Center for Families

Empowering all families to thrive in nurturing environments that meet their essential needs, reduce their exposures to risk, and enhance their individual and collective strength and resilience.

October 27, 2021

2022 Funding Program accepting applications

The Center for Families’ annual funding program supports family research across campus. Faculty and students from all departments and colleges are encouraged to apply.
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October 20, 2021

Do Early-Life Social, Behavioral, and Health Exposures Increase Later-Life Arthritis Incidence?

This study investigates direct and indirect influences of childhood social, behavioral, and health exposures on later-life osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis development. Methods: Drawing from cumulative inequality theory and six waves of the Health and Retirement Study (2004–2014), we estimate structural...
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October 8, 2021

Purdue’s Military Family Research Institute partners with Hamilton Center to promote high standards of care for military families

The Military Family Research Institute at Purdue University (MFRI) has reached a milestone in its goal of promoting high-quality care for veterans, current service members and their families. Hamilton Center in Terre Haute has become the first three-star center in...
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September 28, 2021

Associations among African American Parents’ Beliefs, Involvement, and Measures of School Readiness

Parents’ beliefs about school readiness have been linked to their involvement practices and children’s achievement. However, there is some evidence to suggest associations among parental beliefs, practices, and children’s outcomes may vary by families’ racial and ethnic background. This study...
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August 30, 2021

Parenting amidst COVID-19: Pandemic-related stressors, inequities, and treatment utilization and perceptions

Many parents of children under age 18 are faced with additional COVID-19 parenting-related stressors and may be experiencing increases in psychological difficulties; however, we have yet to investigate parent’s levels of posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) and adjustment disorder. Further, COVID-19...
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August 30, 2021

Variability in Preschool CLASS Scores and Children’s School Readiness

Income disparities in children’s school readiness skills are key contributors to pervasive achievement gaps. Policy efforts concerning early childhood education (ECE), such as increasing access to state-funded prekindergarten programs implemented within Quality Rating and Improvement Systems (QRIS), have been initiated...
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August 21, 2021

Adolescent and Maternal Anxiety Symptoms Decreased but Depressive Symptoms Increased before to during COVID-19 Lockdown

The tragedy of the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing public health responses of social distancing, school closures, and staying home as much as possible “introduced a complex worldwide stressor” (Gruber et al., 2020, p. 6). Within weeks of the onset of the...
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August 20, 2021

Trajectories of depression symptoms during the process of deployment in military couples

Informed by life course theory, we estimated depression symptom trajectories for couples throughout a deployment cycle using data from a longitudinal study of National Guard couples (n= 339). One-third of couples served as a comparison group by participating in data collection...
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August 20, 2021

Toddlers’ Developmental Trajectories as a Function of QRIS Rated Child Care Quality

State-level child care quality rating and improvement systems (QRIS) have been implemented in a majority of states in the U.S.A. One goal is to improve developmental outcomes for young children, especially from families with fewer resources. Research is needed to...
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August 18, 2021

All play, no fun: Pushing back on the pressures of youth sports

The world of youth sports has become a pressure cooker – one that, for now, the Redds have managed to resist. “All we ask when she comes home,” says Ms. Redd, “is how was practice and did you have fun?”
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