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Journal Article By age 3, children from privileged families have heard 30 million more words than children from underprivileged families. Longitudinal data on 42 families examined what accounted for enormous differences in rates of vocabulary growth. Children turned out to be like their parents in stature, activity level, vocabulary resources, and language and interaction styles. Follow-up data indicated that the 3-year-old measures of accomplishment predicted third grade school achievement.
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Journal Article This study examines the role of biological and social fathers in the lives of low-income African American adolescent girls (N= 302). Sixty-five percent of adolescents identified a primary father; two thirds were biological and one third were social fathers. Adolescents reported more contentious and less close relationships with biological than with social fathers. Multivariate regression analyses indicated that daughters' perceptions of anger and alienation from fathers was related to greater emotional and behavioral problems for adolescents, whereas perceptions of trust and communication…
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Journal Article Previous longitudinal research has shown that parental monitoring is a powerful predictor of child outcomes. Children from families with low levels of monitoring are particularly at risk for antisocial behavior, difficulties in school, and related problems. We studied whether parental monitoring--as reported by mothers/stepmothers, fathers/stepfathers, interviewers, and teachers--differs across two-parent biological families, stepmother families, and stepfather families. Two-parent biological families were hypothesized to have higher levels of monitoring than stepparent families. Controlling…
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Journal Article The purpose of this quantitative study is to examine the impact of a job-training program, the Georgia Fatherhood Program (GFP), on the employment levels and wages of low-income, non-custodial parents. A pretest/posttest design was created to compare GFP participants to a similar comparison group. Results of the research indicate that GFP participants experienced a significant increase in employment and gained wages similar to the employed comparison group. However repeated measures analysis revealed that previously employed GFP participants did not significantly increase their wages. The…
