We propose to study the children of 206 young men of the Oregon Youth Study who themselves have been assessed with their parents annually since 1983. The purpose of the Oregon Youth Study was to look at contextual and family variables that would predict delinquency. The sample was chosen for moderate risk (i.e., they lived in high crime neighborhood of the Eugene-Springfield, OR area). The boys have proven themselves to be high risk, with slightly less than half of them failing to complete high school and compiling a modal number of 2.2 arrests. The boys and their families have been studied intensively with observational and questionnaire data since they were 9 years old. Retention has been extremely high and is currently at 99 percent. During their adolescence, the study boys were observed in interactions with peers, in late adolescence with their girlfriends, and as young adults with their partners. In the proposed study, we plan to focus on the parenting style of the young men and the mothers of their children using multi-method measures of parenting behaviors. We plan to collect information concerning attitudes toward children and toward parenting. We plan to gather extensive information concerning the children's temperament attachment classification, sociocognitive measures, behavioral style, and cognitive competency, repeating the assessments at yearly intervals. Using this design, we will be able to examine the intergenerational transmission of parenting styles, as well as direct child effects and interactions between parenting and child effects.
