Parent-Child Separation Causes, Consequences, and Pathways to Resilience

This book examines the similarities in children’s short- and long-term development and adjustment when they have been separated from their parents because of larger institutional forces. It addresses the unique circumstances and the similarities faced by parents and children under three different institutional contexts of separation: parental migration and deportation, parental incarceration, and parental military deployment. Chapters describe the difficulties faced by families in each of these circumstances, along with the challenges in conducting research under the multidimensional and dynamic complexities of parent-child separation. Finally, the volume offers recommendations for creating supportive structures and interventions for families facing separation that can bolster youth well-being in childhood and beyond.

Featured areas of coverage include:

· Parental migration.

· Parental incarceration.

· Parental military deployment.

· Undocumented migration and deportation.

· Child-parent relationship and child resilience and adjustment.

Parent-Child Separation is a must-have resource for researchers, professors, clinicians, professionals, and graduate students in developmental psychology, family studies, public health, clinical social work, educational policy, and migration studies as well as all interrelated disciplines, including sociology, criminology, demography, prevention science, political science, and economics.

Part I. Parental Migration and Deportation.- Chapter 1. Safe-Zone Schools and Children with Undocumented Parents.- Chapter 2. Trauma, Loss, and Empowerment: Impacts of Immigration Enforcement.- Chapter 3. Migrant Mothers' and Youths' Experiences of Separation and Reunification.- Part II. Parental Incarceration.- Chapter 4. Parental Incarceration, Children’s Development, and Resilience.- Chapter 5. Paternal Incarceration: Resilience in Father-Child Relationships.- Chapter 6. Parental Incarceration and Other Family-Based Risks.- Part III. Parental Military Deployment.- Chapter 7. Parental Deployment and Military Children: A Century of Research.- Chapter 8. Parental Mental Health, Deployment, and Children’s Psychosocial Functioning.- Chapter 9: Strengthening Parenting in Deployed Military Families.- Part IV. Future Directions in Parent-Child Separation Research and Practice.- Chapter 10: Parent-Child Separation: Children and Family Adjustment in the Context ofParental Migration, Deployment, and Incarceration. 

Jennifer E. Glick, Ph.D., is Arnold S. and Bette G. Hoffman Professor of Sociology and Demography and Director of the Population Research Institute at Penn State. Dr. Glick is a social demographer with expertise in migration, family processes, and children's education and developmental trajectories. She has written extensively on the educational outcomes among children of immigrants in the United States and how migration alters family relationships and living arrangements.

Valarie King, Ph.D., is Professor of Sociology, Demography, and Human Development and Family Studies, and an Associate of the Population Research Institute at Penn State. Her research focuses on intergenerational relationships across the life course and their implications for the health, well-being, and development of family members. Dr. King’s most recent work focuses on elucidating the factors that promote the development of strong ties between children and their stepfathers, and the ways in which stepfathers can promote children’s well-being.

Susan M. McHale, Ph.D., is Director of the Social Science Research Institute and Distinguished Professor of Human Development and Professor of Demography at Penn State. Her research focuses on children's and adolescents' family roles, relationships, and daily experiences and how these family dynamics are linked to youth development and adjustment. Dr. McHale’s research highlights family gender dynamics and the role of sociocultural practices and values in youth development and well-being.