Current Projects
The Everyday Relationships in Adolescence (E.R.A.) Study
The Family POWER Lab is so excited to have received funding from the Hillman Family Foundations to embark on this ambitious, timely, and important deep-dive into the community, school, peer, family, and individual processes underlying adolescent well-being, success, and substance use risk.
Expanding our Concept of Public Health Impact:
Considering Intergenerational Effects of PROSPER Interventions
Young adulthood is a period of considerable transition, as individuals begin establishing their independent lives, staring jobs, partnering, and for many, begin having children. The Family POWER Lab is involved in a large-scale project aimed to better understand how experiences in the family and at school during the early adolescent years set the stage for success in young adulthood. Going further, we are interested in understanding how participating in school-based and family-based interventions during middle school may make life-course altering changes that impact young adult well-being, family formation, and the quality of the child rearing environment. We are seeking an answer to the question: do interventions provided to early adolescents offer benefits to generations to come?
Our project continues on a study that has been underway for over 15 years now, following 6th graders who are now in their mid-20's as they begin having children of their own. We are grateful to the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01 HD092439) for research funding. This project is led by Co-Principle Investigators Greg Fosco and Mark Feinberg.
Our project continues on a study that has been underway for over 15 years now, following 6th graders who are now in their mid-20's as they begin having children of their own. We are grateful to the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01 HD092439) for research funding. This project is led by Co-Principle Investigators Greg Fosco and Mark Feinberg.
The Family Life Optimizing Well-Being Study:
A 21-Day Daily Diary Study of 150 Adolescents and their Caregivers
We are so excited to share that the F.L.O.W. study has concluded! We are so grateful to the families that participated, and we are busy analyzing these rich, interesting data to better understand the role of family life for adolescent and caregiver well-being.
Some recent findings include:
1: Day-to-day inconsistency in adolescent's perceptions of parent-adolescent relationship quality is an important risk factor for problem outcomes (e.g., depression, anxiety, behavior problems). These findings suggest that it is not only important to have a strong relationship with one's parents; it is also important to support a sense of consistency in the quality of that relationship. See Fosco, Mak, Ramos, LoBraico, and Lippold (In Press) for more information.
2. Daily variation in interparental conflict is a key stressor for adolescent well-being. On days when adolescents are exposed to higher conflict than usual, they are more likely to blame themselves and to perceive conflict as threatening the well-being of the family. In turn, these appraisals of conflict were related to more depression, anger, and diminished positive well-being, such as meaning and purpose in life. See Fosco and Lydon-Staley (2019) for more information.
More research is coming out soon, so be sure to check back from time to time for updates!
*This study is supported by the Karl R. and Diane Wendle Fink Early Career Professorship for the Study of Families.
Family Systems Risk and Protective Models:
A Spotlight on Interparental Conflict
A key theme in our research is how family relationships, such as interparental conflict, parenting practices, parent-youth relationships, and broader family processes function within the family unit to explain child and adolescent outcomes. This work is guided by family systems theoretical principles, in which we explore interdependency among family subsystems, whole-family functioning, and triadic family processes, in an effort to better understand implications for child development and psychopathology. Our work in this area has been informed by Grych and Fincham's (1990) cognitive contextual framework (recently updated by Fosco, DeBoard, & Grych, 2007). This perspective underscores the importance of children's subjective evaluations of interparental conflict for explaining their coping and adjustment. In particular, we focus on threat and self-blame processes, and how these operate in the family system.
Threat appraisals reflect a child or adolescents' worries about their parents conflict, and concern that it may be indicative of something bad, that the conflict may pose a threat to their well-being or the well-being of the family. Recent longitudinal findings indicate that adolescents who perceive their parents' conflicts as threatening are more likely to experience decreases in their overall beliefs in their own self-efficacy, or ability to succeed in efforts that they attempt (Fosco & Feinberg, 2015). In turn, diminished self-efficacy is a risk factor for behavior problems, depression or anxiety, and decreased happiness and life satisfaction. Other work documents threat appraisals as a robust risk factor for depression and anxiety (e.g., Fosco & Grych, 2008; Grych, Harold, & Miles, 2003). Currently, the Family POWER Lab has been investigating the implications of threat appraisals for other important outcomes during adolescence: including implications for engaging and escalating in substance use behaviors and peer relationship quality. Watch for these findings in the near future!
Self-blaming attributions are a different process - these youth believe that they are the reason their parents are fighting, or that it is their responsibility to resolve the problem. We find that self-blame is a broad risk factor for a range of outcomes, including behavior problems, depression and anxiety, and academic problems (Fosco & Grych, 2008; Harold et al., 2008). Even when parents argue about child-related topics, it is not the child's fault; parents ability to manage their disagreements in a constructive way is of the utmost importance.
Triangulation is a family dynamic in which children or adolescents are drawn into parental conflicts. This can occur in several ways (Buchanan & Waizenhofer, 2001). Sometimes, children serve as a conflict mediator, and become involved in conflicts as a "problem-solver". Another form of triangulation occurs when children form an alliance with one parent against the other. And a third common form of triangulation is for children to disrupt parental conflicts through misbehavior. In this dynamic, parents often become distracted by the child and unite to address their shared concern. In general, triangulation is a risk factor for child and adolescent mental health problems; particularly for behavior problems (Fosco & Grych, 2008; Fosco, Lippold, & Feinberg, 2014). More recently, we have found that triangulation into parental conflicts can impact adolescents' dating relationships, as well (Fosco, Xia, Lynn, & Grych, in press)
Family contextual factors also impact the degree to which children are affected by interparental conflicts. Of particular interest to our group are the ways in which the overall family emotional climate and the nature of family relationships (e.g., parent-child or sibling) shape the degree to which children and adolescents are at risk for negative appraisals of conflict (i.e., threat, self-blame) or for maladjustment (internalizing problems, externalizing problems). We have now published a couple of studies that indicate that the emotional climate of the family has an important role for children's self-blaming attributions (Fosco & Grych, 2007), and that parent-child relationships also impact self-blame (DeBoard, Fosco, Raynor, & Grych, 2010) and threat (Grych, Raynor, & Fosco, 2004). There is much to be done in this area. In particular the role of family contextual factors await longitudinal tests in this model.
Threat appraisals reflect a child or adolescents' worries about their parents conflict, and concern that it may be indicative of something bad, that the conflict may pose a threat to their well-being or the well-being of the family. Recent longitudinal findings indicate that adolescents who perceive their parents' conflicts as threatening are more likely to experience decreases in their overall beliefs in their own self-efficacy, or ability to succeed in efforts that they attempt (Fosco & Feinberg, 2015). In turn, diminished self-efficacy is a risk factor for behavior problems, depression or anxiety, and decreased happiness and life satisfaction. Other work documents threat appraisals as a robust risk factor for depression and anxiety (e.g., Fosco & Grych, 2008; Grych, Harold, & Miles, 2003). Currently, the Family POWER Lab has been investigating the implications of threat appraisals for other important outcomes during adolescence: including implications for engaging and escalating in substance use behaviors and peer relationship quality. Watch for these findings in the near future!
Self-blaming attributions are a different process - these youth believe that they are the reason their parents are fighting, or that it is their responsibility to resolve the problem. We find that self-blame is a broad risk factor for a range of outcomes, including behavior problems, depression and anxiety, and academic problems (Fosco & Grych, 2008; Harold et al., 2008). Even when parents argue about child-related topics, it is not the child's fault; parents ability to manage their disagreements in a constructive way is of the utmost importance.
Triangulation is a family dynamic in which children or adolescents are drawn into parental conflicts. This can occur in several ways (Buchanan & Waizenhofer, 2001). Sometimes, children serve as a conflict mediator, and become involved in conflicts as a "problem-solver". Another form of triangulation occurs when children form an alliance with one parent against the other. And a third common form of triangulation is for children to disrupt parental conflicts through misbehavior. In this dynamic, parents often become distracted by the child and unite to address their shared concern. In general, triangulation is a risk factor for child and adolescent mental health problems; particularly for behavior problems (Fosco & Grych, 2008; Fosco, Lippold, & Feinberg, 2014). More recently, we have found that triangulation into parental conflicts can impact adolescents' dating relationships, as well (Fosco, Xia, Lynn, & Grych, in press)
Family contextual factors also impact the degree to which children are affected by interparental conflicts. Of particular interest to our group are the ways in which the overall family emotional climate and the nature of family relationships (e.g., parent-child or sibling) shape the degree to which children and adolescents are at risk for negative appraisals of conflict (i.e., threat, self-blame) or for maladjustment (internalizing problems, externalizing problems). We have now published a couple of studies that indicate that the emotional climate of the family has an important role for children's self-blaming attributions (Fosco & Grych, 2007), and that parent-child relationships also impact self-blame (DeBoard, Fosco, Raynor, & Grych, 2010) and threat (Grych, Raynor, & Fosco, 2004). There is much to be done in this area. In particular the role of family contextual factors await longitudinal tests in this model.