TY - JOUR PY - 2018// TI - Parents who exit and parents who enter. Family structure transitions, child psychological health, and early drinking JO - Social science and medicine (1982) A1 - Pasqualini, M. A1 - Lanari, D. A1 - Pieroni, L. SP - 187 EP - 196 VL - 214 IS - N2 - This paper seeks to extend prior research by exploring whether family structure transition is associated with an increase in early alcohol consumption and whether this association is mediated by; children's socio-emotional problems, providing information on whether the effects of the transition; differ according to the number of changes, the family's initial status, or the time of exposure. The; data have been drawn from the UK Millennium Cohort Study to explore associations framed with; a life-course approach. Our findings suggest that types of family transitions (such as distinguishing; parental exits from and parental entrances to the family) are more important than the number of; family changes during childhood. The results show that moving from a two-parent household to a single-parent household directly increased the probability of being a frequent alcohol consumer among early adolescent boys, whereas the indirect effect on girls was found via socio-emotional difficulties. Our findings also show an increase in socio-emotional and behavioural difficulties in boys due to the entrance of a step-parent only if the transition occurred in the earliest childhood. Indeed, a sensitivity analysis of the time to which the children were exposed to the transition to a new family structure showed stronger effects for those who experienced a family structure change in the early life course, consistent with the cumulative disadvantage process.

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Language: en

LA - en SN - 0277-9536 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2018.08.017 ID - ref1 ER -