Adolescents’ willingness for intergenerational support: Relations to maternal expectations and mothers’ life satisfaction in 14 cultures

How is adolescents’ willingness for intergenerational support affected by parents’ expectations and parenting behavior? Does youths’ willingness for intergenerational support in turn affect parents’ well-being? The current study addresses these questions from a cross-cultural perspective, using data from connected samples of mother-adolescent dyads (N = 4162) from 14 diverse cultural contexts as part of the “Value of Children and Intergenerational Relations Study” (Trommsdorff & Nauck, 2005). The results are based on mixed model analyses (with culture as a random factor). Associations were investigated between family norms (expectations of support by adult children), parenting goals (obedience, independence) and parenting behavior (acceptance, control) reported by mothers and adolescents’ reports on willingness to support (help in household tasks, willingness to tolerate burdens in order to help their parents in case of accident, emotional support given to mothers and fathers). Across cultures, maternal expectations of adult children were positively related to adolescents’ reported household help and their current emotional support to mothers and fathers. Obedience, and control were positively related to the amount of adolescent help in the household, while independence and acceptance were related to a higher willingness to tolerate burdens as well as to higher emotional support given to the mother. Regarding associations between adolescents’ actual and intended intergenerational support with mothers’ life satisfaction, adolescents’ willingness to tolerate burdens was related to a higher maternal life satisfaction while adolescents’ reported household help was not. Adolescents’ current emotional support to fathers (but not to mothers) was also related to higher maternal life satisfaction. While most of the effects were stable across cultures (no significant random slope variance across cultural groups), some effects did significantly vary across cultures. Traditional-vs.-secular values as culture-level characteristics will be discussed as explanation for these culture-specific relations among mothers’ expectations, adolescents’ intergenerational support, and mothers’ life satisfaction.

Intergenerational support: A comparison between Russian and German adult daughters

The aim of this study is a Russian-German cross-cultural comparison of the actual support and the readiness for support that adult daughters give to their parents as well as of the conditions for this support. Compared to Russia, Germany can be characterized by a more individualistic value system and a fully developed social-welfare system. Therefore, the extent of intergenerational support should be less in Germany than in Russia. Furthermore, the study attempts to test if the support-related differences between the two countries are mediated by differences in cultural values. The participants were German and Russian adult daughters who at the same time were mothers of adolescent children. The cross-cultural comparisons showed that compared to their German counterparts, Russian adult daughters reported more current support as well as a higher readiness for future support. These differences were mediated through a higher emotional interdependence (intimacy) of the Russian adult daughters, as well as through their considerably higher family values and norm-oriented motives for support. The results are discussed with regard to theoretical approaches regarding parent-child relations and the culture-specific meaning of intergenerational support in Russia and Germany.

Adult parent-child relationships: Relationship quality, support, and reciprocity

In accordance with Bengtson's model of intergenerational solidarity (e.g. Bengtson & Roberts, 1991), the interrelations between adult daughters' family values, their perception of the relationship quality with their parents, the support they reported to give to and to receive from their parents, and their perception of reciprocity in intergenerational support exchange were investigated for N = 265 middle-aged women in Germany. It was also asked whether the support given to parents and perceived reciprocity are related to daughters' felt burden as a result of their support. Cross-sectional, self-report data were examined with multiple and multinomial logistic regression analyses. The analyses revealed positive relations between family values, relationship quality, and support to parents. Perceived reciprocity was associated with the exchange of intergenerational support and imbalance in support had negative effects on the relationship quality. Felt burden was predicted by the extent of support and the perceived reciprocity. However, specific correlational patterns depending on the kind of support as well as differences in the importance of mother and father occurred. The findings are discussed against the background of the meaning of family obligations and reciprocity in a Western culture.

Daily negative affect and smoking after a self-set quit attempt: The role of dyadic invisible social support in a daily diary study

Objectives Social support receipt from one's partner is assumed to be beneficial for successful smoking cessation. However, support receipt can have costs. Recent research suggests that the most effective support is unnoticed by the receiver (i.e., invisible). Therefore, this study examined the association between everyday levels of dyadic invisible emotional and instrumental support, daily negative affect, and daily smoking after a self-set quit attempt in smoker–non-smoker couples. Methods Overall, 100 smokers (72.0% men, mean age M = 40.48, SD = 9.82) and their non-smoking partners completed electronic diaries from a self-set quit date on for 22 consecutive days, reporting daily invisible emotional and instrumental social support, daily negative affect, and daily smoking. Results Same-day multilevel analyses showed that at the between-person level, higher individual mean levels of invisible emotional and instrumental support were associated with less daily negative affect. In contrast to our assumption, more receipt of invisible emotional and instrumental support was related to more daily cigarettes smoked. Conclusions The findings are in line with previous results, indicating invisible support to have beneficial relations with affect. However, results emphasize the need for further prospective daily diary approaches for understanding the dynamics of invisible support on smoking cessation.

The Lord of Heaven in the Inner Chambers: Jesuits, Women, and Domestic Christianity (ca. 1580-1690)

The study focuses on gender norms and practices in Chinese Christian communities established by Jesuit missionary activity during the long seventeenth century. It analyzes how European and Chinese gender norms and practices affected each other in the context of the Sino-Western cultural contact initiated by the missionaries. The thesis consists of two parts. First, it analyzes the ways in which European Jesuits engaged with Chinese gender relations in the course of their mission in China. The study demonstrates that the Jesuits’ adoption of the Chinese scholar-gentry’s habitus entailed a partial adaptation to Confucian gender norms. The latter placed great emphasis on gender segregation and therefore discouraged direct communication between missionaries and Chinese women. This resulted in the emergence of organizational and devotional arrangements of Christian communities specific to China. Second, the study discusses Chinese Christian women's religious culture that emerged in the absence of a strong missionary presence among female devotees. It points out that Chinese Christian women created their own ritual culture and religious sociability in the domestic context, and that they actively took part in shaping Chinese Christianity as masters of domestic rituals.

Decision Support Models for Composing and Navigating through e-Learning Objects

Libraries of learning objects may serve as basis for deriving course offerings that are customized to the needs of different learning communities or even individuals. Several ways of organizing this course composition process are discussed. Course composition needs a clear understanding of the dependencies between the learning objects. Therefore we discuss the metadata for object relationships proposed in different standardization projects and especially those suggested in the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative. Based on these metadata we construct adjacency matrices and graphs. We show how Gozinto-type computations can be used to determine direct and indirect prerequisites for certain learning objects. The metadata may also be used to define integer programming models which can be applied to support the instructor in formulating his specifications for selecting objects or which allow a computer agent to automatically select learning objects. Such decision models could also be helpful for a learner navigating through a library of learning objects. We also sketch a graph-based procedure for manual or automatic sequencing of the learning objects.

Perseveration in a guessing task by laying hens selected for high or low levels of feather pecking does not support classification of feather pecking as a stereotypy.

Feather pecking is a behaviour by which birds damage or destroy the feathers of themselves (self-pecking) or other birds (allo feather pecking), in some cases even plucking out feathers and eating these. The self-pecking is rarely seen in domestic laying hens but is not uncommon in parrots. Feather pecking in laying hens has been described as being stereotypic, i.e. a repetitive invariant motor pattern without an obvious function, and indeed the amount of self-pecking in parrots was found to correlate positively with the amount of recurrent perseveration (RP), the tendency to repeat responses inappropriately, which in humans and other animals was found to correlate with stereotypic behaviour. In the present experiment we set out to investigate the correlation between allo feather pecking and RP in laying hens. We used birds (N = 92) from the 10th and 11th generation (G10 and G11) of lines selectively bred for high feather pecking (HFP) and low feather pecking (LFP), and from an unselected control line (CON) with intermediate levels of feather pecking. We hypothesised that levels of RP would be higher, and the time taken (standardised latency) to repeat a response lower, in HFP compared to LFP hens, with CON hens in between. Using a two-choice guessing task, we found that lines differed significantly in their levels of RP, with HFP unexpectedly showing lower levels of RP than CON and LFP. Latency to make a repeat did not differ between lines. Latency to make a switch differed between lines with a shorter latency in HFP compared to LFP (in G10), or CON (in G11). Latency to peck for repeats vs. latency to peck for switches did not differ between lines. Total time to complete the test was significantly shorter in HFP compared to CON and LFP. Thus, our hypotheses were not supported by the data. In contrast, selection for feather pecking seems to induce the opposite effects than would be expected from stereotyping animals: pecking was less sequenced and reaction to make a switch and to complete the test was lower in HFP. This supports the hyperactivity-model of feather pecking, suggesting that feather pecking is related to a higher general activity, possibly due to changes in the dopaminergic system.

The Family’s Financial Support as a “Poisoned Gift”: A Family Embeddedness Perspective on Entrepreneurial Intentions

We argue that greater availability of financial support by the family for creating a new venture entails stronger financial and non-financial obligations. Cognizant of these obligations, potential founders anticipate negative performance implications for the planned firm and threats to the family system in the case of their non-fulfillment. We thus postulate that the formation of actual entrepreneurial intentions is less likely the greater the available financial support. We confirm this by studying a sample of 23,304 respondents from 19 countries and find the negative relationship to be dependent on family cohesion and on individual entrepreneurial self-efficacy.

Family’s Financial Support as Poisoned Gift: A Family Embeddedness View on Entrepreneurial Intentions

How is expected financial support by the family related to individuals' entrepreneurial intentions? By drawing on family embeddedness literature we take a novel perspective and argue that the stronger the financial support that individuals will receive from their family to start a new venture is, the lower is the likelihood that they actually form entrepreneurial intentions. We confirm this prediction on a sample of 23,866 individuals from 19 countries and find in addition that the negative relationship between the expected financial support by the family and entrepreneurial intentions is contingent on the level of family cohesion and individuals' entrepreneurial self-efficacy. These results add valuable knowledge to the entrepreneurship and family embeddedness literature.