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Intercountry adoption requires adoptive parents to assume their parenthood as well as to acknowledge the cultural and ethnic origins of their child. Narratives are effective means to help individuals cope with non-normative transitions, including adoption, as they allow them to make sense of and legitimise their experiences. This qualitative study sought to extend knowledge about the value of using narrative methods with adoptive families to explore how the language they employ determines the ways in which they perceive situations and vice versa. It uses the word-driven textual analysis software T-LAB to identify key topics highlighted by parents and analyse them in relation to specific variables. Child characteristics, such as gender, age at adoption and birth country, and family variables, such as mother's and father's narratives and first or not-first parenting experience, were considered. From the 37 narratives sampled, those parents adopting from Asia and Eastern Europe, mothers and first-time parents faced the most challenges.

AbstractAlthough studies have highlighted the role played by couple and parental relationships for children's psychosocial adjustment, especially in challenging situations, research on these two relationship domains has largely developed separately and mostly focussed on negative couple processes. However, Family Systems Theory highlights how these subsystems are interconnected, and studies inspired by this theoretical framework provide evidence of how the quality of the interparental relationship predicts the parent–child relationship. This study focussed on the association between two relational resources (dyadic coping and parent–child relationship quality) and children's emotional difficulties during the outbreak of the COVID‐19 pandemic in Italy. Five hundred ninety‐one Italian parents filled in an online self‐report questionnaire. A path analysis model was estimated to test the mediating role of parent–child relationship quality in the association between partner positive dyadic coping and children's emotional difficulties. The findings showed both a direct effect and an indirect effect of partner positive dyadic coping on children's emotional difficulties, because parent–child relationship quality partially mediated this association. Enhancing parents' ability to cope together with stress and the quality of the parent–child relationship might contribute to decrease children's vulnerability to emotional difficulties in challenging times.

ObjectiveThe current study was aimed at exploring Italian parents' perceived negative and positive changes in family life during the COVID‐19 pandemic, taking into account the role of the stage of the family life and family size.BackgroundDuring the emergency of the COVID‐19 pandemic, millions of families drastically changed their daily life and routines. Little evidence exists on how family characteristics, such as family size or presence of children, are related to families' experience of family change.MethodA large sample of 1,407 Italian parents (70.1% mothers) filled in an anonymous online survey during the third week of the lockdown period (between March 30 and April 7, 2020).ResultsResults showed that parents reported perceiving more positive changes than negative ones, especially in terms of feeling more emotionally close to their children and spending more fun time with them. Interestingly, parents with two or more children reported more positive changes in family life compared with parents who had one child, showing a greater relational regenerative capacity in the face of COVID‐19 lockdown.Conclusion and ImplicationsInvesting in family relationships, especially for larger families, is an effective coping strategy to deal with traumatic situations and promote positive family changes in stressful situations.

Population ageing today affects most industrialised countries, and it will have an impact on many facets of the social system. Intergenerational relationships will play a key role in dealing with the demographical and societal change. This book provides innovative views in the multidisciplinary research field of intergenerational family relations in society, with a focus on Europe. Different, but complementary, perspectives are integrated in one volume bringing together international scholars from sociology, psychology and economics. The book's chapters are grouped into three thematic sections which cover conceptual issues, multigenerational and cross-cultural perspectives, as well as applied issues. Implications for research, policy and practice are addressed and suggestions for future directions are discussed. By raising recent discussions on controversial issues, this book will stimulate the current discourse at various levels. Intergenerational relations in society and family will be equally interesting for researchers, advanced-level students and stakeholders in the fields of social policy, population ageing and intergenerational family relationships