Multiple attachment relationships within families: mothers and fathers with two young children

Security of attachment between mothers and fathers and their 2 children was examined in 41 maritally intact families. Strange Situation assessments of attachment security for the younger children (mean age = 1 year 10 months), Attachment Q-sort ratings of the older children (mean age = 4 years 8 months), and ratings of parental caregiving behavior of both children were obtained. Younger and older children developed concordant attachments to both parents. Parents were consistent in their caregiving behavior toward their 2 children. However, parents were not congruent in their attachment to their 2 children. Associations were found between maternal caregiving and attachment only in the younger group. The results support the idea that parental caregiving behavior accounts for only modest portions of the variance in attachment security; evolving attachments integrate developmental inputs from the children and the caregivers in the network of early family relationships.     

Protection and loss: working with learning-disabled adults and their families

This paper describes a method of working with learning-disabled adults and their families when they encounter entrenched difficulties. Two significant themes are identified: the patterning of life-cycle transitions and the recurrence of grief. Therapy consists of joining the family members to evolve and develop hypotheses about what is preventing them moving to the next family life-cycle stage.     

Fathers' interactions with their high-risk infants

Fathers' face-to-face interactions with their 4-month-old high-risk infants were compared to mothers' interactions with the same infants and to those interactions of fathers and mothers of normal infants. The high-risk infants were less attentive and less affectively responsive than normal infants, and their mothers were more active. Fathers of both high-risk and normal infants engaged in more game playing and laughed more frequently than mothers during interactions. Although the behaviors of the normal and high-risk infants differed, as did the behaviors of mothers interacting with them, the fathers engaged in similar amounts of activity, smiling, laughing and playing games with normal and high-risk infants. Fathers may be less disturbed than mothers by their high-risk infants' lesser responsivity.     

When accommodation matters: Situational dependency within daily interactions with romantic partners

This diary study examined the consequences of experiencing situational dependency within daily social interactions with romantic partners over a two-week period. As predicted, stronger felt dependency (lower influence and control) within interactions with romantic partners was associated with lower perceived acceptance and value and decreased intimacy. Also as predicted, participants who reported a greater tendency to respond to dependency dilemmas with accommodation (i.e., reduced self-protective responses and increased pro-relationship reactions) perceived relatively more acceptance, value and intimacy within - and only within - high dependency situations. These results suggest that pro-relationship regulatory reactions to situational dependency will alleviate the immediate negative outcomes associated with dependence, and it is through these situational effects that relationship maintenance behaviours (at least in part) sustain relationship quality.     

Working with the institutionalized aged and their families: Considerations for clergy

The institutionalization of an aged parent presents unique challenges and strains to the family system. It also provides opportunities for limited intervention and support by empathic clergy. It is often difficult for middle-aged children to understand some of the strong and often sudden emotions they experience regarding their institutionalized parents, particularly as these feelings become confused with their own sense of having reached middle age. Again, opportunities present themselves for clergy to be sensitive to these confusing feelings.     

Anxiety within families: interrelations, consistency, and change

In a community sample of mothers (N = 763), each with a focal child aged 4.5 years, anxiety levels were high. Only 54% of mothers had anxiety scores within the "normal" Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) range, compared with 85% for depression. A subsample (N = 116) was selected for two-parent families, one to three children, and mothers spread over low, medium, and high anxiety levels. Mothers' anxiety was not significantly related to age, education, or work status, but rather to mothers' and fathers' independent ratings of marital satisfaction and family functioning, and to fathers' own anxiety and depression. Fathers' anxiety was related not to their own views of marital satisfaction and family functioning, but rather to mothers' views and to maternal anxiety. Assessments 8 years later--of anxiety, depression, and family functioning--showed high consistency over time, particularly maternal anxiety (r = .70) and paternal depression (r = .81). Although means did not change significantly over time for fathers, mothers' anxiety, depression, and perceptions of family functioning all improved (p < .001). For parents who were later to separate (compared with the others), initial family functioning, dyadic adjustment, and maternal anxiety were significantly "worse." The strongest predictor of later break-up was fathers' dyadic adjustment.     

Afterword: new directions in research with immigrant families and their children

Although migration is fundamentally a family affair, the family, as a unit of analysis, has been understudied both by scholars of migration and by developmental psychologists. Researchers have often struggled to conceptualize immigrant children, adolescents, and their families, all too often giving way to pathologizing them, ignoring generational and ethnic distinctions among immigrant groups, stereotyping immigrants as "problem" or (conversely) "model" minorities, and overlooking the complexity of race, gender, documentation, and language in their lives. In addition, contexts other than the family remain understudied. In this afterword, the authors examine these issues, the contributions of the chapters in this volume to understanding them, and their implications for research and theory within the field of developmental science.     

Young handicapped children and their families: Patterns of interaction with human service institutions

The experiences of nine young handicapped children and their families with a variety of human service institutions are discussed. A retrospective account is presented from the parents' perspective of those aspects of their and their children's experience that have had a significant impact on their quality of life. Central among these experiences has been the interpersonal interaction with professionals. The parents' reported experiences regarding identification, the search for assistance, assessment, and their children's receipt of services suggest that there are problems in the areas of locating and acquiring an appropriate combination of services to meet family needs and in the quality of interpersonal relationships between parents and professionals. Recommendations are made to alleviate these and other problems.     

Social networks and families of divorce: A study of structure-content interactions

This study reports on the social network features of 13 families in the process of divorce. The author notes the splitting of parental networks in this process. He observes that network interaction can be both supportive and destructive-with both intended and unintended effects.     

Infants and their families at risk: Assessment and intervention

One of the basic premises of child-rearing and intervention models is that infant behavior is part of a communication system with the caregiving environment. However, infants vary in the messages that they convey to the caregiving environment, and parents vary in their ability to interpret their infants' signals and provide appropriate caregiving. This paper examines some of the tension that may exist between infant communication and appropriate caregiving. We examine research findings from several different populations of at-risk infants and their mothers in which infant signals and parental responses are variously effective in providing clues for appropriate caregiving. Some kinds of fits or matches between infant characteristics and maternal characteristics may be better than others for optimal infant development. The implications for intervention are also discussed.     

Family interactions in black, lower-class families with delinquent and nondelinquent adolescent boys

The interaction patterns of 32 black, lower-class family triads (mother-father-son), divided into two equal groups by the son's delinquency status, were assessed across self-report and observational measures of family affect, conflict, and dominance. In support of previous research with white, middle-, and lower-middle class families, the results generally indicated that families with delinquent boys were less warm and more conflictual than families with nondelinquent boys. Relative to parents of nondelinquents, parents of delinquents were more conflictual on expressive family issues than on instrumental issues. In addition, the results showed that the content of the family interaction task (expressive vs. instrumental) influenced observed patterns of intrafamily dominance. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.     

The impact of young children with externalizing behaviors on their families

Compared the impact on families of young children with externalizing behaviors (e.g., hyperactive, aggressive; n=22), autism (n=20), or no significant problem behaviors (n=22) on several measures of family functioning. Previous studies have found heightened stress and parental maladjustment in families with externalizing children. The present study expanded upon that literature by (1) including a clinical control group to determine the specific impact of externalizing problems, (2) focusing on preschool aged children, and (3) using a new measure to directly ascertain parents' perception of impact. Compared to parents with normally developing children, parents with externalizing children reported more negative impact on social life, more negative and less positive feelings about parenting, and higher child-related stress. Moreover, parents of externalizing children reported levels of impact and stress as high as those reported by parents of children with autism. On broader measures of parental and marital wellbeing, however, the three groups of families of preschoolers did not differ. The implications of these findings for intervention are discussed.This research was conducted at the Fernald Child Study Center, University of California at Los Angeles. We wish to thank Jan Blacher, Doug Granger, Stephen Hinshaw, and Karen Rudolph for comments on an earlier version of this article, and Kenny Smith and Doug Granger for computer help. We also appreciate the assistance of our colleagues on the Preschool Project, Drew Erhardt, Tracy Heller, Barbara Henker, Alice Huber, Blair Paley, Karen Rudolph, and Jennifer Treuting.     

Working with older adults and their families – a review

This paper discusses family work with older adults by exploring some of the related literature published since Herr and Weakland's work in 1979, and compares psychoeducational and systems-based approaches to work with later life families. Issues of bias and omissions in the existing literature, and the definition of family therapy with this client group are raised. Areas for future research are indicated.     

Parent-offspring conflict theory: an evolutionary framework for understanding conflict within human families

Decades of research demonstrate that conflict shapes and permeates a broad range of family processes. In the current article, we argue that greater insight, integration of knowledge, and empirical achievement in the study of family conflict can be realized by utilizing a powerful theory from evolutionary biology that is barely known within psychology: parent-offspring conflict theory (POCT). In the current article, we articulate POCT for psychological scientists, extend its scope by connecting it to the broader framework of life history theory, and draw out its implications for understanding conflict within human families. We specifically apply POCT to 2 instances of early mother-offspring interaction (prenatal conflict and weaning conflict); discuss the effects of genetic relatedness on behavioral conflict between parents, children, and their siblings; review the emerging literature on parent-offspring conflict over the choice of mates and spouses; and examine parent-offspring conflict from the perspective of imprinted genes. This review demonstrates the utility of POCT, not only for explaining what is known about conflict within families but also for generating novel hypotheses, suggesting new lines of research, and moving us toward the "big picture" by integrating across biological and psychological domains of knowledge.     

Perceptions of parent-adolescent communication within families: it is a matter of perspective

This study examined the concordance between parental and youth's perceptions regarding open communication in their families and its association with youth's psychosocial adjustment. The relative importance of parental and adolescents' perceptions of open family communication in relation to youth's psychosocial adjustment was also investigated. Participants were 336 parent-youth dyads from inner-city low-income communities in an eastern city in the United States. Both parental and youth's perceptions of open communication in the family were categorized into "high" and "low" groups using a median split in scores. Four parent-youth concordance groups (i.e. high-high, high-low, low-high and low-low) were derived based on the combination of the levels of parental and youth's perceptions. Parental and youth's perceptions about open communication were modestly correlated (r = 0.129, p < 0.05). The level of concordance differed by youth gender with male adolescents and their parents being more likely to perceive lower levels of open communication (i.e. "low-low") than females and their parents (32% versus 19%, p < 0.05). In general, youth demonstrated poorer psychosocial adjustment if they perceived a lower level of open communication between them and their parents, independent of the level of their parents' perceptions (e.g. "high" or "low"). The findings suggest an important role of adolescents' own perceptions of the openness of the family communication in relation to adolescent psychosocial adjustment. Developmentally and gender appropriate intervention programs are needed to improve the openness of parent-adolescent communication, to help both parents and youth to recognize the significant preventive role of open communication in the family, especially, the socioeconomically disadvantaged families.     

Depressed mothers' and their infants' interactions with nondepressed partners

Twenty depressed adolescent mothers were videotaped interacting with their own infant and with the infant of a nondepressed mother. In addition, nondepressed mothers were videotaped with their own infant as well as with the infant of a depressed mother. Depressed mothers showed less facial expressivity than nondepressed mothers and received less optimal interaction rating scale scores (a summary score for state, physical activity, head orientation, gaze, silence during gaze aversion, facial expressions, vocalizations, infantized behavior, contingent responsivity, and gameplaying). This occurred independent of whether they were interacting with their own infant versus an infant of a nondepressed mother, suggesting that depressed mothers display less optimal behaviors to infants in general. The infants of both depressed and nondepressed mothers received better head orientation and summary ratings when they were interacting with another mother, perhaps because the other mother was more novel. Infants of nondepressed mothers, in particular, had better summary ratings (state, physical activity, head orientation, gaze, facial expressions, fussiness, and vocalizations) than the infants of depressed mothers when interacting with depressed mothers. Thus, it may be that infants of nondepressed mothers are generally better interaction partners than infants of depressed mothers. Another related possibility is that they persist longer in trying to elicit a response from mothers less responsive than their own, given that they have learned to expect a response to their behavior.     

Assessment of parents' interactions with their developmentally delayed infants

An instrument is described that is used to assess interaction style in parent-infant dyads in which the infant is handicapped or developmentally delayed. The rating scales were designed to be easy to use by professionals and trained nonprofessionals, to be applicable to children who are functioning between birth and 18 months developmental age, and to involve a minimal time commitment so that they could be used in the context of early intervention programs. The rating scales cover intrusive, responsive, and general social behavior by the parent and social and avoidant behavior by the child. Successful implementation of these scales is described.     

Growing up with severe learning difficulties: A longitudinal study of young people and their families

The paper reports on a longitudinal study of young people with severe learning difficulties. Two types of comparison are made: changes between Time 1 and Time 2, and comparisons with the younger age group in the study. The young adults acquired considerably more self-help and communication skills between Time 1 and Time 2. They were less likely to require help with self care than the younger age group and their carers were less stressed. Parents' needs for additional service provision fell into three categories: information needs, help with communication and other skills, and practical help. The greatest need was for information. The main concerns of the mothers at Time 1 and Time 2 are documented. The young adults' preparation for leaving school, current day placements at Social Education Centres and employment prospects are discussed. It is concluded that there are few opportunities to move on to less sheltered environments.