Family Diversity and Well-Being

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SAGE Publications, Jul 15, 1994 - Family & Relationships - 299 pages
How important is family structure to family well-being and the success of family relationships? In an arena in which political rhetoric often substitutes for credible information, leading family researchers Alan Acock and David Demo separate fact from fiction regarding this crucial policy concern. Using data from the authoritative National Survey of Families and Households, the authors' work examines the four most common family types: two-parent families, divorced mothers with children, remarried families, and unwed mothers. Their meticulous analysis reveals the complexity of the questions at issue - family structure matters a great deal in some areas of family relations, and not at all in others. Leavening their sophisticated explications with ample graphics and practical examples, the authors of Family Diversity and Well-Being provide a clear, informative overview of the issues surrounding alternative family types for advanced students, professional, researchers, and policy analysts in family studies, sociology, psychology, interpersonal relationships, social policy, and gender studies.

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Contents

1
25
How Important Is Family Structure?
48
Marital Postmarital and Nonmarital Relations
83
Copyright

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About the author (1994)

Alan Acock (Ph.D., Washington State University) is Professor and former Chair of Human Development and Family Sciences at Oregon State University. He has also taught at Louisiana State University, Virginia Tech, and the University of Southern California. Alan has published 4 books, 20 book chapters, and 120 articles. He is a Fellow of the National Council on Family Relations, a winner of the Reuben Hill Award, several awards for teaching, and his book on Family Diversity and Well-Being received the 1995 Choice Award for Outstanding Academic Book. Alan has held elected offices in the American Sociological Association and the National Council on Family Relations. His substantive research has been on the effects of family structure on the well-being of family members and on intergenerational relations. He is currently investigating the effects of fathers returning to families after incarceration. He has served on editorial boards of several substantive journals including the Journal of Marriage and Family. His methodological research has focused on structural equation modeling and missing values. He is currently writing a book on Stata. He serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Structural Equation Modeling.

David H. Demo is Professor and Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. His research focuses on divorce and family transitions, changes in family relationships accompanying divorce, and the consequences of family transitions for family members’ well-being. He has published widely in professional journals and he has authored or co-authored numerous chapters in edited volumes. He has also authored or edited several books, including Handbook of family diversity (with Katherine R. Allen and Mark A. Fine); Parents and adolescents in changing families (with Anne Marie Ambert); and Family diversity and well-being (with Alan C. Acock), which received the Choice Magazine Outstanding Book Award. He has served on the editorial boards of several journals, and in 2007, he began a term as Editor of Journal of Marriage and Family. He is a Fellow of the National Council on Family Relations.

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