articolo 3 valerio

1. A R T I C L E
EXPECTANT ADOLESCENT COUPLES’ RELATIONS
AND SUBSEQUENT PARENTING BEHAVIOR
PAUL FLORSHEIM
University of Utah
ALLISON SMITH
Northern Illinois University
ABSTRACT: The goal of this study was to test the “spill over” hypothesis— that the quality of relations
between expectant couples would predict parenting behavior— among a sample of adolescent mothers
and fathers. At Time 1, self-reported and observational relationship data were collected from 36 expectant
adolescent couples. At follow-up, observational data were collected from both young mothers and fathers
who were asked to participate in a structured play activity with their 2-year-old children. Logistic and
multiple regression analyses were run to examine the correspondence between couples’ relationship qual-
ity prior to the childbirth and subsequent relationship status (i.e., paternal disengagement or coparenting)
and the quality of parenting behavior. Results generally supported the spill over hypothesis. More spe-
cifically, findings indicated that the quality of the expectant mother’s behavior toward her partner pre-
dicted his (paternal) behavior at follow-up. Couples who reported high positive relations at the prenatal
assessment were more likely to remain involved in coparenting. Results underscore the relevance of
couples’ relations to the development of positive parenting practices among atypical samples of mothers
and fathers.
RESUMEN: EL objetivo de este estudio fue el de probar la hipotesis “spill over” de que la calidad de las
´
relaciones entre las parejas que esperan un hijo podrıa predecir la conducta de crianza, dentro de un grupo
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muestra de madres y padres adolescentes. En el momento inicial, se recogio informacion basada tanto en
´ ´
la observacion de la relacion como en los propios reportes de las 36 parejas que espereban un hijo. Al
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momento del seguimiento, la informacion de observacion fue adquirida tanto de las jovenes mamas como
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de los jovenes papas, a quienes se les pidio que participaran en una actividad estructurada de juego con
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sus hijos de dos anos. Se hicieron analisis logısticos y de regresion multiple con el fin de examinar la
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correspondencia entre la calidad de la relacion de la pareja antes del nacimiento y la condicion de la
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subsecuente relacion (el desentendimiento paterno o la crianza compartida), ası como la calidad de
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la conducta de crianza. Los resultados generalmente apoyaron la hipotesis “spill over.” Mas especıfica-
´ ´ ´
mente, los resultados indicaron que la calidad de la conducta de la madre embarazada hacia su pareja
predijo la conducta paterna al momento del seguimiento. Aquellas parejas que reportaron unas relacionaes
altamente positivas al momento de la evaluacion prenatal, estuvieron mas propensas a permanecer in-
´ ´
volucradas en el proceso de una crianza compartida. Dichos resultados subrayan la relevancia de las
relaciones de las parejas en cuanto al desarrollo de practicas positivas de crianza entre madres y padres
´
atıpicos.
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Direct correspondence to: Paul Florsheim, Department of Psychology, University of Utah, 380 South, 1530 East,
Room 502, Salt Lake City, UT 84112; e-mail: Florsheim@psych.utah.edu.
INFANT MENTAL HEALTH JOURNAL, Vol. 26(6), 533– 548 (2005)
2005 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health
Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/imhj.20076
533

2. 534 ● P. Florsheim and A. Smith
´ ´
RESUME: Le but de cette etude etait de tester l’hypothese de «debordement» selon laquelle la qualite des
´ ´ ` ´ ´
relations chez le couple qui attend un bebe pourrait predire le comportement de parentage— chez un
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echantillon de meres et de peres adolescents. A Temps 1, des donnees reportees par le couple et des
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donnees observationnelles sur la relation ont ete recueillies pour 36 couples adolescents attendant un
´ ´´
enfant. Au suivi, les donnees observationnelles ont ete recueillies a la fois des jeunes meres et des jeunes
´ ´´ ` `
peres, a qui l’on a demande de participer a une activite de jeu structuree avec leurs enfants de deux ans.
` ` ´ ` ´ ´
Des analyses logistiques et de nombreuses analyses de regression ont ete faites afin d’examiner la cor-
´ ´´
respondence entre la qualite de la relation des couples avant la naissance et le statut de la relation a venir
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(desengagement paternel ou co-parentage) et la qualite du comportement de parentage. Dans l’ensemble,
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les resultats soutiennent l’hypothese du debordement. Plus specifiquement, les resultats indiquent que la
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qualite du comportement de la mere enceinte envers son partenaire predisait son comportement (paternel)
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au suivi. Les couples qui ont fait etat de relations positives a l’evaluation prenatale avaient plus tendance
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a rester impliquesdans le co-parentage. Les resultats soulignent la pertinence des relations des couples
` ´ ´
pour le developpement de pratiques de parentage positives chez des echantillons atypiques de meres et
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de peres.
`
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ZUSAMMENFASSUNG: Das Ziel dieser Studie war es eine “Uberlaufshypothese” in einer Stichprobe von
jugendlichen Muttern und Vatern zu prufen, namlich, ob die Qualitat der Beziehung zwischen Paaren,
¨ ¨ ¨ ¨ ¨
die ein Kind erwarten ihr elterliches Verhalten voraussagen kann. Zum Zeitpunkt 1 wurde selbst be-
schriebenes und Beobachtungsmaterial zur Beziehung von 36 jugendlichen Paaren gesammelt. Bei der
Nachuntersuchung wurde Beobachtungsmaterial, sowohl von den jungen Vatern als auch Muttern er-
¨ ¨
hoben, die gebeten wurden an einer strukturierten Spielaktivitat mit ihren zwei Jahre alten Kindern teil-
¨
zunehmen. Logistische und multiple Regressionsanalysen wurden durchgefuhrt, um die Korrelation
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zwischen der Beziehungsqualitat des Paars vor der Geburt und den nachfolgenden Beziehungsstatus
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(elterliche Abwendung oder gemeinsame Elternschaft) und die Qualitat des elterlichen Verhaltens zu
¨
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untersuchen. Die Ergebnisse unterstutzten generell die Uberlaufhypothese. Spezifischer zeigten die Er-
¨
gebnisse, dass die Qualitat des Verhaltens der erwartenden Mutter gegenuber ihrem Partner sein (vater-
¨ ¨ ¨ ¨
liches) Verhalten bei der Nachuntersuchung vorhersagte. Bei Paaren, die sehr positive Beziehungen bei
der vorgeburtlichen Untersuchung berichteten war gemeinsame Elternschaft wahrscheinlicher. Die Er-
gebnisse unterstreichen die Bedeutung der Paarbeziehung bei der Entwicklung von positiver Elternschaft
bei einer atypischen Stichprobe von Muttern und Vatern.
¨ ¨
* * *

3. Adolescent Coparenting Couples ● 535
There has been a great deal of research examining the links between couples’ relations
and parental functioning (Cox, Paley, Payne, & Burchinal, 1999; Erel & Burman, 1995; Floyd,
Gilliom, & Costigan, 1998; Krishmakumar & Buehler, 2000). Most of this research has indi-
cated that the quality of the marital relationship (defined in terms of relationship satisfaction,
communication, and interpersonal processes) is closely associated with the quality of parenting
(Belsky & Hsieh, 1998; Cox & Paley, 1997; Cummings & Wilson, 1999; Katz & Woodin,
2002; Lindahl, Clements, & Markman, 1997; Stocker & Youngblade, 1999). When the asso-
ciation between partnering and parenting has been examined longitudinally, the quality of a
couple’s relationship has provided some important insights as to how each partner might func-
tion as a parent (Cox & Paley, 1997; Frosch, Mangelsdorf, & McHale, 2000). Several research-
ers have proposed that how positively or negatively partners engage with one another tends to
“spill over” onto the parent – child relationship (Erel & Burman, 1995; Heinicke & Guthrie,
1992; Katz & Gottman, 1996; Krishnakumar & Buehler, 2000). Conceptualizing the link be-
tween the marital and parent – child relationship in terms of “spill over” is appealing because
it is consistent with a number of theoretical perspectives on parenting including attachment
theory, family systems theory, and developmental-contextualism (Belsky, Putman, & Crnic,
1996; Cowan & Cowan, 2002; Cox & Paley, 1997; Erel & Burman, 1995; Grych, 2002; Lerner,
Rothbaum, Boulos, & Castellino, 2002). An implicit assumption of these conceptualizations is
that couples work together to “create” a relational context for child rearing (Heinicke & Guthrie,
1992).
There also is research demonstrating some degree of consistency between how a husband
behaves toward his wife and how he behaves toward his child, suggesting that the sorts of
interpersonal skills needed to establish a positive relationship with a romantic partner are
closely related to the skills needed to become a competent parent (Katz & Gottman, 1996;
Margolin, Gordis, & John, 2001; McHale, Keursten-Hogan, Lauretti, & Rasmussen, 2000).
These skills include (but are not restricted to) the capacity to (a) focus on the needs of another
person for the sake of that person’s well-being, (b) remain warmly engaged even under stressful
conditions, and (c) maintain a balance between providing guidance and caring, and facilitating
autonomy (Edwards, 1995; Grossmann & Grossmann, 2000; Heinicke & Guthrie, 1992). While
this perspective is not inconsistent with the concept of spill over, it implies a greater emphasis
on the role of the individual’s skills within the relationship.
These somewhat distinct explanations for the link between couples’ relations and parental
functioning are complementary rather than competing theories. It seems probable that both
individual and relational effects are simultaneously operative within the same family system.
It also seems likely that specific components of couples’ relations will be differentially asso-
ciated with specific components of parent – child relations. Moreover, some components of the
couple’s relationship may be more relevant to the adjustment of particular groups of parents,
such as divorced parents or adolescent parents. Among at-risk parents (who may be less inter-
personally skilled), the distinction between global relationship factors and specific interpersonal
skills may provide important information about how to effectively intervene to avoid negative
parenting outcomes.
FOCUS ON ADOLESCENT PARENTS
One question that remains relatively unexplored by family researchers is how well our current
understanding of the link between marital relations and parenting generalizes to disadvantaged
or nontraditional families (Cowan & McHale, 1996; Lindahl et al., 1997). Most of the research
on the association between couples’ relations and parenting behavior has focused on married,

4. 536 ● P. Florsheim and A. Smith
middle-class, White adults. More research is needed in nontraditional arrangements. For ex-
ample, adolescent couples are at much greater risk for relationship difficulties, and their ro-
mantic behavior may be less clearly linked to their parenting relationships because patterns of
interpersonal processes are not yet firmly established.
There is a good deal of evidence that adolescent parents are likely to experience difficulties
meeting the challenges of parenthood. Compared to adult mothers, adolescent mothers have
been found to be (a) less patient and emotionally attentive with their children (Brooks-Gunn
& Chase-Landsdale, 1995; Flanagan, Coll, Andreozzi, & Riggs, 1995; Stevens-Simon, Nelli-
gan, & Kelly, 2001), (b) less verbally interactive and responsive (Barratt & Roach, 1995;
Brooks-Gunn & Furstenberg, 1986), and (c) more likely to become hostile and/or overly re-
strictive with their children (Berlin, Brady-Smith, & Brooks-Gunn, 2002; East, Matthews, &
Felice, 1994; Osofsky, Hann, & Peebles, 1993). Compared to adolescent mothers, less is known
about the parenting behavior of adolescent fathers, but there is some indication that they also
have trouble meeting the challenges of parenthood (Lerman, 1993; Marsiglio & Cohan, 2000).
Specifically, previous research has indicated that compared to adult fathers, adolescent fathers
are at higher risk for becoming disengaged from their children (Furstenberg & Weiss, 2000;
Johnson, 2001).
Generally, these findings suggest that many adolescent parents have not acquired the in-
terpersonal skills needed to negotiate a positive partnership or consistently attend to the emo-
tional needs of a small child (Lamb & Elster, 1985; Moore & Florsheim, 2001). Moreover,
many adolescent parents approach parenthood beset with a number of additional problems
including histories of delinquent behavior, academic failure, and depression (Deal & Holt,
1998; Elster, Lamb, Peters, Kahn, & Tavare, 1987; Fagot, Pears, Capaldi, Crosby, & Leve,
1998; Ketterlinus, Lamb, & Nitz, 1991; Lerman, 1993). There also is some evidence that
adolescent parents are less able to establish a secure relational context for raising children
(Cutrona, Hessling, Bacon, & Russell, 1998; Larson, Hussey, Gillmore, & Gilchrist, 1996;
Nitz, Ketterlinus, & Brandt, 1995).
STUDY GOALS
Previous research on the association between couples’ relations and parenting is limited in two
important respects. First, most couples researchers have not included measures of a couple’s
subjective (self-reported) relationship and observation-based measures of the relationship in
the same set of analyses. Including both methods may be useful in differentiating the influence
of the relational “climate” from the more specific interpersonal behaviors noted during obser-
vational analyses (Kanoy, Ulku-Steiner, Cox, & Burchinal, 2003). Interpersonal process vari-
ables may be more directly linked to the skills of individual partners, which we regard as
important components of the relational climate and potentially important targets for interven-
tion.
Second, much of the research on couples and parenting focuses on traditional family
systems, overlooking important subgroups of parents such as adolescent parents and separated
couples. Related to this, the traditionally narrow focus on mothers as caregivers has contributed
to a general lack of research on men as parents. In recent years, this has begun to change, and
several family researchers have included fathers in their study designs examining links between
couple’s relations, mothering, and fathering (e.g., Cox et al., 1999; Feldman, 2000; Katz &
Gottman, 1996; Katz & Woodin, 2003; Van Egeren, 2003; von Klitzing, Simoni, Amseler, &
Burgin, 1999). Nonetheless, most of what we know about fathers is not necessarily relevant to
adolescent fathers, and nearly all research on adolescent parents focuses on adolescent mothers

5. Adolescent Coparenting Couples ● 537
alone (Coley & Chase-Lansdale, 1998). As a step toward addressing these gaps in the literature,
this study was designed to examine links between distinct components of couples’ relations
and subsequent parenting behavior among a sample of adolescent mothers and fathers.
Researchers studying the development of parenting practices cannot avoid the question of
how to differentiate positive (growth-promoting) parenting behavior from negative parenting
behavior. Research on the association between parenting behavior and child outcomes suggests
that the definition of positive parenting depends on the developmental stage of the child as
well as the context of the parenting (Deater-Deckard & Dodge, 1996; Lerner et al., 2002). In
this study, we take the position that for toddlers, positive parenting includes encouragement,
nurturance, and moderate doses of structure when needed (Edwards, 1995). Conversely, neg-
ative parenting includes high levels of intrusive, coercive control and/or inappropriate expres-
sions of hostility. This definition of positive parenting is consistent with several closely related
definitions articulated by previous theorists and researchers (Barber & Harmon, 2002; Baum-
rind, 1993; Bowlby, 1980; Gershoff, 2002; Webster-Stratton, 1998). Interestingly, family re-
searchers tend to define positive partnering and positive parenting in similar terms. That is,
positively engaged couples achieve a workable balance between encouraging one another’s
autonomy while providing large doses of care and support. By definition, negatively engaged
(at-risk) couples are more interpersonally coercive or hostile.
Note that for some high-risk families, the mere presence or absence of the father is one
component of parenting (Lin & McLanahan, 2001). Because disengagement is a relatively
frequent outcome for adolescent fathers, we also were interested in whether relationship quality
and partner behavior would predict whether couples remained engaged in coparenting their
child.
In summary, this study was designed to test two hypotheses related to couples’ relations
and parental functioning. First, it was hypothesized that couples who perceived their relation-
ship as generally positive would be more likely to make a positive adjustment to parenthood,
defined in terms of continued coparenting (or continued paternal engagement) and low levels
of hostile controlling parenting. Second, it was hypothesized that expectant mothers and fathers
who exhibited lower levels of hostile controlling behavior with their partners also would exhibit
lower levels of hostile controlling behavior with their children.
METHOD
Participants
Participants included a total of 36 expectant couples with no previous children (N 72).
Expectant adolescent couples (i.e., both partners 19 years of age or younger) were recruited
through a clinic providing prenatal care to pregnant teens. The recruitment rate for expectant
adolescent couples was approximately 70%. At the time of the interview, the mean age of
expectant fathers was 17.7 years (SD 1.2), and the mean age of expectant mothers was 16.4
years (SD 0.9). The average number of weeks pregnant was 14.0 (SD 8.9). None of the
couples reported that the pregnancy was planned; however, 30.6% indicated they had never
used birth control. All pregnant teens had decided to keep their babies.
This study included a primarily White (81.9%) sample. One participant self-identified as
a Pacific Islander, and 10 participants identified themselves as Hispanic. According to the
Hollingshead Four-Factor Index of Social Status (Hollingshead, 1975), the mean SES of the
sample (based primarily on information about parents’ occupation and education) was in the

6. 538 ● P. Florsheim and A. Smith
middle-class range. A total of 67.8% of the adolescents in the sample fell into this category
while 8.9% were characterized as upper class and 23.4% as lower class (i.e., machine operators,
semiskilled workers, menial service workers).
A previously published article, based solely on data collected from this sample prior to
childbirth, provides additional information regarding differences between this expectant sample
and a matched sample of their nonexpectant peers (Moore & Florsheim, 2001). The present
study was designed as a follow-up to examine whether some of the relationship problems noted
in the expectant couples (and reported previously) predicted problems in parenting.
At follow-up, parenting data were collected from 27 mothers and 20 fathers. Follow-up
data on relationship status were collected from 35 couples. We were able to collect the data
regarding relationship status over the phone from one or the other partner. Twenty-three couples
were romantically involved, 4 couples were coparenting but not romantically involved, and 8
couples were disengaged (i.e., neither coparenting nor romantically involved). None of the
mothers had become completely disengaged from parenting. Eleven couples were married at
follow-up, and another 2 were cohabiting but not married.
Tests were run to examine demographic differences (age, SES, ethnicity, and gender)
between participants who participated in follow-up data collection and those who did not
participate because they had moved out of state or were unwilling to remain involved. There
are no differences in age or SES between those who remained in the study and those who
withdrew. White participants were significantly more likely than Latino participants to partic-
ipate in the follow-up, (2, N 72) 8.71, p .05, and mothers were marginally more likely
than fathers to participate in the follow-up, (1, N 72) 3.03, p .08.
Measures
Quality of couples’ relationship. The Quality of Relationship Inventory (QRI; Pierce, 1996)
was used to assess participants’ perceived relations with partners at Time 1. The QRI is a 25-
item self-report measure designed to assess levels of support, conflict, and depth in dyadic
relationships. The QRI has been found to have high internal consistency and test-retest reli-
ability, and high levels of construct, convergent, and discriminate validity (Pierce, 1996; Pierce,
Sarason, Sarason, Solky-Butzel, & Nagle, 1997). The QRI consists of questions such as “To
what extent can you trust this person not to hurt your feelings?” and “To what extent can you
count on this person to help if you were in a crisis situation, even if he or she had to go out
of his or her way to help you?” These questions are rated on scale of 1 (not at all) to 3 (a lot).
Higher scores on the QRI indicate more positive appraisals of the relationship. In this sample,
QRI scores ranged from 41 (describing a negative relationship) to 100 (describing a very
positive relationship). The internal consistency of the QRI for this sample was good ( .87
for girlfriends’ QRI; .91 for boyfriends’ QRI).
Observed interpersonal behavior. At Time 1, prior to childbirth, couples participated in a 10-
minute, videotaped conflict task in which they were asked to discuss and resolve a recent
conflict or disagreement. After explaining the task, the interviewers left the room to allow the
adolescents to talk. At follow-up, approximately 2 years after childbirth, each young parent
was asked to participate (separately) in a 10-minute, structured-play activity with his or her
child. More specifically, parents were asked to help their child put together puzzles and then
read together two storybooks.
Videotaped couple and parent – child interactions were coded using an observational cod-
ing scheme based on the Structural Analysis of Social Behavior (SASB; Benjamin, 1974). The
SASB model is based on two dimensions of behavior, interdependence and affiliation, distrib-

7. Adolescent Coparenting Couples ● 539
TABLE 1. Gender Differences in Quality of Relationship Scores, Partners’ Hostile Control Behavior
Scores, and Parents’ Hostile Control Behavior Scores
Male Female Paired
Mean (SD) Mean (SD) t test df
Quality of Relationship Inventory scores 76.81 (11.21) 78.72 (11.21) 1.21 35
Hostile Control Behavior toward partner 206.09 (214.93) 102.62 (189.80) 2.70* 35
Hostile Control Behavior toward child 108.15 (120.75) 167.71 (150.74) 2.40* 19
*p .05.
uted across three circumplex surfaces.1 The affiliation dimension of the SASB model describes
the degree of warmth and/or hostility in any given interpersonal exchange, ranging from attack
(extreme hostility) to love (extreme warmth). The interdependence dimension of the SASB
model is used to describe the degree of enmeshment (control or submit) and/or differentiation
(autonomy giving or autonomy taking) observed in a given behavior.
The process of SASB coding a unit of interpersonal behavior involves three steps. First,
the coder decides whether a behavior is self-focused, other-focused, or both self- and other-
focused. Once the focus of the behavior has been determined, its degree of interdependence is
rated on a scale of 9 (highly enmeshed; e.g., controlling or submitting) to 9 (highly differ-
entiated; e.g., autonomy taking or giving). Finally, the degree of affiliation is rated on a scale
of 9 (extremely hostile) to 9 (extremely warm). Based on these three coding decisions, a
behavior can be represented either in terms of a specific category (“cluster” code; for details,
see Florsheim & Benjamin, 2001) or a set of dimensional scores (e.g., control, autonomy,
warmth, and hostility).
For the purposes of this study, we focused on the rate of hostile controlling behaviors
(between partners and among parents) relative to other forms of interpersonal behavior de-
scribed by the SASB model. As indicated earlier, the use of hostile control has been found to
be problematic across family contexts and is often the focus of clinical interventions for at-
risk couples and parents. SASB codes were used to create a summary score designed to index
hostile controlling behavior while taking into account other relevant behaviors, including
warmth and autonomy (give and take). The formula for this summary score is as follows:
Hostile Control Behavior Score Interpersonal Hostility (Hostility Warmth)
Interpersonal Control (Control
Autonomy Give and Take)
Using this formula, four summary scores were created: (a) expectant mothers’ hostile
controlling behavior toward her partner, (b) expectant fathers’ hostile controlling behavior
toward his partner, (c) mothers’ hostile controlling behavior toward her child, and (d) fathers’
hostile controlling behavior toward his child. Because couples tended to engage in more warm
autonomous behaviors than hostile controlling behaviors, mean scores at both Time 1 and
follow-up were in the negative range (see Table 1). Scores that are more negative (lower)
represent lower rates of hostile controlling behavior and higher rates of warm autonomous
behaviors.
1The term circumplex refers to a model which has the mathematical properties of a circle (or a diamond shape), in
that its structure is determined by its vertical and horizontal axes (Benjamin, 1974).

8. 540 ● P. Florsheim and A. Smith
Coder training. In this study, we used the SASB-Composite Observational Coding Scheme
(SASB-COMP; Florsheim & Benjamin, 2001), which is based on the same principles as the
original microanalytic SASB coding scheme but developed to simplify the coding process
(Florsheim & Benjamin, 2001; Moore & Florsheim, 2001).
The specific steps in composite coding are as follows:
1. The coder watches the videotaped interaction in 2-min intervals, focusing on one mem-
ber of the dyad at a time. In cases of interruptions or interactants “talking over each
other,” each member’s specific verbal and nonverbal behavior (including the behavior
reflecting the interruption) is coded separately for the appropriate interval of interaction.
2. The coder tallies specific SASB codes, and these tallies are converted into frequency
scores.
3. For each 10-min section of interaction, the coder calculates a “composite” score based
on the frequency of codes given for each SASB cluster. These scores were then con-
verted into hostile control scores using the formula described earlier.
Videotaped discussion tasks were rated by coders who had received a minimum of 75 hr
of training in the original SASB system and an additional 20 hr of training with the SASB-
COMP. All coders attained a criterion level of reliability with both the original SASB coding
scheme (Cohen’s weighted 0.7) and the SASB-COMP (Intraclass correlation .80).
Interrater reliability for SASB-COMP (assessed by intraclass correlation) ranged from .80 to
.95 (M .90). Intraclass correlation is designed to assess for the rate of agreement between
two or more raters on a continuous scale or interval data while controlling for any systematic
bias among raters (Shrout & Fleiss, 1979; Streiner, 1995).
RESULTS
Preliminary Analyses
Prior to conducting our primary analyses, data were examined for outliers, skew, and kurtosis.
All variables were close to being normally distributed. Several preliminary analyses were run.
First, we examined differences in relationship variables between participants who dropped out
of the study and participants who remained in the study at follow-up. Parents who participated
in the follow-up had higher QRI scores at Time 1 than parents who were unable or unwilling
to participate in the follow-up, t(69) 2.13, p .05, two-tailed. There were no differences
in the hostile control scores between those parents who participated in the follow-up and those
who did not.
Paired t tests were used to examine gender differences in quality of relationship scores,
partnering behavior scores, and parenting behavior. Results reported in Table 1 indicate that
expectant fathers engaged in less hostile controlling behavior than their partners, t(35) 2.70,
p .05. At follow-up, it was observed that mothers engaged in less hostile controlling behavior
toward their children than fathers, t(20) 2.40, p .05.
Pearson zero-order correlations were used to examine the associations between demo-
graphic factors (age, SES, marital status at Time 1 and follow-up) and relationship/parenting
variables (QRI and hostile control scores). Results indicated that QRI scores at Time 1 were
positively associated with marital status at follow-up (r .39, p .05, two-tailed).
Pearson zero-order correlations also were used to examine the bivariate associations among
and between IVs and DVs. Complete results are outlined in Table 2. As expected, we found

9. Adolescent Coparenting Couples ● 541
TABLE 2. Correlations Among Primary Variables
(2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)
1. Expectant Mother’s QRI score .35* .64*** .39** .89*** .13 .23 .39**
2. Expectant Mother’s Hostile .39** .36* .41** .42** .48*** .09
Control (toward partner)
3. Expectant Father’s QRI score .36* .91*** .34* .41* .49***
4. Expectant Father’s Hostile .30 .39* .49* .02
Control (toward partner)
5. Couples QRI score .33* .29 .47**
(combined)
6. Mother’s Hostile Control .39* .17
(toward child)
7. Father’s Hostile Control NA
(toward child)
8. Still romantically involved at
follow up (1 yes)
Note: NA not applicable.
*p .05. **p .01. ***p .001, one-tailed. As indicated in the text, ns vary between 20 and 36.
that expectant mothers’ rate of hostile controlling behavior was positively associated with
expectant fathers’ rate of hostile controlling behavior. Expectant fathers’ and mothers’ QRI
scores were negatively correlated with both fathers’ and mothers’ hostile controlling behavior
at Time 1, indicating that the high QRI scores were associated with less hostile controlling
behavior within couples. Pearson correlations also indicated that expectant mothers’ hostile
controlling behavior toward their partners was positively associated with subsequent hostile
controlling parenting behavior. Expectant fathers’ hostile controlling behavior toward their
partners also was associated with subsequent hostile controlling parenting behavior. Addition-
ally, expectant mothers’ hostile controlling behavior at Time 1 was positively associated with
their partners’ hostile controlling parenting behavior, indicating that pregnant adolescents who
were more hostile controlling with their partners tended to have partners who were more hostile
controlling with their children. A similar trend was observed in the association between ex-
pectant father’s hostile controlling behavior at Time 1 and his partner’s parenting behavior at
follow-up. Moreover, we found that mothers’ hostile controlling parenting behavior was pos-
itively correlated with fathers’ hostile controlling parenting behavior.
Primary analyses. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses were used to test the hypothesis
that couples’ quality of relationship (QRI scores) and partners’ hostile controlling behavior
scores would predict hostile controlling parent behavior scores at follow-up. Because partners’
QRI scores were highly correlated with each other and correlated with outcome scores (as
indicated in Table 2), expectant mothers’ and fathers’ QRI scores were combined for the
primary analyses. Separate analyses were run to predict young mother’s and young father’s
parenting behavior, and results are reported in Table 3. Total QRI scores were entered in the
first step of the regression analyses, and both partners’ hostile control scores were entered in
the second step.
Results indicated that expectant fathers and mothers who engaged in more hostile con-
trolling behavior toward their partners engaged in more hostile controlling behavior toward
their children. Expectant fathers whose partners had high hostile control behavior scores (at

10. 542 ● P. Florsheim and A. Smith
TABLE 3. Couples’ Relationship Predictors of Parenting Behavior
Mothers’ Hostile Fathers’ Hostile
Control Behavior Controlling Behavior
Score at Follow-Up Score at Follow-Up
(N 27) (N 20)
Step B SE of B B SE of B
Step 1
Couples’ QRI score at T1 1.57 1.58 .20 1.73 1.33 .29
R2 .038 .085
Step 2
Couples’ QRI score at T1 0.39 1.80 .05 1.12 1.53 .19
Subjects’ Hostile Control 0.31 0.16 .42* 0.20 0.13 .41*
Score at T1
Partners’ Hostile Control 0.03 .176 .05 0.26 0.10 .49*
Score at T1
R2 .176 .428*
*p .05, one-tailed.
Time 1) were significantly more likely to engage in higher rates of hostile controlling with
their children at follow-up. By contrast, mothers’ parenting behaviors were not associated with
their partners’ hostile controlling behavior.2
Hierarchical logistic regression analysis was used to test the hypothesis that couples’ QRI
scores and partners’ hostile controlling behavior scores would predict paternal disengagement
at follow-up. Again, couples’ QRI scores were entered in the first step, and partners’ hostile
control scores were entered in the second step. Results indicated that lower couples’ QRI scores
predicted paternal disengagement at the 2-year follow-up, such that couples with higher QRI
scores were more likely to remain engaged in coparenting, (3, 35) 11.55, p .01. Results
are reported in Table 4.
DISCUSSION
The primary purpose of this study was to clarify links between couples’ relations and parenting
behavior in a group of young mothers and fathers. As indicated in the introduction, previous
research with married adults has indicated that the quality of a couples’ relationship, assessed
using both self-report measures and observational measures, has been linked to the quality of
parenting behaviors (Krishnakumar & Buehler, 2000). Moreover, there is some indication that
the link between marital relations and parenting is strongest for fathers, perhaps suggesting
2
It seemed plausible that the association between expectant mothers’ hostile control scores at Time 1 and paternal
behavior at follow-up was confounded by the association between fathers’ and mothers’ parenting scores. To test this,
we ran another multiple regression analysis predicting fathers’ hostile control scores from (a) girlfriends’ hostile control
scores (to partner at Time 1), (b) boyfriends’ hostile control scores (to partner at Time 1), and (c) mothers’ hostile
control scores. This analysis tested whether the association between a girlfriend’s behavior toward her partner and his
subsequent paternal behavior would remain statistically significant after controlling for the association between ma-
ternal and paternal behavior. Results indicated that the maternal-behavior scores did not predict paternal-behavior
scores ( .12), and the addition of maternal behavior to the regression equation did not diminish the association
between girlfriends’ hostile control scores (Time 1) and paternal hostile control scores at follow-up.

11. Adolescent Coparenting Couples ● 543
TABLE 4. Relationship Predictors of Paternal Disengagement
Disengaged (n 8) versus Coparenting (n 27)
B SE Exp (B) Wald
Step 1
Couples’ QRI score at T1 .075 .029 1.08** 6.93
Step 2
Couples’ QRI score at T1 .084 .032 1.09** 7.01
Expectant Fathers’ Hostile Control Behavior .002 .003 1.02 0.06
Score at T1
Expectant Mothers’ Hostile Control Behavior .001 .003 1.01 0.52
Score at T1
**p .01.
that for men the roles of coparenting partner and parent are more entwined (Belsky et al.,
1996).
Results of this study lend general support to the “spill over” hypothesis, which has been
previously tested with adult couples (Crockenberg & Langrock, 2001; Heinicke & Guthrie,
1992; Katz & Gottman, 1996). Specifically, findings indicated that how expectant adolescent
partners behaved toward each other was partially predictive of how they engaged with their
young children. At the bivariate and multivariate level of analyses, hostile controlling behavior
between partners was associated with hostile controlling parenting behavior for both mothers
and fathers. This suggests that for adolescent couples, interpersonal process measured prior to
childbirth may be a useful index of parenting risk, which mirrors previous research with adult
couples. Moreover, the medium to large effects obtained in this study are comparable to those
reported among studies of adult coparenting couples, as indicated in Krishnakumar and Bueh-
ler’s (2000) meta-analytic review.
Results revealed the unexpected finding that the quality of the expectant mother’s behavior
toward her partner predicted paternal behavior at follow-up. In other words, the fathers in our
study seemed to treat their children in a manner that reflected how they were treated by their
partners. This finding complements the results of a previous study of adult couples indicating
that a husband’s hostile behavior toward his wife predicted her negative behavior toward their
children (Katz & Gottman, 1996) and supports the idea that a hostile interpersonal climate
between partners is likely to spill over into the parent – child relationship. It also suggests that
some of the spill over is indirect and may be overlooked, underscoring the importance of
considering the subtle and complex relationships among family subsystems. This particular
finding seems consistent with previous research suggesting that compared to mothers, fathers
may be more strongly affected by the quality of their relations with their coparenting partners
(Belsky et al., 1996; Cox & Paley, 1997; Lindahl et al., 1997; Parke, 2002; Van Egeren, 2003).
It also was found that those adolescent couples who reported higher levels of satisfaction
with their relationship prior to childbirth were more likely to remain together, either as copar-
ents or as romantic partners. As is usually the case with adult couples, when parental disen-
gagement occurred, it was the father who became disengaged from parenting. The link between
general relationship quality (as indexed by the combined QRI scores) and paternal disengage-
ment suggests that couples who are already reporting dissatisfaction with their relationship
prior to childbirth are at risk for not being able to work through their differences across the
transition to parenthood. Based on the data collected in this study, we are not able to clarify
the process through which these fathers became disengaged, which is an issue worthy of further

12. 544 ● P. Florsheim and A. Smith
study. Moreover, we do not know how some couples, who seemed to have relationship prob-
lems at Time 1, were able to resolve or set aside their differences and remain together as
coparents. Understanding the subgroup of couples who function well as parents despite initial
relationship difficulties is important to the development of effective preventive intervention
programs (Florsheim & Ngu, 2005).
This study builds on previous research on the transition to parenting in two important
ways. First, we measured both perceived and observed couples’ relations in an effort to develop
a more comprehensive understanding of the expected link between partnering and parenting.
Results indicated that couples’ general relationship quality was only moderately associated
with partnering-behavior scores, supporting our expectation that different methods of assess-
ment would tap into distinct features of couples’ relationship functioning. Results also indicated
that specific aspects of couples’ relationships differentially predicted parenting behavior among
mothers and fathers, underscoring the value of using different assessment methods.
Second, we focused on adolescent couples in an effort to examine the generalizability of
the spill over effect to an at-risk group of young parents. Testing whether current theories of
parenthood, which are largely based on research with adult, middle-class couples, generalize
to nontraditional families is important because (a) many children are being raised in nontrad-
itional families and (b) we need a knowledge base for developing preventive interventions
designed to support coparenting across the wide spectrum of family circumstances (Cowan &
Cowan, 2002).
As indicated in the introduction, most of the previous research on adolescent parents has
focused on adolescent mothers only (Coley & Chase-Lansdale, 1998; Elster & Lamb, 1982;
Moore & Brooks-Gunn, 2002). Our efforts to include both parents were fruitful in the sense
that findings revealed several interesting differences between young mothers and fathers. First,
we found that expectant mothers tended to engage in higher rates of hostile controlling with
their partners than did expectant fathers. By contrast, we found that mothers engaged in lower
rates of hostile controlling parenting behavior than fathers. This set of findings raises some
interesting questions about the relationship between gender, role, and interpersonal process;
female participants were more hostile and controlling than their partners in one context and
less hostile and controlling in another.
It seems possible that higher levels of hostile controlling behavior among the expectant
mothers may be related to gender differences associated with pregnancy, including hormonal
upsurges and stress associated with the anticipation of motherhood (Susman et al., 1999). This
hypothesis is consistent with previous findings, using this same dataset, that expectant adoles-
cent mothers were observed to be more controlling toward their partners (boyfriends) than were
a matched cohort of nonexpectant adolescent girlfriends, after controlling for differences in
predisposing psychological risk factors (Moore & Florsheim, 2001). The finding that mothers
were more warmly engaged with their children than fathers also is consistent with previous
research on gender-based parenting differences among adult couples (Cowan & Cowan, 2002;
Cox & Paley, 1997; Lamb, 2000; Parke, 2002).
Several family researchers have recently suggested that after years of research indicating
that positive partnering predicts positive parenting, it is time to develop interventions for fa-
cilitating improvement in coparenting relations among high-risk couples (Cowan & Cowan,
2002; Krishnakumar & Buehler, 2000; Margolin et al., 2001). For example, it seems plausible
that some couples who engage in high rates of hostile controlling behavior would benefit from
an intervention designed to help each partner express his (and her) feelings more positively
and in a manner that is respectful of the other partner’s autonomy. Although we still know
relatively little about how and when to intervene with nontraditional coparenting couples (Lin

13. Adolescent Coparenting Couples ● 545
& McLanahan, 2001), these results suggest that efforts to improve the interpersonal skills of
expectant adolescent couples also may facilitate paternal engagement and more positive par-
enting behavior. It may be especially useful to deliver such services during the prenatal period
before fathers begin to disengage and before the chaos that accompanies the transition to
parenthood begins. A preventive intervention program designed to improve coparenting rela-
tions of pregnant teens and their partners, based in part on the results of this study, currently
is being tested in our lab in Salt Lake City. Information about this program is available upon
request from the first author.
Despite the value of our longitudinal, multimethod approach to the study of adolescent
coparenting couples, our small sample size raises questions about the generalizability of the
findings reported. While our decision to focus on a primarily White, middle-class sample of
adolescent parents allowed for a cleaner comparison with previous research on adult coparents
(which has focused on White, middle-class couples), it also raises questions about the gener-
alizability of findings to African American and Latino adolescent parents. These limitations
underscore the importance of conducting research with more diverse samples of nontraditional
parents. Such research is likely to reveal additional twists in how particular groups of couples
negotiate the transition to parenthood and to provide clues about how we might help the large
number of couples struggling to coparent outside the context of the traditional nuclear family
(Cowan & Cowan, 2002).
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