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This study examined the association between paternal and maternal employment changes and changes in the frequency of fathers praising, showing affection, disciplining, and reading to children. Data were drawn from the Young Adult supplement to the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (1979). Supporting economic theory, fathers were more involved when they and their partner were employed full time and were less involved when their employment exceeded that of their partner. Although fathers tended to be less involved when they worked less, fathers who held traditional gender role attitudes were more involved than those who held nontraditional gender role attitudes. The results suggest the important part fathers' attitudes and values have in influencing their involvement with children under differing employment conditions.

Used trends in proportion of children with working mothers and trends in numbers of children to project proportion of children with employed mothers in 1990 and 1995, by age of child. Profiles distribution of children in nonparental care, examining trends since 1965. Discusses supply of child care and trends in supply. Examines future supply and demand for child care. (Author/NB)

With the rise in out-of-wedlock childbearing and divorce in the last quarter of the twentieth century, an increasing proportion of children have been exposed to a variety of new family forms. Little research has focused on the consequences of childhood family structure for men's transition to fatherhood or on the family processes that account for the effects of family structure on the likelihood that young women and men become first-time unmarried parents, what we now call "fragile families." The data come from the linked Children and Young Adult samples of the 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY79), which provide information on the children of the women of the NLSY79 from birth until they enter young adulthood. Females growing up with a single parent and males experiencing an unstable family transition to parenthood early, particularly to nonresidential fatherhood for males. For males, the effects are strongly mediated by parenting processes and adolescent behaviors and are shaped by economic circumstances. Having experienced multiple transitions as a child is associated with a reduced likelihood that males father their first child within marriage and an increased likelihood that they become fathers within cohabitation, demonstrating how changes in family structure alter family structure patterns over time and generations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides corrected estimates of the weekly time that 3- to 12-year-old children spent either directly engaged with their parents or with their parents accessible to them in 1997, replicating the figures presented in the original 2001 Demography article. The data come from the 1997 Child Development Supplement to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The results show a considerably greater increase in children's total time in 1997 with mothers, fathers, or either parent than was shown in the original article. Some alternative estimates, likely reasons for the larger change, and the implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to examine how American children under age 13 spend their time. sources of variation in time use, and associations with achievement and behavior. Data come from the 1997 Child Development Supplement to the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The results suggest that parents' characteristics and decisions regarding marriage, family size, and employment affect the time children spend in educational, structured, and family activities, which may affect their school achievement. Learning activities such as reading for pleasure are associated with higher achievement, as is structured time spent playing sports and in social activities. Family time spent at meals and time spent sleeping are linked to fewer behavior problems, as measured by the child's score on the Behavior Problems Index. The results support common language and myth about the optimal use of time for child development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study presented in this article examined the contribution of parents' extrafamilial resources in childhood to children's completed years of schooling in young adulthood, controlling for human and financial resources. The sample consisted of 901 black and white children observed in the Panel Study of Income Dynamics at ages 11-16 and again at age 22. The findings indicated that human and financial resources of the family are strongly associated with children's schooling and that parents' access to time or money help from friends is significantly associated with the years of schooling completed by children from high-income (but not low-income)families. Help from friends affects college attendance but not high school completion and is not uniform across the socioeconomic spectrum of families. Some residential mobility appears to increase the college attendance of children from high-income families, but it is detrimental to the college attendance of children from low-income families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dramatic changes have occurred in children's family experiences, and these changes are even more dramatic when actual living arrangements, not just parental marital statuses, are considered. According to data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, by age 17, 19% of white children born in 1950-1954 had lived with only one parent. By age 17, 70% of white children born in 1980 are projected to have spent at least some time with only one parent before they reach age 18. The proportion was 48% for black children born in 1950-1954 and is projected to be 94% for black children born in 1980. Of course, these figures do not indicate the actual proportion of their lives children spend in various family types. White children born in 1950-1954 could expect to spend 8% of their childhood with only one parent, black children 22%. Of those children born in 1980, white children can be expected to spend 31 % of their childhood years with one parent, black children 59%. Children's experience depends on family type at birth. Sixty-four percent of white children born in 1980 into a first-marriage family could expect to live at some point in a one-parent family by age 17; they could expect to spend 25% of their childhood in such a family. The comparable figures are 89% and 44% for black children born in the same year. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This section presents a rely to a comment on the article "Updating Children's Life Course." The primary reason why numbers are different is that very different things are being estimated. In addition, although everybody wants the bottom line, obtaining that number is very difficult. The author of the article has done a real service with his two very careful studies of the experience of children, the first in 1979 and the second in 1984. All studies are restricted by the fact that the most recent cohorts of children have not experienced their full childhood, and therefore, does not know what their experience will be.