Our researches focuses on fostering inclusive, intergenerational environments that promote human development and strengthen family dynamics. By exploring the intersection of multiple generations, we aim to understand how diverse age groups can collaborate, support each other, and thrive together. Our studies emphasize the importance of inclusivity, well-being, and the positive impact of intergenerational relationships on both individual growth and family cohesion.
2023
Parents’ and older siblings’ socialization of younger siblings’ empathy: a sample case in China
In 2016, China officially ended its One-Child policy and started allowing urban married couples to have up to two children. Beginning in 2021, Chinese policy officially began encouraging couples to have up to three children in response to low birth rates and increasing needs for workers and care providers in an aging country. Siblinghood in China has thus begun to re-emerge as a social phenomenon among urban Chinese.
Safety and Exposure in Transparent Scholl Interiors: Patterned User Perception of Glass
This paper examines user perceptions of glass in a Midwestern high school in the U.S. that exemplifies a new generation of school buildings using transparent interior features both to support social connections and to allow for the informal supervision of students. It is well known that occupants often try to reestablish spatial boundaries that architects had attempted to dematerialize with the use of glass, yet the discourse of transparency typically focuses on architects’ intentions and excludes user perceptions.
2022
Chinese childbearing decision-making in mainland China in the post-one-child-policy era
In 2016, China enacted its two-child policy, further lifted to a three-child policy in 2021, in response to low birth rates and imbalanced sex ratios resulting from the almost 40-year one-child policy. Despite this, China’s birthrate is at a historic low as fewer parents are having children. Now more than ever, inductive explorations are needed to understand what motivates Chinese parents to have first and second children in the post-one-child policy era, particularly explorations that situate individual decision-making within the larger social context.
Family functioning, contributions to college expenses, access to mentors, and college student’s health and flourishing: Examining moderation by family structure
Objective: To evaluate how family functioning, family contributions to college expenses, and access to mentors are associated with college student’s self-reported health and flourishing, and to test for moderation by family structure. Participants: Undergraduate college students (N=238) recruited through an email list-serve at a large midwestern state university.
Filial support behaviours: associations with fillial piety, reciprocity and parent-child contact in China
With the emphasis on children’s responsibility for the care of ageing parents, this study examined how Chinese adult children’s support provided to parents was associated with filial piety, support from parents and parent-child contact frequency. With the 2006 Chinese General Social Survey, we used structural equation modelling with 1,452 adults with two living parents and tested the model for sons and daughters separately.
Mainland Chinese Mothers’ Autonomy Support Across Four Caregiving Contexts
Self-determination theorists argue that parental autonomy support is a significant foundation for children’s optimal development and wellbeing. However, research is scarce regarding how parents of very young children practice autonomy support, especially in non-western countries (such as mainland China). This paper describes two studies that address this gap. Both studies investigated how Chinese mothers (children’s age < 7) say they would support their children’s autonomy in four caregiving scenarios.
Navigating Discussion of Death with Young Children: Variable Strategies of Protection
Purpose: Death is a universal inevitability of life, though parents and adults often report difficulty or concerns about discussing the topic with children. This investigation reports on how parents of very young children (ages 3–6) have or would discuss death with their child, and what parents consider in navigating such discussions.
Siblings as ethnic-racial socialization agents: A call for research
Research illustrating the adverse impact of discrimination and the increasing ethnic and racial diversity in the United States has resulted in a substantial body of work examining risk and protective factors for marginalized and ethnic and racial minority individuals. One factor that has received considerable attention over the past several decades is ethnic–racial socialization (ERS).
Social Networks and Extended Families
Individuals, couples, and families exist within wider interactive worlds. These wider circles of social networks and extended families take on new forms and nuances in every era. In the new millennium, prominent shifts in these domains have been characterized by the rapid development of new communication technologies (Antonucci et at., 2019) and the prevalence of increasing diversity in family structures and norms (e.g., cohabiting relationships, same-sex relationships, postdivorce families; Ganong et at., 2015).
2021 and 2020
Chinese International Scholars’Work-Life Balance in the United States: Stress and Strategies
Acculturative stress and strategies have been investigated with undergraduate international students in the United States. However, not much is known about scholars who come to the United States for advanced educational or career opportunities. Guided by Berry’s (2006) acculturative stress coping adaptation theory, the current study explored lived experiences of CISs through longitudinal interviews.
Maternal Autonomy Support and Children’s Social Competencies, Academic Skills, and Persistence: Social Determinants and Mediation
Drawing on self-determination theory, family stress theory, and the social determinants of health framework, the current study sought to evaluate direct and indirect relationships among socioeconomic status (maternal education and income), parenting stress, autonomy supportive parenting behavior, and children’s positive outcomes (e.g., social competences, academic skills, and persistence) using a racially diverse sample from low-income backgrounds.
Conversations Between African American Mothers and Children About School and Education
This study investigated what low-income, African American mothers say to their children about the value of education and how children respond to these messages. Method: Qualitative methods were used to analyze 43 videotaped mother–child conversations about disagreements regarding school and education. The conversations had been videotaped for the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation.
Parents’ Anticipated Discussions About Death With Young Children
Guided by family communication patterns theory and terror management theory this mixed-methods investigation explored how parents (N = 112) of young children (ages 3–6) described the way they would discuss death when it comes up in conversations. Responses were coded inductively, resulting in four themes: explanations that death is inevitable, explanations that death is in the distance, the use of religion to frame discussions of death, and finally, discussing afterlife connections to deceased family members.
2019 and before
Responsibility inferences and judgements about helping older parents and stepparents
The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of responsibility inferences on judgments about helping older parents and stepparents with activities of daily living, health management, and recovery in the aftermath of an illness or injury.
Conceptualizing Family Structure in a Social Determinants of Health Framework
In this article, we propose the conceptualization of family structure as an important socially stratified grouping within a social determinants of health (SDOH) framework. We explore how family science literature supports this conceptualization of family structure through evidence of inequity in health outcomes across structurally diverse families that can and ought to be addressed.
Exploring the complexity of Stepgrandparent-stepgrandchild relationship
Stepgrandparent-stepgrandchild relationships are increasingly common as a result of relatively high rates of divorce and remarriage and increased longevity. When relationships are close, stepgrand-parents may be valuable resources for stepgrandchildren, but the relational processes salient to the development of these ties remain largely unknown.
