Living Arrangements of Single-Mother Families: Variations, Transitions, and Child Development Outcomes

Using a sample of 7,656 children observed over a three-year period in the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), we document the proportion of time children spend in various living arrangements and the number of transitions among them. We focus on four types of living arrangements for children: (a) living with a married mother; (b) coresiding with a single mother and her parent(s); (c) cohabiting with a single mother and her male partner; and (d) living with a single mother who is neither coresiding nor cohabiting. A substantial number of children experience coresiding and cohabiting arrangements, and approximately 11% of the children experience at least one transition. Results suggest that living with a single mother or living in a cohabiting arrangement is associated with poorer child development outcomes relative to living in married mother arrangements. In contrast, children in coresiding arrangements do not have poorer outcomes relative to children in married mother arrangements.

[1]  S. Nelson.  Beyond the Two-Parent Family: How Teenagers Fare in Cohabitating Couple and Blended Families , 2001 .

[2]  R. London.  The interaction between single mothers' living arrangements and welfare participation , 2000 .

[3]  D. Morrison,et al.  Routes to Children's Economic Recovery after Divorce: Are Cohabitation and Remarriage Equivalent? , 2000, American Sociological Review.

[4]  A. Raftery,et al.  Family Structure, Educational Attainment, and Socioeconomic Success: Rethinking the "Pathology of Matriarchy"1 , 1999, American Journal of Sociology.

[5]  D. Lichter,et al.  Parental Cohabitation and Children's Economic Well-Being , 1996 .

[6]  Lingxin Hao.  Family Structure, Private Transfers, and the Economic Well-Being of Families with Children , 1996 .

[7]  Lawrence L. Wu.  Effects of family instability income and income instability on the risk of a premarital birth. , 1996 .

[8]  W. Aquilino.  The Life Course of Children Born to Unmarried Mothers: Childhood Living Arrangements and Young Adult Outcomes. , 1996 .

[9]  D. Entwisle,et al.  Family type and children's growth in reading and math over the primary grades. , 1996 .

[10]  J. Brooks-Gunn,et al.  Young African-American multigenerational families in poverty: quality of mothering and grandmothering. , 1994, Child development.

[11]  B. Leadbeater,et al.  Predictors of behavior problems in preschool children of inner-city Afro-American and Puerto Rican adolescent mothers. , 1994, Child development.

[12]  Lawrence L. Wu,et al.  Family structure and the risk of a premarital birth. , 1993 .

[13]  R. Bradley,et al.  Low-birth-weight infants born to adolescent mothers. Effects of coresidency with grandmother on child development. , 1993, JAMA.

[14]  R. Haurin.  Patterns of Childhood Residence and the Relationship to Young Adult Outcomes. , 1992 .

[15]  D. Unger,et al.  Partner and grandmother contact in black and white teen parent families. , 1992, The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine.

[16]  F. Furstenberg,et al.  Divided Families: What Happens to Children When Parents Part , 1992 .

[17]  D. Entwisle,et al.  The Influence of Family Composition on Children’s Conformity to the Student Role , 1992 .

[18]  W. Aquilino,et al.  Parent-Child Relations and Parent's Satisfaction with Living Arrangements When Adult Children Live at Home. , 1991 .

[19]  L. Bumpass,et al.  Children's experience in single-parent families: implications of cohabitation and marital transitions. , 1989, Family planning perspectives.

[20]  P. Allen-meares.  Adolescent Pregnancy and Parenting , 1984 .

[21]  Rawlings Sw,et al.  Household and family characteristics , 1977 .

[22]  J. Vaizey,et al.  What Money Can't Buy , 1969, Nature.

[23]  A. Crouter,et al.  How do Communities Undergird or Undermine Human Development? Relevant Contexts and Social Mechanisms , 2001 .

[24]  Sharon Vandivere,et al.  Poverty, Welfare, and Children: A Summary of the Data. Child Trends Research Brief. , 1999 .

[25]  L. Casper,et al.  Coresident Grandparents and Grandchildren , 1999 .

[26]  Lawrence L. Wu.  FAMILY STRUCTURE , EARLY SEXUAL BEHAVIOR , AND PREMARITAL BIRTHS , 1997 .