The parental experience in midlife

de Carol D. Ryff, Marsha Mailick Seltzer

In this groundbreaking volume, distinguished scholars in anthropology, demography, economics, psychology, social work, and sociology explore the uncharted years of midlife parenthood. The authors employ a rich array of theory and methods to address how parental experience affects the health, well-being, and development of parents. Collectively, they look at the time when parents watch their children grow into adulthood and begin to establish adult-to-adult relationships with children. With a strong emphasis on the diversity of midlife parenting, including sociodemographic variations and specific parent or child characteristics such as single parenting or raising a child with a disability, this volume presents for the first time the complex factors that influence the quality of the midlife parenting experience.