Cluster analysis was used to identify groups defined by the patterning of fathers' and mothers' sources of knowledge about adolescents' experiences in a sample of 179 families with adolescents (M = 16.5 years). Three clusters emerged for fathers (relational, relies on spouse, relies on others) and mothers (relational, questioners, relies on others). Cluster membership was associated with socioeconomic status, work hours, personal characteristics, and parent-child relationship quality. Longitudinal path analyses revealed that knowledge sources predicted levels of knowledge, which in turn predicted risky behavior 1 year later, indirect paths that were more consistent for fathers than for mothers. Although direct associations between sources of knowledge and subsequent risky behavior were scant, when fathers relied on spouses, youth engaged in less risky behavior.

ࡗ Implications of Overwork and Overload for the Quality of Men's Family RelationshipsThis study examined the implications of men's long work hours and role overload for the quality of their relationships with their wives and their firstborn (M ϭ 15 years) and secondborn adolescent offspring (M ϭ 12.5 years) in a sample of 190 dual-earner families. Holding constant men's occupational self-direction and level of education, long hours were related to less time spent with the wife but were unrelated to spouses' love, perspective-taking, or conflict; high levels of role overload consistently predicted less positive marital relationships. In contrast, the combination of long hours and high overload was consistently associated with less positive father-adolescent relationships, a pattern that was similar for older and younger adolescents and for sons and daughters.An important and unresolved issue in the literature on work and family is whether or not the sheer amount of time people work matters for the quality of their lives off the job. In the 1990s, several widely publicized monographs in the work and family area emphasized the long hours many Americans spend on the job and the potential negative repercussions of long work hours for workers themselves and for their families (Hochschild,

This study focused on the connections between mothers' and fathers' work pressure and the psychological adjustment of their older (M = 15 years) and younger (M = 12.5 years) adolescent offspring in a sample of 190 dual-earner families. Structural equation models revealed that the effects of work pressure on adolescent well-being were mediated by parental role overload and parent-adolescent conflict. Work-family linkages were similar for mothers and fathers with one exception: Fathers' work pressure predicted both parents' feelings of role overload, whereas mothers' work pressure predicted only their own overload, not their spouses'. The patterns of association were consistent for older and younger adolescent siblings.

This study investigated the ways in which 2 indicators of parental autonomy granting, adolescents' decision-making input and parental knowledge of adolescents' daily experiences, differed as a function of contextual factors (i.e., parents' gender role attitudes or sibling dyad sex composition) and boys' and girls' personal qualities (i.e., gender, pubertal status, developmental status, or birth order) in a sample of 194 families with firstborn (M = 15.0 years) and second-born (M = 12.5 years) adolescents. Firstborns were granted more autonomy than second borns, especially in families with firstborn girls and second-born boys. Girls in families marked by traditional maternal gender role attitudes were granted fewer autonomy opportunities. Postmenarcheal second-born girls were granted more opportunities for autonomy than were premenarcheal second-born girls, but only in families with less traditional maternal gender role attitudes.

Recent research indicates that parental work stress has implications for the quality of family interaction and, in turn, children's and adolescents' adjustment. Studies in two distinct genres are reviewed: investigations relying on global reports of work demands, family dynamics, and child and adolescent adjustment and studies focusing on within-person comparisons of family interaction on days characterized by high and low work stress.