Socioeconomic status, parenting investments, and negative personality traits over time and across generations.

Abstract

The current investigation tested predictions from the interactionist model (IM) of socioeconomic influences on the development of negative personality traits with respect to feelings of alienation and low well-being. The model tested proposed that lower family socioeconomic status would lead to fewer parenting and material investments in the next generation adolescent, which in turn would be associated with higher levels of adolescent negative personality traits. The IM also predicted a transactional process in which adolescent negative personality attributes would then deter future socioeconomic success during adulthood which, in turn, would hinder adult development in terms of greater feelings of alienation and diminished well-being. Analyses with a cohort of 347 adolescents followed for over 20 years produced findings consistent with these predictions. Moreover, additional analyses with 282 of the third generation children of these cohort members demonstrated that this same process was being replicated in the third generation. The findings suggest reciprocal or transactional influences that promote the development of negative personality attributes and accumulating personal, economic and social advantages over time and generations.

An examination of genetic and environmental factors related to negative personality traits, educational attainment, and economic success.

“…Brief descriptions of the model constructs are provided below. For measurement details see Martin and Donnellan (2021).…”

“…This was assessed as a latent variable with three indicators: warm parenting, low (reversed) hostile parenting, and low (reversed) harsh and inconsistent discipline. G1 parenting investments were assessed in 1992 during family discussion and problem-solving tasks (see Martin & Donnellan, 2021 for details). Higher scores represent greater parental investment.…”

Special section on personality development: Testing environmental and genetic associations across generations.

“…The model also assessed the contribution of G2 parenting and Conscientiousness in early adulthood to the development of conscientiousness in the next generation, the G3 children. The second empirical article (Martin & Donnellan, 2021) follows a similar format to R. D. Conger et al (2021) by examining the development of negative emotions (alienation and low sense of well-being) among the G2 target participants from adolescence to young adulthood in response to family SES and parenting processes.…”

“…The FTP is a community-based study of over 500 early adolescents (G2) and their families that began in 1989 and continues today with information obtained from all three generations; the study has over 2,400 individual participants. This program of research features broad genotypic and phenotypic measures, including commonly used informant-based measures of personality (Martin & Donnellan, 2021). Participants have been assessed on multiple occasions using a measurement strategy that is extensive (i.e., covers multiple domains of personal and social characteristics) and intensive (i.e., multi-informant assessment including self-reports, other family member reports, teacher reports, ratings by trained observers, school records, and public records; e.g., K.…”

Effects of a Combination Economic Empowerment and Family Strengthening Intervention on Psychosocial Well-being Among Ugandan Adolescent Girls and Young Women: Analysis of a Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial (Suubi4Her)

“…In addition to the direct physical and emotional consequences of poverty and economic instability, these factors have been shown to adversely impact the quality of family relationships, which can exacerbate poor psychosocial outcomes for youth [ 19 , 20 ]. For example, in a cohort of 347 adolescents followed for over 20 years, lower family socioeconomic status yielded fewer parenting investments in their children, which subsequently yielded higher levels of negative adolescent personality traits [ 21 ]. Family strengthening interventions have been shown to directly improve psychosocial outcomes among adolescents in multiple settings [ 22 – 25 ] and lengthen the benefits of improved family economic stability [ 26 , 27 ].…”