world for means of satisfying the it, and the observing I or super-ego
whose task it was to keep tabs on the potentially delinquent ego or I, also the source of satisfaction
living up to ideals and standards (Schafer, 1960).
S. Freud occupied a unique place within psychoanalysis. As founder of a new and influential per-
spective on the psychology of mental life with broad implications for the study of personal and social
life, through the force of both his person and his writing, he was the dominant voice until his death
in 1939 and for much time thereafter. Subsequent developments have been important in a changing
psychoanalytic understanding of the motivation for parenthood and the study parenthood across the
adult years. Much of this change is exemplified in Pine’s (1988, 1990) portrayal of the four psycholo-
gies of psychoanalysis—drive, ego, object relations, and self—and Lerner and Ehrlich’s (1992) review
of changes taking place in psychoanalysis from the structural (conflict) models focusing on the inter-
play of the three macrosystems of ego, id, and super-ego, and child-developmental perspectives in the
period following the end of World War II to the present time. Pine (1988, 1990) suggested that each
of these perspectives on psychoanalysis assumes the necessity of a compromise between intention
or desire generally unacceptable in social life and the expectations of orderly social life. As a result,
each of these approaches founded in some aspect of S. Freud’s work share concern with the manner
for resolving the problem of satisfying wish or desire within the constraints imposed by social life.
The first modification of S. Freud’s drive psychology or “ego psychology” focused on the person’s
psychological adaptation to the environment (Hartmann, 1939). Two other perspectives in psychoa-
nalysis, object relations and self, have received much greater attention in the contemporary psycho-
analytic literature and have particular relevance in understanding psychoanalytic contributions to
the study of parenthood. The object relations perspective represents the reformulation of a position
828
initially elaborated by S. Freud (1905) that the drive has an origin (the body), aim (satisfaction), and
an object (that which would satisfy the drive). S. Freud saw this drive as plastic, satisfied in a variety
of ways depending on constitutional and developmental factors. Some persons seek satisfaction in
other than an intimate relation with women or men, preferring objects such as a shoe fetish, or as a
result of being looked at or looking and others in sexual intimacies; the term “person relation” might
have been less awkward, recognizing that the object of desire might be a person of either gender and
that such alternative modes of satisfaction as fetish are based on experiences in childhood and across
the adult years.
Having discovered the significance of the son’s experienced rivalry with his father, together with
the emergence and resolution of fantasies regarding both own wishes and the father’s presumed
retaliation, S. Freud was little interested in events in childhood predating this drama marking the
transition from early to middle childhood. However, he did recognize (S. Freud, 1905) that, to the
extent that the son could not resolve this intrapsychic conflict, the son retreated from this encounter,
seeking satisfaction in terms more typical of the toddler epoch than that of the preschool child. Drive
satisfaction was said to be attained in the manner most characteristic of children not yet encounter-
ing this nuclear conflict, with relationships with others inevitably also characteristic of a retreat from
the psychic conflict of the preschool epoch.
Since S. Freud’s signal contributions, psychoanalysis has moved away from focus on wish, drive,
and conflict to focus on accompanying object/person relationships and accompanying foci on psy-
chological needs arising in connection with caregiving outcomes from the period of infancy and
early childhood, as contrasted with wishes arising in connection with the emergence and resolu-
tion of the nuclear conflict and the prototypical neurosis founded on anxiety and the appearance of
psychological symptoms such as hysteria or obsessions as a means of protection or defense against
awareness of the nuclear wish appearing across the preschool years (Akhtar, 1994; A. Freud, 1965).
The term “object relation” in its contemporary meaning was first adopted by Balint (1935) in a paper
focusing on the epoch in early childhood in which the child first learns the experience of satisfac-
tion from person relationships in the early caregiver-child tie. Balint focused on the life of those for
whom this earliest experience had been less than satisfying and the implications of this disappoint-
ment for subsequent relationships with others. Winnicott (1960a, 1960b), first a pediatrician and
then a psychoanalyst, followed in the tradition pioneered by Balint, portraying the dilemma of the
infant whose mother is emotionally unavailable, restating essentially the same issue of the caregiver
not experienced by the baby as “good enough”.
This focus on the periods of infancy and toddlerhood was given additional impetus with the
emergence of systematic study of early childhood in the years following World War II. Spitz (1945,
1946) reported that children in foundling homes given even minimal care were able to survive but
those infants neglected failed to thrive. Reports such as that of Spitz, together with burgeoning
research in developmental science, had such an impact on clinical psychoanalytic activity that by
1961, it had become the dominant model for making sense of personal experience (Gitelson, 1962).
Preeminent in this shift was the psychoanalyst Bowlby (1969, 1973, 1980, 1982, 1988), who pointed
to the importance for the child’s personality development of the quality of attachment with her or
his caregiver, and the psychoanalyst Mahler and her colleagues (Mahler, Pine, and Bergman, 1975),
who highlighted the significance of the child’s experience of both attachment and, later, emergence
of sense of separateness from the caregiver of early infancy.
Guntrip (1961) and Mitchell (1988; Mitchell and Black, 1995) each elaborated the importance
for psychological development of the child’s earliest experiences with others, or object relations, first
elaborated from S. Freud’s earlier work by Balint (1935), for the course of adult experience of others.
As systematized by Mitchell (1988), the “relational perspective” maintains that much variation in the
adult’s capacity for sustaining intimate ties with others is founded in the first years of life, particularly
in those instances when the child experiences caregiving as “not good enough” (Winnicott, 1960b,
829
pp. 145–146), a deficit is constructed for the later capacity for empathy with others and for establish-
ing appropriate mature ties across the adult years.
The relational perspective is principally a deficit theory; for relational theorists, focus is much
more on what might go “wrong” in development than in explaining positive contributions of the
child’s experiences of caregiving, except as the absence of deficit. Furthermore, psychoanalytic expla-
nations of childhood and adult personality rely primarily on the child’s development and experience
of caregiving in infancy and early childhood in explaining the course of adult lives (Lerner and Ehr-
lich, 1992). Cohler and deBoer (1996), Colarusso and Nemiroff (1979), Galatzer-Levy and Cohler
(1993), Kagan (1980, 1998), and Nemiroff and Colarusso (1990) critiqued this perspective regarding
the course of development as solely determined within the first years of life. These authors ques-
tioned the assumption that psychological development in the first years of life can serve as a template
for understanding adult development. Rather, these authors suggested that the nuclear conflict of
early to middle childhood may be the first of several important transformations in sense of time and
memory across the course of life. Furthermore, these authors suggested that, although the meaning
of relationships across the course of life may be influenced by events of early childhood, life changes
across adolescence and the adult years also influence the experience of self and others.
Another critique of the relational perspective is that psychoanalysis ceases to focus on the psycho-
logical experience of others and becomes instead a two-person psychology (Gill, 1994) emphasizing
a real relationship rather than meanings made of this relationship. Even if important for the technique
of clinical psychoanalysis, it may be questioned whether this two-person psychology moves away
from S. Freud’s fundamental concern with the experienced other rather than a social psychology
of relationships (Kohut, 1971). Although still reflecting the bias within psychoanalysis regarding the
first years of life as formative for later psychological development, a psychology of the self, as initially
formulated by Kohut (1971, 1977), focuses on the development of a sense of personal continuity and
integrity across the course of life. Kohut (1977) suggested that realization of self as vital and effective
was a domain of personality separate from the capacity for relationships with others. A psychology of
the self maintains that it is difficult to realize satisfying relationships when we are preoccupied with
the effort to maintain self-regard.
Still presuming concern with the young child’s experience of caregiving as the foundation for
psychological development across the course of life, Kohut and his colleagues emphasized that, ini-
tially, the child does not differentiate between self and caregiver (Cohler, 1980); to the extent that
the caregiver fails to be “good enough” (Winnicott, 1960b, pp. 145–146) for that child, this failure
is experienced less as the preparatory step for later deficits in relatedness than as the beginning of
a sense of self as unable to manage states of increased tension and to modify grandiose ambitions
needed to prop up an enfeebled self. Kohut and his colleagues maintained that others become
important as they are used either to provide missing self-sustenance or to complement efforts after
maintaining a sense of integrity and vitality across the course of life (Wolf, 1980, 1994). As Wolf
(1994, pp. 81–82) observed:
The need for self-object experiences is not confined to early years but self-object responses
in a variety of forms are needed throughout the life span . . . the need for self-object
responses is always present, waxing and waning with the ups and downs of the strength
and vulnerability of the self . . . the universal need of any self to be affirmed as significant.
Although Kohut and Wolf presumed that the evoked or experienced other is a valuable asset at
any point of creative challenge or time of difficulty, through oldest age, Basch (1985) maintained
that concern with the manner in which others are used as a source of support and self-sustenance is
laid down in early childhood and that adults should no longer need to rely on an evoked other as a
source of solace and support. Consistent with S. Freud’s (1927, 1930) view that humankind should
830
outgrow such infantile dependence and with the view of Mahler et al. (1975) that at about age 4,
the child should have attained autonomy from reliance on a caregiver, Basch regarded the concept
of an evoked or experienced other as an attribute of earliest childhood development that is charac-
teristically of little significance for adults having realized emotional maturity. Basch maintained that
continued reliance on others as a source of emotional sustenance is present only among those unable
to sustain personal vitality.
The contributions of Wolf (1980, 1994) and of Colarusso and Nemiroff (1979) are distinctive
in psychoanalysis for their explicit concern with the course of adult lives. These contributions view
psychosocial issues of adult lives, including parenthood, as influenced by the course of presently
recalled childhood experiences and by adult experiences. This concern with self and personal nar-
rative goes well beyond Erikson’s (1951) effort to understand adult lives within a more mechanistic
epigenetic perspective. This discussion of changes in psychoanalytic understanding of the course of
personality development beyond the direct influence of the childhood years reflects changes taking
place in this perspective for the study of adult lives (Cohler and deBoer, 1996; Lerner and Ehrlich,
1992; Mitchell and Black, 1995). Influenced by significant changes more generally in the humanities
and social sciences across the past five decades, psychoanalysis has reconsidered S. Freud’s portrayal
of psychological development. At the same time, discussion of adult lives from a psychoanalytic
perspective has expanded on S. Freud’s fundamental observation that our thoughts and feelings are
determined by wish and intent not necessarily in conscious awareness. However, these thoughts and
feelings can be discerned through a study of the connections between the meanings which we make
of our experience. These meanings have been fashioned over a lifetime and change over the course
of life as the outcome of particular life changes within a template of shared meanings provided by
social and historical context (Chodorow, 1999).
This fundamental assumption of meanings founded on lived experience and determining wish
and intent reflects the distinctive contribution of psychoanalysis to the study of parenthood and
other adult roles. Finally, it should be noted that, although S. Freud’s conflict psychology is a psychol-
ogy of the son mourning the loss of the father, fathers have largely been excluded from the psycho-
analytic discussion of parenthood. Although edited collections such as those of Cath, Gurwitt, and
Ross (1982) and Cath, Gurwitt, and Gunsberg (1989) have sought to correct this balance presuming
that the important aspect in studying psychoanalysis is motherhood, it remains the case that there has
been much less psychoanalytic study of fatherhood than of motherhood.
Parental Personality Development and the Parenting Process

Discussion of the historical background of the psychoanalytic study of lives highlights two problems in
applying this perspective to the study of parenthood as an adult experience. The dilemma that psychoa-
nalysis has been a psychology of offspring, particularly of sons, poses particular problems as offspring
become parents responsible for the care of another rather than being cared for. The further dilemma
that psychoanalysis has made at best limited progress in understanding the psychological development
of women adds to the problem in discussing motivation for parenthood among women. S. Freud (1925,
1931) considered the wish for a baby as a fundamental aspect of female sexuality. Wyatt (1967, 1971)
suggested that the motivation for parenthood may be more complex than S. Freud acknowledged.
Rejecting S. Freud’s claim of an instinct for parenthood, he noted that social forces and a lifetime of
experiences with others co-determine the motivation for parenthood. Wyatt noted the singular impor-
tance of experiences of early childhood as a determinant of attitudes regarding the decision to be a
parent. Should a little girl observe her own mother ambivalent about caring for her, this experience of
childhood is likely to affect her own attitude toward becoming a parent. Wyatt chided his colleagues for
assuming one single and sovereign motive for motherhood. He observed that both little girls and little
boys wish for a child of their own, which may reflect part identification with the child’s own parents
831
enacted anew as children later become parents themselves. Wyatt maintained that parenthood provides
a new identity, one which is both personally and socially validated.
The classical position regarding psychoanalysis and parenthood was stated by Deutsch (1945,
p. 14), who observed that,
Every mother brings into [motherhood] certain emotional factors and conflicts, that is, a
certain psychodynamic background partly determined by her life situation, partly by her
inner disposition due to her whole psychological development. From this, we can under-
stand that while the beginning of motherhood poses the most mature task of femininity,
it will also tend to revive all the infantile conceptions of pregnancy and motherhood and
childhood emotional reactions.
Providing the guiding hypothesis for much of the psychoanalytic study of parenthood to the
present time, Deutsch (1945) discussed the motivation for motherhood very much within the
scope of S. Freud’s initial discussion of the psychology of women, emphasizing penis envy and the
significance of childbirth as a means of compensating for the disappointment at having a vagina.
The desire for a child is in this view a means for a woman to gain the long-sought penis (Kesten-
berg, 1956). Langer’s (1992) effort to include social context in understanding the problems posed
for women as mothers in the post-war epoch was also founded on S. Freud’s drive psychology
and supporting his limited understanding of women’s lives. Even Langer’s more socially aware dis-
cussion of motherhood, founded largely on Klein’s (1932, 1935) assumptions regarding envy and
aggression among young children, appears somewhat limited when viewed in terms of such more
contemporary contributions as that of Chodorow (1999).
The dilemma presently confronting psychoanalysis of abandoning S. Freud’s initial conflict or
drive perspective emphasizing wish or intent in favor of a psychology based on developmentally
founded needs arising from vicissitudes of caregiving pose problems for understanding motivation
and meaning regarding the role of becoming and being a parent. It is ironic that the two most
important contributions to the psychoanalytic study of parenthood have been posed by two female
psychoanalysts originally a part of the European psychoanalytic community before their immigra-
tion to the United States following the rise of National Socialism in Germany in the late 1930s.
Parenthood as a Developmental Phase:

The Work of Therese Benedek
The present discussion focuses on psychoanalytic research from a normative context, and on psycho-
dynamic issues among “ordinary devoted parents,” rather than with those identified as showing psy-
chiatric distress. Benedek’s (1959) initial contribution was phrased in terms of S. Freud’s psychology
of psychological conflict founded on the compromise between the nuclear wish seeking satisfaction
and the opposition of social reality leading to some satisfaction of the nuclear wish in terms of such
disguised means as dreams, slips of the tongue, psychoneurotic symptoms, artistic productions, and
endowment of others with one’s own wishes or “transferences.” At the same time, the scope of her
contribution went well beyond S. Freud’s epigenetic psychology. In her statement of parenthood as
a developmental phase of the libido, Benedek (1959) sought to extend S. Freud’s (1905) epigenetic
theory (Hartmann and Kris, 1945), as later revised by Abraham (1924) and Erikson (1951/1963),
yet taking into account the reality that parent and child reciprocally influence each other across the
course of life (Parens, 1975). Benedek viewed parenthood as an emergent adult role, the response to
which is largely colored by the experience of the early childhood years. At the same time, caring for
the baby leads to maternal psychological change (in her formative essay, Benedek focused primar-
ily on mother rather than father, which follows from her previous extensive study of the woman’s
832
psychophysiology). Benedek framed her discussion in terms of drive theory, maintaining that through
initial caregiving in meeting the baby’s needs, the infant becomes attached to the mother. At the same
time, caregiving is important for the mother herself. Optimally responsive caregiving provides the
baby with a sense of self-confidence and the mother with increasing self-confidence. However, this
experience of caregiving presumes that the mother is able to feel comfortable with the provision of
such basic care.
Benedek’s view of the importance of caregiving for the baby follows the post-war emphasis in
psychoanalysis on the “diatrophic bond” (Gitelson, 1962) between mother and child, which stressed
the importance for the baby’s development of personal integrity of good enough care or care as
experienced by the baby as satisfying (Winnicott, 1956, 1960a). What is significant about Benedek’s
discussion is that she also focused on the impact of caregiving for the mother, including the emer-
gence of the ability to receive enjoyment and enhanced self-confidence from caring for her baby.
As she observed (Benedek, 1959, p. 383): “The oral-dependent needs of the child as well as the psy-
chologic processes which evolve from them have been well studied. The mother’s receptive needs
from the child, however, are not easily recognized in their healthy manifestations except through
psychoanalysis.”
Benedek maintained that, to the extent that the mother herself had experienced unresolved
issues related to feeding and caregiving stemming from her own presently experienced childhood
years, she will find it additionally difficult to respond appropriately to the baby’s demands. Her
own pleasures and pains as an infant are stimulated once again by the act of caregiving. As a result
of unresolved conflict regarding childcare, the mother may either overprotect the baby through
continuing needs of her own for such care or, alternatively, enact anew her feelings of deprivation
through her failure to respond appropriately to the baby’s needs. Benedek (1959, p. 384) further
observed that
motherliness involves the repetition and working through of the primary, oral conflicts
with the mother’s own mother, the healthy normal processes of mothering allow for reso-
lution of those conflicts . . . [t]hus motherhood facilitates the psychosexual development
toward completion.
This discussion of the mother-baby tie as interaction which is psychologically significant for baby
and mother alike leads to Benedek’s (1959, p. 385) statement of her position:
I propose that not only with and as a result of the physiologic symbiosis of pregnancy and
the oral phase of development, but in each “critical period” the child revives in the parent
his related developmental conflicts. This brings about either pathologic manifestations in
the parent, or by resolution of the conflict it achieves a new level of integration in the par-
ent. In turn, the child reaches each “critical period” with a repetition of the transactional
processes which lead anew to the integration of the drive experience with the related
object and self-representations.
This formulation remains the basis of much of the discussion of parenthood from a psychoanalytic
perspective (Parens, 1975). Benedek then extends this perspective to the study of fatherhood, noting
that for fathers, the baby represents primarily an extension of own hopes and fears, to be realized
through his child; she notes that to the extent that fathers are able to care for the baby, they real-
ize some enhanced sense of self-esteem. However, she also extends her perspective to include the
father who, like the mother, “repeats with each child, in a different way, the steps of his own devel-
opment, and under fortunate circumstances achieves further resolution of his conflicts” (Benedek,
1959, p. 388).
833
Although phrased in terms of S. Freud’s (1905) epigenetic theory of the development, focusing on
the vicissitudes of satisfaction of infant needs for later life, Benedek implicitly posed her discussion
in relational terms, concerned with the experience of each participant for the parent-child exchange,
and also recognized the importance of this process for the development of self and the capacity for
empathy for the baby and for a continued sense of positive self-esteem for mothers and fathers able
to provide good care. Again, recognizing S. Freud’s (1923, 1933) structural theory, including the
observing I or super-ego, she was concerned with the impact of parenting for the reciprocal identifi-
cations of child with parent and parent with child. Finally, in reflecting on her contribution, Benedek
(1959/1973) noted the importance of both biology and culture in determining the interplay of par-
ent and child. She also extended her discussion to include the active phase of parenthood as a whole
until the time the now adult offspring leaves home to begin a new life beyond the family of origin.
With the child’s sexual maturity often coinciding with parental middle age, parents inevitably
want the best for their children, but their own revived conflicts may help or hinder the child’s ability
to move on, to find a mate, and to become a parent; Benedek maintained that there is a biologi-
cal need for parents to survive through their children’s own children. However, echoing S. Freud’s
(1905) discussion, Benedek suggested that mothers have greater difficulty than fathers in maintaining
an appropriate relationship with adult offspring. Benedek maintained that the adult child’s marriage
and, somewhat later, advent of parenthood was particularly likely to revive the mother’s unconscious
identifications with her adult child, which is reflected in the effort to be involved in every aspect of
the adult offspring’s life. This continued identification is reflected in the particularly complex lifelong
tie between older mothers and their young adult to middle-age daughters (Cohler, 1987; Cohler and
Grunebaum, 1981).
Following the publication of the initial essay in 1959, Benedek pursued the significance of her
observations regarding the determinants of parental experience and the impact of this experience
for the parent-child tie from infancy to the course of life as a whole. Benedek (1973) observed that,
as long as there is memory of past experiences, parenthood is timeless and parents are always parents:
“Parenthood ends when memory is lost and intrapsychic images fade out” (Benedek, 1973, p. 407).
Collaborating with the psychoanalyst Anthony, she published a collection of papers extending her
conception to parenthood across the adult life course well beyond her earlier concern, with the psy-
chobiological factors emerging in the early mother-child interaction (Benedek, 1970d). In a series
of papers remarkable for their dual focus on the psychological experience of parenthood and the
complexities of parenthood as an adult role, Benedek (1970a, 1970b, 1970c, 1970d) made clear that
parenthood is timeless and that parents and children are continually negotiating anew their relation-
ship with each other. Benedek sought to move beyond study phrasing parent-offspring interaction
as pathological to considering the impact of the expanding worlds of children and their parents on
parental understanding of themselves as parents. In this series of papers, she (1970a, 1970e) distin-
guished among (1) “total parenthood,” while the child is still young, the time when children are in
school, through adolescence; (2) a middle phase of parenthood as offspring become adults, marry,
and have children of their own; and (3) grandparenthood, as older parents become involved in per-
petuating the lineage.
Benedek (1970e) noted that as children enter school, parents begin to feel exposed; the child’s
success in school and community becomes a test of the parent’s own success in providing for chil-
dren earlier in life. She also observed that parents of school-age children wish to hang on to the
past when they knew everything about the child. She believed that parents become apprehensive
when children begin school and enter into a world beyond the family. At the same time, parents
also identify with their children’s school successes and failures. The child’s sexuality may pose par-
ticular problems for women less comfortable with their own womanliness and, particularly as chil-
dren become adolescents, live again their own adolescence through that of their offspring. Benedek
(1970d) observed that fathers may have similar difficulties, not infrequently jealous of their son’s
834
virility. This identification with the lives of offspring, particularly daughters, increases as the daughter
becomes an adult, marries, and has children of her own. Often, instead of relaxing their influence
over their daughter’s life, mothers may become increasingly intrusive. The arrival of grandchildren
may intensify this identification, realizing enhanced sense of self-esteem from bestowing the status of
parent on their offspring and insuring that grandchildren are able to carry on family traditions. Freed
from the demands of total parenthood when their own children were young, grandparents are able
to enjoy their grandchildren in ways which they could not enjoy their own children.
From Pregnancy to Parenthood: Grete Bibring and the Concept

of “Crisis” Points in Development
The psychoanalyst Bibring (1959) and her colleagues (Bibring, Dwyer, Huntington, and Valenstein,
1961a, 1961b) also considered the psychological significance of parenthood. Although Benedek’s
work was largely theoretical, her research group tried to anchor their formulations in findings from
the study of women across the course of pregnancy. Bibring noted the spate of studies attributing
personality and adjustment among offspring to presumed aspects of mothering but that these stud-
ies did not consider the reality that observed parental distress may already be reactive to the child’s
own disturbance. To study the origins of maternal distress reported in so many studies of parents
caring for young children, Bibring and her colleagues recruited a group of 15 women, about to
become first-time mothers, who were willing to participate in a course of psychoanalytic investiga-
tion designed to understand maternal personality prior to the first birth. Pregnancy was understood
as a period of crisis involving somatic and psychological changes. Bibring’s presumption in this study
was similar to that of Benedek, endorsing S. Freud’s (1905) epigenetic psychology and Erikson’s
(1951) extension of S. Freud’s formulations across the adult years, although presuming the careful
psychobiological study that had first encouraged Benedek’s exploration of the psychodynamics of
parenthood. Bibring (1959, p. 116) observed that,
In pregnancy, as in puberty and menopause, new and increased libidinal tasks confront the
individual, leading to the revival and simultaneous emergence of unsettled conflicts from
earlier developmental phases and to the loosening of partial or inadequate solutions of the
past . . . the outcome of this crisis is of the greatest significance for the mastery of the thus
initiated phase (maturity in puberty, aging menopause and motherhood in pregnancy).
However, it is well known that these crises are equally the testing ground of psychological
health, and we find that under unfavorable conditions they tend toward more or less severe
neurotic solutions.
This perspective was well portrayed in the Boston pregnancy study; Bibring and her colleagues
reported that the women in their study repeated a mode of relating to others, such as pronounced
dependency on others, that was most characteristic of their own earlier life. This tendency was
particularly pronounced after women felt the first signs of life in their fetus. At the same time, the
developmentally relevant challenge of becoming a parent forced new solutions to their lack of “good
enough care” (Winnicott, 1960a) and recollected parental emotional preoccupation that they had
experienced during their own childhood. Furthermore, the crisis of transition to parenthood was not
completed until after delivery and in the immediate postpartum epoch.
Maternal personality maturation, following the backward shift to earlier modes of satisfaction
during pregnancy, followed new maturational steps as women kept pace with their baby’s develop-
ment. Daughters were reported to be better able to realize psychological independence from their
own mothers following the advent of parenthood. There has been much more limited psychoana-
lytically informed study of the impact of becoming a parent on the father. However, Liebman and
835
Abell (2000) suggested that expectant parenthood leads men to resolve their relationship with their
own father in ways more satisfying than they had experienced as young children, including continu-
ing efforts to resolve the psychological conflict of affection for their mother and fear of their father’s
reprisal for having this desire.
Ghosts in the Nursery: The Contributions

of Selma Fraiberg and Daniel Stern
While Benedek and Bibring and her colleagues relied on S. Freud’s epigenetic perspective, as modi-
fied by Abraham (1924) and Erikson (1951), in explaining the impact of parents’ experienced early
childhood as a determinant of response to the baby, Fraiberg with Adelson and Shapiro (1975)
restated this perspective in terms more consonant with ego-psychological perspectives in psychoa-
nalysis. Observing that “in every nursery there are ghosts” (Fraiberg et al., 1975, p. 100), Fraiberg and
her colleagues maintained that although there is some variation in the extent to which parents’ own
experiences of being parented interfere in the baby’s care, detailed presentation of two case studies
of work with mothers showed that parents use strategies founded on the continuing affective haunt-
ing experience of an aggressive parent of their own childhood (A. Freud, 1936) in their relationship
with their own children. In these instances, the past is repeated rather than remembered and resolved.
Fraiberg and her colleagues observed that parents keep the psychological pain of their own child-
hood alive and suggested that parents experience this pain anew with the advent of parenthood and
as they care for their own young children.
Stern (1985, 1995) extended the paradigm for understanding the impact of the mother’s receipt of
care during her own childhood initially developed by Fraiberg and her colleagues in his description
of “the motherhood constellation.” The mother’s own subjective experience of caregiving is founded
in experiences with her own parents from earliest childhood and with other significant persons in
her life to the present time such as her husband (representations of interactions that have been gen-
eralized, or “RIGs”). These evoked or essential others (Galatzer-Levy and Cohler, 1993) or “RIGs”
as formulated by Stern (1985) are meanings that are made of relationships with others based on gen-
eralization of interactions repeated with particular significant persons over relatively long periods of
time. Stern suggested that RIGs of mother and father provide a template for a mother’s interactions
with her own children. The child, in turn, forms a similar representation based on generalization of
interactions over time, which then provides the template for the child’s own understanding of self
and others across the course of life.
Stern (1985) maintained that it is not enough to show that parental representations of child-
hood experiences influence the present relationship with the child. The child must experience this
enactment of the parental past, and there must be evidence in the child’s response to the parent that
the child has experienced this “ghost” of the parent’s own childhood presently represented in their
relationship through recording of a brief parent-child interaction sequence and the parent’s experi-
ence of this sequence directly following the observation. Stern used the mother’s narrative of her
experience during this video recorded interaction as the basis for understanding her experience of
caring for her child, founded on her own experience being parented, and as a means for evaluating
the child’s response to caregiving.
Self-Psychological Perspectives on Parenthood

In his discussion of the motivation for parenthood, Wyatt (1967) questioned views focused on pre-
sumed instinctual-biological psychoanalytic perspectives and, particularly, those viewing the wish for
a baby as simply another means of a woman’s effort to resolve her disappointment that she did not
have a penis. Wyatt called attention to the significance of the motive for parenthood as an expression
836
of the adult self, noting that there is an “inner duality” in which motivation for parenthood evokes
anew early life experiences within own parental family and resolves feelings associated with remem-
bered dissatisfactions with own parental care as the adult becomes a parent. The advent of parent-
hood becomes a means for fostering integration of experiences of a lifetime crystalized in this new
role. Wyatt’s discussion, and his critique of the motivation for parenthood in terms of a woman’s
conflict regarding her sexuality anticipated later discussions of parenthood as an expression of the
adult self (Kohut, 1971, 1977; Kohut and Wolf, 1978).
S. Freud (1914c) had discussed the origins of self-regard and the importance of this sense of
personal integrity for both well-being and psychopathology. He suggested that parental love and
concern were expressions of the parent’s own self-love now transformed into the care for another. S.
Freud (1914b) noted in his essay on narcissism that parents need to view their child as the essence of
perfection, renewing the sense of heightened self-regard that they had since been forced to renounce
when confronted with reality. From this perspective, parental love is little more than self-regard
reborn although identifying the child’s own attainments with what parents had desired for them-
selves. For Manzano, Palacio Espasa, and Zilkha (1999), this investment in the child represents a
problem, but for those working within the tradition of a psychology of the self, to the extent that
parents experienced positive morale and enjoyed enhanced self-regard from what they had experi-
enced as emotionally attuned caregiving, the experience of parental attuned caregiving provides for
an enhanced sense of personal integrity as offspring become parents themselves. These authors focus
on problems where parental anxiety interferes with being able to remain empathically attuned, but
with parents enacting unresolved struggles anew with their children narcissism and presumptive self-
love too often have negative connotations in psychoanalysis.
Kohut and his associates (Kohut, 1971, 1977; Kohut and Wolf, 1978) extended S. Freud’s (1914b)
discussion in his essay on narcissism in an effort to provide a complementary developmental process
to that provided by S. Freud’s drive or conflict theory, and suggested that it is difficult to care for
another unless one is able to realize self-love or self-regard. As contrasted with the formulation of
separation-individuation theorists (Mahler et al., 1975), Kohut suggested that the baby experiences
care provided by parents, not as something external and separate from self, with a problematic attach-
ment to the outcome of this struggle to realize psychological autonomy, but rather as an integral
aspect of own self-experience (Cohler, 1980). To the extent that such care is not “good enough”
in terms of the child’s needs, the child develops an enfeebled sense of self. Lacking personal vitality
and integrity, the child and later the adult feel unable to modulate wishes and desires, experience
increased psychological tension, and, ultimately experience a sense of depletion and despair.
Over time, parental caregiving activities become part of the child’s experience of self and others
and, with attainment of adulthood, the basis for experiencing oneself as caregiver in the parental role.
To the extent that the baby experiences parental concerns and actions as affirming nascent efforts
after mastery and as modulating tension states, the child can develop the skills necessary to modulate
ambitions and talents in terms of that which is both personally satisfying and may be realistically
attained. Certainly, parents relive their own ambitions anew through their children, albeit in a modu-
lated and transformed manner expressed as empathy and attunement to the baby’s needs and, later, to
each aspect of the child’s development. Although parents may wish for unbounded success for their
offspring, they are generally realistic regarding what their children might realize. Elson (1985) stressed
the reciprocal nature of parent and offspring experience of each other. Clearly, a baby easy to care for
and alive to the world, responsive to caregiving and vigorous, makes fewer demands for caregiving
on the part of mother and father.
To the extent that one or both parents experienced some failure of parental empathic response
to their nascent efforts at mastery during their own early childhood, parents would experience some
limitations in their ability to provide caregiving good enough for the baby’s needs. Furthermore, as
Elson (1985) observed, each parent must able to empathically respond to the needs of the other to
837
facilitate caregiving. For the father, this often means supporting his wife’s caregiving activities. Elson
(1985) viewed this formulation as a clarification of the position of Benedek and Bibring regarding
the role of the personal past in determining manner of response to parenthood. If parents fail each
other as partners in caregiving, this failure may be experienced by the child as a failure in own abil-
ity to modulate tension states and, later in childhood and adulthood, as deficits in the capacities to
remain empathic with others or to feel a continued sense of personal integrity and vitality.
This self-psychological perspective on parenthood was also explored by Ornstein and Ornstein
(1985). Sharing with Elson (1985) an appreciation for the findings of developmental study that had
shown both the competence of infants, together with the reciprocal nature of influences in the
parent-child relationship, the Ornsteins stressed the extent to which parenting, the active caregiving
for offspring, is characterized by parent-child mutuality in which each adapts to characteristics of the
other, as a “selfobject unit.” For the child, self and experienced caregiving are experienced as one.
For the child, appropriate, well-modulated parental responses support the development of a sense of
personal vitality and integrity; for the parents, the ability to respond empathically to the baby leads
to baby’s development of an enhanced sense of personal vitality and self-confidence. The Ornsteins
emphasized that parents and offspring each uses the other psychologically to enhance this sense of
personal integrity or self-regard. Following Kohut’s self-psychological perspective in psychoanalysis,
to the extent that the child feels appreciated and affirmed by caregiving, the child is able to develop
a sense of self as competent and, feeling positive self-regard, is later able to reach out empathically
to others.
Much of both psychoanalytic and systematic observational study of children has shown the func-
tions which parents serve for children, but there has been much less focus on the significance of
childcare for the parents’ own adult self. Again, consistent with the point of view advanced by Emde
(1983), Colarusso and Nemiroff (1979), Nemiroff and Colarusso (1990), and Galatzer-Levy and
Cohler (1993), it is important to understand the impact of childcare for the adult self. From the
moment of conception, parental hopes and expectations provide the basis for parental concern for
the child, facilitating the child’s own development of a firm sense of self. As the child grows and
develops particular talents and skills, the child’s developing abilities are ever important for parents
who join in affirming the child’s growth and maturation. In the extreme instance, parents may “live”
through their child’s accomplishments; within families, parents take pleasure in the attainments of
their offspring, from first smile, development of motor activities, and language, through later attain-
ments in school and community.
Parents thus receive affirmation for their parenting through their caregiving; parenting is a valued
aspect of adult lives. The intrusiveness and parental preoccupations that interfere in appropriate,
empathic responses unique to each point in the child’s own development are understood as a deficit
in the parent’s own personality stemming from experienced empathic failure in the parent’s own
earlier life and may interfere with the child’s emotional development. Parents may view their child as
extension of self, becoming overly involved, or else may distance themselves from their child out of
a fear of loss of self in the intimacy of caregiving. Ornstein and Ornstein (1985) shared Winnicott’s
(1956) view that in the average devoted family, parents are able to continue to provide developmen-
tally appropriate responses reciprocal to the child’s developmental gains and to support the child
through inevitable everyday disappointments and frustrations.
Finally, the Ornsteins called attention to the importance of the continued experience of each
generation of the other through the adult years. Even following the end of active parenting, each
generation provides sustaining functions for the other through mutual empathic resonance with
both the disappointments and problems of everyday life, including such significant life changes as
the unexpected death of the spouse in either generation, job loss, or serious illness in another family
member. Each generation seeks continued validation and support across the course of life, and each
838
generation provides empathic support for the other. Parents and offspring continue to need and to
use each other in ways appropriate for each point in the life course through parents’ own oldest age.
Research on Parental Personality and Offspring Development

Research in psychoanalysis remains somewhat problematic; much of the formal research had con-
cerned study of the efficacy of clinical psychoanalytic intervention to relieve personal distress
(Galatzer-Levy, Bachrach, Skolnikoff, Waldron, and Levy, 2000; Miller, Luborksy, Barber, Docherty,
1993; Shapiro and Emde, 1995). Grünbaum (1993) questioned the value of this research on the basis
of case studies that rely on a patient’s verbal reports and the analyst’s subjective judgment of the
meaning of these verbal reports using presumably circular reasoning, patient verbal accounts that are
liable to suggestion, and theoretical commitments. Much of this critique applies to all research rely-
ing on life history accounts. In response, psychoanalysis, as other research using narratives (Mishler,
1990; Spence, 1994), has made available the evidence used in formulating assumptions regarding
meanings and in the study of particular lives.
Expecting Parents and the Transition to Parenthood

Much of both classical and contemporary study of parenthood from a psychoanalytic perspective has
focused on parental preparation for parenthood, particularly the meaning for the prospective mother
of pregnancy and parturition (Bradley, 2000). There has been much discussion of the psychology of
pregnancy and childbirth over the past half-century. Much of this study has been concerned with
the onset of psychiatric illness in the period just prior to or following childbirth (Cohen, 1966;
Grunebaum, Weiss, Cohler, Gallant, and Hartman, 1982; Melges, 1968; Miller, 1999; Yalom, Lunde,
Moos, and Hamburg, 1968). The first systematic study was Bibring’s (1959) formulation regarding
pregnancy as a crisis or turning point in a woman’s life, similar to both puberty and menopause,
requiring new and different solutions for lifelong adaptation and leading, under favorable conditions
to enhanced adjustment or under less optimal circumstances, to the failure to move forward in the
course of adult development. Bibring and her colleagues wondered what the impact might be of the
profound psychological changes assumed to take place during pregnancy on the mother’s attitudes
toward her newborn. In particular, to the extent that a woman avoids coming to terms with her
pregnancy and is unable to face the reality of parturition, a woman may be less sensitive to her baby’s
needs and less able to be a responsive mother.
A related question concerns the extent to which pregnancy as a maturational crisis differs from
other such transformations across the course of life (Rossi, 1968). Pregnancy includes both a woman’s
loving relationship with her husband together with her effort to make sense of physiological and
psychological changes; this inward-looking experience may lead the pregnant woman to focus more
intensely than prior to pregnancy on herself and these changes. First, there is the expectation that
a woman will be able to experience the fetus as a part of herself and then, with “quickening,” to
tolerate the disruption in this merger of self and baby, accepting the baby as both part of herself yet
also separate; from birth onward, the baby represents part of herself, yet she must also love the baby
as a separate being. At the same time she reproduces herself, she is also reproducing a child who will,
from birth onward, also be loved as a separate being. Finally, there is the task of recognizing that from
birth onward the woman adopts a new identity and responsibility as a mother and also changes her
relationship with her own mother. Any of these related aspects of the psycho-physiological challenge
of pregnancy can pose an obstacle to the mother’s ability to provide caregiving that is attuned to the
child’s needs and to permit the child to develop a sense of self as psychologically separate from the
mother.
839
Founded on the study of 15 women, generally highly educated and articulate, volunteering for
the study which included detailed, repeated interviews based on the model of the psychoanalytic
interview (including two women agreeing to participate in a recorded research psychoanalysis across
the course of the study), Bibring and her colleagues (1961a, 1961b) reported that, across pregnancy,
they found signs of conflict and a return to psychologically earlier modes of dealing with own needs
related to food and other aspects of bodily functioning. Much of this change took place in the time
after first feeling signs of life. However, women who were highly rational and organized showed
less such return to concern with body and eating, becoming ever more rational and well organized,
anticipating, and trying to carefully plan every aspect of pregnancy and the postpartum period.
One of the distinctive aspects of this research was a careful specification of issues to be studied
and the related effort to translate concepts from clinical psychoanalysis into terms which could be
reliably rated, including means used to deal with conflicts taking place across the period of pregnancy,
a number of semi-structured (projective) techniques, and rating sheets used in interviews with the
patient and her husband (little information was provided regarding findings with fathers). These
measures were developed on a pilot group of more than 50 mothers. The original research plan was
for women to be interviewed up through the first postpartum year. Tragically, this systematic psy-
choanalytic research study of pregnancy and parenthood never came to fruition.
Three other psychoanalytically influenced accounts of pregnancy among women pregnant with
their first baby have been reported (Ballou, 1978; Breen, 1975; Leifer, 1980). Breen (1975) studied
a group of 60 first-time mothers and reported that those women most able to admit to concern
about being able to care for the baby also reported coping better with providing care for their
infants. Extending her earlier discussion, Birksted-Breen (2000) reported that women inevitably
harbor mixed feelings about becoming parents but all too often have no one to talk with about their
concerns. Following the psychoanalytic theory advanced by Klein (1932, 1935), Birksted-Breen
stressed the problems posed for the pregnant woman feeling both love and hate for the baby growing
inside her and the anxiety that accompanies recognition of these ambivalent feelings. Birksted-Breen
(2000) also noted that pregnancy may lead a woman to feel pulled back to her relationship with her
own mother during her own childhood. Pregnant women may then believe that their childbirth
experiences must inevitably be like that reported by their own mother and may confuse their own
body with their mother’s body.
Relying on the relational perspective in psychoanalysis, concerned with the manner in which
we experience and make meaning of others, Ballou (1978) studied a group of 12 pregnant women
in a university community willing to volunteer in a study relying on clinical ratings of semi-
structured (projective) tests, and participation in detailed clinically informed interviews including
reports of dreams. Clinically experienced raters examined protocols for a woman’s characteristic
ways of getting along with her husband and parents, sense of self, and overall style of relating to
others. Women were interviewed during each trimester of pregnancy and again 6 weeks and 3
months postpartum. Independent ratings of the mother-baby relationship were made during the
postpartum period.
On the basis of discussion of a number of themes emerging in the interviews and tests, Ballou
(1978) reported that, across the course of pregnancy, women were able to make peace with their
earlier feelings of resentment and anger regarding their relationship with their own mother. Consist-
ent with the concept of “ghosts in the nursery” of Fraiberg et al. (1975), an important determinant
of the mother’s response to her own baby was her relationship with her own mother; Ballou (1978)
reported that women tended to repeat with their infant their relationship with their own mother.
Consistent with Bibring’s (1959) clinical observation that pregnancy leads to disruptions in the ways
in which a woman understands herself and others, Ballou’s (1978) principal concern was with the
impact of pregnancy on these ways of understanding self and others. Themes of both autonomy
and dependency emerged anew during pregnancy. Women who had been able to work out the
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complexities of their relationship with their mother and father, and with others, showed a better
adjustment in their pregnancy.
Relationships with their husbands proved more complex for these women; husbands found it
difficult to be nurturant with their wives, together with showing enhanced anxiety regarding the
integrity of both their own body and that of their wives over the course of their wife’s pregnancy.
Finally, women dealt in quite different ways with issues of the baby’s coming separateness after child-
birth, repeating an issue also considered by Bibring and her colleagues (1961a), the observation of
mother-child interaction at 3 months postpartum suggested that these women were able to foster
reciprocity with the baby as a separate person.
A study similar in design to that of Ballou was reported by Leifer (1980). A group of 19 women
volunteers within a university community, all in their first trimester of pregnancy with their first
child, was interviewed at each trimester of pregnancy and again about 2 months postpartum. In
general, these women reported greater worry and dissatisfaction with the process of pregnancy
including changes in physical appearance and physical symptoms after rather than during pregnancy.
These women also reported a diminished sense of well-being in the postpartum period, along with
increased concerns and fatigue. Many women felt overwhelmed by the transition to parenthood and
socially isolated even as they became preoccupied with the baby. Most women even felt some regret
at becoming a parent. These women did not consider themselves sick during pregnancy but reported
enhanced symptoms during the first and third trimester; the second trimester was marked by the
greatest sense of physical and emotional well-being.
Women worked during pregnancy to develop more realistic attitudes toward their marriage (hus-
bands were reported to experience their wife’s pregnancy with enhanced stress and concern) and in
anticipating parenthood. Across the period of pregnancy, women developed increased feelings for
the baby, together with fantasies and expectations regarding the advent of parenthood. By 7 months
postpartum, mood had returned to normal in about two thirds of the women who were actively
struggling to strengthen their relationship with their baby and continuing ambivalence regarding
the process of becoming a parent; most women reported their husbands to be of little assistance and,
most often, actively working to build their careers. Consistent with Gutmann’s (1975, 1987) claim
that the impact of the advent of parenthood is to lead to stereotyped enactment of gender roles,
women became particularly focused on the baby as their husbands became preoccupied with issues
of providing for the family.
Most mothers of girls expressed some initial disappointment that they had not given birth to boys;
by 7 months postpartum, mothers of girls appeared to be protecting themselves against remember-
ing this initial disappointment. Women worried about rearing a boy who would be appropriately
masculine. Finally, women whose babies were somewhat less responsive to their care felt an enhanced
sense of disappointment that their baby was not more responsive. Still, most women felt an enhanced
sense of womanliness at having borne a child. At the same time that they were able to take great pride
in their achievement and in finally realizing social maturity, these women struggled across the first
months of parenthood at managing role conflict, strain, and overload. As Cohler (1985) noted, virtu-
ally all studies of the transition to parenthood similarly report a drop in morale with the advent of
parenthood that begins to shift as children begin school and mothers realize increased personal free-
dom during the day. As Leifer (1980, p. 230) observed, “Even women who have achieved a mature
level of personality integration, satisfying marriages, and stable identities, and who enjoy caring for
their infants, nevertheless experience considerable stress on being confronted with the life changes
associated with motherhood.”
These two detailed studies of response to pregnancy and parturition among small groups of well-
educated women, volunteering for an extensive interview study, provide thoughtful observations that
support larger and more detailed social psychological studies such as those of Shereshefsky, Yarrow, and
their colleagues (1973), Grossman, Eichler, and Winickoff (1980), Entwisle and Doering (1981), and
841
Cowan and Cowan (1992) as well as Michaels and Goldberg’s (1988) edited collection, together with
the large literature on the transition to parenthood in the sociological tradition (Cohler, 1985; Cohler
and Grunebaum, 1981; LeMasters, 1970; Walker, 1999). Perhaps most striking of these studies is that of
Cowan and Cowan (1992), who followed nearly 100 expectant parent couples and a group of nonpar-
ent couples volunteering for the study in Northern California over a period of more than a decade.
Adopting a family systems perspective, including the family’s relationships with other kindred and
the larger community, the Cowans highlighted the problem that the transition from couplehood to
parenthood is a difficult one; parents’ satisfaction with their marriage, work, and ties with their own
family have much to do with maintaining closeness after becoming parents and in continuing to
support each other. Such particularly troublesome issues for expectant parents after becoming parents
include the assignment of childcare responsibilities. Echoing the psychoanalytic perspective of Frai-
berg and her colleagues (1975), the Cowan and Cowan (1992) noted that parents must be on guard
not to repeat with their own children problems experienced in their own growing up.
Parents’ Remembered Childhood Experiences and

the Adjustment of Their Young Children
A second area in which psychoanalysis has made significant contributions to the study of parenthood
concerns the complex relationship of parenting and such aspects of early childhood adjustment as the
child‘s evidence of being able to form a secure attachment. As already noted, ours is a culture that
presumes that the child’s psychological development depends very much on the quality of parenting
provided in the first years of life. Presuming that “the child is the father of the man” (Wordsworth,
1807), to the extent that parents have been able to offer the average expectable environment, children
will be able to overcome challenges to development across the first years of life (Hartmann, 1939;
Robertson, 1962; Winnicott, 1960a). Subtle variations in childcare may have less of an influence than
often supposed; it is those long-term, malignant patterns of maladaptation with the family that might
negatively impact the child’s development (Stern, 1985, 1989).
Mahler and the Separation-Individuation Paradigm

Although S. Freud’s model of the development of the mind placed great emphasis on parental care of
infants, contemporary psychoanalysis has singled out the second year of life as critical for the child’s
development. First discussion of this period (Mahler et al., 1975) was as an extension, by analogy, to
work with children whose coping ability was severely limited by personal distress. Mahler (1968)
described her work with a group of infants who lacked communication abilities and suffered from a
syndrome known as “infantile autism.” Generalizing from this earlier study of a small group of infants
with unusual limitations in coping ability, Mahler et al. (1975) maintained that the infant was born
without relatedness and only gradually developed a tie to caregivers (primarily the mother) across
the first months of life, leading to a merger of mother and self.
Over the course of the second year of life, the toddler struggled with the first emergence of a
sense of separateness from mother reflected in darting and shadowing—as the toddler makes her or
his first hesitant moves away from her mother, only to return to the safety of the mother’s lap and
“emotional refueling.” This so-called practicing subphase foreshadows the child’s growing awareness
of both the possibilities and dangers of being separate from the mother reflected in an anxious, hesi-
tant, ambivalent effort to move psychologically away from the mother toward greater psychological
autonomy that Mahler and her colleagues term the subphase of “rapprochement” on the way to
realization of complete psychological independence and object constancy, or the ability to maintain
a sense of relatedness with the mother apart from her physical presence during the third to fourth
years of life.
842
This portrayal of the child’s development of a sense of psychological autonomy focuses very much
on the child’s struggle to realize a sense of separateness rather than on attributes of the mother that
might foster or interfere with this effort. Mahler presumed that the mother is emotionally available
to the child during this critical developmental period of the second year of life and is able to fos-
ter that sense of psychological separateness that later leads to the sustained experience of a reliable
caregiver important during those times of increased tension and sense of vulnerability and ability to
use (without overuse) those caregiving others available in later life. However, among those children
unable to realize this sense of separateness, when attaining adulthood and parenthood, this earlier
intrapsychic struggle may interfere in fostering a sense of separateness among own children, and in
fostering children’s’ own sense of separateness.
Kramer, Byerly, and Akhtar (1997) suggested that parents who themselves had difficulty in realizing
a sense of psychological autonomy with their own parents show problems in fostering psychological
autonomy among their offspring; these parents may interfere with their children’s development of
friends and any life outside the binding relationship with the mother. In this portrayal of the mother
who psychologically (and socially) prevents her children from developing real-world connections
outside the family, Mahler and her colleagues reflected the ideal within U.S. culture that independ-
ence and autonomy are desirable aspects of personal adjustment and that interdependence and sense
of connectedness with other family members poses a problem.
This perspective is elaborated in Stierlin’s (1974) discussion of parents who either use their off-
spring as their “delegates” in managing the reality outside the family, sending their offspring into the
world to realize the successes and goals they believe they never attained, or binding their adolescents
so closely to them that the adolescent is unable to leave home. Blos (1967, 1985) had also noted that
issues of separation and individuation are evoked anew within the family of the adolescent. Ideally,
the adolescent has the psychological autonomy, able to separate from parents and manage adulthood.
For Blos, adolescence poses problems for both young people and their parents, but also an opportu-
nity for the resolution anew of the crisis of the nuclear neurosis as the young man is able to find a
mate similar in many respects to his mother. Furthermore, discussions of the separation-individuation
paradigm posed by Mahler and her colleagues, initially focused on the meanings made of relation-
ships, subtly shifted to interpersonal characteristics.
Attachment Theory and the Systematic Study of “Ghosts in the Nursery”

Mahler and her colleagues initially observed mother-child pairs in her a clinical research setting,
providing evidence for her theory of psychological development. This developmental perspective
has been less influential as an intellectual focus for research. In part, the particular assumptions of
Mahler’s approach, founding normal developmental study on observations originally made with
troubled children, and the use of clinical terms for these normal developmental processes, have been
a source of concern. Furthermore, the emergence of both relational and self-psychological perspec-
tives for understanding development across the first years of life have questioned whether focus on
issues of separation and emergence of psychological autonomy adequately reflect the emergence of a
stable sense of self and ability to realize satisfying relationships with others across the childhood years
(Fonagy, 1995, 1999, 2000; Main, 1995, 2000; Wolf, 1994).
For these theorists, portraying the process of emergence of a sense of psychological autonomy
among children later destined to become parents, much of the emphasis is placed on the relation-
ship between mother and toddler in the second year of life. A similar perspective is provided by
theorists focusing on emergence of the child’s experience of “attachment” to caregivers. This per-
spective on the caregiver’s contribution to the child’s capacity for relatedness was influenced by
Bowlby’s (1969, 1973) clinical study of the formation of affectional bonds or attachment in earliest
infancy, which focused on the emotional impact of mourning and loss in childhood for personality
843
development across the course of life and the adaptive potential of attachment in a social evolu-
tionary context. Concern with the manner in which the baby develops the capacity for relating to
others and forming a secure sense of self is shared among psychoanalytic theorists of development
across the course of life and the manner in which this developmental process takes place for the
infant. Consistent with both cultural accounts of development and psychoanalytic study are the
capacities for relatedness and self-regard as determined in large part by caregiver attributes, particu-
larly the mother’s ability to foster a sense of psychological separateness while being able to resonate
with the emotional states of others and to use intimacy as a source of comfort and satisfaction across
the course of life.
There is an obvious connection between Bowlby’s formulation, expressed in his concern
with the baby’s realization of a secure experience of the availability and comfort of the caregiver
through representation of this caregiving which is stable over time, and similar concern within
psychoanalysis regarding representations of caregiving that are psychologically sustaining. Fon-
agy (1999) reviewed the points of convergence and divergence between the two developmental
traditions of psychoanalysis and attachment theory. Reviewing the contributions of A. Freud
(1965) in the elaboration of a developmental scheme, Mahler and her colleagues, object relations
theorists, and such psychoanalytically informed developmental theorists as Stern (1985, 1989,
2000), Fonagy’s (1999) review highlights the theoretical congruence between the concept of
attachment and secure working base for the child’s attachment to others and the role of facili-
tating caregiver.
As Fonagy noted, few psychoanalytic propositions have been submitted to systematic test (and,
indeed, there is considerable question whether this natural science model is in any way relevant
to psychoanalytic study). Moreover, although psychoanalysis focuses primarily on incongruities in
development and problems in realizing a secure sense of caregiver as an aspect of own self-regard,
the attachment perspective focuses on realization of developmental continuities. These two per-
spectives share a common concern with a developmental perspective in personality focused on
the caregiver-infant tie. Furthermore, attachment theory focuses both on the contribution of the
parent to the child’s personality development and on attributes of the parent’s own personality that
are related to the child’s personality development. Indeed, Fonagy (1999) explicitly acknowledged
Fraiberg et al.’s (1975) concern with the “ghost in the nursery” as a guiding presumption of attach-
ment perspectives.
Much of the focus in studies using the Strange Situation experimental paradigm developed by
Ainsworth and her colleagues (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, and Wall, 1978; Cassidy and Shaver, 1999)
to evaluate security of the child’s attachment to parents has concerned attributes of caregivers such
as variation in childcare arrangements, differences in maternal adjustment, or variation in socioeco-
nomic disadvantage (primarily of mothers), which might be associated with individual differences in
the baby’s response leading to placement of the baby within one of the four categories of response
to separation and reunion. On the basis of this attachment paradigm, there has been an effort to sys-
tematically portray the mother’s own contribution to the formation of attachment bonds with her
baby in terms of the mother’s own style of attachment founded on recollection of experiences with
others within the psychoanalytic relational paradigm.
Main and her colleagues (Main, 1985; Main, Kaplan, and Cassidy, 1985) created an Adult Attach
ment Interview (AAI) founded on more than a decade of research based on the attachment paradigm
(Bretherton and Munholland, 1999). Their classification of caregiver security is based primarily on
the coherence reflected within a narrative analysis of a caregiver’s memories of care within own
parental family (Hesse, 1999; Hesse and Main, 2000; Main, 1995, 2000). As Bretherton and Munhol-
land (1999, p. 105) observed, “What appears to count, in terms of transmitting patterns of relating
from parents to children, is a parent’s ability to produce a coherently organized account of his or her
own childhood attachment experiences as currently remembered and interpreted.”
844
One obvious focus of study using approaches such as the AAI was as a means for studying the
guiding “hypothesis” of psychoanalytic study of parenthood, that the nature of parental response to
the tasks of parenthood is determined by the parents’ own experience of being parented across the
years of early childhood. Indeed, it was the apparent relation between classification of adult attach-
ment styles among parents and classification of child response to the Strange Situation that provided
initial support for the use of this measure. As Main (1995, p. 211) observed, “Parents who are coher-
ent, consistent, and plausible in describing and evaluating their own attachment histories, whether
favorable or unfavorable, have infants whose response to them in this semistressful situation is judged
secure.” The finding of an association between parental narration and offspring classification in the
Strange Situation was statistically significant at well beyond chance levels.
Influenced by the classic report of Fraiberg and her colleagues (1975), Fonagy, Steele, Moran,
Steele, and Higgitt (1993) used the AAI in a study involving 100 mothers and fathers preparing for
the birth of their first child. Prospective parents were interviewed with the AAI, and their children
were later studied in the Strange Situation paradigm at 1 year and again at 18 months. Not only
did the AAI predict the child’s response to separation and reunion, but also there was an association
between mothers whose narratives were classified as secure/autonomous, dismissing/detached, or
entangled/preoccupied with infants’ responses: Seventy-eight percent of mothers rated as secure/
autonomous had children who at 1 year showed a secure attachment; 72% of infants of mothers
classified as other than secure were classified as not showing a secure response to maternal separation
and reunion.
Fonagy and his colleagues (1993, p. 969) observed that
The ghost haunting the nursery, as predicted by Fraiberg, is more likely to appear when the
parents’ defensive stance is apparently formidable . . . among parents of infants manifesting
avoidance on reunion, defensive strategies . . . were far more marked in accounts of child-
hood relationships.
The important determinant of the child’s response in the Strange Situation paradigm was the moth-
er’s AAI classification rather than that of the father. Mothers who are unable to recognize and
acknowledge their own feelings are less able to respond empathically to their baby’s cues; even young
infants learn to respond in ways directed, in part, by maternal style of managing relationships with
others.
Maternal capacity for self-reflection, measured by a scale of parental ability to reflect on own
motives and those of their own parents and their children, showed a modest relation with security of
infant attachment. Fonagy and his colleagues maintained that the capacity for “mentalizing” or self-
reflection is of critical importance in the provision of childcare. Indeed, where care has been “good
enough” (Winnicott, 1960a), the child develops this capacity for self-reflection; realization of this
empathic state is difficult where a secure caregiver-infant attachment bond has not developed. Fur-
thermore, the child’s own ability to engage in such self-reflection depends in large part on parents’
own capacity for self-reflection; following Main’s (1991) suggestion, Fonagy (1999) maintained that
the mother’s own capacity for reflective self-awareness depends on having experienced a caregiver
during childhood able to provide such self-reflection (Fonagy et al., 1993; Fonagy et al., 1995).
The AAI is a particularly controversial means for studying parents’ contribution to childcare,
because of the presumption that parental childhood experiences directly affect such aspects of adult
life as childrearing, and because of the presumption that parents are able to recall in some accurate
way their own experiences across the childhood years. Main and her associates maintain that pre-
sent maternal attachment classifications, founded in the parent’s own childhood experiences, are
coded on the basis of the coherence and structure of the account rather than specific content of the
account. Therefore, the AAI does not depend on accuracy of accounts of the past. Rather, following
845
from the topographic point of view in psychoanalysis (in which forces out of awareness are presumed
to influence attention; Rapaport, 1960), the telling of the narrative is interrupted by intrusions
founded on past conflict.
Main and her colleagues presume that disruption presents evident in the parent’s own narrative
have origins in a remembered past. The study of autobiographical memory appears to challenge that
assumption (Brenneis, 1997; Conway, 1996: Fitzgerald, 1996; Singer and Salovey, 1993; Thompson,
Skowronski, Larsen, and Betz, 1996). This area of study suggests that memories are constructed anew
across the course of life. From this constructionist perspective, memories of the past change across
the course of life as a result of life changes and social and historical change. Memories of childhood
caregiving reported by adults may not correspond with either childhood experiences or memories
of caregiving reported at other points across the adult years. Stern (1995) also challenged the assump-
tion underlying the AAI. He suggested that the mother brings to each encounter with her baby not
only an internal working model (Bowlby, 1969) or representation of her own mother as caregiver,
but also working models of her husband and other present and past significant persons in her own
life. Stern suggested that the AAI more closely reflects the mother’s own present relationship with
her mother than the remembered childhood relationship. Stern (1985, 1995), Cohler and deBoer
(1996), and Kagan (1998) all questioned the assumption that there are particular sensitive periods
for personality development in early childhood that might directly influence such adult personality
attributes as attachment styles.
Affect expressed in the AAI is as easily understood in terms of recent experiences that may have
little to do with either a personal past or childcare as some cloudy recollection of emotion from
childhood. Some events are remembered more clearly than others (Bornstein et al., 2018); across the
course of life, adults are always rewriting the story of their personal past. This life-writing represents
a continued reintegration of a presently recollected past that may bear little relation with a past as it
“really” existed. Present coherence of the narrative may as easily be affected by the stresses and strains
of adult life as by a shadowy past. Main and Hesse (1990) suggested that maternal experience of early
childhood loss had an adverse impact in helping 1-year-olds to realize a secure attachment, leading
infants to be classified as disorganized/disoriented. This classification is presumed to reflect the last-
ing impact of severe parental childhood trauma.
This report, although based on a very small group of mothers experiencing such loss, provided
support for the basic hypothesis of the ghost (of the parental past) in the nursery. That some parents
are rejecting, leading to disruption in childcare, is clear. That such interference may be attributed to
parental trauma stemming from childhood may be less clear. Brenneis (1997) found little support for
any premise that adults are able to recall their childhood past with any degree of accuracy. Further-
more, parents are not able to recall with uniform accuracy events in the lives of their own children
(Bornstein et al., 2018; Mednick and Schaffer, 1963; Robbins, 1963; Yarrow, Campbell, and Burton,
1968), let alone remember all aspects of their own childhood. Challenging assumptions presumed
to be central both to social learning theory and to relational perspectives in psychoanalysis, Kagan
(1998, p. 105) opined there is little reason to assume that events of early childhood necessarily have a
greater impact on adult experience of self and others than events taking place decades later.
Fatherhood and Psychoanalytic Study of the Parental Role

To date, and most clearly evident in studies within the attachment tradition, the study of parenthood
has presumed study of the mother’s personality, life experiences, and impact on the child’s develop-
ment. Indeed, few other cultures around the world presume either that specific aspects of childcare
have a major impact on adult lives or that mothers bear the primary responsibility in determining
adult adjustment (Fischer and Fischer, 1963; Minturn and Lambert, 1964). As Blos (1985) observed,
it is ironic, considering the emphasis that S. Freud placed on the little boy’s experience of the father,
846
that evidence founded on his construction of psychoanalysis as a psychology of the son mourning
the loss of his father, and the ambivalence consequent in such mourning (S. Freud, 1917), so evident
in S. Freud’s study of a preschool-age boy (S. Freud, 1909), that much of psychoanalytic study of
parenthood has focused on the role of the mother.
Striking in S. Freud’s account is the involvement evident in the father’s care of his little son Hans
suffering a phobia resolved through psychoanalytic intervention via the father. Even while the family
was on summer holiday, staying in a suburb of Vienna, with Hans’s father going to work in the city
during the week, his father carefully followed Hans’s development (although Ross, 1989, questioned
the extent to which his father fostered in Hans the desire to be a father himself one day). This theme
of the importance of the father for the child’s development remains in discussions of fatherhood
(Dowd, 2000; Lamb, 1997; Marsiglio, Amato, Day, and Lamb, 2000; Parke, 1996). Again, Benedek
(1970d) was keenly aware of the father’s role in childcare and of the importance of studying the fam-
ily as a unity of interacting personalities.
In her discussion of fatherhood, Benedek (1970d) stressed the significance of the father’s role
as family provider. Gutmann (1975, 1987) suggested that, with the transition to parenthood, new
parents experienced an “emergency” leading them to emphasize socially stereotyped definitions of
gender roles within the family, with the husband-father the provider and the wife-mother providing
nurturance. Over the past decades, there has been considerable discussion regarding the father’s role
within the family. Much of this discussion has been critical of traditional sex-role socialization in
which the father is relegated to the position of breadwinner with little day-to-day involvement in the
child’s development (Dowd, 2000; Lamb, 1997; Parke, 1996). Indeed, Chodorow (1978) suggested
that if mothers and fathers really coparented their young children, it might be possible to change the
understanding that these offspring would have when they became parents. Gutmann (1975, 1987)
maintained that traditional sex-role socialization is intrinsic to adult development across cultures and
is a function of the meaning that parenthood has for fathers and mothers.
Clearly influenced by reports of the father’s contributions to the child’s development (Lamb, 1997;
Parke, 1996), the psychoanalytic study of fatherhood has wrestled with issues regarding renewed
focus on the role of the father within the family. They have been fostered by social change and its
impact on the family across the past decades. Cath and his colleagues (Cath, Gurwitt, and Ross,
1982; Cath, Gurwitt, and Gunsberg, 1989) posed alternatives to the presumption of the father’s role
within the family as the distant, somewhat autocratic parent whose stern presence is necessary for
the little boy to develop a strong moral sense. They stressed the importance of warm caregiving by
each parent as essential for the well-being of both daughters and sons. At the same time, much of
the psychoanalytic literature on fatherhood views the father’s role within the family in the socially
scripted manner of provider and “instrumental” as contrasted with an “emotional” socializing agent
within the family (Parsons, 1955).
For example, Galenson and Roiphe (1982) and Pacella (1989), using the paradigm of symbiosis-
individuation (Mahler et al., 1975), emphasized the significance of the father-daughter tie for the
resolution of the daughter’s tie to her mother, shifting and diluting the symbiotic pull of the little
girl to her mother, and fostering both psychological autonomy and self-esteem. Pacella (1989) noted
that the reality that the father is not involved in the ambivalence of the child said to be in what
Mahler et al. (1975) termed the “rapprochement child,” seeking emotional reassurance from her or
his caregiver, the father is able to foster psychological autonomy and enhanced sense of reality of the
world beyond the family in both sons and daughters and provides a basis of positive gender identity
for boy, pulling the little boy toward the father and pushing the little girl toward her mother. Galen-
son and Roiphe (1982) noted that, although their study revealed marked variation in the time that
fathers spent with their young children, the important factor in the father’s contribution to the child’s
development was the mother’s expectation regarding what role she wanted her husband to play in
the child’s life. The father-child relationship must be understood in terms of the mother-child tie.
847
Galenson and Roiphe (1982) reported one detailed case study showing that the mother’s own
disappointment in the failure to realize an erotic tie with her own father during her childhood
was repeated in the manner in which she encouraged her toddler-age daughter to relate to her
husband. Particularly during the period at about 18 months, and throughout the second year,
the result was that her daughter turned almost exclusively to her father, and the mother received
unconscious satisfaction of unresolved wishes from her own childhood in identifying with her
daughter as father and daughter formed a close tie. Her effort to resolve her own disappointment
with the failure of the father-daughter tie during her own childhood, and the effort to resolve this
issue anew through identification with her daughter’s tie to her husband came at the cost of the
daughter’s own development of a feminine identity and consequent loss of the vitality, which the
authors observed in the little girl across the first year and a half of life. However, Tessman (1989)
suggested that a daughter’s capacity for love (erotic excitement) and for work (endeavor excite-
ment) is significantly influenced by her tie to her father. The little girl’s ability to feel excitement
in later relationships with men depends on her father’s ability to respond positively to her bids for
affection in early childhood.
Tessman (1989) also noted that the little girl’s relationship with her mother is important in under-
standing the father-daughter tie. The mother’s own capacity for erotic excitement is important if
the daughter is to realize that such happiness can exist. Studying a group of women scientists, those
realizing exceptional achievements across the adult years showed more positive childhood and adult
ties with their own fathers, but in ways which were typically feminine. This study suffers from obvi-
ous problems of retrospective bias, because women were reporting on presently remembered aspects
of childhood, and of presuming that a more “characteristic” feminine role was more appropriate for
women. Ross (1982b) and Liebman and Abell (2000), extending the position initially provided by
Blos (1967), suggested that the father is critical in fostering in his son those instrumental skills that
permit him to move beyond the parental family and to find a marital partner. Problems emerge when
fathers are either overcontrolling, perhaps seeking to resolve unfulfilled expectations and disappoint-
ments through their son’s achievements, or ignoring their son. Herzog (1982) and Liebman and
Abell (2000) observed that the father is important in fostering the boy’s appropriate “core” gender
identity. The father is important in helping his boy to learn an appropriate capacity for modulating
aggressive and residual competitive feelings first emerging in the Oedipal struggle of the preschool
years (Blos, 1967). In a similar manner, Sarnoff (1982) stressed the particular importance of the father
in supporting the self-esteem and school achievements of both daughters and sons, fostering such
ego skills as memory and tolerance of ambiguity.
Psychoanalytic writers stress the father-offspring relationship (primarily sons) as critical for adult
development. Following Blos (1967) and Stierlin (1974), Esman (1982) noted the importance of the
father’s ability to foster enhanced psychological autonomy across the years of adolescence (Anthony,
1970): The boy’s idealization of his father, and the ability of both father and son to deal with the
inevitable de-idealizations that follow from the son’s immersion in the world outside the family and
the development of a more realistic picture of the father’s strengths and problems at work and at
home. Esman is among the few writers on the father-son relationship at adolescence to focus on the
father’s experience of this process of the “second individuation” phase (following the paradigm por-
trayed by Mahler et al., 1975). As the son struggles with the issue of a more realistic understanding of
his father’s strengths and weaknesses, the father may experience an enhanced sense of threat, further
challenged by his son’s newfound sexual maturity and rebelliousness. Esman offered the hope that
through empathic understanding of his son’s struggles, the father at mid-life may have yet another
opportunity to resolve for himself issues of potency and authority that were the inheritance of his
struggle with his own father within the multigenerational family.
There has been much less discussion of the father’s contribution to the family of adulthood than
to the development of offspring through the first two decades of life. All too often, the manner in
848
which the father had resolved his relationships with his own father is viewed as presaging the father’s
relationship both with his offspring, and in dealing with the larger world across the adult years. Cola-
russo and Nemiroff (1979) and Nemiroff and Colarusso (1990) considered the interplay of personal
development in adulthood as the nexus within which adults experience and respond to relationships
with others. Both expected role changes of adult life (as retirement) and unexpected changes (as loss
of work, serious illness, or death of spouse or children) inevitably alter the relationship of fathers and
their adult offspring. Sons and daughters need their parents as sources of affirmation and support
across the adult years. Fathers (and mothers) preoccupied by their own grief and disappointment may
find it difficult to reach out to their adult offspring struggling with such life changes as marriage and
the advent of parenthood as well as successes and problems at work.
Future Directions in the Psychoanalytic Study of Parenthood

Psychoanalysis is a field of study in which meanings which we make of the world about us, jointly
constructed by shared meanings prevalent in culture and particular life experiences, influence both
wish and action. This human science emphasis on meanings, including those understood through
empathy or vicarious introspection in the study of experience, is unique as a method for providing
additional perspectives on issues in parenting in contemporary society (Kohut, 1971, 1978), such as in
the study of parenthood and sexual orientation, the psychological problems posed for parents living
in poverty, and the impact of divorce on parents.
The Meaning of Parenthood for Lesbians and Gay Men

The rapid social transformations of the past decades have led to dramatic changes in every aspect
of gay and lesbian life, including family formation, which is no longer open only to those gay men
and lesbians who choose to heterosexually marry (Cohler and Galatzer-Levy, 2000). Patterson (1996,
2000) has shown that there are many routes into parenthood among gays and lesbians and that gay
parenthood can begin at different points in the life course of both parents and children. Findings
reviewed by Patterson (2000) suggest that lesbian mothers and gay fathers may be more child cen-
tered than their same‑sex heterosexual counterparts and particularly emotionally available for their
offspring. Furthermore, divorced lesbian mothers are more likely to be living with a partner (and able
to provide both support and assistance with caregiving) than divorced heterosexual mothers.
There has been little study of the motivation for parenthood among lesbians and, particularly,
gay men, in the manner undertaken by Wyatt (1967, 1971) more generally for parenthood. There
has been much less systematic study of gay fathers than of lesbian mothers. To date, there have been
two primary routes into gay fatherhood: Fathers may have shared or sole custody of children follow-
ing divorce, or they may adopt. In general, gay fathers have found it much more difficult to retain
custody following divorce as compared with lesbian mothers (Falk, 1989; Patterson, 1996). Indeed,
far fewer gay fathers than lesbian mothers share a household with their children (Bigner and Bozett,
1990). Gay fathers are typically more concerned about the impact of their sexual orientation on the
development of their children, and are less likely than lesbian mothers to see possible benefits for
offspring, such as increased tolerance for diversity (Harris and Turner, 1985).
In a comparison of divorced gay fathers and divorced and married heterosexual fathers, Bigner
and Jacobsen (1989) and Dunne (2001) found few differences in motivation for becoming parents,
although gay fathers noted that societal expectations and pressures to assume this quintessential adult
role made realization of the parental role even more significant for them than among their hetero-
sexual counterparts who had not had to overcome social barriers in caring for their children. Bigner
and Jacobsen (1989) reported that gay fathers were more committed than straight their paternal
counterparts to providing ongoing care and more motivated to maintain close ties with children.
849
Recognizing that the comparison group contained both married and divorced men, it may well be
that divorce enhances such motivation irrespective of sexual orientation.
Isay (1986, 1996) suggested that, among at least some boys later identifying as gay, the boy strug-
gling with the resolution of the nuclear neurosis of early childhood develops an erotic tie to the father
rather than to the mother. The father, sensing this same-gender attraction, may be frightened of this
attraction and withdraw from his son, leaving the little boy feeling this absence and perhaps resentful
regarding his father’s effort to create emotional distance. Later, as these gay men become fathers, this
unresolved issue from childhood may be experienced anew with own sons (Dunne, 2001). However,
anecdotal reports suggest that gay men may be particularly motivated to provide warm and empathic
care for their offspring (Dunne, 2001). Rather than hindering the ability to respond empathically,
perhaps in an effort to resolve childhood disappointments, these men are determined to be particu-
larly involved in their son’s life. Many gay men have suffered an ambiguous loss (Boss, 1999) during
their own childhood as a result of their father’s own confused and troubling emotional withdrawal
in response to their gay son’s emerging gay identity (Isay, 1986, 1996). As fathers, these men appear
determined to provide support for their own sons that they felt missing in their own childhood. At
the same time, this very determination may pose problems as the adolescent sons of gay fathers seek
the autonomy and independence associated with adolescence. These questions can be resolved only
through a longer term psychoanalytically informed study of gay fathers and their sons.
Psychoanalytic Perspectives on Parenthood and the Socially

Disadvantaged Family and Community
Among the most pressing social problems confronting families in contemporary urban society is that
of families living in the midst of urban poverty and suffering the impact of social stigma, stereotyp-
ing, and poverty. These are often families in which mothers and their young children live together
in crowded conditions in deteriorating and dangerous public housing projects in which physical
violence is all too common (Bell and Jenkins, 1993; Mahron, 1993). Study of these families living
in abject urban poverty and, often, in the midst of an unresponsive community turning away from
care for the most disadvantaged families, may provide additional information regarding the complex
interplay of social context and meanings of parenthood for parents who have grown up in the midst
of social disadvantage.
Many parents are able to overcome this impact of stigma and social advantage and provide conti-
nuity in childcare, but other parents become overwhelmed and depleted by the demands of childcare
while at the same time maintaining precarious personal balance. Osofsky, Wewers, Hann, and Fick
(1993) and Kilpatrick and Williams (1997) suggested that psychiatric symptoms reported by parents
and offspring living within socially disadvantaged communities most often resemble post-traumatic
stress disorder (PTSD), as shown in fears for personal safety, avoidance of memories connected with
violence, inability to fall asleep, and protective armor of violent actions and lack of concern for the
welfare of others. Understood from a psychoanalytic perspective, parents who live in a world expe-
rienced as overwhelming may experience feelings of personal depletion and fragmentation and may
find it difficult to remain empathically attuned with the needs of offspring.
Sensation seeking, such as through substance abuse, may provide at least some feeling of being
alive in a world otherwise felt as psychologically inert (Galatzer-Levy, 1993; Mahron, 1993). The
sensation seeking that is so often associated with violence in urban society (Galatzer-Levy, 1993)
may be viewed as arising from a personally adaptive effort to maintain a sense of being psychologi-
cally alive rather than alternatively a feeling of being overwhelmed and deadening senses of personal
depletion and depression. From earliest childhood, many parents living in the midst of poverty were
cared for by parents and other adults who were so personally overwhelmed and depressed that they
were unable to provide that empathic concern which is so essential for the development of a sense
850
of self (Cohler, 1980; Kohut, 1977; Kohut and Wolf, 1978). Having grown up with the experience
of personal depletion leading to impending fragmentation relieved only by sensation seeking and
feelings of being alive that arise from involvement in violence, these parents command few emotional
resources available for responding to their own children. Psychoanalytic perspectives on parenthood,
focusing on the parent’s own experience of caregiving and its motivation, may be particularly rel-
evant to understanding the interplay of social disadvantage and poverty and in working to improve
the lives of parents and children alike (Pavenstedt, 1967).
Divorce and the Psychodynamics of Parenthood

There has been a dramatic increase in the proportion of marriages ending in divorce. This statis-
tic is somewhat inflated by the tendency of some people to successively marry and divorce, but
divorce has lasting impact on the lives of parents and offspring. There has been much study of the
impact of parental divorce on offspring (Buchanan, Maccoby, and Dornbusch, 1996; Hetherington
and Clingempell, 1992; Maccoby and Mnookin, 1992; Wallerstein and Blakeslee, 1989; Wallerstein,
Lewis, and Blakeslee, 2000; Wallerstein and Kelly, 1980), but there has been much less study of the
impact of divorce on the parent’s own life story and of the personal meaning of this life change for
the futures of divorcing mothers and fathers. For example, many problems posed for offspring are the
consequence of marital conflict prior to divorce. Following divorce, break-up of the household and
often complex custody arrangements are not necessarily in the best interests of the child. Problems
posed for the child depend on the capacity of parents to maintain the “parenting alliance” (Cohen
and Weissman, 1985), together with the quality of the postdivorce family situation for each of the
divorcing parents. There is little information regarding the manner in which parents experience
custody arrangements as an important factor in fostering the parenting alliance.
Wallerstein and her colleagues (Wallerstein and Blakeslee, 1989; Wallerstein, Lewis, and Blakeslee,
2000) believe that families of divorce maintain particular vulnerability over time. Offspring of
divorced parents, who later become parents themselves, experience their family life prior to paren-
tal divorce in much more positive terms than their parents (although this portrayal of the family
situation prior to divorce may be colored by the offspring’s wish that family life had been close).
Offspring of divorced parents are much less likely than their parents to feel that the impact of the
divorce has been favorable. Wallerstein’s work supports that of other studies that it is the quality of
the parenting alliance that is critical for the child’s adjustment following divorce.
Wallerstein followed up her group of divorcing families at 10- and 25-year intervals (Waller-
stein and Blakeslee, 1989; Wallerstein and Blakeslee, 2000). In the 25-year restudy, Wallerstein and
her colleagues estimated that a quarter of presently young to middle-age adults have experienced
parental divorce and that the aftermath of the divorce may be felt across a lifetime. In seeking to
understand this lasting adverse impact, Wallerstein, Lewis, and Blakeslee (2000) noted that mothers
generally have custody of the children and are overwhelmed by financial obligations and needing
to be both parents.
This postdivorce world is lonely for parents and offspring alike, and includes the chaos for the
household of custody and the child’s movement between two different households, lovers com-
ing and going, and parental feelings of depression and resulting emotional unavailability for their
children. Reviewing the findings from Hetherington and Clingempell’s (1992) report, Maccoby
(1992) concluded that divorced mothers find it difficult to maintain the authority of two parents;
adolescent offspring in these families report enhanced conflict with their mothers regarding such
typical adolescent issues as daily routines and use of control and punishment. It would be interesting
to know the mother’s own experience of these issues as a parent of an adolescent and the impact of
this responsibility in terms of the psychodynamics of parenthood for adolescents (Anthony, 1970;
Benedek, 1970e).
851
Wallerstein and Blakeslee (2000, p. 299) observed that “it’s in adulthood that children of divorce
suffer the most. The impact of divorce hits them most cruelly as they go in search of love, sexual
intimacy and commitment.” Wallerstein et al. (2000) claimed that children reared in divorced or
remarried families are less well adjusted as adults than those reared in intact families. Even the most
resilient of these children experience the long-term impact of parentification; other children experi-
ence enhanced vulnerabilities because of parental personal and emotional absence from the day-to-
day tasks of childcare.
Particularly relevant for the present discussion, Wallerstein et al. (2000) maintained that the impact
of parental divorce is felt anew as these offspring themselves become parents. They maintained that
these children lack good role models for becoming marital partners and parents. Further, they lack
continuing support from their own parents, particularly their fathers, as they confront the expectable
tasks of adulthood. Wallerstein et al. claimed that these adult children of divorce remain lonely and
single or, if parents, fail to protect their own children. However, Wallerstein and her colleagues were
less specific regarding the different impact of parental divorce on the experience of parenting for
men and for women, offspring of divorce, and children themselves becoming parents. Furthermore,
in much of their study, focus fell on the experience of divorce for the mother’s parenting. As is char-
acteristic of much of the literature on parenthood, much less attention as paid to determinants of the
father’s experience of divorce and capacity for continued concern with the best interests of the child
within the parenting alliance.
Conclusion
Psychoanalysis began as the effort by a son to grieve his father’s death and “discovery” of ambivalent
feelings when confronted with this loss. To a large extent, psychoanalysis has continued as a son’s
psychology and a man’s psychology. S. Freud’s own fascination with the drama of Oedipus the King
focused on the son’s triadic relationship with a disappointing and neglecting father concerned with
his own pleasure at the cost of his son, an accidental slaying, and the intimate union with his mother.
Sophocles provided S. Freud with abundant evidence for understanding the psychology of the son,
but little evidence regarding the experience of either mother or father. Particularly intriguing is the
question of Jocasta’s own motive in fostering an incestuous union. Presumably knowing Oedipus’s
true identity, her own experience of parenthood remains veiled. This legacy of a son’s psychology
has posed problems for the realization of a psychoanalytic study of parenthood. To a very large
extent, psychoanalysis has focused on the development of boys rather than girls and on mother-son
or father-son relationships in the preschool years.
Furthermore, S. Freud’s own archeological model of personality development, in keeping with
the science of the late nineteenth century, stressed beginnings without considering the transforma-
tions taking place across adolescence and adulthood through old age, which posed new challenges
for maintaining a sense of personal integrity and vitality. Finally, much psychoanalytic understand-
ing emerged from the consulting room, based on detailed accounts of analysands. Generalization to
the world beyond the consulting room poses additional challenges and offers new opportunities for
increasing psychoanalytic understanding.
Following the framework proposed by Benedek (1959), Bibring (1959), Elson (1985), Ornstein
and Ornstein (1985), and particularly Fraiberg and her colleagues (1975) there are ghosts (of the
parental past) in the nursery, but these ghosts are a function of the parental childhood past and a pres-
ently remembered past in an ever-changing life story across the course of childhood, adolescence,
and adulthood (Cohler and deBoer, 1996; Colarusso and Nemiroff; 1979). It is in the parent’s own
continuing life story of a presently remembered past, experienced present, and anticipated future
that the parent’s response to caregiving is formed, concerning offspring and understanding of the
parenting experience for oneself at a particular point in the course of life. To the extent that parents
852
feel burdened by such personal and social problems as marital conflict and separation, early off-time
parenthood, and poverty, the capacities to respond empathically to offspring and to maintain a focus
on generativity are bound to be compromised. One of the tasks of a future psychoanalytic study of
parenthood is to fathom the manner in which these problems affect parental understanding of self
and the ability to realize the many complex demands of parenthood in contemporary society.
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INDEX
Note: Italicized page numbers indicate a figure on the corresponding page. Page numbers in bold
indicate a table on the corresponding page.
abusive behavior 444, 750 – 751 Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting
acceptance in parenting cognitions 700 System 423
acculturation 251 – 252, 390 Adoption and Safe Families Act (1997) 421
accumulation hypothesis 324 adult-adult dyadic subsystems 138
adaptation-competence 801 adult attachment 638
adaptive parenting 180, 631 – 632 Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) 40, 146, 238,
added adult hypothesis 324 698 – 699, 732, 734 – 735, 844 – 846
adequate parenting 12 adult-child dyadic subsystems 138
adolescent parenthood: childcare concerns adult development theory 565
219 – 220; in developed countries 201, 202; adult identity formation 204
in developing countries 202; education, adultification 6, 20, 389
employment, economic impact of 211 – 212; adult life theory 563
factors associated with 201 – 203; global trends advanced socioemotional development 385 – 387
200 – 203; heterogeneity in 199, 207; home affective organization of parenting 620 – 622
visiting 221 – 222; impact of 208 – 216; impact on affinity-seeking behaviors 323 – 324
children 213 – 215; individual and social context African Americans: adolescent parenthood 105,
207 – 208; introduction to 199 – 200; mental 202 – 203, 214; coparenting 140, 144, 150,
health and 209 – 211; models and frameworks 152 – 153, 154; custodial grandparent families 253;
203 – 208; parenting programs 220 – 221; policies extended family groups 18; father involvement
and programs for 216 – 222; resilience promoting 70, 73, 79, 80, 95, 96; goal-directed behavior
factors 215 – 217; summary of 223; support for by mothers 697; grandparenting 251; parental
220 – 222; teen mothers 20, 143, 207, 211 – 212, attributions 739; parental emotions 643; parenting
215 – 218, 222, 285 – 287; transition to parenthood cognitions 702; pedi-focal beliefs 332; sibling
204 – 207, 205, 206 caregiving 378, 397; Single Mothers by Choice
adolescents/adolescence: coparenting in diverse 292; single-parent families 273, 281 – 282; single-
families 144; depression during 458; father- parent fathers 295; socialization context 785;
adolescent communication 74, 75; father-child three-generational families 19; unwed mothers
relationships 96; as fathers 20; as mothers 105; 279 – 280
prosocial behavior in 255; sibling caregiving by age considerations: grandparenting role
381 – 382 243 – 244; increasing age of parenthood 598;
Adopt a Grandparent movement 257 intergenerational (IG) parenting 460; lineage vs.
adoption: grandparenting through 249; pre-adoptive age 233; nonlinear relations with maternal age 564;
homes 423; second-parent adoptions 361; single sibling caregiving 376
parenthood and 280; transition to parenthood aggregation principle 799
529 – 531 aggression 14, 112, 453, 743
861
Index
aggressive parenting 112, 453 vs. coercion 803 – 808, 810; work-related

agreeableness 805 – 806 autonomy 15
AIDS see HIV/AIDS availability component of involvement 68
Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) awareness 700, 827 – 831
218
Allport, Gordon 798 Baby Boomers 570
alternative dispute resolution (ADR) 152 Baehr v. Miike (1996) 360
ambivalent mothers 176 Baker v.Vermont (1999) 360
American Academy of Pediatrics 417 Bandura’s Self-Efficacy Theory 654 – 658, 656, 675
American Community Survey 515 Becoming a Family (BAF) Project (Cowan, Cowan) 149
Anaclitic Depression 45 behavior: abusive behavior 444, 750 – 751; affinity-
analytic-systems orientation stage 562 seeking behaviors 323 – 324; antisocial behavior
anger in parenting 621 106, 453, 782; attractors in 23; bonding behavior
Anglo-Canadian culture 738, 771 572; children’s oppositional behavior 747 – 748;
angry associates category 316 discipline behavior 572; education behavior 572;
anthropology studies 330 gateclosing/gateopening attitudes or behaviors
antisocial behavior 106, 453, 782 172, 176, 178, 180 – 182; general welfare and
anxiety 44, 430, 520, 704 protection behavior 572; goal-directed behavior
apathetic gate managers 176 – 177 621, 662 – 663, 696, 696 – 697, 697; male
apathetic sibling relationships 384 reproductive behavior 171; negativity behavior
applied implications in parental emotions 643 – 644 572; prosocial behavior in adolescents 255; risk
Arab families 191 conditions/risky behaviors 397 – 398, 529 – 541,
Arabs, socialization context 786 538 – 539; sensitivity behavior 572; social-cognitive
arginine vasopressin (AVP) 525 – 526 approach to 799
Aristotle’s notions of hedonia and eudaimonia 601 behavioral control 806, 807, 810, 811
arousal and regulation indices 634 – 637 being parented by children stage 581
Asian Americans: father involvement 71 – 72, 73; beliefs in parenting: intergenerational (IG) parenting
goal-directed behavior by mothers 697; parental 460; parental emotions 639 – 640; parenting
attributions 737 – 738; parental emotions 642; cognitions and 683, 689 – 691, 690; resilience and
socialization context 785 22; well-being in parenting 600
assimilationist perspective 346 Belsky’s Process Model 800 – 801
Association Task 698 Bene-Anthony Family Relations Test 486
Attachment and Biobehavioral Catch-Up 643 Benedek, Terese 832 – 835
attachment theory: grandparenting 237 – 238; benevolence 763, 815
intergenerational (IG) parenting 446 – 447; Bibring, Grete 835 – 836
nonparental caregiving 411 – 412, 413, 424 – 425; bidirectional processes among interparental conflict
psychoanalysis and parenthood 843 – 846 25
attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD): Big-Five Inventory 395
coparenting and 147; institutional studies of Big Five personality scheme 801 – 803, 811 – 812
children 46; parenting attributions and 729, 747; bigotry and father roles 64
parenting cognitions and 699; self-efficacy and biological factors/theories: in family systems theory
661 – 662 25 – 26; father-child relationships 83 – 86; foster
attention regulation 113 family-biological family-child triangle 157 – 158;
attitudes in parenting cognitions 691 – 693, 692, 705 generativity 104; intergenerational (IG) parenting
attractors in behavior 23 445 – 446; neurobiological effects in transition to
attrition in intergenerational (IG) parenting 469 parenthood 525 – 529; primacy of biology 324;
atypical children and parental attributions 748 – 749 psychobiological view of paternal behavior 84;
Australian father-child relationships 74 – 75 sociobiological theory nonparental caregiving 412
Australian teachers’ attributions 746 birth control legalization 597
authoritarian parenting 246, 748, 764, 771 birth order in sibling caregiving 376 – 377
authoritative parenting 106, 108, 246, 322, 765 blended/stepfamilies 18
authority stage 566 Block, Jack 145
autism spectrum disorder (ASD) 46 Block, Jeanne 145
autonomic nervous system (ANS) 634 bonding behavior 11, 154, 323 – 324, 494 – 497, 500,
autonomy: goals in family systems 17; maternal 530, 572 – 575
gatekeeping and 191 – 192; self-determination Borzormenyi-Nagy’s Contextual Theory 8
theory and 605; socialization and 767 – 768, boundary dissolution in family systems theory 13 – 14
780 – 781; supportive parenting and 772; support Bowen Family System Theory 8
862
Index
Bowlby, John 47, 684, 685 Child Trends (2016) report 278
brain development 85 – 86, 412 child welfare: global context 426 – 431; as nonparental
breastfeeding practices 37, 187, 533, 540, 561, 670, caregiving 409 – 410, 421 – 426; systems 157 – 158
683, 689, 700 Chinese Americans: goal-directed behavior by
British Cohort Study 217 mothers 697; grandparenting 250 – 251; parenting
British father-child relationships 72 beliefs 691; socialization context 785
British Stepfamily Association 334 Chinese Canadian immigrant mothers 191
Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model of human Chinese teachers’ attributions 746
development 800 chronic illness of child in sibling caregiving 396 – 397
bullying in sibling caregiving 388 – 389 chronic illness of parents in sibling caregiving 396
Bush, George W. 802 circularity 5
Circumplex Model of Marital and Family Systems 11
Cambridge Longitudinal Study 52 Classroom Assessment Survey Scale (CLASS) 416
caregivers and grandparenting 241 Clinton, Bill 802
categorical (preoperational) stage 560 coaching in parenting cognitions 700
causal cognitions 723 – 726, 727 coalition forming 9, 11 – 13
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R.) 421
201 coercive family processes 9, 51
Central America, adolescent parenthood 203 cognitive-affective factors in parenting 562
Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) Cognitive Behavior Therapy 54
421 cognitive contextual model operationalized
Child Adjustment and Parent Efficacy Scale (CAPES) triangulation 12
673 cognitive development theories: central issues in
child aggression 743 562 – 563; child cognitive development 53; father-
Child Attribution Test 733 child relationships 65, 113 – 114; nonparental
childbearing 38 caregiving 412 – 413, 431; parental development
childcare 169, 171, 254 – 255, 413 – 418, 419 stages 560 – 562; see also parenting cognitions
Childcare and Development Fund (CCDF) 540 Cognitive Reframing condition 750
Child Caretaking Scale 393 cohabitation 152 – 153, 282 – 284, 287 – 289, 292
child-centered parenting 598, 600, 729, 735 cohesion construct 11, 12
child characteristics in parenting self-efficacy 668 collectivistic society 390, 399, 574, 693, 746,
child characteristics in sibling caregiving 396 – 398 770 – 771, 813
child cognitive development 53 Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care (Spock)
child-driven processes in family systems 23 37
child gender 146 – 147 communication: coparenting in diverse families
child health and parenting self-efficacy 669 – 670 143; cross-cultural studies in 330; divorce and
childhood histories of parents 461 – 462 remarriage impact on 325; father-adolescent
child hostile attributions 746 communication 74, 75; information and
child-initiated sibling caregiving 379 communication technologies 239, 240; resilience
Childlessness Overcome Through Surrogacy (COYS) and 22
498 compensating (concrete operational) stage 560
child maltreatment 217, 221, 452, 458 – 459, 620, 622, compensatory processes 4 – 5
698, 743, 768 competence and self-determination theory 605
child neglect 392 – 393, 444, 627, 748 competent socializing agents 373
child-oriented emotions 627 – 629 competitive coparenting 145
child outcomes and parental emotions 624 – 625, 625 concerns in parenting cognitions 695, 695 – 696
childrearing decisions 297, 597 – 598 Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group 751
Children Act (1989) 257 conflict resolution 92 – 93
Children of Lesbians and Gays Everywhere Conflict Tactics Scale 749
(COLAGE) 359 confused gate managers 176
Children’s Bureau of the Administration on Children, congenial sibling relationships 384
Youth and Families 424, 425 connectedness and self-determination theory 605
Children’s Depression Inventory 747 conscientiousness 292, 395, 457, 801 – 803, 807 – 808
children’s oppositional behavior 747 – 748 consistency in parenting 51 – 52
child secure attachment 52 consistency socialization 780
child social understanding 48 – 50 constructivism stage 576
child temperament 86, 147 – 149, 640, 668, 778, contemporary coparenting theory 139
782 – 783, 815 contextual issues on fatherhood 118
863
Index
contingent gateopeners 181 deficit comparisons in nuclear family studies 331

control and socialization 767 – 768 Demick’s Holistic/Systems-Developmental Theory
control domain 777 – 778 (HSDT) 575 – 580, 577, 581, 582
conventional norms 773 departure stage 566, 569
conventional orientation stage 561 deployed fathers 107 – 108
cooperative colleagues 316 depression: during adolescence 458; adolescent
cooperative coparenting 144 – 145, 149, 151, 154, 180, parenthood and 209; in adolescents 144; Anaclitic
326, 332 – 333, 379 Depression 45; child welfare and 430; father-child
coparenting: central issues in 139 – 140; child relationships 89; intensive parenting styles 598;
adjustment and 144 – 145; child development and maternal depression 15, 37, 667 – 668; parental
143 – 144; child gender role in 146 – 147; child depression symptoms 107 – 108; postpartum
temperament impact on 147 – 149; cohabiting depression 39, 54 – 55, 89, 209, 528, 533, 659, 661,
and stepfamilies 152 – 153; conflicts with 327; 667 – 669; prenatal depression 667; transition to
cooperative coparenting 144 – 145, 149, 151, 154, parenthood 520
180, 326, 332 – 333, 379; development of 142 – 143; detached grandparenting style 245
direct and indirect effects 140 – 142; divorce and detouring 9, 12, 15
remarriage 314, 316 – 317, 326 – 328; extended developmental changes/perspectives: advanced
kinship networks 156 – 157; family systems theory socioemotional development 385 – 387; coparenting
13, 15; former spouses/partners 326; foster in diverse families 143 – 144; father-child
family-biological family-child triangle 157 – 158; relationships 65, 104 – 114, 116; intergenerational
gatekeeping 327 – 328; historical considerations in (IG) parenting stability 462 – 463; LGBTQ children
137 – 138; individual parents and children 145 – 146; 356 – 358; life course theories 204 – 207, 205,
intergenerational (IG) parenting 459 – 460; 206; nonparental caregiving 419 – 420, 429 – 431;
interventions to improve 149 – 150; introduction parental attributions 736; parental emotions 638;
to 137; military families 154 – 155; negative psychoanalysis and 832 – 835; psychoanalysis and
coparenting 145, 146, 148; positive coparenting offspring development 839 – 842; sibling caregiving
141, 145, 148, 178 – 179, 542; postdivorce 384 – 385; social development of LGBTQ children
coparenting 151 – 152; remarried spouses/partners 358 – 359
327; summary of 158; theory in 138 – 139; three- developmental delays/difficulties 89, 273
generation households 253 – 254; transition to Developmental Psychology 470
parenthood 520 – 521; two-parent heterosexual developmental stage 575
coresidential families 140 – 151; unmarried families differentiated person-in-environment system state
153 – 154 578
Copenhagen Child Cohort Study 50 diffuse to articulate polarity 578
coping strategies 22, 460 directedness and planning stage 576
corporal punishment of children 51 direct influences on grandparenting 252 – 255
correlational research in socialization 771 direct mechanisms in intergenerational (IG)
cortisol 83 – 84, 105, 412, 525 – 526, 639, 644 – 645, parenting 450
751, 753 disabled children 250
couple relationship, impact on parenting 12 disadvantaged fathers 105 – 106
couples group (CG) format 112, 149 discipline 149, 155, 169, 288, 296, 302, 572, 780 – 783
coupling patterns 24 disclosing parents in donor-conception 491 – 492
criticizing mothers 186, 188 – 189 Disneyland dad hypothesis 325
cross-generational alliances in coparenting 15 dispassionate leadership 765
cross-generational father involvement 86 – 87 distant grandparenting style 245
cultural diversity/differences: in family systems diversity: among LGBTQ parenting 347 – 349;
15 – 22; father-child relationship 65, 76 – 77; cultural/ethnic diversity in family systems 15 – 22;
grandparenting 250 – 252; mother-child in grandparenting 249 – 250; in motherhood
relationship 50; Mowder’s Parent Development 43 – 44; parenting cognitions and 701 – 702; see also
Theory 574; socialization and 769 – 771, 784 – 786; coparenting, in diverse families; cultural diversity/
see also coparenting, in diverse families; diversity differences; ethnic diversity/minorities
custodial grandparenting 252 – 253 divorce: custodial parents 295 – 298; father-child
custodial parenting and divorce 315 – 316 relationships 96; gay fathers 351; impact on
grandparenting 247 – 249; lesbian mothers
Day Reconstruction Method 603, 608, 611 350 – 351; nonresident father and 179; postdivorce
death of grandchild 249 coparenting 151 – 152; psychoanalysis and
dedifferentiated person-in-environment system state parenthood 851 – 852; rates of 312; sibling
578 caregiving 394; single-father families and 289
864
Index
divorce and remarriage: central issues 314 – 320; Eisenstadt v. Baird 597

coparenting 314, 316 – 317, 326 – 328; custodial emerging adult sibling caregiving 382 – 383
arrangements 315 – 316; future research directions emotional arousal 655 – 656
334 – 335; growing recognition phase 330; emotional climate 98 – 99
historical considerations 312 – 314; interventions emotionally disengaged marriages 296
in 334; introduction to 311 – 312; mediating efforts emotional stability 808 – 810
333 – 334; in New Millennium Era 331 – 333; emotional symbiosis 40
parenting issues 314 – 318; parenting/stepparenting emotions/emotional processes: advanced
314; qualitative approaches 334 – 335; remarried socioemotional development 385 – 387; anger in
parents 318 – 319; renegotiating personal identities parenting 621; applied implications in parental
318; research into 328 – 333; selection theories emotions 643 – 644; child-oriented emotions
328; social problem/social address phase 329; 627 – 629; empathy 622 – 623, 627 – 629; father-
stepfamilies 311 – 312, 314, 319 – 320; stress-related child relationships 112 – 113; impact of maternal
theories 321 – 326; summary of 335 – 336; support behavior on 50 – 52; meta-emotion philosophies
interventions 333 – 334; theories about 320 – 333; 681; negative emotions 606, 608, 629 – 631; open
underexamined parents 335; see also stepfamilies/ emotional expression 22; parenting and 608;
stepparenting positive emotions 604 – 605, 627 – 629; sibling
doing gender notion 170 caregiving 374 – 375, 386 – 387; socioemotional
domain-general vs. domain-specific attributions development/support 101, 385 – 387, 430, 743,
729 – 730 754; sympathy 622 – 623; see also parental emotions
donor-conception families: disclosing parents in empathy 622 – 623, 627 – 629
491 – 492; LGBTQ parenting 492 – 494; No-donor employment and adolescent parenthood 211 – 212
532; nondisclosing parents in 490 – 491; rates of empty nest phenomenon 558, 569
disclosure 488 – 492; unknown donor 348, 353, Enhanced Triple P program 643
532;Yes-donor 532 enmeshed parenting 4 – 6, 12 – 13, 20 – 21, 319, 704
donor insemination (DI) 353, 354, 486, 492 – 494, 531 environmental characteristics in parenting self-
Donor Sibling Registry 496 efficacy 668 – 669
dopaminergic reward circuit 527 environment of evolutionary adaptedness (EEA) 171
DSM-IV Defensive Functioning Scale 43 epistemic beliefs 329
dual earners 99, 540, 599 epistemic constraints 329
Dynamic Developmental Systems (DDS) model 448 Erikson’s Stage theory 103 – 104
dynamic systems (DS) theory 23 – 25 ethnic diversity/minorities: adolescent parenthood
dysfunctional attributions 747 – 748 216; in family systems 15 – 22; father involvement
70 – 72; Galinsky’s stage of parenthood 571;
early adult sibling caregiving 382 – 383 intergenerational (IG) parenting 462; parental
Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (ECLS) 143 attributions 738 – 739; parental emotions 642 – 643;
Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort sibling caregiving 378, 393; unwed mothers 279
(ECLS-B) 219 eudaimonia 601
Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten European Americans: adolescent birth rates 201;
Cohort (ECLS-K) 213 cohesion construct 11; dual-earner couples
early childhood sibling caregiving 380 – 381 99; fatherhood work patterns 101 – 102; father
early education in nonparental caregiving 413 – 418, involvement 70, 80, 95; goal-directed behavior by
419 mothers 697; great-grandparent roles 245; parental
Early Head Start 414 attributions 739; parental emotions 643; parenting
early-timed childbearing 96 beliefs 691; parenting cognitions 702; sibling
Early Upper Paleolithic period 235 caregiving 378; socialization context 785
ecological systems theory 411 European Study of Assisted Reproduction Families
Edin-Nelson project 105 485, 491
education: adolescent parenthood impact on Everyday Blessings:The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting
211 – 212; attainment differences 300; childcare/ (Kabat-Zinn, Kabat-Zinn) 699
early education 415, 417; early education in evidence-based interventions 399, 573
nonparental caregiving 413 – 418, 419; education evolutionary theory 235 – 237, 323, 516 – 517
behavior 572; father involvement 95; parental expectations in parenting cognitions 694 – 695
attributions 746 – 747 experimental research in socialization 771
egg donation 482 explicit attributions 724, 728, 729, 730, 747, 754
ego 52, 828 extended family: contextual influences of 355;
egoistic orientation stage 561 cultural support 11, 77 – 79, 251 – 252, 377, 390,
Egyptian Canadian parental attributions 738 427 – 429; face-to-face contact with 116; functional
865
Index
coparenting 157; image of fathering and 87; 85 – 86; challenges before preparation 95 – 97;
influence of 64; older mothers and 564; overview child characteristics 89 – 90; child outcomes 112;
of 18 – 19; transitioning to parenthood 516; cognitive processes 113 – 114; consequences of
wellbeing and 571, 596 100 – 104; couple relationships 91 – 93; deployed
extended kinship coparenting 156 – 157 fathers 107 – 108; determinants of involvement
extrafamilial social systems 66 83 – 100; disadvantaged fathers 105 – 106; emotional
extraversion 804 – 805, 814 – 815 processes 112 – 113; employment patterns 97 – 98;
ethnic minority father involvement 70 – 72;
face-to-face grandparent-child interaction 239 evolution of 171 – 172; family factors/variation
face-to-face parent-child interaction 53, 68, 116, 621 90 – 94, 115 – 116; future research trends 115 – 118;
facilitative gatekeeping 180 hormonal influences 83 – 85; impact on mother-
Fair Labor Standards Act 597 father relationships 100 – 101; incarcerated fathers
families as open systems 7 106 – 107; individual factors impacting 86 – 90;
family accommodations 703 – 704 in intact, majority families 69 – 70, 92; intact
Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) 540 families 108 – 114; in intact marriages 78 – 83;
family complexity hypothesis 325 international perspective on 72 – 73; intervention
family custodian/historian 241 evidence of 111 – 112; introduction to 64 – 66, 67;
family dynamic processes 4 involvement in development 65, 104 – 114, 116;
Family Equality Council 359 male attitudes, motivation, and skills 88; male self-
family foster care see foster care identity and 102; maternal attitudes and 90 – 91;
Family Foundations 539 maternal involvement vs. 68 – 69; military fathers
Family Foundations (FF) 149 – 150 82 – 83; paternal incarceration 80 – 81; paternal
Family-go-round 79 mental health 89; paternal work quality 98 – 100;
family-level variables 4 psychological adjustment of men 103; qualitative
family of origin 86 – 87 effects 73 – 77; reversed role families 105, 109 – 111;
Family Pride Coalition 363 secular trends 116 – 117; social connections
family resilience 22, 215 – 216 beyond family 103 – 104; societal conditions and
Family Spirit 222 variants 94 – 100; summary of 118 – 119; timing
family structure 12, 377 – 378; see also extended family of parenthood 94 – 95; transnational patterns of
family systems theory (FST): biological processes in contact 81 – 82, 107; vulnerability hypothesis
25 – 26; Borzormenyi-Nagy’s Contextual Theory 93 – 94; work patterns and 101 – 102
8; boundary dissolution 13 – 14; Bowen Family fatherhood programs 153 – 154
System Theory 8; brief history of 7 – 11; circularity Fatherhood Research and Practice Network (FRPN)
5; coparenting 13; cultural/ethnic diversity in 154
15 – 22; divorce and remarriage 325; early architects father-only families 271, 276
of 7 – 8; enmeshment 6; families as interdependent fathers/fathering: adolescents as 20; gender dynamics
network 167; families as open systems 7; family in family systems 14, 16; maternal gatekeeping
resilience 22; family structural types 12; Functional impact on 173 – 175; nonresident fathers 79,
Family Therapy 10; fundamental concepts 3 – 7; 179 – 182, 185; parental attributions 744 – 745;
future directions 22 – 26; gender dynamics 14 – 15; psychoanalysis and 846 – 849; stay-at-home fathers
grandparenting 238 – 239; holism 3 – 4; homeostasis 599; vulnerability hypothesis 93 – 94
5; interdependency 4 – 5; introduction to 3; fatigue in parenting 606 – 607
intrusiveness 7; Minuchin’s Structural Family Fears, Solomon 288
Theory 8 – 9; Multidimensional Family Therapy feeblemindedness 45
10 – 11; Multisystemic Therapy 10; neglect of Feminine Mystique,The (Friedan) 599
development 20 – 22; parentification 6; parenting fertility rate declines 598
associations 11 – 15; social learning perspective 9; fictive kin 18 – 19, 332
spousification 6 – 7; subsequent developments in fiery foes category 316
10 – 11; subsystem boundaries 5 – 7; summary of Figuring It Out for the Child (FIOC) 150 – 151
26; theoretical and empirical challenges 16 – 22; Finland TtP policies 540 – 541
transition to parenthood 516 – 517; translational first-time parenthood 559, 565
research on 26; triangulation 9, 12 – 13; whole food stamps 212
family constructs 11 – 12 formal grandparenting style 245
Family Thriving Program 749 – 750 foster care: family foster care 422; foster family-
family-work conflict 98 biological family-child triangle 157 – 158; low-
father absence 300 – 301 and middle-income countries 428; nonparental
father-child relationships: attention regulation caregiving and 421, 430; sibling caregiving
113; biological factors 83 – 86; brain impact on 394 – 395
866
Index
“foster grandparent” programs 257 goal-directed behavior 621, 662 – 663, 696, 696 – 697,
Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study 697
(FFCWS) 78, 143, 190, 274 – 275, 287 – 289, 298 goal-directed theories of development 566
Fraiberg, Selma 836 Go/No Go Association Task 698
Frederick II 44 Goodenough’s Draw-a-Person Test 568
Freud, Sigmund 37, 824 – 837, 842, 846 – 847, 852 grandmother hypothesis 235 – 236
Friedan, Betty 599 Grandparent Association 257 – 258
Functional Family Therapy (FFT) 10 grandparenting: attachment theory 237 – 238;
fun seeker grandparenting style 245 coparenting three-generation households
future-oriented parenting cognitions 694 – 697, 695, 253 – 254; cultural differences 250 – 252; custodial
696, 697 grandparenting 252 – 253; death of grandchild 249;
direct influences on 252 – 255; disabled children
Galinsky’s stage of parenthood 565 – 571, 580, 250; effects of being 256; evolutionary theory
581 – 583 235 – 237; family diversity 249 – 250; family systems
gateclosing/gateopening attitudes or behaviors 172, theory 238 – 239, 244; frequency of contact with
176, 178, 180 – 182 grandchildren 239 – 240; future research directions
gatekeeping: advancements and applications 178 – 183; 258 – 259; great-grandparents 244 – 245; as head
associations with father involvement 186 – 189, of households 19; historical issues and studies
187; backlash from 175; in coparenting 327 – 328; 233 – 235; indirect influences 255; introduction
evolutionary perspectives 171 – 172; expanded to 232 – 233; legal status 257 – 258; life-span/
view of 175 – 177; facilitative gatekeeping 180; life-course perspectives 239; nature of contacts
family factors in 90 – 91; focus on 168 – 172; with 240 – 242; parental divorce and 247 – 249;
gender perspectives 169 – 171; historical perceptions of 246 – 247; practical aspects of
underpinnings 173; inconsistent gatekeeping 180; 256 – 258; role of proximity 240; societal views of
introduction to 167 – 168; justified gatekeeping 246; stereotypes of 246 – 247; style of 245 – 246;
180, 181; limiting father involvement 173 – 175; summary of 259; temporary childcare 254 – 255;
literature review 172 – 183; measuring 182 – 183; theoretical perspectives 235 – 239; varying
new conceptualization of 183 – 189, 184, 187; characteristics 242 – 244
nonresident father and 179 – 182, 185; passive gray matter (GM) volume 85
gatekeepers 181; predictors of 177 – 178; restrictive Great Depression 116
gatekeeping 180 – 182, 328; summary of 189 – 192; great-grandparents 244 – 245
unjustified restrictive gatekeeping 180 Great Recession 116
Gates, Bill 802 group participation domain 776 – 777
Gay and Lesbian Medical Association (GLMA) 360 growing recognition phase 330
gay father surrogacy families 502 – 503, 533 guided learning domain 776
gender differences: dynamics in family systems Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children
14 – 15; employment patterns impact on 410 – 411
parenting 97 – 98; in grandparenting role 242;
intergenerational (IG) parenting 463 – 465; Handbook of Grandparenthood (Szinovacz) 235
maternal gatekeeping and 169 – 171; parental happiness: defined 601 – 602; paths to greater
attributions 736; sibling caregiving 377; well-being 604 – 605; paths to lower 605 – 607
in parenting 600 – 599, 609 – 610 harsh-intrusive parenting 172, 288, 808
gender dynamics in family systems theory 14 – 15 Head Start programs 414, 417
gender gap/inequality 72, 539 Healthy Child Care 417
gender identity 170, 356 – 358 Healthy Families Massachusetts (HFM) 221 – 222
gene-environment correlations (rGE) 768 hedonia 601
General Register Office of the United Kingdom Heinicke’s Framework 801
Office for National Statistics 498 helicopter parenting 598, 704
general welfare and protection behavior 572 help-seeking roadblocks 700
generational perceptions of grandparenting 247 heterogeneity in adolescent parenting 199, 207
generativity concept 104, 558 heterosexual relationships 348, 351
genetic concerns/theories 445 – 446, 466, 488, HEXACO model 802
768 – 769 hierarchical structure in parenting 11
genital mutilation 827 high-income countries (HICs) 36, 44, 48, 54, 55
gerontology studies 330 hindering mothers 185 – 186, 188
gestation complications 38 – 39 HIV/AIDS 253, 428 – 430
ghosts in the nursery concept 39, 836, 840, 843 – 846 holism 3 – 4, 23
globalization 771 holistic stage 575
867
Index
Holistic/Systems-Developmental Theory (HSDT) interdisciplinary perspective on fatherhood 117 – 118

557, 575 – 580, 577, 581, 582 – 583 interfused to subordinated polarity 577
Holocaust survivors 238 intergenerational (IG) parenting: attachment
homeostasis 5, 7 – 9, 23, 296, 634 theory 446 – 447; attrition 469; central issues
Home Visiting Evidence of Effectiveness (HomVEE) in 448 – 465; contextual stability 447 – 448;
222 descriptive understanding of 449, 449 – 458, 450,
home visiting for adolescent parenthood 221 – 222 451; development and time 469; differences
homophobic bullying 359 between mothers and fathers 463 – 465;
hormonal influences 83 – 85, 525 – 527 Dynamic Developmental Systems (DDS)
hostile-competitive coparenting 142 model 448; future research directions 470 – 472;
hostile sibling relationships 384 genetic and biological theories 445 – 446;
household chaos impact 733 – 734 historical considerations 444 – 445; instability
hunter-gatherer societies 235, 236 or moderation of 458 – 463; introduction to
husband-wife relationship 64 443 – 444; limitations and challenges of 467 – 470;
hypothalamus 527, 528 negative parenting 451 – 455; positive parenting
hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis 39, 412, 455 – 457; prospective data 468; representativeness
644, 753 468 – 469; research on 465 – 470; social learning
theory 447; strength and characteristics of
id 828 465 – 467; summary of 472 – 473
identity: adult identity formation 204; confusion intergenerational identity dynamics 39 – 41
vs. 206; gender identity 170, 356 – 358; intergenerational transmission: attachment 237 – 238;
intergenerational identity dynamics 39 – 41; male attitudes 233; harshness/hostility 86, 87; instability
self-identity 102; in mothering 42 – 43, 182; or moderation of 458 – 463; negative parenting
renegotiating personal identities 318; sexual 451 – 455; parenting styles 87, 210, 252, 255, 451,
identity 348, 350 – 352, 356 – 358, 363; social 451 – 458
position framework 65 – 66 internalization of values 767 – 768
IFEEL picture test 733 internal working models (IWMs) 205 – 206, 237
image-making stage 566, 568 interparental conflict 4, 316 – 317
implicit attitudes in parenting cognitions 698 interpersonal problem-solving 381
implicit attributions 728 – 729 Interpretation of Dreams,The (Freud) 824
incarcerated fathers 106 – 107 interpretive stage 566, 568 – 569
inchoate negativity 40 interruption of negative chain reactions 22
incomplete institutionalization hypothesis 325 intervention in adolescent parenthood 220 – 222
in conflict person-in-environment system state 578 intimacy versus isolation 206 – 207
inconsistent gatekeeping 180 intimate partner violence (IPV) 150
indirect mechanisms in intergenerational (IG) intimate sibling relationships 384
parenting 450 – 451, 450 – 451 intra-cytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI): concerns
indiscriminate sociability 46 about 483 – 484; gay father surrogacy families 503;
individual differences in parental emotions 637 – 643 introduction to 482 – 483; research on 486 – 487
Industrial Revolution 597 intrafamilial violence 114
infantile autism 842 intra-family coparenting adaptations 156
infant-parent attachment 145 intrusiveness 7, 14, 16, 804, 838
infants 75, 85, 90, 148 invisible gate ignorers 177
infertility treatment see reproductive technology in vitro fertilization (IVF): concerns about 483 – 484;
information and communication technologies (ICTs) gay father surrogacy families 353, 503 – 504;
239, 240 introduction to 482 – 483; research on 485 – 486
information gathering in socialization 772 irrelevance hypothesis 324
insider-outsider dynamics in remarriage 319 Islamic grandparenting 251, 252
instability of intergenerational (IG) parenting isolated person-in-environment system state 578
458 – 463 Israeli-Jewish families 191
institutional care/group homes 45 – 46, 423, 428 – 430 Israeli socialization context 786
integrated model of parental emotions 623 – 624, 624 issue-specific parenting 458
integrated person-in-environment system state 578 Italian parental attributions 737
intelligence (IQ) 37, 46, 55
intensive parenting styles 598 Japan Stepfamily Association 334
interaction component of involvement 68 Jewish socialization context 786
interdependency 4 – 5, 21, 566, 569 Jobs, Steve 802
868
Index
joint legal custody 313 low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) 36, 44,
justified gatekeeping 180, 181 54, 55, 427 – 429
low birthweight (LBW) 537
Karitane Parenting Confidence Scale (KPCS) 672 low-income families 18, 111 – 112, 415, 417, 600
Kennedy, John F. 802 loyal sibling relationships 384
Kindchenschema (baby schema) 48 Lyon-Martin Women’s Health Services 360
kinship care 422 – 423, 427 – 428, 429
Knowledge of Infant Development Inventory (KIDI) maladaptive parenting 180, 559
706 male reproductive behavior 171
Korean Americans 702 male self-identity and fatherhood 102
managerial responsibility of mothers 69
labile to stable polarity 578 marital satisfaction/quality 100 – 101, 140 – 142
labor force participation 444 marital schism 7
Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund 360 marital skew 7
language competence 108, 213 marriage: declines among African Americans 281;
late adult sibling caregiving 383 – 384 declines with adolescent parenting 218 – 219;
late-timed parenthood 96 emotionally disengaged marriages 296; father-
Latin Americans: adolescent birth rates 201, 203; child relationships 95; low-income families 302;
cohesion construct 11; father involvement 70 – 71, paternal mental health 89; satisfaction/quality
72, 74, 95; goal-directed behavior by mothers 697; 100 – 101, 140 – 142
institutional care studies of infants 45; parental maternal depression 15, 37, 667 – 668
attributions 738, 739; parenting cognitions 702; maternal deprivation 44 – 47
sibling caregiving 378, 397; unwed mothers Mattes, Jane 290
279 – 280 meaning, in life 604
leadership in coparenting 157 meaning making in parenthood 200
learned beliefs 731, 733 Me-as-a-Parent Scale (MaaP) 673
Leeds Attributional Coding System (LACS) 732 medial pre-optic area (MPOA) 527
lesbian baby boom 492 mediating efforts in divorce and remarriage 333 – 334
letter writing in parent-child contact 80 memory-based knowledge structures 726
LGBTQ parenting: advocacy directions 364; barriers men and family of origin 86 – 87
and support 352 – 353; children of 356 – 359; menopause 235 – 236, 826, 835, 839
contextual influences 355 – 356; coparenting mental health: adolescent parenthood and 209 – 211;
155 – 156; diversity among 347 – 349; divorced gay of child in sibling caregiving 397; of children
fathers 351; divorced lesbian mothers 350 – 351; 108; grandparenting impact on 256; help-seeking
donor insemination 492 – 494; family processes roadblocks to 700; of parents in sibling caregiving
354 – 355; gay father surrogacy families 502 – 503; 395 – 396; paternal mental health 89
gender/sexual identity development in children mentalizing parenting cognitions 698 – 699
356 – 358; grandparenting 250; healthcare resources Mental Research Institute (MRI) 8
360; historical context of 345 – 346; introduction mentor role 87, 104, 150, 241, 380, 387
to 345; legal and public policy issues 349; legal men with illegal earnings 292
resources 360 – 361; parent groups 359; pathways to Merkel, Angela 802
353; planned families 352 – 354; prevalence of 347; metacognition in parenting cognitions 699 – 700
psychoanalysis and 849 – 850; research directions meta-emotion philosophies 681
361 – 363; research on 350 – 356; role of theory in Mexican Americans: father-child relationships
research 346 – 347; service directions 363 – 364; 94; goal-directed behavior by mothers 697;
services for 359 – 361; social development of grandparenting 252; maternal gatekeeping 191;
children 358 – 359; summary of 364 – 365; transition sibling caregiving 372, 390 – 391
to 354; in vitro fertilization 482; see also same-sex middle adult sibling caregiving 383
parents middle childhood sibling caregiving 381
life course theories 204 – 207, 205, 206, 380 – 384 military families 82 – 83, 154 – 155
life span 234, 564 Millennials 570
life structures 565 Millennium Development Goals (MDG) 410 – 411
limit setting and socialization 780 – 783 mindfulness in parenting cognitions 699
lineage and grandparenting role 242 – 243 mindfulness programs 643, 681
lineage vs. age 233 Minuchin’s Structural Family Theory 8 – 9
lone mothers 294 mirroring behavior 49
Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG) 258 Mischel, Walter 798 – 799, 816
869
Index
mismatch-repair process 51 National Survey of Families and Households (NSFH)

moderation of intergenerational (IG) parenting 78
458 – 463 National Survey of Family Growth 352
morality and socialization 779 National Survey of Households and Families (NSHF)
motherese 49 295
mothers/mothering: abusive mothers 750 – 751; naturalistic observation in socialization 771
breakdown in adjustment to 44; child cognitive negative coparenting 145, 146, 148
development 53; child secure attachment 52; negative emotions 606, 608, 629 – 631
child social understanding 48 – 50; diversity in negative outcomes of nonparental caregiving
43 – 44; effects of 44 – 53; evolutionary perspective 424 – 425
172; gender dynamics in family systems 14 – 15; negative parenting 451 – 455, 732, 765 – 767
hostile attributions 746; identity changes 42 – 43, negativity behavior 572
182; identity confirmation 182; impact on child NEO Personality Inventory-Revised 803
emotions 50 – 52; institutional care studies 45 – 46; neurobiological effects and transition to parenthood
intergenerational identity dynamics 39 – 41; 525 – 529
intervention with difficulties 53 – 56; introduction neuroticism 395, 808 – 810
to 36 – 38; lone mothers 294; maternal depression nevermarried “fragile” families 18
15, 667 – 668; maternal deprivation 44 – 47; nature new competencies in sibling caregiving 386
of 38 – 44; night-time maternal care 47; paternal New Millennium Era 331 – 333
involvement vs. 68 – 69; path to 41; physiological new responsibilities hypothesis 322
changes 38 – 39; psychological changes 39 – 44; night-time maternal care 47
responsiveness to distress 766; summary of 56; Nixon, Richard 802
surrogate mothers 501 – 502; teen mothers 20, 143, No-donor 532
207, 211 – 212, 215 – 218, 222, 285 – 287; transition no-fault divorce grounds 312 – 313
to parenthood 41, 42; work-to-family conflict noncustodial grandparenting 256
177 – 178; see also maternal gatekeeping nondisclosing parents in donor-conception 490 – 491
Mowder’s Parent Development Theory (PDT) nonepistemic beliefs 329
571 – 575, 581 – 583 nonlinear relations with maternal age 564
Moynihan, Daniel Patrick 273 nonparental caregiving: attachment theory 411 – 412,
Multidimensional Family Therapy (MDFT) 10 – 11 424 – 425; childcare/early education 413 – 418,
multigenerational coparenting 157 419; children’s rights 410 – 411; child welfare in
multigenerational households 18 global context 426 – 431; child welfare in United
multi-partner fertility (MFP) unions 153 States 409 – 410, 421 – 426; cognitive and social
multiple-birth rates 484 stimulation theories 412 – 413, 431; conceptions
multiple intentionality stage 576 of 418 – 419; ecological systems theory 411; effects
multiple models of analysis stage 576 on child development 419 – 420, 429 – 431; effects
multiple worlds stage 576 on children 423 – 425; global forms of 418 – 420;
Multisystemic Therapy (MST) 10 institutional care/group homes 423, 428 – 430;
mutually responsive orientation (MRO) 775 – 776 international contexts 420; introduction to
409 – 410; kinship care 422 – 423, 427 – 428, 429;
National Association for the Education of Young low- and middle-income countries 427 – 429;
Children (NAEYC) 417 sociobiological theory 412; socioemotional
National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) development 430; state involvement in 419;
360 – 361 summary of 432; theory/framework of 410 – 413;
National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect 421 variable factors 425 – 426; see also foster care
National Collaborative Perinatal Project (NCPP) 214 nonresidential fathers 79, 105, 179 – 182, 185, 322
National Institute of Child Health and Human nonresidential mothers 323
Development (NICHD) Study of Early Care 432 nonresidential stepmothers 319 – 320, 324
National Institute of Child Health and Human normative family processes of stepfamilies 153
Development Study of Early Childcare and Youth nuclear family 17, 143, 235, 329 – 331, 502
Development 409, 415 – 416 nurturing stage 566, 568
National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) 78,
86, 214, 215 Obama, Barack 802
National Stepfamily Resource Center (NRSC) 334 Obergefell v. Hodges (2015) 349, 361
National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) 153
(NSCAW) 424 offspring development 839 – 842
National Survey of Children’s Health (NSCH) 78 older single-mother families 290
870
Index
on-time/off-time experiences of grandparenting 247, summary of 586 – 587; transition to parenthood

259 559 – 560
open emotional expression 22 parental discrimination 323
opening of opportunities 22 Parental Emotion Regulation Inventory (PERI) 632
operationalization in parenting self-efficacy 669 parental emotions: affective organization of parenting
oppositional behavior by children 747 – 748 620 – 622; applied implications 643 – 644; beliefs,
Oppositional Defiant Disorder 147 experience and knowledge 639 – 640; child
oral contraception 597 characteristics and 640 – 641; child outcomes and
Oregon Social Learning Center 9 624 – 625, 625; conceptual perspectives 620 – 625;
Oregon Youth Study (OYS) 467 – 470 contextual factors 641 – 643; developmental history
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and and adult attachment 638; empathy, sympathy,
Development (OECD) 36, 271, 411, 418 and personal distress 622 – 623; future research
organizational patterns of resilience 22 directions 644 – 645; individual differences in
orthogenetic principle 575 – 578 637 – 643; integrated model of 623 – 624, 624;
other-oriented induction 764 introduction to 620; measurement of 625 – 627;
out-of-the home workforce participation 377 negative and parent-oriented emotions 629 – 631;
overlooked survival strategy 392 neurological perspective on 623; physiological
overreactivity in parenting 806 indices of arousal and regulation 634 – 637; positive,
oxytocin (OT) hormone 525 – 526, 527 empathic, and child-oriented emotions 627 – 629;
psychopathology of 639; regulation of 631 – 634;
paid leave policies 540 social information-processing perspective 622;
paradigmatic constraints 329 stable traits and 638 – 639; summary of 645 – 646
parallel parenting 326 parental engagement after remarriage 322
parental attitudes 561, 580 parental generativity 104
parental attributions: attribution theory 727; parental investment/parental discrimination
atypical children and 748 – 749; causal cognitions proposition 323
723 – 726, 727; children’s oppositional behavior Parental Locus of Control (PLOC) 745
747 – 748; child responses and 742 – 744; distal parental reflective functioning 698
influences 735 – 738; domain-general vs. domain- Parental Regulation Inventory (PRI) 182 – 183
specific 729 – 730; dysfunctional attributions parental responses and parental attributions 740 – 742
747 – 748; in educational settings 746 – 747; Parental Sense of Competence Scale (PSOC) 671,
ethnic and immigrant variations in 738 – 739; 672
expectations vs. 752; explicit attributions 729; Parent Attribution Questionnaire (PAQ) 737
of fathers 744 – 745; future research directions Parent Attribution Test (PAT) 732 – 735, 738 – 739,
751 – 753; implicit attributions 728 – 729; 745 – 746, 750
influence of 727 – 729; interventions for abusive Parent Behavior Frequency Questionnaire-Revised
mothers 750 – 751; introduction to 722 – 723; (PBFQ-R) 572
as learned beliefs 731; measures of 745 – 746; Parent Behavior Importance Questionnaire-Revised
mediating processes 753; nature of 723 – 726, (PBIQ-R) 572
730 – 731; origins and effects 733 – 740; parental parent-centered goals 696, 729
responses and 740 – 742; positive attributional parent characteristics in sibling caregiving 395 – 396
style 746; proximal influences 734 – 735; social Parent Control Over Failure Scale of the Parent
cognitive learning theory 723 – 725, 726; social Attribution Test 739
information processing theory 731 – 733, 741, Parent Development Interview 496, 699
747; summary of 753 – 754; theoretical approaches Parent Development Theory (PDT) 571 – 575,
726 – 731 581 – 583
parental awareness 561, 580 parent-driven processes in family systems 23
parental development stages: central issues 562 – 564; parentese 49
cognitive development theories 560 – 562; parent groups for LGBTQ parenting 359
Demick’s Holistic/Systems-Developmental Theory parentification 6, 8, 14, 16, 23, 389, 852
(HSDT) 557, 575 – 580, 577, 581, 582 – 583; future parenting adult children stage 581
research directions 581 – 586, 584 – 585; Galinsky’s parenting beliefs see beliefs in parenting
stage of parenthood 565 – 571, 580, 581 – 583; parenting cognitions: attitudes in 691 – 693, 692,
historical considerations 557 – 562; introduction to 705; brief history 683 – 685; capturing change in
556 – 557; modern theory and research 564 – 580; 703; clinical and health-related research 703 – 704;
Mowder’s Parent Development Theory 571 – 575, cognitive behavior linkages 707; evaluation
581 – 582; practical information on 580 – 581; of 704 – 707; expanding diversity 701 – 702;
871
Index
future-oriented 694 – 697, 695, 696, 697; group pedi-focal beliefs 332

differences 702; implicit attitudes 698; increasing peer victimization 358 – 359
attention to 701; introduction to 681 – 683; Perceived Maternal Parenting Self-Efficacy Scale
measurement and methodological issues 706 – 707; (PMP-SE) 672
mentalizing 698 – 699; metacognition 699 – 700; Perceived Parental Self-Efficacy (PPSE) questionnaire
mindfulness 699; present-oriented evaluative 673
cognitions 691 – 694, 692, 693; present-oriented perceptions in parenting cognitions 687, 687,
nonevaluative cognitions 687, 687, 687 – 691, 690; 687 – 689
processes in 700 – 701; summary of 707; trends in permissive parenting 765
701 – 704; typology of 685 – 686, 685 – 697 personal distress 622 – 623
Parenting Coordination 152 personality and parenting: agreeableness 805 – 806;
Parenting magazine 737 Belsky’s Process Model 800 – 801; Big Five
parenting programs for adolescent parenthood personality scheme 801 – 803, 811 – 812;
220 – 221 characteristics of parents 395; conscientiousness
parenting-related affective processes 623 807 – 808; emotional stability neuroticism 808 – 810;
parenting self-efficacy see self-efficacy in parenting extraversion 804 – 805, 814 – 815; future research
Parenting Stress Index 486, 487 directions 813 – 815; Heinicke’s Framework 801;
parenting young children stage 580 introduction to 797 – 798; measurement of 803;
Parent Management Training Oregon (PMTO) 9 moderators of 815; openness to experience
Parents as Teachers (PAT) 222 810 – 811; person-situation debate 798 – 800;
parents/parenthood: adaptive parenting 180, psychoanalysis and 800, 831 – 832; research in
631 – 632; adequate parenting 12; affective 803 – 813; summary of 816; theoretical framework
organization of 620 – 622; aggressive parenting 798 – 803
112, 453; anger in parenting 621; authoritarian Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity
parenting 246, 748, 764, 771; authoritative Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) 218
parenting 106, 108, 246, 322, 765; as person-in-environment system 557, 576 – 579
developmental phase 557 – 559; effectiveness of person relation 829
325; engagement after remarriage 322; enmeshed person-situation debate 798 – 800
parenting 4 – 6, 12 – 13, 20 – 21, 319, 704; first- perspective taking and socialization 781 – 782
time parenthood 559, 565; gatekeeping 167 – 168, perspective taking in sibling caregiving 387
179 – 182, 189 (see also maternal gatekeeping); perspectivistic (formal operational) stage 560 – 561
helicopter parenting 598, 704; hierarchical Phenomenological Variant of Ecological Systems
structure in 11; interparental conflict 316 – 317; Theory (PVEST) 207 – 208
issue-specific parenting 458; knowledge of child Philadelphia Child Guidance Clinic 8 – 9
perception 781 – 782; late-timed parenthood 96; physical abuse in sibling caregiving 388 – 389
maladaptive parenting 180, 559; mindfulness in physical punishment 782 – 783
parenting cognitions 699; negative parenting physiological indices of arousal and regulation
451 – 455, 732, 765 – 767; overreactivity in 806; 634 – 637
parallel parenting 326; permissive parenting physiological mobilization 740 – 741
765; positive parenting 455 – 457, 765 – 767; self- Piaget, Jean 684
blame by 736; social-cognitive awareness of 560; planned LGBTQ families 352 – 354
styles of 764 – 765; supportive parenting 9, 13, planned pregnancies 290 – 291
77, 255, 608, 665, 772, 805, 807, 812, 815; time- play/physical play 51, 74
intensive parenting 598, 600; total parenthood PMTO model of translational research 26
period 558; underexamined parents 335; polarized mothers 176
warmth in parenting 805, 809; see also adolescent polygamy 390
parenthood; coparenting; father-child relationships; positive affectivity 96, 112, 384, 397, 450, 523, 602,
grandparenting; intergenerational (IG) parenting; 609, 613, 621, 630, 814
same-sex parents; single parenthood; well-being in positive attributional style 208, 746
parenting positive coparenting 141, 145, 148, 178 – 179, 542
Parents’ Well-Being Model 596, 603 – 604, 604, 609, positive emotions 604 – 605, 627 – 629
612 positive outcomes of nonparental caregiving 425
partner-assisted reproduction 353 positive parenting 455 – 457, 765 – 767
passive gatekeepers 181 postdivorce coparenting 151 – 152
paternal banking strategies 181 postpartum depression 39, 54 – 55, 89, 209, 528, 533,
paternal incarceration 80 – 81 659, 661, 667 – 669
paternal work quality 98 – 100 post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD): adolescent
Pavan v. Smith (2017) 349, 361 parenthood and 209; child welfare and 430;
872
Index
intergenerational (IG) parenting 462; military randomized controlled trial (RCT) 220, 222
fathers 82; negative parenting and 454; socially rates of disclosure by donor-conception families
disadvantaged communities 850; socioemotional 488 – 492
adjustment and 107 – 108 rational objectivity bias 329
praising mothers 185, 188 readiness-to-learn scores 294
pre-adoptive homes 423 reciprocal processes in family systems 23
precipitants of sibling caregiving 378 – 379 reciprocity domain 775 – 776
Pregnancy Discrimination Act (1978) 599 regulation of parental emotions 631 – 634
pregnant women, preventative intervention 751 relational perspective 829
prekindergarten programs 414 relationships: couples and father-child relationships
premature adultification 389 91 – 93; dual-earner couples 99; internal
prenatal depression 667 working models 237; marital satisfaction/
Preschool Activities Inventory (PSAI) 357 quality 100 – 101, 140 – 142; pregnancy impact on
present-oriented evaluative cognitions 691 – 694, 692, 840 – 841; strain in 607; transition to parenthood
693 514, 517 – 521, 536; see also divorce; marriage;
present-oriented nonevaluative cognitions 687, 687, same-sex parents
687 – 691, 690 religiosity 216, 286
preventative intervention with pregnant women 751 religious freedom laws 349
primacy of biology 324 remarried parents 318 – 319; see also divorce and
primacy of residence 324 remarriage
privacy management theory 325 renegotiating personal identities 318
proactive encouragement 185 representativeness in intergenerational (IG) parenting
proactive gateopening/gateclosing 180 – 181 468 – 469
problem-solving 22, 381, 386, 520 reproductive technology: absence of genetic
process-person-context perspective 516 relationships 488; concerns about 483 – 484;
process vs. achievement analysis 576 donor-conception families 487 – 496; donor
Progressive Muscle Relaxation 54 insemination 353, 354, 486, 492 – 494; introduction
prolactin 83 – 84, 525 – 527 to 482 – 483; research on 485 – 487; secrecy
Promising Practices Network 222 concerns 487 – 488; summary of 503 – 504;
prosociality 255, 778 – 779, 782 surrogacy families 497 – 503
protection domain 774 – 775 reservoir of wisdom grandparenting style 245
protective processes 22 resiliency in adolescent parenthood 215 – 217
psychoanalysis and parenthood: attachment theory resiliency with divorce and remarriage 325 – 326
843 – 846; developmental stage and 832 – 835; respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) 634, 635 – 637,
divorce and 851 – 852; expectant parents 839 – 842; 734
fatherhood and 846 – 849; future research responsibility component of involvement 68
directions 849 – 852; ghosts in the nursery concept responsive parenting 803
836, 840, 843 – 846; historical considerations restrictive gatekeeping 180 – 182, 328
827 – 831; introduction to 823 – 824; lesbians reversed role families 105, 109 – 111
and gay men 849 – 850; offspring development rigid to flexible polarity 578
839 – 842; as parenthood perspective 824 – 827; rigid triangles 9, 12
personality development 831 – 832; pregnancy risk conditions/risky behaviors 397 – 398, 529 – 541,
o parenthood 835 – 836; response to the baby 538 – 539
836; self-psychological perspectives 836 – 839; role reversal 6, 21, 110 – 111
separation-individuation paradigm 842 – 843; role sharing 104 – 105, 109 – 110
socially disadvantaged family/community role theory 177 – 178, 189, 573
850 – 851; summary of 852 – 853 Rompuy, Herman van 802
psychoanalytic theorizing 800 Russian parental attributions 738
psychobiological view of paternal behavior 84
psychological adjustment of fatherhood 103 same-sexed sibling relationships 384
psychological vulnerability of solo mothers 294 same-sex parents: coparenting 155 – 156; father-child
psychopathology of parental emotions 639 relationship 77; introduction to 18; maternal
psychosexual stages of development 563 gatekeeping and 179, 191; transition to parenthood
punishment and socialization 782 – 783 513, 515, 531 – 535; well-being in parenting 599;
pushing mothers 185, 187 – 188 see also LGBTQ parenting
scaffolding 386, 398, 774, 776, 787
Q-set ratings 802 school-based childcare centers 219 – 220
questionnaires in socialization 771 second-parent adoptions 361
873
Index
secrecy concerns in reproductive technology diversity/differences 393; defined 374 – 375;

487 – 488 disadvantages of 388 – 389; duration and extent
secular shifts in father-child relationship 65 of 380; economic factors 393; ethnic diversity/
segregated conjugal roles 181 minorities 378, 393; externally-directed 378 – 379;
selection effects in family structure 331 familial influences 393 – 395; family structure and
self-blame 12, 736 377 – 378; as family survival strategy 385; forms of
self-control in parenting 460, 520 – 521 375 – 384; functions of 384 – 389; future research
self-determination theory 605, 670 – 671, 763, directions 399; gender differences 377; historical
772 – 773 factors 391 – 392; introduction to 9, 372; legal
Self-Efficacy for Parenting Tasks Index-Toddler Scale standards 392 – 393; parental marital status/quality
(SEPTI-TS) 672 394 – 395; parent characteristics 395 – 396; personal
self-efficacy in parenting: adolescent parenthood characteristics 378; precipitants of 378 – 379;
215; child functioning and 663 – 665, 664; promotion of 398 – 399; provider impact 389; risks
family systems and 22; future research directions of 388; social/emotional understanding 386 – 387;
674 – 675; influential ideas about 659 – 663, 660; socialization and 373 – 374; sociocultural influences
intervention research 665 – 666; introduction on 389 – 393; summary of 400; sustained sibling
to 188, 654; measurement issues 671 – 674; self- caregiving 373; as unseen phenomena 372 – 373
determination theory and 670 – 671; state of the art sibling-headed households 18
in 658, 658 – 670; summary of 675; thematic areas Simmel, Georg 767
in research 663 – 671; theoretical developments in Single Mothers by Choice (SMC) 290 – 293,
670 – 671; theory of 654 – 658, 656, 675; transition 494 – 496
to parenthood 666 – 669 single parenthood: adoption and 280; attitudes toward
self-enhancement 763 273 – 274; child outcomes 298 – 301, 299; by choice
self-esteem 114, 146, 248, 602 285; cohabiting families 282 – 284, 287 – 289;
self-help groups in divorce and remarriage 334 demographic changes 277, 277 – 284, 280;
self-insemination 494 – 495 divorced custodial parents 295 – 298; father absence
self-object unit 830, 838 300 – 301; Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing
self-perception 293, 559, 683, 688, 702, 736 Study 274 – 275, 287 – 288; headed by fathers
self-psychological perspectives 836 – 839 289; increase in unmarried births 278 – 280, 280;
self-regulation 24, 149, 763, 807, 810 introduction to 271; older single-mother families
self-transcendence 763 290; overview of families 285; research directions
sensation seeking 850 – 851 in 301 – 302; rising incidence of 271 – 273, 272;
sensitivity behavior 572 similarities and differences across 284 – 298; Single
sensitivity behavior in girls 15 – 16, 24 – 25 Mothers by Choice 290 – 293; solo mothers
sensitivity behavior in parents: by in adolescent 293 – 295; summary of 302 – 303; teen mothers
mothers 210, 215; differential sensitivity 446; 285 – 287; variations among 275 – 277
by fathers 167; Heinicke’s framework 801, 803; skin conductance level (SCL) 634 – 637, 641
importance of 627 – 631; improved childhood sleep deprivation 518, 606 – 607
outcomes 108; by mothers 806, 808, 810 – 811, Smart Steps program 334
814; parent development theory and 572 – 575, sociability in father-child relationships 89
580; positive parenting and 457; predictive validity social capital model 171, 187, 238, 323
to 626; response to infants 73, 238, 385 – 386, 485; social-cognitive approach to behavior 799
SCL augmentation 634 – 637, 640; self-efficacy social-cognitive awareness of parents 560
and 661, 664, 671 – 673; between siblings 396; social cognitive learning theory 723 – 725, 765
socialization process and 766, 769, 787; wellbeing social connections/skills 103 – 104, 145, 216
and 602 social fittedness of infant and mother 49
separation-individuation paradigm 842 – 843 social information processing theory 622, 701, 726,
separatism 346 – 347 731 – 733, 741, 748
sexual identity 348, 350 – 352, 356 – 358, 363 social interactional tradition 113 – 114
sexual maturity 834, 848 socialization: boys into father role 87 – 88; classical
sexual minority family systems 22 and modern research on 780 – 786; cultural context
shared custody 313 – 315 and 784 – 786; discipline and limit setting 780 – 783;
sibling caregiving: across life course 380 – 384; domains of 774 – 778; father-child relationship
advanced socioemotional development 77; future research directions 787 – 788; genetic
385 – 387; age characteristics 376; birth order makeup of children 768 – 769; goals in family
376 – 377; bullying and abuse 388 – 389; child systems 17; historical considerations 764 – 765;
characteristics 396 – 398; child-initiated 379; internalization of values 767 – 768; introduction
cross-cultural examinations 389 – 390; cultural to 762 – 763; methodological research concerns
874
Index
771 – 772; monitoring and disclosure 783 – 784; sibling caregiving 394; see also divorce and
morality and 779; positive vs. negative parenting remarriage
765 – 767; practical parenting considerations 786; Stepfamily Association of America (SAA) 334
prosociality and 778 – 779; relational perspective step-grandparenting 249
765; role of culture 769 – 771; self-determination stereotypes in grandparenting 246 – 247
theory 772 – 773; sibling caregiving 373 – 374; social Stern, Daniel 836
knowledge domains 773 – 774; social learning Strange Situation (SS) 237, 238, 734, 844 – 845
theory and 9, 764; summary of 788; theoretical Strengthening Families Program 643
implications 779 – 780; theories of 772 – 780 stress/stressors: adolescent parenthood 209;
social judgment processing 39 grandparents as buffers against 248; related theories
social knowledge domains 773 – 774 in divorce and remarriage 321 – 326; single-parent
social learning theory: intergenerational (IG) families 296; transition to parenthood 517 – 518;
parenting 447; introduction to 9; parenting and work-family stress 102
572; social cognitive learning theory 723 – 725, subjective-individualistic orientation stage 562
765; socialization and 9, 764 sub-Saharan Africa, adolescent parents 200 – 201
social maladjustment 45 substance use/abuse 454 – 455
social problem/social address phase 329 substitution hypothesis 324
social roles 604, 605, 607, 823 suicidal ideation 114
social stimulation theory 412 – 413 Suleman, Nadya 484
societal conditions and variants 94 – 100 superego 828
societal generativity 104 Supporting Father Involvement program (SFI) 111,
sociobiological theory 412 112, 149
sociocultural contexts 205, 389 – 393 supportive coparenting 142
socioeconomic status (SES): adolescent parenthood supportive grandparenting style 245
impact on 211 – 212; divorce and remarriage supportive parenting 9, 13, 77, 255, 608, 665, 772,
315 – 316, 321 – 322, 332; father-child 805, 807, 812, 815
relationship 79 – 80; gender-role revolution surrogacy families: gay father surrogacy families 353,
292; intergenerational (IG) parenting 447 – 448; 502 – 503; grandparenting style 245; parenting
low- and middle-income countries 427 – 429; concerns 497 – 498; parenting research on
low-income families 18, 111 – 112, 415, 417, 600; 498 – 503; reproductive technology 482, 497 – 503;
parental development stages 585 – 586; parental surrogate mothers 501 – 502; transition to
emotions 641 – 642; psychoanalysis and parenthood parenthood 531, 533
850 – 851; sibling caregiving 393; well-being in Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP)
parenting 606, 610 413
socioemotional development/support 101, 385 – 387, Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) 411
430, 743, 754 sustained sibling caregiving 373
solidarity in parenting 137, 141 – 143, 145, 148 – 149, symbiotic (sensorimotor) stage 560
238, 390, 521 sympathetic nervous system (SNS) 634, 636 – 637
solo mothers 187, 285, 290, 293 – 295 sympathy 622 – 623
South American parental attributions 737 syncretic to discrete polarity 578
South Korean grandparenting 250 – 251 systems-oriented stage 575
Spitz, Rene 45
Spock, Benjamin 37 teacher role 241
spouses’ sex role attitudes 101 teachers’ attributions 746 – 747
spousification 6 – 7, 14, 21 teen mothers 20, 143, 207, 211 – 212, 215 – 218, 222,
spurious associations in intergenerational (IG) 285 – 287
parenting 449, 449 teen parents see adolescent parenthood
stable traits and parental emotions 638 – 639 Teenwise Minnesota resource 222
stagnation concept 558 Telegraph,The newspaper 392
state-supported prekindergarten programs 414 Telling Our Stories, Culturally Different Adults Reflect
stay-at-home fathers 599 On Growing Up In Single-Parent Families (Ford) 286
stepchild abuse 323 telomere length and father loss 301
stepfamilies/stepparenting: blended/stepfamilies temperament and coparenting in diverse families
18; child abuse in 323; coparenting, in diverse 147 – 149
families 152 – 153; coparenting in 152 – 153; Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)
divorce and remarriage 311 – 312, 314, 319 – 320; 212, 218, 423
by grandparents 249; nonresidential stepmothers Tender Years Doctrine 169, 313
319 – 320, 324; normative family processes 153; testosterone 83 – 84
875
Index
theory of mind (ToM) 48, 114, 527, 528 United States Food and Drug Administration 597
Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (Freud) 826 universalism 763
three-generational families 19 unjustified restrictive gatekeeping 180
Three-Generational Study (3GS) 467 – 470 unknown donor 348, 353, 532
Thula Sana intervention 55 unmarried parents: coparenting and 153 – 154; fathers
time in intergenerational (IG) parenting 469 95; LGBTQ parents 348; mothers 278 – 280, 280,
time-intensive parenting 598, 600 535 – 537; nevermarried “fragile” families 18
toddler parenting 75, 145, 148 unregulated kinship 431
totalitarianism 764 urban-industrial revolution 234
total parenthood period 558 U.S. Census Bureau 17
transactionalism stage 576 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
transactional model of parenting self-efficacy 674 (DHHS) 222, 422, 426
transactional processes 23, 25, 91 U.S. National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study 494
transition to parenthood (TtP): adoptive parenthood U.S. Supreme Court 257, 534
529 – 531; biological risk with 537 – 538; brain
functioning changes 527 – 528; brain structure values in parenting cognitions 693, 693 – 694
changes 528 – 529; conditions of risk 529 – 541; very low birthweight (VLBW) 537
coparenting quality 520 – 521; cross-national Video-Feedback Intervention to Promote Positive
variation in 539 – 541; demography of 515 – 516; Parenting 643
effects on family relationships 514, 517 – 521; Video-Feedback Treatment 54
effects on parent adjustment 521 – 525; expectant visitation rights 80 – 81, 107, 153, 155, 157, 256 – 257,
parents 839 – 842; hormonal changes 525 – 527; 276, 313, 349
introduction to 513 – 515; motherhood 41, vulnerability hypothesis 93 – 94
42; neurobiological effects 525 – 529; parental Vulnerability-Stress-Adaptation (VSA) model
development stages 559 – 560; same-sex parents 516, 519
531 – 535; self-determination theory and 670 – 671;
self-efficacy in parenting 666 – 669; summary of Walker’s Parental Attribution Questionnaire 733
541 – 543; support for families at risk 538 – 539; warmth in parenting 805, 809
theoretical perspectives on 516 – 517; unwed well-being in parenting: beliefs and behavior in
mothers 535 – 537 parenting 600; central issues 601 – 603; changing
translational research on family systems theory 26 gender roles 600 – 599; childrearing decisions
transnational fathers 81 – 82, 107 597 – 598; classical research in 607 – 608;
trial homes 423 future research directions 612 – 613; historical
triangular capacity 21 considerations 597 – 600; introduction to 596;
triangulation 9, 12 – 13 methodological approaches to investigating
Triple P-Positive Parenting Program 643, 662 602 – 603; moderators of 608 – 611; modern
Trump, Donald 802 research in 608 – 611; Parents’ Well-Being Model
Tufts Interdisciplinary Evaluation Research (TIER) 603 – 604, 604, 609, 612; paths to greater happiness
221 604 – 605; paths to lower happiness 605 – 607;
two-dimensional projection 659 practical information 611 – 612; summary of 613;
two-parent heterosexual coresidential families theory in 603 – 607; well-being, defined 601 – 602
140 – 151 Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and
two-phase model of parental development 564 Democratic (WEIRD) societies 38
Wolof Muslim sibling caregiving 390
U.K. Longitudinal Study of Assisted Reproduction women in workforce 391 – 392
Families 489, 491, 500, 501 Women’s Movement 137 – 138
underexamined parents 335 Working Model of the Child Interview 43, 699
UNICEF 426, 428 – 429 work-related autonomy 15
uniform attachment representation 464 work-to-family conflict 177 – 178, 297
United Nations (UN) Convention on the Rights of World Fertility Survey 597
the Child (CRC) 410, 413, 426, 428 World Health Organization (WHO) 200
United Nations (UN) Population Fund (UNFPA) Written Analogue Questionnaire 747
200
United Nations (UN) Statistics Division’s Yes-donor 532
Demographic Yearbook 201 Young Parents Program (YPP) 150
United States Consumer Product Safety Commission
388 Zinacantec Mayan village culture 386
876

Handbook of Parenting - Volume 3 - Being and Becoming A Parent

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What are the main topics covered in the handbook?

What are the main topics covered in the handbook?

What are some of the characteristics of parents that are examined?

What are some of the characteristics of parents that are examined?

Edited by Marc H. Bornstein

Preface to the Third Edition x

1 Parenting and Family Systems 3

3 Fathers and Families 64

4 Coparenting in Diverse Family Systems 137

5 Parental Gatekeeping 167

6 Adolescent Parenting 199

8 Single Parenthood 271

9 Divorced and Remarried Parenting 311

10 Lesbian and Gay Parenthood 345

11 Sibling Caregiving 372

12 Nonparental Caregiving 409

13 Intergenerational Transmission of Parenting 443

14 Parenting and Contemporary Reproductive Technologies 482

15 Transition to Parenthood 513

16 Stages of Parental Development 556

17 Well-Being in Parenting 596

18 Parenting and Emotions 620

19 Parenting Self-Efficacy 654

20 Parenting Cognitions 681

21 Parental Attributions 722

22 Parent Socialization and Children’s Values 762

23 Personality and Parenting 797

24 Psychoanalysis and Parenthood 823

BIOLOGY AND ECOLOGY OF PARENTING is Volume 2 of the Handbook. For par-

Mairin E. Augustine is a Carolina Consortium for Human Development postdoctoral fellow

Daphne Blunt Bugental is Distinguished Professor Emerita at the Department of Psychological

Amaranta de Haan is Assistant Professor of Pedagogical Sciences at Erasmus University Rotter-

in psychology, with concentration in developmental psychology, from Ateneo de Manila, Philippines.

Tessa N. Hamilton is a PhD student in School Psychology at Northeastern University. Hamilton

S. Katherine Nelson-Coffey is Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of the South

Christina M. Padilla is a PhD candidate in the Psychology Department at Georgetown University.

Ross D. Parke is Distinguished Professor of Psychology Emeritus at the University of California,

Rebecca M. Ryan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at Georgetown Uni-

Margaret M. Smith is a clinical psychology PhD student at Southern Methodist University in

Peter K. Smith is Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Goldsmiths, University of London, U.K. He

Fundamental Concepts Underlying Family Systems Theories

Organization and Coherence

Boundaries, Subsystems, and Boundary Dissolution

Families as Open Systems

A Brief Historical Walk Through the Development

Early Architects of Family Systems Theory

Bowen Family System Theory

Mental Research Institute (MRI)

Borzormenyi-Nagy’s Contextual Theory

Minuchin’s Structural Family Theory

The Social Learning Perspective

Subsequent Developments in Family Systems Theory

Functional Family Therapy

Multidimensional Family Therapy

Empirical Investigations of the Association Between

Family Structural Types

Spillover of Couple Relationships Onto Parenting and Family Process

Coparenting and Family Process

Preface to the Third Edition x

1 Parenting and Family Systems 3

3 Fathers and Families 64

4 Coparenting in Diverse Family Systems 137

5 Parental Gatekeeping 167

6 Adolescent Parenting 199

8 Single Parenthood 271

9 Divorced and Remarried Parenting 311

10 Lesbian and Gay Parenthood 345

11 Sibling Caregiving 372

12 Nonparental Caregiving 409

13 Intergenerational Transmission of Parenting 443

14 Parenting and Contemporary Reproductive Technologies 482

15 Transition to Parenthood 513

16 Stages of Parental Development 556

17 Well-Being in Parenting 596

18 Parenting and Emotions 620

19 Parenting Self-Efficacy 654

20 Parenting Cognitions 681

21 Parental Attributions 722

22 Parent Socialization and Children’s Values 762

23 Personality and Parenting 797

24 Psychoanalysis and Parenthood 823

Societal condions changing over me