Abstract
This paper documents the types and amounts of aid exchanged between adults and their non-coresidential parents. Data for the study are drawn from a representative national sample survey of Americans age 19 and older conducted in 1987–1988. Exchanges of monetary and material resources, childcare, household assistance, and companionship and advice are considered.
Patterns of intergenerational exchange are found to differ by gender, family structure, age, ethnicity, and socioeconomic situation. Differences in exchange between males and females and between whites and Mexican-Americans are related to other life-course characteristics, and to the availability and proximity of kin. Blacks and persons living in poverty are shown to be less involved than other groups in intergenerational exchanges. Finally, patterns of prior assistance and the available needs and resources of the respondents and their parents are found to influence current patterns of exchange.
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Support for this research was provided by NICHD Grant No. 1 R01 HD26070-01, “Intergenerational Exchanges in Families with Children,” Dennis P. Hogan, Principal Investigator. Funds for the computer analysis were provided by the Pennsylvania State University Intercollege Research Programs.
David Eggebeen is an Assistant Professor of Human Development in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies and a research associate at the Population Issues Research Center at Pennsylvania State University. He trained in sociology and demography at the University of North Carolina. His current research interests, besides those related to intergenerational relations, are the recent changes in the demographic structure of childhood in America and their implications for children’s social and economic well-being.
Dennis P. Hogan is a professor of sociology and the director of the Population Issues Research Center at Pennsylvania State University. His current research interests, besides those related to intergenerational relations, are in the interrelation of social structures and the demographic life course. He is coauthor with David I. Kertzer ofFamily, Political Economy, and Demographic Change: The Transformation of Life in Casalecchio, Italy, 1861–1921, University of Wisconsin Press, 1989.
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Eggebeen, D.J., Hogan, D.P. Giving between generations in American families. Human Nature 1, 211–232 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02733984
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02733984