TY - JOUR
T1 - Hard Times and Heart Break
T2 - Linking Economic Hardship and Relationship Distress
AU - Williams, Deadric T.
AU - Cheadle, Jacob E.
AU - Goosby, Bridget J.
PY - 2015/6/4
Y1 - 2015/6/4
N2 - We used the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being Study to examine an integrated mediational model linking economic hardship to relationship distress. Depressive symptoms, partner’s discord, parenting stress, and coparenting are combined into a joint model linking economic hardship to relationship distress among mothers and fathers in intimate relationships. Although economic hardship is significantly associated with each mediating factor, only discord is associated with both relationship distress and dissolution in the full model. Moreover, comparisons using multigroup structural equation modeling indicate that while economic hardship is associated with higher discord among both mothers and fathers, the influence is substantially larger among fathers. We suggest that the link between hardship and relationship distress is largely contingent on interactional processes (i.e., discord) and how mothers perceive their child’s father in the midst of economic hard times.
AB - We used the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being Study to examine an integrated mediational model linking economic hardship to relationship distress. Depressive symptoms, partner’s discord, parenting stress, and coparenting are combined into a joint model linking economic hardship to relationship distress among mothers and fathers in intimate relationships. Although economic hardship is significantly associated with each mediating factor, only discord is associated with both relationship distress and dissolution in the full model. Moreover, comparisons using multigroup structural equation modeling indicate that while economic hardship is associated with higher discord among both mothers and fathers, the influence is substantially larger among fathers. We suggest that the link between hardship and relationship distress is largely contingent on interactional processes (i.e., discord) and how mothers perceive their child’s father in the midst of economic hard times.
KW - economic hardship
KW - family stress
KW - interpersonal discord
KW - parenting stress
KW - relationship distress
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84930408581&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84930408581&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/0192513X13501666
DO - 10.1177/0192513X13501666
M3 - Article
C2 - 26097273
AN - SCOPUS:84930408581
VL - 36
SP - 924
EP - 950
JO - Journal of Family Issues
JF - Journal of Family Issues
SN - 0192-513X
IS - 7
ER -