As Mother’s Day 2020 fast approaches, the coronavirus pandemic—coupled with ongoing demographic trends—is making family life even more complicated for Americans. Millions of families are at increased risk of falling into poverty due to pandemic-related job losses, and social distancing protocols are separating some children from their parents who live in a different household. American…

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Race may be a social construct but it’s one with consequences that may span generations. While both Black and white families can experience upward or downward wealth mobility from one generation to the next, studies show the dramatic socioeconomic disadvantages for Black families have persisted across generations.

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Trauma and adversity in childhood raise the risk of numerous health problems such as diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and mental illness in adulthood.1 Several recent studies found that women who experienced childhood adversity are more likely to have their first child early or outside of marriage and face a higher risk of cancer than men….

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U.S. Hispanics tend to defy the odds: They outlive non-Hispanic whites by three years on average, despite having lower income and education levels. In 2014, life expectancy at birth for the U.S. Hispanic population was 81.8 years, compared with 78.8 years for the U.S. non-Hispanic white population.1 For nearly three decades, demographers have probed why…

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The number of married same-sex couples in the United States has increased dramatically in recent years, as reported in a recent Bulletin on U.S. family change from the Population Reference Bureau.1 In June 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in every U.S. state; a 2013 ruling required the federal government to recognize state-sanctioned…

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In Nigeria, where 10 percent of the world’s deaths to children occur, literate mothers are much less likely to see their children die before their fifth birthday than their illiterate peers, according to a new study published online in the journal, Demography.1 And having a mother who can read well also makes a difference for…

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