Communication Processes That Mediate Family Communication Patterns and Mental Well-Being: A Mean and Covariance Structures Analysis of Young Adults From Divorced and Nondivorced Families

Abstract

In this study, demand/withdraw patterns and feeling caught were tested as mediators of family communication patterns and young adults' mental well-being. Participants included 567 young adults from divorced and nondivorced families. For young adults in nondivorced families, family conversation orientations had both a positive, direct effect on mental well-being and an indirect effect on well-being through witnessing marital demand/withdraw patterns and feeling caught. For young adults in divorced families, however, conversation orientations had only a direct, positive effect on wellbeing, whereas conformity orientations had a negative, indirect effect through witnessing demand/withdraw patterns. Interestingly, respondents from divorced families reported more feelings of being caught between their parents, yet such feelings predicted diminished well-being only for respondents from nondivorced families.

Family Communication Patterns and Willingness to Engage in Family Discussion about Organ Donation

“…As a limitation, the scale of revised family communication patterns in the current study had lower reliabilities than in previous studies using this scale (e.g., Ritchie & Fitzpatrick, 1990;Schrodt & Ledbetter, 2007). At this point, it is uncertain whether the scale needs improvement or whether the lower reliabilities in the current study were simply due to sampling error.…”

“…Young adults who grew up in families with higher conversation orientation were more likely to indicate greater communication competence skills in their interpersonal relationship with others (Koesten, 2004). Additionally, research has shown that the two types of family communication patterns were differentially related to young adults' mental well-being (Schrodt & Ledbetter, 2007) and young adults' relational maintenance behaviors (Ledbetter, 2009).…”

Coparental Communication with Nonresidential Parents as a Predictor of Couples' Relational Satisfaction and Mental Health in Stepfamilies

“…Higher scores represented more frequent mental health symptoms, and thus, poorer mental health. Again, the validity and reliability of the mental health symptom scale is well established (Dornbusch et al, 1991;Schrodt & Afifi, 2007;Schrodt & Ledbetter, 2007), and in this study, the scale produced alpha coefficients of .83 and .82 for parents and stepparents respectively.…”

A Social Relations Model of Everyday Talk and Relational Satisfaction in Stepfamilies

“…Take, for example, recent empirical evidence documenting children's feelings of being caught between parents in stepfamilies (i.e., Afifi, 2003;Afifi & Schrodt, 2003a;Amato & Afifi, 2006;Braithwaite, Toller, Daas, Durham, & Jones, 2008;Schrodt & Afifi, 2007). One of the conclusions drawn from this work is that despite similarities in the processes that foster triangulation, children from postdivorce families (including stepfamilies) continue to report higher levels of feeling caught than children in first-marriage families (Schrodt & Afifi, 2007;Schrodt & Ledbetter, 2007).…”