Peer-reviewed article
Risk and resilience from early to middle childhood in three-generation families: Grandmother coresidence stability matters.
Na Zhang, Yuanyuan Zhang, Wen Wang, Athena Chung Yin Chan, Qiu Wang ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study examined how grandmother coresidence stability affects children's psychological well-being in three-generation families. The research followed low-income, predominantly Black and Hispanic families over six years, tracking whether grandmothers continued living with the family or moved out. Grandmother stability appeared to protect children from developing internalizing and externalizing problems, particularly by breaking the cycle where maternal mental health issues lead to aggression toward children. The study found that when grandmother coresidence was disrupted, children were more likely to show behavioral and emotional problems, even when accounting for maternal mental health and parenting practices.
Key points
- Grandmother coresidential stability from age 3 to age 5 moderated the relationship between maternal and child mental health outcomes
- In disrupted grandmother coresidence groups, maternal psychopathology at age 3 directly predicted child psychopathology at age 9
- In stable grandmother coresidence groups, this direct intergenerational transmission pathway was not observed, suggesting protective buffering
- Grandmothers' behavioral health risk predicted maternal physical aggression, while maternal psychopathology predicted psychological aggression toward children
- Sample consisted predominantly of single, young, low-income Black and Hispanic mothers living in three-generation households
Limitations
The study is observational and cannot establish causation; families self-selected into continued or disrupted coresidence groups, making it unclear whether grandmother stability caused better outcomes or whether more stable families had better outcomes to begin with. The research does not measure the quality of grandmother involvement or other family factors that might explain protective effects.
Abstract
Coresidential three-generation families are becoming increasingly prevalent, but the contribution of grandparent coresidence stability during early childhood is poorly understood. Informed by the process-person-context-time theory, this study links grandmothers' behavioral health risk and mothers' psychopathology to child psychopathology (i.e., total internalizing and externalizing problems). We hypothesized mediation pathways through maternal psychological and physical aggression and tested grandmother coresidential stability as a moderator. A nationally representative sample of three-generation families was selected from the Future of Families and Child Well-Being Study. Most mothers in the sample were Black or Hispanic, single, young, and living in low-income households. Based on grandmother coresidence stability from Year 3 to Year 5, families were divided into a disrupted (N = 248) and continued (N = 189) group. Multigroup structural equation modeling results showed similar and unique pathways across the groups. Similarly, in both groups, grandmothers' behavioral health risk at Year 3 was related to maternal physical aggression at Year 5, whereas maternal psychopathology at Year 3 was related to maternal psychological aggression at Year 5. Uniquely in the disrupted group, but not in the continued group, evidence was found on the intergenerational transmission of psychopathology: maternal psychopathology at Year 3 had a direct link to children's psychopathology at Year 9, and this was also mediated by psychological aggression at Year 5. These findings demonstrate the heterogeneity of multigenerational families and emphasize developmental implications for risk and resilience. Grandmother coresidential stability appears to have a protective role for young children's socioemotional development in socioeconomically disadvantaged families. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).