Perceived Changes in Family Life During COVID‐19: The Role of Family Size

• Published date: 01 December 2021
• Author: Elena Canzi,Francesca V. Danioni,Miriam Parise,Giulia Lopez,Laura Ferrari,Sonia Ranieri,Raffaella Iafrate,Margherita Lanz,Camillo Regalia,Rosa Rosnati
• Date: 01 December 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12579

E C, F V. D, M P, G L, L F,

S R, R I, M L, C R,  R R

Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan, Italy

Perceived Changes in Family Life During

COVID-19: The Role of Family Size

Objective: The current study was aimed at

exploring Italian parents’ perceived negative

and positive changes in family life during the

COVID-19 pandemic, taking into account the

role of the stage of the family life and family size.

Background: During the emergency of the

COVID-19 pandemic, millions of families dras-

tically changed their daily life and routines.

Little evidence exists on how family characteris-

tics, such as family size or presence of children,

are related to families’ experience of family

change.

Method: A large sample of 1,407 Italian parents

(70.1% mothers) lled in an anonymous online

survey during the third week of the lockdown

period (between March 30 and April 7, 2020).

Results: Results showed that parents reported

perceiving more positive changes than negative

ones, especially in terms of feeling more

Department of Psychology, Family Studies and

Research University Centre, Università Cattolica del

Sacro Cuore, Largo Gemelli 1, 20123, Milan, Italy

(elena.canzi@unicatt.it).

© 2021 The Authors. Family Relations published by Wiley

Periodicals LLC on behalf of National Council on Family

Relations.

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative

Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribu-

tion and reproduction in any medium, provided the original

work is properly cited.

Key Words: COVID-19 pandemic, family life, family size,

negative and positive changes.

emotionally close to their children and spending

more fun time with them. Interestingly, par-

ents with two or more children reported more

positive changes in family life compared with

parents who had one child, showing a greater

relational regenerative capacity in the face of

COVID-19 lockdown.

Conclusion and Implications:Investing in fam-

ily relationships, especially for larger families,

is an effective coping strategy to deal with trau-

matic situations and promote positive family

changes in stressful situations.

During the emergency of COVID-19 pandemic,

millions of families were forced to drastically

change their daily life and routines. Italy is one

of the countries severely affected by this health

emergency. As of August 25, 2021, there were

4,502,396 conrmed cases and 128,914 deaths.

For a period of time lasting almost 3 months,

Italian families practiced physical distancing by

isolating themselves at home and restricting

movements and interactions. Indeed, the Ital-

ian government, starting on March 11, 2020,

imposed progressive restriction measures, forc-

ing Italian families into lockdown to control

the spread of the virus. Group activities, social

gatherings, and outdoor activities were strongly

limited or prohibited. Any kind of unessential

business was forced to close and, when possi-

ble, working remotely from home was strongly

encouraged. Moreover, schools and educational

services were closed.

Family Relations 70 (December 2021): 1303–13111303

DOI:10.1111/fare.12579