Estrangement Between Mothers and Adult Children: The Role of Norms and Values

Abstract

Relationships between mothers and their children are expected to be lifelong and rewarding for both members of the dyad. Because of the salience of these ties, they are likely to be disrupted only under conditions of extreme relational tension and dissatisfaction. In this work, the authors drew on theoretical arguments regarding societal norm violations and value similarity to examine the processes that lead to estrangement between mothers and adult children. To address this issue, they used quantitative and qualitative data on 2,013 mother–adult child dyads nested within 561 later life families, including 64 in which mothers reported being estranged from at least 1 of their children. Value dissimilarity was found to be a strong predictor of estrangement, whereas violation of serious societal norms was not. Qualitative data revealed that value dissimilarity created severe relational tension between mothers and adult children leading to estrangement.

The Abdication of King Edward VIII: a study of estrangement between an adult son and elderly mother

“…He was unable to understand why his mother could not then embrace his long-delayed marital happiness; after her death in 1953 he noted bitterly that she had had ‘ice’ in her veins 12. For Queen Mary, the Windsor marriage presented the kind of conflict of values identified by Gilligan et al ,3 a conundrum that she could not resolve in her lifetime, namely, that by accepting her son’s wife as a gesture of the love she felt for him, she would have to disavow the devotion to duty for which she had sacrificed her personal happiness and renege on the implicit promise made to Queen Victoria years earlier.…”

“…The transmission of values is largely a parental role and one by which parents are judged both by society and by themselves; failure in this endeavour is a likely source of the humiliation experienced by parents estranged from their adult children, regardless of how or by whom the split was initiated 3. In the elderly, moreover, social values may be more closely and uncompromisingly held than in younger adults, sometimes at the cost of sacrificing an otherwise loving parent-child relationship.…”

“…As seen in other estrangements between adult children and elderly parents,3 the old Queen’s awareness of her limited time may also have contributed to her reluctance to accept the finality of the breach.…”

“…In 2015 Gilligan, Suitor and Pillemer,3 a team of medical sociologists, undertook a large-scale investigation of later-life mother-child estrangement. Selecting mothers and children for study, the authors followed the lead of Bowen,4 who characterised estrangement as a way of coping with unresolved disputes by limiting or curtailing physical contact or by imposing an emotional distance.…”

“…Selecting mothers and children for study, the authors followed the lead of Bowen,4 who characterised estrangement as a way of coping with unresolved disputes by limiting or curtailing physical contact or by imposing an emotional distance. Comparing estranged with non-estranged mother-adult child dyads in the same family units, Gilligan et al 3 found that ‘value dissimilarity’ or dissonance was a predictor of estrangement, whereas contravention of more superficial social norms was not.…”