Intergenerational Consequences of Family Disruption

TLDR

The study investigates how childhood family disruption influences adult family outcomes using proportional hazard models on National Survey of Family Growth data. They applied these models to test economic‑deprivation, socialization, and stress hypotheses as explanations for intergenerational effects. Women who grew up in one‑parent families are more likely to marry and have children early, give birth before marriage, and experience marital dissolution—except among blacks where early marriage is unrelated to family background—supporting the socialization explanation.

Abstract

This paper examines the effects of childhood family disruption on adult family experience by applying proportional hazard models to data from the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG). The results provide strong evidence that women who spend part of their childhoods in one-parent families are more likely to marry and bear children early, give birth before marriage, and have their own marriages break up. The major exception is that, among blacks, early marriage is unrelated to family background. Several explanations for intergenerational consequences are tested, including the economic-deprivation hypothesis, the socialization hypothesis, and the stress hypothesis. The results are most consistent with the socialization explanation, which argues that parental role models and parental supervision are the major factors in determining offspring's future family-formation behavior.