Maternal depression and adolescent optimism.

The life course perspective posits that parents' and children's lives are linked through shared experiences and interdependent contexts such as the household. In this paper, we draw on the life course perspective to examine the relationship between maternal depression and adolescent optimism, an important trait that reflects adolescents' positive expectations for the future, and how features of the family context explain this association. We use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 3013), taking advantage of the study's longitudinal measures of maternal depression that span a 15-year period.

Gender Differences in Adolescents' Work and Family Orientations in the United States.

We use the Education Longitudinal Study: 2002 to compare the perceived importance of work and family achievement among young women and men. We apply latent class analysis to identify distinct configurations of values, then examine associations between latent classes and educational and occupational expectations. Results show high ambitions for both work and family among both young women and men.

Job Characteristics, Job Preferences, and Physical and Mental Health in Later Life.

Existing research linking SES with work primarily focuses on the precursors (educational attainment) and outcomes (income) of work, rather than asking how diverse facets of work influence health. Using four waves of data from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study, we evaluate whether multiple measures of respondent job characteristics, respondent preferences for those characteristics, and their interaction substantially improve the fit of sociological models of men's and women's physical and mental health at midlife and old age compared to traditional models using educational attainment, parental SES, and income. We find that non-wage job characteristics predict men's and women's physical and mental health over the lifecourse, although we find little evidence that the degree to which one's job accords with one's job preferences matters for health.

Health Limitations among Mothers and Fathers: Implications for Parenting.

Despite good reasons to expect that poor health could impede parenting, relatively little research considers this possibility. This study uses data from the Fragile Families and Child Well-being Study (N=3,376) and propensity score matching to examine the relationship between maternal and paternal health limitations-health conditions that limit the amount or type of work one can do-and mother- and father-reported parenting stress, cooperation in parenting, and engagement with children. First, we find that mothers' and fathers' health limitations are associated with greater parenting stress.

Parent-Child Relationships at the Transition to Adulthood: A Comparison of Black, Hispanic, and White Immigrant and Native-Born Youth.

Parents play a key role in launching their children into adulthood. Differences in the resources they provide their children have implications for perpetuating patterns of family inequality. Using data on 6,962 young adults included in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997, we examine differences in the support parents provide to young adult children by immigrant status and race/ethnicity and whether and how those differences are explained by parent resources and young adult resources and roles.

The Dynamics and Correlates of Religious Service Attendance in Adolescence.

This study examines changes in religious service attendance over time for a contemporary cohort of adolescents moving from middle to late adolescence. We use two waves of a nationally representative panel survey of youth from the National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR) to examine the dynamics of religious involvement during adolescence. We then follow with an analysis of how demographic characteristics, family background, and life course transitions relate to changes in religious service attendance during adolescence.

Behavioral functioning among Mexican-origin children: does parental legal status matter?

Using data on 2,535 children included in the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey, we investigate how the legal status of immigrant parents shapes their children's behavioral functioning. Variation in internalizing and externalizing problems among Mexican youth with undocumented mothers, documented or naturalized citizen mothers, and U.S.

The consequences of unrealized occupational goals in the transition to adulthood.

Do unmet occupational goals have negative consequences for well-being? Several social-psychological theories posit that aspirations become standards against which individuals judge themselves, thereby decreasing well-being when unmet. Yet other evidence points to young adults' goal flexibility and resilience, suggesting unmet aspirations may not affect well-being. This paper tests these alternatives using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979 (N = 9016) and the National Educational Longitudinal Study of 1988 (N = 10,547) to examine whether the degree of match between adolescent occupational aspirations (NLSY) and expectations (NELS) and later attainment affect job satisfaction and depression.

His and Hers: Economic Factors and Relationship Quality in Germany.

Research has linked economic factors to relationship quality in the United States, primarily using cross-sectional data. In the current study, 2 waves of the Panel Analysis of Intimate Relationships and Family Dynamics data ( = 2,937) were used to test the gendered association between economic factors and relationship satisfaction among young German couples. In contrast to U.

A Person-Centered Examination of Adolescent Religiosity Using Latent Class Analysis.

Empirical studies of religion's role in society, especially those focused on individuals and analyzing survey data, conceptualize and measure religiosity on a single measure or a summary index of multiple measures. Other concepts, such as "lived religion," "believing without belonging," or "fuzzy fidelity," emphasize what scholars have noted for decades: humans are rarely consistently low, medium, or high across dimensions of religiosity including institutional involvement, private practice, salience, or belief. A method with great promise for identifying population patterns in how individuals combine types and levels of belief, practice, and personal religious salience is latent class analysis.

Profiles of Risk: Maternal Health, Socioeconomic Status, and Child Health.

Child health is fundamental to well-being and achievement throughout the life course. Prior research has demonstrated strong associations between familial socioeconomic resources and children's health outcomes, with especially poor health outcomes among disadvantaged youth who experience a concentration of risks, yet little is known about the influence of maternal health as a dimension of risk for children. This research used nationally representative U.

Other People's Racism: Race, Rednecks, and Riots in a Southern High School.

This article uses data drawn from nine months of fieldwork and student, teacher, and administrator interviews at a southern high school to analyze school racial conflict and the construction of racism. We find that institutional inequalities that stratify students by race and class are routinely ignored by school actors who, we argue, use the presence of so-called redneck students to plausibly deny racism while furthering the standard definition of racism as blatant prejudice and an individual trait. The historical prominence of rednecks as a southern cultural identity augments these claims, leading to an implicit division of school actors into friendly/nonracist and unfriendly/racist and allowing school actors to set boundaries on the meaning of racism.

Compensating differentials, labor market segmentation, and wage inequality.

Two literatures on work and the labor market draw attention to the importance of non-pecuniary job amenities. Social psychological perspectives on work suggest that workers have preferences for a range of job amenities (e.g.

Economic Factors and Relationship Quality Among Young Couples: Comparing Cohabitation and Marriage.

Are economic resources related to relationship quality among young couples, and to what extent does this vary by relationship type? To answer these questions, we estimated regression models predicting respondent reports of conflict and affection in cohabiting and married partner relationships using the National Longitudinal Study of Youth, 1997 (NLSY97, N = 2,841) and the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health, N = 1,702). We found that economic factors are an important predictor of conflict for both married and cohabiting couples. Affection was particularly responsive to human capital rather than short-term economic indicators.