Safety nets and scaffolds: parental support in the transition to adulthood
Open accessAbstract
Using longitudinal data from the Youth Development Study (analytic sample N = 712), we investigate how age, adult role acquisition and attainments, family resources, parent-child relationship quality, school attendance, and life events influence support received from parents in young adulthood. Parental assistance was found to be less forthcoming for those who had made greater progress on the road to adulthood, signified by socioeconomic attainment and union formation. The quality of mother-child and father-child relationships affected parental support in different ways, positively for mothers, negatively for fathers. School enrollment, negative life events, and employment problems were associated with a greater likelihood of receiving support. The findings suggest that parents act as "scaffolding" and "safety nets" to aid their children's successful transition to adulthood.
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
The metaphorical scaffolding around the emerging adult is crucial for safe and successful navigation of this developmental phase, but it constantly evolves.
“The metaphorical scaffolding around the emerging adult is crucial for the safe and successful navigation of this developmental phase, but it constantly evolves. 153,154”
From The Lancet Psychiatry Commission on youth mental health (2024) · cites this paper as [154]
The Abstract describes scaffolding as temporary parental support and says the findings suggest that parents aid a successful transition to adulthood. The Conclusion says support depends on young adults’ circumstances and that parents step back as their children progress. These passages support changing, helpful support, but do not establish that scaffolding is crucial or that it constantly evolves. (LLM, conf=0.84)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Cites
No references could be resolved yet.
Research works printed but not linked: 25
- Amato PR Rezac SJ Booth A Helping between parents and young adult offspring: The role of parental marital quality, divorce and remarriage Journal of Marriage and the Family 1995 57 363 374
- Aquilino WS Impact of family structure on parental attitudes toward the economic support of adult children over the transition to adulthood Journal of Family Issues 2005 26 143 167
- Bengtson VL Beyond the nuclear family: The increasing importance of multigenerational bonds Journal of Marriage and Family 2001 63 1 16
- Cote J Arrested adulthood: The changing nature of maturity 2000 NYU Press New York
- Eggebeen DJ Davey A Do safety nets work? The role of anticipated help in times of need Journal of Marriage and the Family 1998 60 939 950
- Finch MD Shanahan MJ Mortimer JT Ryu S Work experience and control orientation in adolescence American Sociological Review 1991 56 597 611
- Fingerman KL Miller LM Birdett KS Zarit S Giving to the good and the needy: Parental support of grown children Journal of Marriage and Family 2009 71 1220 1233 20161599 PMC2811272
- Goldscheider FK Thornton A Yang LS Helping out the kids: Expectations about parental support in young adulthood Journal of Marriage and Family 2001 63 727 740
- Hogan DP Eggebeen DJ Clogg CC The structure of intergenerational exchanges in American families American Journal of Sociology 1993 98 1428 1458
- Lareau A Unequal childhoods: Class, race, and family life 2003 UC Press Berkeley
- Lye DN Adult child-parent relationships Annual Review of Sociology 1996 22 79 102
- Mortimer JT Working and growing up in America 2003 Harvard University Press Cambridge, MA
- Raudenbush SW Bryk AS Hierarchical linear models 2002 Sage Newbury Park, CA 2nd edition
- Ryff CD Schmutte PS Lee YH Ryff CD Selzer MM How children turn out: Implications for parental self-evaluation The parental experience at midlife 1996 853 866 University of Chicago Press
- Sarkisian N Gerstel N Till marriage do us part: Adult children's relationships with their parents Journal of Marriage and Family 2008 70 360 376
- Scabini E Marta E Lanz M The transition to adulthood and family relations: An intergenerational perspective 2006 Psychology Press East Sussex, UK
- Schoeni RF Ross KE Settersten RA Jr. Furstenberg FF Jr. Rumbaut RG Material assistance from families during the transition to adulthood On the frontier of adulthood: Theory, research, and public policy 2005 396 416 University of Chicago Press
- Settersten RA Jr. Furstenberg FF Jr. Rumbaut RG On the frontier of adulthood: Theory, research, and public policy 2005 University of Chicago Press
- Silverstein M Bengtson VL Lawton L Intergenerational solidarity and the structure of adult child-parent relations in American society American Journal of Sociology 1997 103 429 460
- Silverstein M Gans D Yang FM Intergenerational support to aging parents: The role of norms and needs Journal of Family Issues 2006 27 1068 1084
- Smits A Van Gaalen RI Mulder CH Parent-child coresidence: Who moves in with whom and for whose needs? Journal of Marriage and Family 2010 72 1022 1033
- Staff J Mortimer JT Educational and work strategies from adolescence to early adulthood: Consequences for educational attainment Social Forces 2007 85 1169 1194 PMC1858630 17468782
- Tyre P Bringing up adultolescents Newsweek 25 March 2002 38 40 11930772
- Van Gaalen RI Dykstra PA Solidarity and conflict between adult children and parents: A latent class analysis Journal of Marriage and Family 2006 68 947 960
- White L Coresidence and leaving home: Young adults and their parents Annual Review of Sociology 1994 20 81 102
Cited by
Sorted by citations
The Lancet Psychiatry Commission on youth mental health
McGorry, P. D., Mei, C., Dalal, N., Alvarez-Jimenez, M., Blakemore, S.-J., Browne, V., Dooley, B., Hickie, I. B., Jones, P. B., McDaid, D., et al. (2024) · The Lancet Psychiatry · doi:10.1016/s2215-0366(24)00163-9 · Cited by 663 · see citing works
Hong, P., & Cui, M. (2020) · Journal of Child and Family Studies · doi:10.1007/s10826-019-01541-2 · Cited by 74 · see citing works
- Authors
- Swartz, T. T., Kim, M., Uno, M., Mortimer, J., & O'Brien, K. B.
- Affiliations
- University of Minnesota (US)
- Corresponding author
- Swartz, Teresa Toguchi
- Venue
- Journal of Marriage and Family
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2011-03-10
- Volume
- 73
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 414-429
- ISSN
- 0022-2445 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC3109900
- OpenAlex
- W2146145387
- Cited by
- 274
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 16 · 2024: 24 · 2023: 22 · 2022: 16 · 2021: 24 · 2020: 23 · 2019: 22 · 2018: 23 · 2017: 24 · 2016: 17 · 2015: 18 · 2014: 16 · 2013: 9 · 2012: 7
- FWCI
- 36.43
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Journal of Marriage and the Family (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of Mental Health (R01MH042843)
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01HD044138)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Youth Education and Societal Dynamics
- Social Sciences › Demography › Family Dynamics and Relationships
- Social Sciences › Education › Higher Education Research Studies
- Keywords
- parental support, coming of age, early adulthood, parent-child relationship, mother-child relationship, father-child relationship, family resources, socioeconomic attainment, union formation, school attendance, life events, employment problems, scaffolding, social safety nets
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
