Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

The study of intergenerational relationships and exchange is about the structure and process of sharing that occurs in the linked lives of grandparents, parents, and children (and sometimes extended kin) as they move along the life course. Like the discipline of sociology, this subfield emerged in the wake of rapid industrialization, urbanization, and expansion of the state's role in families (e.g., the education of children and caring for the elderly), and is concerned with how these major social changes altered extended family ties, the role of grandparents, and parent–child relationships. Middletown researchers in the 1920s, for example, observed challenges to parental control as children's individualistic aspirations began to compete with family obligations. In the US, parents' relationships with children have since shifted from an emphasis on obedience and strict conformity to developing children's autonomy and independence. In Japan, South Korea, and other countries, the significance of filial piety seems to be diminishing, raising new questions about who should care for the old and young. The study of intergenerational relationships and exchange has been guided by two questions. The first involves intergenerational transmission: what do families transmit from one generation to the next, how do processes of intergenerational transmission occur, and why? Sizable correlations ... log in or subscribe to read full text