The Psychology of Intergenerational Transfers

描述（由申请人提供）：在美国，很少有法律的或社会制裁要求成年人为父母或成年子女提供帮助，但中年人经常与他们的上一代和下一代交换帮助。一个新兴的文献表明，大多数成年人也经历了挫折和紧张与父母和成年子女。拟议的研究审查：目标1）与父母和子女的交换模式（交换什么，谁进行交换），目标2）对这些交换的信念，目标3）对这些交换和关系的感受。我们还考虑了父母和后代的交流报告。这项研究通过检查心理过程（例如，信仰、感情），并考虑多个家庭成员对这些交流的看法。参与者将包括400名年龄在40至60岁之间的欧洲裔美国人和220名非洲裔美国人，他们至少有一名父母和一名18岁以上的子女。分层抽样将确保按性别、年龄和种族分布。随机选择的父母和目标参与者的后代也将完成面试。计算机辅助电话面试（CATI）将包括开放式和强迫选择的项目。分析策略将依赖于多层次模型（MLM）。传销将使我们能够考虑中年人的看法交流跨多个支持域（例如，工具性的、经济上的、情感上的）与多个家庭成员。这些分析将包括中年成人的特征（例如，种族、个性），家庭成员（例如，年龄），和关系（例如，父母与子女）来理解交换模式。我们还将使用传销来检查多个家庭成员（中年人，子女，父母）的交流报告，以及家庭成员的同意和不同意，支持和感情的看法。这项研究的独特贡献包括审查：不同家庭成员对同一家庭内支持的报告（目标1）;对与父母和子女交流的动机的信念（目标2）;对日常交流和关系的积极和消极感受（目标3）。先前的研究已经将与他人的积极关系与中年发病率和死亡率的降低联系起来，但研究尚未确定关系影响健康的机制。这项研究的结果将有助于了解如何提供和接受支持与中年健康的变化有关。调查结果也将有助于政策制定者对成年人的期望和感受，对家庭和公共义务。此外，临床医生可以利用这些发现来帮助成年人照顾成年子女或父母。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): There are few legal or social sanctions in the U.S. requiring adults to provide assistance for their parents or grown offspring, but middle-aged adults frequently exchange assistance with generations above and below them. A burgeoning literature shows that most adults also experience frustration and tensions with parents and grown offspring. The proposed study examines: Aim 1) patterns of exchanges with parents vs. offspring (what is exchanged and who does the exchanging), Aim 2) beliefs about these exchanges, and Aim 3) feelings about these exchanges and relationships. We also consider parents' and offspring's reports of the exchanges. The study fills a large gap in the literature by examining psychological processes (e.g., beliefs, feelings) associated with exchanges and considering multiple family members' perspectives on these exchanges. Participants will include 400 European American and 220 African American adults aged 40 to 60 who have at least one living parent and one child over the age of 18. Stratified sampling will assure distributions by gender, age, and ethnicity. A randomly selected parent and offspring of target participants will also complete an interview. Computer assisted telephone interviews (CATI) will include open-ended and forced-choice items. The analytic strategy will rely on multilevel models (MLM). MLM will allow us to consider middle- aged adults' perceptions of exchanges across multiple support domains (e.g., instrumental, financial, emotional) with multiple family members. These analyses will include characteristics of the middle-aged adult (e.g., ethnicity, personality), family member (e.g., age), and relationship (e.g., parent vs. offspring) to understand patterns of exchanges. We will also use MLM to examine multiple family members' (middle-aged adult, offspring, parent) reports of exchanges, as well as agreements and disagreements in family members', views of supports and feelings. Unique contributions of the study include examination of: different family members' reports of support within the same family (Aim 1); beliefs about motivations underlying exchanges with parents and offspring (Aim 2); positive and negative feelings about everyday exchanges and relationships (Aim 3). Prior studies have linked positive relationships with others to decreased morbidity and mortality at midlife, but research has not identified the mechanisms through which relationships influence health. Findings from this study will have implications for understanding how provision and receipt of support are associated with variability in health at midlife. Findings also will be of use to policy makers concerning expectations and feelings adults hold regarding familial versus public obligations. Furthermore, clinicians may draw on findings to assist adults who provide care to grown children or parents.