The Religious Dimensions of the Grandparent Role in Three-Generation African American Households

The Use of Spirituality and Kinship as Contributors to Successful Therapy Outcomes with African American Families

“…Research over the past few years have affirmed that when African American families use one or both of these traditional strengths, they have been able to alleviate some of their crises, including preventing some children from entering foster care (Gibson, 2005), decreasing economic woes of family members through sharing residences (King, Burgess, Akinyela, Counts-Spriggs, & Parker, 2006), and decreasing the emotional distress of depression (Watlington & Murphy, 2006).…”

Grandparent-Grandchild Relationships in Israel: A Comparison between Different Jewish Religious Groups

“…For example, they had more frequent contact with their grandchildren, and felt closer to them. In addition, religious grandparents considered it their role to convey family history and religious values to their grandchildren (King, Burgess, Akinyela, Counts-Spriggs, & Parker, 2006;Littler, 2008;Martin & Martin, 1978;Rosenthal, 1985). Although the effect of religiosity conveyed by grandparents to grandchildren is mediated by the parents, grandparents still have direct and independent influence on their grandchildren in three dimensions of religiosity: frequency of church attendance, religiousness, and conservative religious beliefs (Bengtson et al, 2009;Copen & Silverstein, 2007).…”

“…In addition, religious faith is also perceived as a support and coping resource for grandparents who are functioning as their grandchildren's custodial or primary caregivers, and can be an important factor in grandparents' role satisfaction (King et al, 2006;Weber, Sands, & Goldberg-Glen, 1999). …”

Parenthood in the Twenty-First Century: African American Grandparents as Surrogate Parents

“…Results indicated that although the majority of the grandchildren were content living with their grandparents, they experienced adjustment issues related to their histories of family disruption and parental loss (Kelch-Oliver, 2001). King, Burgess, Akinyela, Counts-Spriggs, and Parker (2006) write about how the role of grandparents in family religious literature has received less attention. They note that many studies articulate the importance of family elders in the transmission of religious values, but few studies delineate the ways African American grandparents transmit their religious values to younger family members.…”

“…In their qualitative study, they describe the religious dimensions of the grandparent role in a sample of 17 co-resident intergenerational African American families. Their findings show that African American grandparents provide religious instruction and guidance, model religious behavior, engage in intercessory prayer, and promote the religious significance of family Downloaded by [Computing & Library Services, University of Huddersfield] at 00:23 26 December 2014 relationships, and their findings suggest that religion is an important variable in grandparent role satisfaction and that a family-level analysis of religiosity among African American elders provides a fuller understanding of religion and aging than individual-level descriptors of religiousness alone (King et al, 2006).…”