Emotional Intimacy and Children's Adjustment: A comparison between single-parent divorced and intact families

The present investigation studies the levels of emotional intimacy within nonclinical single-parent families and intact families, and how these may relate to children's academic, social and emotional adjustments. Participants were 94 children of divorced families, 95 children of intact families, and their mothers (60 married and 58 divorced). The inventory of family feelings (IFF) and Kvebaek family sculpture technique (KFST) were used to examine subjects' emotional relationships with their family members. The results show significant differences between the divorced and intact groups on several measures of intimacy and adjustment. Most of these differences, however, are found to be small (as reflected by their small size effect). The only exception is with regard to the children's feeling of intimacy with their divorced noncustodial father. The quality of this dyad relationship also has a predictive power for the children's psychological, social and academic levels of functioning. These results are discussed in the context of divorced families' emotional boundaries and concerns over the long-term effects of parental divorce on children.     

Coping with family transitions: winners, losers, and survivors

This article presents the results of a longitudinal study of the effects of divorce and remarriage on children's adjustment. It was found that individual characteristics, such as children's temperament, family relations, and extrafamilial factors, played an important role in exacerbating or buffering children from negative consequences associated with their parents' marital transitions. Although boys in divorced families and children in remarried families showed more problems in adjustment than did children in nondivorced families, some also showed remarkable resiliency in the face of multiple life stressors.     

Income, family characteristics, and physical violence toward children

OBJECTIVE: This paper discusses the ways in which existing microeconomic theories of partner abuse, intra-family bargaining, and distribution of resources within families may contribute to our current understanding of physical child abuse. The empirical implications of this discussion are then tested on data from the 1985 National Family Violence Survey (NFVS) in order to estimate the effects of income, family characteristics, and state characteristics on physical violence toward children. METHODOLOGY: The sample consists of 2,760 families with children from the NFVS. Probit and ordered probit models are used to explore relationships between income, family characteristics, state characteristics, and physical violence toward children among single-parent and two-parent families. RESULTS: In both single-parent and two-parent families, depression, maternal alcohol consumption, and history of family violence affect children's probabilities of being abused. Additionally, income is significantly related to violence toward children in single-parent families. CONCLUSIONS: These results reinforce earlier findings that demographic characteristics, maternal depression, maternal alcohol use, and intra-family patterns of violence may largely contribute to child abuse. This research also suggests that income may play a substantially more important role in regard to parental violence in single-parent families than in two-parent families.     

农村单亲家庭学生心理健康调查与调适策略探索

文章主要分析农村单亲家庭学生心理健康方面存在的问题,并从几个方面研究农村单亲家庭学生心理健康调适策略。要唤醒农村单亲家庭学生,树立其自信心;走近农村单亲家庭学生,提高其适应能力;帮助农村单亲家庭学生,让其感受爱的温暖;尊重农村单亲家庭学生,维护其自尊心。     

Sibling Differences in Problem Behavior and Parental Treatment in Nondivorced and Remarried Families

This article examines within-family differences in parenting and problem behavior in nondivorced and remarried families, with a specific focus on whether sibling differences are magnified and whether the links between differential treatment and sibling adjustment are stronger in remarried families. Multimethod assessments of parenting and problem behavior were done on 516 families with 2 same-sex adolescent siblings. The remarried families included those in which one or neither sibling was the mother's stepchild and one or both siblings were the father's stepchildren. Within-family differences in parenting and problem behavior were greatest in remarried families where siblings did not share the same biological parent. Differential treatment was also more strongly related to problem behavior in this family context, with the mother's biological child and father's stepchild at greater risk. Results are discussed in terms of the differing experiences of biological children and stepchildren in remarried households.     

单亲家庭子女心理健康的研究现状

随着我国单亲家庭逐年增多,单亲家庭子女心理问题更为突出,这已经引起社会的广泛关注.单亲家庭子女缺少来自父母的情感温暖及理解,缺乏安全感及家庭的自豪感,同时存在孤僻、自卑的性格,容易形成极端性格.同时单亲家庭子女的心理健康总体水平较差,有较多的抑郁症状,并且存在更多的行为问题.为了减少单亲家庭子女心理问题的出现,应该采取积极的心理干预,培养其人格健康发展.     

Parenting during the Second Year: Effects of Children's Age, Sex, and Attachment Classification

70 2-parent families with 12-month-old infants and 67 2-parent families with 18-month-old toddlers participated in the study. Mothers and fathers participated in separate interviews and filled out questionnaires on family and child behaviors. Mothers and their children participated in the Ainsworth Strange Situation, and the families were observed for a total of 4 hours in their homes. Families were compared on composite measures of family environment variables, parents' perception of their children, and on process variables from home observations. Family differences in environmental stress and marital adjustment showed no effects for attachment classifications, although parents of 12-month-olds reported greater marital adjustment and more pleasure in parenting than parents of 18-months-olds. Both mothers and fathers reported that children classified as resistant were more difficult on several temperament measures. During home observations, 12-month-old children received more positive responses from mothers, and 18-month-old children received more instructions and directions from both parents. Insecure boys (both avoidant and resistant) received the least instructions and directions from both parents, but insecure-avoidant girls received the most instruction from fathers.     

青岛市单亲家庭子女教育状况调研报告

当前,单亲家庭逐年增多已是不容忽视的事实。由于教育方法不得当,单亲子女在学习、自我认知、社会交往、人格发展等方面存在问题。家庭是社会的基本构成单位,是建设和谐社会不可或缺的领域。只有从家庭、学校、社会三方面入手,为单亲子女营造一个健康的成长环境,才能促进青少年身心健康发展。     

A Prospective Study of the Effects of Marital Status and Family Relations on Young Children's Adjustment among African American and European American Families

The present study investigated the effects of divorce and family relations on young children's development prospectively, using an ethnically diverse sample of approximately 300 low-income families. We also were able to examine the moderating effects of ethnicity on child adjustment in always two-parent, to-be-divorced, already-divorced, and always single-parent families. Results indicated that to-be-divorced European American and African American families demonstrated higher rates of preschool-age behavior problems, and already-divorced families showed similar trends. Parental conflict and behavior problems accounted for predivorce differences in child behavior problems, whereas rejecting parenting accounted for differences in problem behavior between always single-parent and always two-parent families. The results are discussed in terms of the importance of ethnicity in influencing young, low-income children's adjustment to different family structures.     

Interactions between Family Environment and Friendship and Associations with Self-Perceived Well-Being during Early Adolescence

Using a sample of 138 early adolescents and their parents, we examined the hypothesis that family and friendship measures would moderate each other's associations with measures of children's perceptions of their adjustment and well-being. Family environment was assessed by asking parents to complete the Family Adaptability and Cohesion Scale II. A sociometric nomination procedure and the Friendship Quality Scale were completed by the subjects as assessments of reciprocity and quality in their best friendship relations. The Perceived Competence Scale for Children was used to assess children's adjustment. Stronger associations were observed between the family measures and the adjustment measures in children without a close friendship than in children with such a relationship. Also, friendship was more strongly linked to outcome measures for children from low adaptive and low cohesive families than for children in more adaptive and cohesive families. These findings indicate that experiences in the family and friendship domains interact in their associations with children's impressions of their adjustment during early adolescence.     

Cognitive Endophenotypes of Dyslexia

The study investigated cognitive deficits associated with dyslexia and familial risk of dyslexia (endophenotypes) by comparing children from families with and without a history of dyslexia. Eighty-eight school-aged children were assessed on measures of phonology, language and rapid automatized naming. A series of regression analyses with family risk and dyslexia status as predictors indicated that word recall, morphology, and rapid automatized naming were associated with the deficit, whereas the two phonological measures (phoneme awareness and nonword repetition) were associated with both literacy deficits and family risk, suggesting that the phonological deficit is an endophenotype of dyslexia. Whereas the association with familial risk was similar for the two phonological measures, they differed in their relation to dyslexia status: Phoneme awareness showed a stronger association with dyslexia than risk status, whereas nonword repetition was more strongly related to the risk. The data are interpreted within the framework of multiple deficit models of dyslexia.     

Does Children's Academic Achievement Improve when Single Mothers Marry?

Promoting marriage, especially among low-income single mothers with children, is increasingly viewed as a promising public policy strategy for improving developmental outcomes for disadvantaged children. Previous research suggests, however, that children's academic achievement either does not improve or declines when single mothers marry. In this paper, we argue that previous research may understate the benefits of mothers' marriages to children from single-parent families because (1) the short-term and long-term developmental consequences of marriage are not adequately distinguished and (2) child and family contexts in which marriage is likely to confer developmental advantages are not differentiated from those that do not. Using multiple waves of data from the ECLS-K, we find that single mothers' marriages are associated with modest but statistically significant improvements in their children's academic achievement trajectories. However, only children from more advantaged single-parent families benefit from their mothers' marriage.     

Unique and protective contributions of parenting and classroom processes to the adjustment of African American children living in single-parent families

The unique contributions that parenting processes (high levels of monitoring with a supportive, involved mother-child relationship) and classroom processes (high levels of organization, rule clarity, and student involvement) make to children's self-regulation and adjustment were examined with a sample of 277 single-parent African American families. A multi-informant design involving mothers, teachers, and 7- to 15-year-old children was used. Structural equation modeling indicated that parenting and classroom processes contributed uniquely to children's adjustment through the children's development of self-regulation. Additional analyses suggested that classroom processes can serve a protective-stabilizing function when parenting processes are compromised, and vice versa. Further research is needed to examine processes in both family and school contexts that promote child competence and resilience.     

Community characteristics associated with child abuse in Iowa

PROBLEM: Various demographic and community characteristics are associated with child abuse rates in national and urban samples, but similar analyses have not been done within rural areas. This study analyzes the relationships between reported and substantiated rates of child abuse and county demographic, health care resource and social services factors in a predominantly rural state in the US. METHODS: County-level data from Iowa between 1984-1993 were analyzed for associations between county characteristics and rates of child abuse using univariate correlations and multivariate stagewise regression analysis. Population-adjusted rates of reported and substantiated child abuse were correlated with rates of children in poverty, single-parent families, marriage and divorce, unemployment, high-school dropouts, median family income, elder abuse, birth and death rates, numbers of physicians and other healthcare providers, hospital, social workers, and number of caseworkers in the Department of Human Services. RESULTS: Rates of single-parent families, divorce and elder abuse were significantly associated with reported and substantiated child abuse in multivariate analysis, while economic and most health care factors were not. Reporting and substantiation rates differed across districts after adjustment for multiple factors including caseworker workload. CONCLUSIONS: In this rural state, family structure is more significantly associated with child abuse report and substantiation rates than are socioeconomic factors. The level of health care resources in a county does not appear to affect these rates.     

Family stress, parenting styles, and behavioral adjustment in preschool-age adopted Chinese girls

This study seeks to extend previous research on family stress, parenting, and child adjustment to families with adopted Chinese children. In doing so, we also seek to strengthen inferences regarding the experiential underpinnings of previously obtained relationships among these variables by determining if they also occur in families where parents and children are not biologically related. Participants were families of 133 preschool-age adopted Chinese girls (M_age = 5.2 years, SD = 0.7; M_{age at adoption} = 12.8 months, SD = 4.1). Data on family stress, parenting styles, and children's behavioral adjustment were collected from the adoptive mothers with the Social Problem Questionnaire (SPQ), Parenting Styles and Dimensions Questionnaire (PSDQ), and Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) respectively. Results showed that adoptive mothers reported relatively mild family stress, frequent authoritative parenting, and few behavior problems in their children. Nonetheless, family stress, authoritarian and permissive parenting styles positively correlated with children's behavioral problems. Finally, authoritarian parenting mediated the effect of non-child-related family stress (NCR-stress) on the adopted Chinese girls’ CBCL internalizing and overall problems, even after controlling for corresponding CBCL scores from 2 years earlier. Our results showed that the overall pattern of relationships found in non-adoptive families is also seen in families with adopted Chinese children.     

Child psychological maltreatment in Palestinian families

OBJECTIVES: This study was designed to identify predictors of child psychological maltreatment (CPM) in Palestinian families. It examined the relative contributions of child characteristics, parents' sociodemographics, and economic hardship, in addition to family's characteristics such as family values, family ambiance, gender inequities, parental support, harsh discipline, and other forms of maltreatment, to psychological maltreatment. METHOD: The sample consisted of 1000 school age children who ranged in age from 12 to 16 years. Two school counselors carried the interviews with children at school, and with the available parent at home. RESULTS: Child school performance was specifically associated with CPM. The two-parent families and parents from refugee camps appeared to employ more psychological maltreatment of their children than single-parent families and parents from urban and rural areas. Parents who perceived that the family did not have enough money to meet the child's needs were more likely to abuse their children psychologically. Gender inequities, harsh discipline, family ambiance, and lack of parental support were the most salient predictors of CPM. Child psychological maltreatment occurred concurrently with other forms of maltreatment such as physical abuse and child's labor. Parental psychological maltreatment proved to be weakened with high traditional family values. CONCLUSION: A significant proportion of the sample could be considered psychologically maltreated. Intervention and prevention efforts should be focused on child welfare, educational programs aimed at high-risk parents, and mobilization of the community and social services agencies.     

Adoptive Gay Father Families: Parent–Child Relationships and Children's Psychological Adjustment

Findings are presented on a U.K. study of 41 gay father families, 40 lesbian mother families, and 49 heterosexual parent families with an adopted child aged 3–9 years. Standardized interview and observational and questionnaire measures of parental well‐being, quality of parent–child relationships, child adjustment, and child sex‐typed behavior were administered to parents, children, and teachers. The findings indicated more positive parental well‐being and parenting in gay father families compared to heterosexual parent families. Child externalizing problems were greater among children in heterosexual families. Family process variables, particularly parenting stress, rather than family type were found to be predictive of child externalizing problems. The findings contribute to theoretical understanding of the role of parental gender and parental sexual orientation in child development.     

Christian Families,Educative Lenses,and Incarnational Roots 1

The Christian family is a deeply rooted theological way of being in the world with others. It is a functional domain from where initial and life-long lessons emerge. In rich ways, it helps foster human identity, development, ethical formation, autonomy, and communal responsibility amid a greater understanding of Christ's actualizing presence in the daily rhythms of life. The author presents the notion of family as incarnationally rooted in Christ's humanity and as an educative lens into better living the Gospel with others. The focus is on today's Christian families with young children and the implications for the religious education of these families within the rich tradition of the Church as a human organization.