In response to the rapid growth in mass incarceration, a burgeoning literature documents the mostly deleterious consequences of mass incarceration for individuals and families. But mass incarceration, which has profoundly altered the American kinship system, may also have implications for...

In this paper we investigate the effect of relative income on marital status. We develop an identity model based on Akerlof and Kranton (2000) and apply it to the marriage decision. The empirical evidence is consistent with the idea that people are more likely to marry when their incomes...

As maternal incarceration may help, harm, or have no effect on child wellbeing, increases in the risk of maternal imprisonment are relevant to scholars interested in both mass imprisonment and the forces that shape inequalities in child wellbeing. Unfortunately, with the exception of a few...

Research on the immigrant paradox healthier behaviors and outcomes among more socioeconomically disadvantaged immigrants is mostly limited to the U.S. Hispanic population and to the study of birth outcomes. Using data from the Fragile Families Study and the Millennium Cohort Study, we expand our...

Using data from years one and three of the Fragile Families and Child Well-being Study, changes in depressive and anxious symptoms are compared for mothers and fathers who: 1) dissolve a cohabitating union versus remain intact; 2) dissolve a marital union versus remain intact; and 3) dissolve a...

Maternal parenting stress is associated with lower levels of life satisfaction and marital satisfaction, poor parent-child communication and disruptive child behavior. Belsky’s process model of parenting suggests that stress is influenced by three domains: maternal, child and contextual...

Though sociologists have examined the consequences of mass imprisonment of African-American men on the incarcerated men, their families, and their communities, no study has considered its impact on racial disparities in educational achievement. Analyzing the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing...

This paper uses data from a subsample of the Fragile Families and Child Well-being survey (N = 1,799) to examine the relationship between parental depression and children’s developmental outcomes. Results suggest that parental depression when children are 12 months old, particularly maternal...

While an extensive literature has shown that family structure is linked with child wellbeing, less well understood is how the dynamics within families affect children. Family systems theory posits that parents’ couple relationship is important for children’s well-being. In this paper, we use...

Data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 2,725) are used to examine associations between mothers‘ partnership instability and coparenting over the first five years after a nonmarital birth, differences between coresidential and nonresident, dating transitions and variation...