The Intergenerational Consequences of Parental Health Limitations

• Author: Kristin Turney,Jessica Halliday Hardie
• Published date: 01 June 2017
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12341
• Date: 01 June 2017

J H H Hunter College, City University of New York

K T University of California, Irvine∗

The Intergenerational Consequences of Parental

Health Limitations

Scholars have theorized interrelationships

between family members’ health and well-being.

Though prior research demonstrates associa-

tions between parents’ and children’s health,

less is known about the relationship between

parental health limitations and children’s

behavioral and academic outcomes. This article

uses data from the Fragile Families and Child

Well being Study (N=3,273) to estimate the

relationship between parental health limitations

and four aspects of children’s well-being. Find-

ings reveal that mothers’ health limitations,

especially when they occur in middle childhood

or chronically, are independently associated

with greater internalizing and externalizing

behaviors, lower verbal ability, and worse over-

all health at age 9. Fathers’ health limitations

are not associated with children’s well-being.

Fathers exert inuence in other ways, as the

relationship between mothers’ chronic health

limitations and children’s internalizing behav-

iors is concentrated among children not residing

with their fathers. These ndings support the

development of policies and interventions aimed

at families.

Department of Sociology, Hunter College, CUNY, 16th

Floor Hunter West, 695 ParkAvenue, New York, NY 10065

(jh1389@hunter.cuny.edu).

∗Department of Sociology, Universityof California, Irvine,

3151 Social Science Plaza, Irvine, CA 92697-5100

This article was edited by Kelly Raley.

Key Words: behavior, child health, child well-being, family

health, fragile families.

There are good reasons to expect that parental

health—with its potential to either strengthen or

deplete family emotional, nancial, and social

resources—has implications for children’s

well-being. Some researchers have character-

ized the family as a setting for health promotion

and urged greater attention to the intercon-

nections between family members’ health and

well-being (Christensen, 2004; Novilla et al.,

2006). Despite this, relatively little research

examines the consequences of parental health

for children’s well-being after infancy (though

for research showing a bidirectional relation-

ship between maternal and child health, see

Garbarski, 2014; Garbarski & Witt, 2013).

Health limitations are an important yet under-

studied indicator of health that may be especially

consequential for children’s well-being. More

than one tenth of adults (12.0% of men and

12.9% of women) report activity limitations that

interfere with their ability to work, live indepen-

dently, or participate in community activities

(National Center for Health Statistics, 2014).

Parental health limitations impair families’

emotional, nancial, and social well-being and,

accordingly, may reduce children’s well-being.

In this study, we use data from the Fragile

Families and Child Well being Study (FFCWB;

http://www.fragilefamilies.princeton.edu/; Rei-

chman, Teitler, Garnkel, & McLanahan, 2001)

to examine the association between maternal and

paternal health limitations and four measures

of child well-being: internalizing behaviors,

externalizing behaviors, verbal ability, and

overall health. We also consider the timing and

Journal of Marriage and Family 79 (June 2017): 801–815 801

DOI:10.1111/jomf.12341