Explaining Family Interactions represents a unique collection that may stand alone or complement a traditional textbook. The contents reflect the ever-changing nature of families and the role communication plays in creating and maintaining family relationships. The collection captures the wide universe of family experience as represented in fine scholarship. --Kathleen M. Galvin, Northwestern University What relationship exists between family structure and communication? How do communication patterns between family members change over time? What role does culture play in family communication? In this groundbreaking volume, a stellar team of contributors answers these and other significant questions by offering a detailed review of current research and state-of-the-art ideas concerning both communication processes and family functioning. Contributors explore a rich tapestry of topics, including family conflict, courtship and dating relationships, postdivorce relations, communication and family culture, and dual-career families, to name but a few. And, while contributors each explore different aspects of family communication, all address similar questions and incorporate a range of methodological and/or theoretical positions. Explaining Family Interactions is an ideal resource for all scholars and students in the fields of interpersonal communication, family studies, relationships, family sociology, and social psychology.

Make your everyday interactions with children intentional and purposeful with these steps: Be Present, Connect, and Extend Learning.

This book discusses measures of work-family, conflict, policies designed to reduce conflict, comparisons with other industrialized nations, and reasons why family-friendly work-policies have not been adopted with enthusiasm.

Decades of research have demonstrated that the parent-child dyad and the environment of the familyâ€"which includes all primary caregiversâ€"are at the foundation of children's well- being and healthy development. From birth, children are learning and rely on parents and the other caregivers in their lives to protect and care for them. The impact of parents may never be greater than during the earliest years of life, when a child's brain is rapidly developing and when nearly all of her or his experiences are created and shaped by parents and the family environment. Parents help children build and refine their knowledge and skills, charting a trajectory for their health and well-being during childhood and beyond. The experience of parenting also impacts parents themselves. For instance, parenting can enrich and give focus to parents' lives; generate stress or calm; and create any number of emotions, including feelings of happiness, sadness, fulfillment, and anger. Parenting of young children today takes place in the context of significant ongoing developments. These include: a rapidly growing body of science on early childhood, increases in funding for programs and services for families, changing demographics of the U.S. population, and greater diversity of family structure. Additionally, parenting is increasingly being shaped by technology and increased access to information about parenting. Parenting Matters identifies parenting knowledge, attitudes, and practices associated with positive developmental outcomes in children ages 0-8; universal/preventive and targeted strategies used in a variety of settings that have been effective with parents of young children and that support the identified knowledge, attitudes, and practices; and barriers to and facilitators for parents' use of practices that lead to healthy child outcomes as well as their participation in effective programs and services. This report makes recommendations directed at an array of stakeholders, for promoting the wide-scale adoption of effective programs and services for parents and on areas that warrant further research to inform policy and practice. It is meant to serve as a roadmap for the future of parenting policy, research, and practice in the United States.

This third edition of Family Communication carefully examines state-of-the art research and theories of family communication and family relationships. In addition to presenting contemporary cutting-edge research, it also includes extensive presentation and application of classic theories and findings in family science that have informed current day understandings of essential family processes. With over 2,500 references, 800 of which are new to this edition, Family Communication represents a current and comprehensive presentation of principled research conducted throughout the world for both students and teachers of family communication. Professionals who work with families and seek an evidence-based understanding of functional and dysfunctional family processes will also find this text useful. The third edition provides instructors and students with a rich set of resources including: Chapter Specific Resource Guides (chapter outlines, guiding questions, multiple choice, essay, and discussion questions, as well as numerous media resources and links) Chapter Specific PowerPoint Slides Sample Syllabus This edition addresses long-standing questions (e.g., how to maintain a marriage, how to build resiliency in remarriages and stepfamilies) and prioritizes research on a variety of family relationships beyond the couple and parent–child relationship, while also exploring new research on romantic relationship pathways, same-sex marriage and divorce, parenting trends, as well as military families, adoptive families, and families with a transgender member. It also examines the complex relationship between family communication and mental health as well as powerful and potentially surprising findings on the connections between family interaction and physical health.

Family communication is a topic of central interest in a large number of fields across the social and behavioural sciences - for instance, in the domains of language acquisition, cognitive development and socialization. This concise, readable book is the first to offer an interdisciplinary integration of current research on parent-child interaction in the `traditional' family structure. Examining the important variables of self-control, self-concept and communication competencies in childhood, this volume functions as a research heuristic and a vehicle for conversation between theorists, researchers and practitioners.

A detailed review of current research and ideas concerning both communication processes and family functioning is provided in this valuable contribution to the literature. Divided into three parts the book focuses on: communication of family members over time; the role of interaction in various family relationships; and the association between family structure and communication.