The intergenerational costs of parental social stressors: academic and social difficulties in early adolescence for children of young mothers.
Social stressors embedded in parents' occupational and family roles have been shown to have effects on family interaction and the cognitive and emotional development of young children. Here we consider whether these patterns also hold for children in early adolescence. We study 1,158 10 to 14-year-old children born to the early childbearers among the female respondents of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth cohort. We find that both poor quality of parental employment and low quality of mothers' relationships with their partners have adverse effects on the cognitive stimulation and maternal warmth children receive; living in informal unions is also associated with poorer parent-child interaction. These family interaction patterns in turn both buffer the effects of stressful family conditions and shape academic and behavior outcomes directly. Some work and family conditions interact in their effects: In particular, single mothering has less adverse effects on cognitive stimulation and behavior problems when mothers are employed in occupations providing higher complexity. The effects of current conditions are diminished but seldom eliminated when we control for possible selection effects by using data from earlier waves to control for earlier levels of child problems. These findings suggest that current parental social stressors continue to have consequences for both academic and behavioral outcomes during early adolescence.
Menaghan
E G
EG
Ohio State University, Columbus, USA. menaghan.1@osu.edu
Kowaleski-Jones
L
L
Mott
F L
FL
D000124:Achievement; D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D015331:Cohort Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D008423:Maternal Age; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D012917:Social Adjustment; D012924:Social Conditions; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000150:complications*