Parents' Anticipated Discussions About Death With Young Children

Guided by family communication patterns theory and terror management theory this mixed-methods investigation explored how parents (N = 112) of young children (ages 3-6) described the way they would discuss death when it comes up in conversations. Responses were coded inductively, resulting in four themes: explanations that death is inevitable, explanations that death is in the distance, the use of religion to frame discussions of death, and finally, discussing afterlife connections to deceased family members. Logistic regression analyses were used to evaluate whether parents' conformity or conversation orientations were associated with the frequency with which parents discussed death with their child and the content of parent vignette responses. Quantitative analysis revealed parents' conversation orientations were associated with the frequency with which they discussed death with their child and conformity orientations were associated with parents' use of religion and discussing afterlife connections to deceased family members in their responses.

Parents' Discussions of the COVID-19 Pandemic and Death With Young Children

Death and loss are often uncomfortable topics for adults to discuss with young children. Disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, however, made the avoidance of these topics nearly impossible. The current study explored how 20 parents engaged with their young children (ages 3-6) in discussions about death, dying, and loss as they jointly experienced this global crisis. Interviews were conducted both prepandemic (Summer/Fall 2019) and a year later, at the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic, before vaccines were approved (Summer 2020). Results suggest parents largely sought to balance sheltering children from stress and socializing them with socioemotional competencies. The pandemic context, however, brought parents a sense of urgency to scaffold their children's ability to remain resilient after experiencing losses. Practical implications are discussed regarding how family nurses and other practitioners can provide support to families of young children during the COVID-19 pandemic and potential future global crises.

Chinese childbearing decision-making in mainland China in the post-one-child-policy era

In 2016, China enacted its two-child policy, further lifted to a three-child policy in 2021, in response to low birth rates and imbalanced sex ratios resulting from the almost 40-year one-child policy. Despite this, China's birthrate is at a historic low as fewer parents are having children. Now more than ever, inductive explorations are needed to understand what motivates Chinese parents to have first and second children in the post-one-child policy era, particularly explorations that situate individual decision-making within the larger social context. Individual and relational choices occur in larger sociopolitical contexts. Understanding these "personal" actions involves considering how micro and macro processes inform each other. In this study, we elicited qualitative responses from Chinese mothers (N = 117) with two children in early childhood (firstborn ≤8 years old) from Liao Ning province. Most mothers were well educated, employed, and married to children's fathers. Using inductive thematic analysis procedures, we coded qualitative responses about the factors that motivated mothers to have first and second children. Our data revealed that (a) mothers expressed different reasons for having firstborns compared to secondborns, and (b) decision-making occurred against a backdrop of interacting micro-level and macro-level influences (e.g., cultural norms, national policy changes). In particular, mothers described the decision to have secondborns as more deliberative than with firstborns, considering long-term benefits siblinghood and shared demands of elderly caregiving. If efforts to stimulate the national birthrate are likely to succeed, policymakers should consider micro-level as well as macro-level factors that shape mothers' childbearing decision-making.

Family functioning, contributions to college expenses, access to mentors, and college student's health and flourishing: Examining moderation by family structure

Objective: To evaluate how family functioning, family contributions to college expenses, and access to mentors are associated with college student's self-reported health and flourishing, and to test for moderation by family structure. Participants: Undergraduate college students (N = 238) recruited through an email list-serve at a large midwestern state university. Methods: Participants completed an online survey (distributed through Qualtrics) in February 2020. Data were analyzed using linear regression (in SPSS 28) and simple slope analyses. Results: College students' access to mentors is associated with their self-reported health, and family structure moderates the association between family strengths and self-reported health. Family functioning and access to mentors are both associated with college students' flourishing. Conclusions: College students' health and flourishing may benefit from access to mentors and functional family dynamics. Though students from post-divorce families see fewer benefits from family strengths compared to peers in nuclear biological families.

Siblings as ethnic-racial socialization agents: A call for research

Research illustrating the adverse impact of discrimination and the increasing ethnic and racial diversity in the United States has resulted in a substantial body of work examining risk and protective factors for marginalized and ethnic and racial minority individuals. One factor that has received considerable attention over the past several decades is ethnic-racial socialization (ERS). Extant empirical research on ERS has heavily focused on parents, especially mothers, as socialization agents. What is noticeably missing from this literature is the potentially important roles of siblings as salient ERS agents. After briefly illustrating the focus of past research on parents as ERS agents, we review the theoretical justification for studying siblings in the ERS process and the very limited research on siblings' role in ERS-related processes. We close with a discussion of the important considerations for future researchers investigating sibling ERS.

Conversations between African American mothers and children about school and education

OBJECTIVES

This study investigated what low-income, African American mothers say to their children about the value of education and how children respond to these messages.

METHOD

Qualitative methods were used to analyze 43 videotaped mother-child conversations about disagreements regarding school and education. The conversations had been videotaped for the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation Project when children were in fifth grade.

RESULTS

The majority of discussions about school and education were initiated by mothers, not children. Mothers' reasons concerning the importance of education mostly reflected utility values. No mother criticized teachers or accepted children's attempts to blame external factors for poor performance. Children were open with their mothers and seemed to accept their standards.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings underscore the sincerity of most mothers' communications to children about the importance of education and their children's receptivity to these messages. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Family-Centered Care and Positive Developmental Outcomes for Youth With Special Health Care Needs: Variations Across Family Structures

Drawing on a social determinants of health framework, we evaluated associations between perceived family-centered care (FCC) and positive developmental outcomes for youth with special health care needs across six different family structures (married biological families, cohabiting biological families, married stepfamilies, cohabiting stepfamilies, divorced/separated single-mother families, and never-married single-mother families). Using data from the 2011-2012 National Survey of Children's Health, we found that married biological families perceive greater FCC than do other family structures. Perceived FCC was positively associated with all three positive youth outcomes evaluated (children's health, participation in extracurricular activities, and flourishing) in married biological families, and two of the three outcomes (children's health and flourishing) in married stepfamilies and divorced/separated single-mother families. Implications for health care provision and future research with structurally diverse families are discussed.