Recent Research Reports and News: February
2004
Fathers—Research |
Children & Families |
Fatbers/Mothers in Prison |
Census Data |
Systemic Barriers |
Welfare Reform
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Who Are “Fragile Families” and What Do We Know About
Them? Mary Parke, A CLASP Policy Brief, Couple and Marriage Series,
Brief #4, The Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), January 2004.
Abstract:
Nearly one-third of all births now occur to unmarried parents—creating
what have been called “fragile families.” The term “fragile
families” emphasizes both that these unmarried couples and their
children are, in fact, families—and that they are at greater risk
of poverty and of family dissolution than married families. This policy
brief, the fourth in the Couples and Marriage Series, summarizes selected
findings from two studies: (1) the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing
Study (FFCWB), the first national study of unmarried parents, their
relationships to each other, and the well-being of their children, and
(2) the Time, Love, Cash, Caring and Children Study (TLC3), a related
ethnographic study of a sub-sample of romantically involved couples
from FFCWB. (Publication No. 04-01).
To obtain a copy of the complete brief in PDF format, visit the CLASP
web site.
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Children in Low-Income Families Are Less Likely to Be in Center-Based
Child Care, Jeffrey Capizzano and Gina Adams, Urban Institute, January
27, 2004.
Excerpt:
The child care arrangements of children younger than 5 with working
mothers vary by income. Children in higher-income families?particularly
3- and 4-year olds?are more likely to be placed in center-based arrangements
while low-income children are more likely to be in the care of relatives.
These differences may have implications for the school-readiness of
low-income children.
This Snapshot uses the 2002 National Survey of America's Families (NSAF)
to examine differences in the primary child care arrangements of low-
and higher-income children with working mothers. We define low-income
families as those with incomes below 200 percent of the federal poverty
thresholds, while higher-income families are those with incomes at or
above that level. The primary child care arrangement is the one in which
the child spent the most hours while the child's mother worked. To be
counted as a child care arrangement, the arrangement had to be used
regularly, defined as at least once a week during the past month. Child
care arrangements include center-based child care (child care center,
Head Start, nursery school, preschool, prekindergarten, and before-
or after-school programs); family child care (care by a nonrelative
in the provider's home); baby-sitter or nanny care (care by a nonrelative
inside the child's home); relative care (care by a relative in either
the child's or the provider's home); and parent/other care (those children
whose mothers did not report the use of any regular child care arrangement
while they worked)
To obtain a copy of the full report in PDF format, visit the Urban
Institute web site.
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Unsupervised Time: Family and Child Factors Associated with Self-Care,
Sharon Vandivere, Kathryn Tout, Martha Zaslow, Julia Calkins, and Jeffrey
Capizzano, Urban Institute, November 2003.
Report Excerpt:
The way children spend their time when they are not in school is an
important issue for families, communities, and policymakers. In recent
years, policymakers and parents have agreed that children's out-of-school
time deserves attention at both a local and national level (Larner,
Zippiroli, and Behrman 1999). New policies aimed at improving the affordability
of school-age child care and state and local initiatives offering academic
and enrichment activities for children after regular school hours are
public acknowledgments of the importance of providing more supervised
after-school options for children and their families. Nevertheless,
for a variety of reasons, a substantial number of families with school-age
children regularly leave them with a sibling or alone to care for themselves.
Often called "latchkey" care, self-care may place children
at risk. Children in self-care may experience more accidents and injuries
(Kerrebrock and Lewit 1999; Peterson 1989); externalizing behavior problems
(Colwell et al. 2001; Vandell and Posner 1999); and lower social competence,
GPAs, and achievement test scores (Pettit et al. 1997). Likewise, self-care
in adolescence has been linked to an increased likelihood of cigarette
smoking, alcohol consumption, and drug use (Mott et al. 1999; Mulhall,
Stone, and Stone 1996). Thus, while self-care may reflect a step toward
independence and autonomy for some children, it is often portrayed as
a potentially dangerous arrangement for children that parents use as
a last resort when they have no options for nonparental supervised care.
Yet self-care occurs under diverse circumstances, for a variety of reasons,
and with different implications for different children (Kerrebrock and
Lewit 1999; Vandell and Shumow 1999). For example, self-care is more
prevalent among older children (Hofferth et al. 1991; Smith 2000). In
addition, the use of self-care is less likely when parents have concerns
about their child's maturity or about the safety of their neighborhood
(Vandell and Shumow 1999). When outcomes such as social competence,
behavior problems, and school performance are examined in relation to
self-care, negative associations are more likely to be found for younger
children and for children from low-income families, implying that these
groups of children are at greater risk than other children (Marshall
et al. 1997; Pettit et al. 1997; Vandell and Posner 1999). Clearly,
the context in which self-care occurs makes a difference.
Despite the accumulation of evidence about self-care, a number of
unanswered questions remain. In particular, while we know that factors
such as children's maturity and family resources play a role in the
use of self-care, we do not know which of these are most strongly related
to self-care when a range of relevant family and child characteristics
is examined simultaneously. What matters most? Do the patterns of relevant
factors differ for different groups of children?
To obtain a copy of the full report in PDF format, visit the Urban
Institute web site.
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The Right Start for America's Newborns: City and State Trends,
Annie E. Casey Foundation, February 10, 2004.
The online report, The Right Start for America's Newborns: City and
State Trends, has been updated to include 2001 data, adding to the birth
information tracked yearly since 1990. Nationally, five of the eight
measures improved from 1990 to 2001, although huge disparities persist
across cities and states.
The site offers visitors the ability to create profiles, line graphs,
national maps, rankings, and raw data for the nation's 50 largest cities
(plus 5 additional cities in which the Casey Foundation has made a long-term
investment) and the 50 states through 2001. The Right Start is a joint
project of KIDS COUNT, an initiative of the Annie E. Casey Foundation,
and Child Trends, a Washington, DC-based research organization.
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