Families originally living in public housing were assigned housing vouchers by lottery, encouraging moves to neighborhoods with lower poverty rates. Although we had hypothesized that reading and math test scores would be higher among children in families offered vouchers (with larger effects...

We use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study with a cross-lagged longitudinal design to examine how couple relationship quality and parental engagement with children affect one another during the first three years of a child’s life for both married and unmarried parents who...

Although it has long been known that parental socioeconomic status correlates strongly with various measures of child and adult achievement, the causal roleplayed by income remains controversial. Important unanswered questions include: 1) the role of the timing of economic deprivation during...

We use data from the Fragile Families Study (N=1975) to examine the relationship between mothers’ partnership changes and parenting behavior during the first five years of their child’s life. We compare coresidential and dating transitions and recent and more distal transitions. We also...

We use data from the Fragile Families Study (N = 1,370) to examine child behavioral problems among children born to cohabiting and married parents who remain together until the child is age 3. The primary objective of the analysis is to determine how much of the difference in child outcomes at...

We use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to investigate the association between co-parenting quality and nonresident fathers’ involvement with children over the first five years after a nonmarital birth (N=2,191). Using structural equation models to estimate cross-lagged...

Existing research shows that marriage and marital stability are positively associated with health and well-being. Thus, recent increases in births to unmarried parents and the instability surrounding these relationships raise concerns about the possible health effects associated with changes in...

The association between parental mental health problems and child wellbeing has rarely been examined in the context of non-traditional families. Using the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS), this analysis exploits the full range of parent relationship types, including married,...

We use data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study to examine associations between first-year maternal employment and child outcomes for 3-year-old white, Black, and Hispanic children. We find that first-year maternal employment is associated with lower vocabulary scores for white,...