Abstract
Kinship and Cohort in an Aging Society is a festschrift for Vern Bengtson, a leading scholar in social gerontology and intergenerational family relations for some 40 years (a personal note: he was once described by one of my colleagues as “the grand old man” of aging, and he was then only in his 40s!). A foreword by Toni Antonucci and an introduction by Merril Silverstein and Roseann Giarrusso provide broad outlines of Bengtson’s contributions, in particular the “intergenerational solidarity paradigm,” a multidimensional conceptual framework developed by Bengtson and colleagues that has guided much research on family and aging issues, and the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG), rightly described by Antonucci as a “groundbreaking study” that has been a continuing presence in gerontological conferences and scholarship since the 1970s.
The book combines original research and conceptual reviews addressing (like Bengtson’s work) a diversity of empirical and theoretical questions. A variety of data sets are represented: only one selection uses the LSOG, others range from localized samples (e.g., Massachusetts and rural North Carolina and Pennsylvania) to U.S. national samples (e.g., National Survey of American Life and Health and Retirement Study) to national samples of other countries (e.g., the Netherlands and a cross-national survey of 27 countries). Methods are similarly diverse: both cross-sectional and longitudinal, and both quantitative and qualitative.
The book is comprised of 15 chapters by leading scholars, including some who have been colleagues and/or been mentored by Bengtson. These are divided into five sections: Part I (“Family Connections: Solidarity Within and Across Generations”) includes selections on favoritism in parent-adult child relations (by Jill Suitor and Karl Pillemer), inequality in economic transfers between biological and step-children (Corey Remle and Angela O’Rand), and differences between relations with adult children and siblings (Kees Knipscheer and Theo van Tilburg); Part II (“Grandparents in a Changing Demographic Landscape”) includes selections on differentiation in grandmother-grandchild relations in low-income rural families (Linda Burton, Whitney Welsh, and Lane Destro) and the mentoring role of grandparents for adolescent and young adult grandchildren (Miles Taylor, Peter Uhlenberg, Glen Elder, and Steve McDonald); Part III (“Of Generations and Cohorts”) includes selections on the various meanings of the concept “generation” and an analysis of the persistence of generational influences in the Bennington Study ( Duane Alwin), family intergenerational interactions and “generational intelligence” (Simon Biggs and Ariela Lowenstein), and spirituality and “biographical pain” (Malcolm Johnson); Part IV (“Religion and Families”) includes selections on theory-building in the domains of religion and spirituality (Andrew Achenbaum), intergenerational transmission of religious traditions (Norella Putney, Joy Lam, Frances Nedjat-Haiem, Thien-Huong Ninh, Petrice Oyama, and Susan Harris), and solidarity and conflict in church-based interactions (Karen Lincoln, Linda Chatters, and Robert Taylor); Part V (“Global, Cross-National, and Cross-Ethnic Issues”) includes selections on the meaning and implications for society and families of “global aging” (Victor Marshall), challenges faced by transnational families and a “cycle of induced solidarity” (Dale Dannefer and Rebecca Siders), cross-national attitudes toward public spending and the “intergenerational social contract” (Christopher Marcum and Judith Treas), and health patterns in Hispanic families reflecting “multiple stratification hierarchies” (Kyriakos Markides, Ronald Angel, and Kristen Peek).
Silverstein and Giarrusso describe the book as an “eclectic collection.” But rather than being unfocused, the book thereby connects with Bengtson’s multidimensional and multidisciplinary theoretical and research contributions. As the editors note, the chapters “map major thematic areas” in his work. Several selections address intergenerational solidarity and the “intergenerational social contract,” at the micro level of family relations and private support and the macro level of society and public support. There is attention, as well, to both increased longevity and “verticalization” of family relations, and to increasing diversity of family forms. The complexities of understanding generational and cohort phenomena are addressed in several ways, as is diversity and differentiation within families. Patterns and sources of racial and ethnic variation and inequality are investigated, as well as global aging issues confronting families and societies. Issues of aging and family are also related to religious involvements, meanings, and outcomes. This listing represents quite a daunting agenda for sociologists studying aging and the life course; it is all the more remarkable that it is associated with one scholar’s body of work.
Some of the selections will be familiar as extensions of ongoing research projects; others take some new directions. Three chapters seem most distinctive to this reader. Karen Lincoln, Linda Chatters, and Robert Taylor apply concepts of solidarity, conflict, and ambivalence associated with family relationships to the church as a “quasi-family form.” They investigate both positive and negative interactions and outcomes in church-based social support networks. Victor Marshall looks at growing concerns about “global aging,” and foreboding predictions associated with “voodoo, or apocalyptic, demography” (p. 271). He counters this with alternative scenarios that present population aging as a source of challenges for societies and families, but not necessarily a “crisis,” and outlines a research agenda for understanding globalization and aging. Christopher Marcum and Judith Treas assess cross-national differences in attitudes toward public spending for children and older people, two “dependent” groups sometimes portrayed as competing for limited resources. They investigate variation associated with individual- and household-level factors, and with societal differences in “welfare regimes”; support is strongest overall for spending on both children and older people, but “support for the intergenerational social contract is most tenuous in liberal regimes” like the United States.
All of the work presented in this book adds valuably to the gerontological and family literatures. Further, the selections are very “Bengtsonian” (as Suitor and Pillemer put it), and in combination they also provide a fine reflection of and tribute to Vern Bengtson’s many scholarly contributions.